The tranquilizer worked fast, the cold numbness spreading through Bruce's limbs. He tried to fight, to move, but his body wouldn't respond. He collapsed to the linoleum floor within seconds, his limbs going completely slack.
The heavy thud of combat boots on the floor echoed in the lab as soldiers poured through the entrance. "Target is down! Move, move!"
Blonsky led the charge, his rifle up and ready. He reached Bruce first and gave him a hard kick to the ribs. Just a limp reaction. He crouched, then, with a grunt, slammed the hard plastic butt of his rifle into Bruce's skull. A dull thwack. Bruce's head just lolled to the side. No reaction. No green tint to the skin. No transformation.
"Looks like your normal form is your biggest weakness after all," Blonsky sneered.
Within moments, soldiers had Bruce in restraints. The cold metal of shackles clicked shut around his wrists and ankles. They lifted him like a dead weight onto a stretcher and carried him out into the flashing red and blue lights.
Ross watched from outside, his arms crossed, satisfaction written across his weathered features. Bruce Banner, secured without incident. No Hulk, no property damage, no casualties. A clean operation.
Betty followed the soldiers, her face pale but determined. In her mind, this was almost over. Bruce had been cured. Once her father understood that, once he saw there was no more Hulk, he'd have to let Bruce go. There'd be no reason to keep him imprisoned.
As the soldiers passed Ross, the general leaned down close to Bruce's unconscious form and whispered, "If you really are cured, I'll make sure you spend the rest of your life in a cell."
Betty stopped. She heard every word. Her voice came out hard and cold. "If you do this to him, I will never forgive you. Never."
Ross didn't even look at her. "He's a fugitive."
"This is your fault!" Betty's hands balled into fists at her sides, nails digging into her palms. "You're just trying to cover up your mistakes, save your career. Well, I'm done. I'm not your daughter anymore."
Ross's jaw tightened. A flash of anger lit his eyes. "If you weren't my daughter, you'd already be under arrest, too."
Betty glared at him for a long, burning moment, then turned and climbed into the back of the transport vehicle holding Bruce. The heavy door slammed shut behind her.
Stern's Laboratory
Inside the lab, the smell of ozone and chemicals hung thick in the air. Soldiers questioned Stern, who sat hunched in his chair, wringing his hands. Blonsky stood nearby, listening intently. A female soldier handled the interrogation.
"You're saying you can create more beings like Banner? More Hulks?"
Stern shook his head, his voice nervous. "No, not exactly. I can replicate parts of the process, but not the complete transformation. Not yet."
He didn't notice the way Blonsky's eyes lit up at those words. Blonsky had seen the Hulk in action. That raw, terrifying power. Even with the super soldier serum coursing through his veins, boosting his combat power to 50 points and making him the best soldier in the entire military, he'd felt inadequate. He'd watched the Hulk's destructive force. Iron Man's technological superiority. Smith Doyle suppressing the monster with his bare hands.
His current strength wasn't enough. It would never be enough. He wanted more. He needed the Hulk's power, or something even greater. And he was certain his willpower, his discipline, could control it. He wouldn't lose himself to rage like Banner did. He'd be a weapon that could be aimed and fired at will.
Stern continued, his voice gaining a manic enthusiasm. "Banner was an accident, you understand. My goal is to refine the process, make it better, more controllable."
The female soldier nodded. "So Banner is the only successful subject..."
Blonsky knew the protocols. If he wanted Hulk serum, he'd need to file requests, go through medical review boards, wait for approval from half a dozen departments. The bureaucracy could take months. He might never get clearance. This was his only chance.
He moved fast. His fist connected with the female soldier's temple with a sickening, wet crack. She dropped without a sound.
Stern jerked back in his chair, eyes wide with terror. "What did you do that for?"
Blonsky leveled his rifle at the scientist's chest. "She talks too much."
He took a step closer, his voice dropping to something cold and certain. "I want what you extracted from Banner. The Hulk's blood. Inject it into me. Now."
Stern swallowed hard, his eyes darting between the rifle and the unconscious soldier. But curiosity, a scientist's desperate need to see, was already overriding his fear. A chance to see his research applied to a willing, enhanced subject? To observe the transformation firsthand? His hands moved toward the refrigerated samples, almost on their own.
Within minutes, the cold, green-tinged Hulk blood flowed into Blonsky's veins.
The effect was immediate and catastrophic.
Blonsky screamed, a sound that was not human. His body convulsed. A sound of bones cracking and reforming filled the lab. His muscles swelled grotesquely, black veins bulging as they tore through his uniform. His skin hardened, taking on a rough, scaled, yellowish-brown texture. Sharp spines erupted along his vertebrae. His face twisted, jaw elongating into something monstrous.
In seconds, Emil Blonsky ceased to exist. In his place stood the Abomination.
A few drops of the mutated Hulk blood splattered across Stern's forehead as he fell backward, injured by the violence of the transformation. The scientist lay stunned on the floor, dazed, unaware of the contamination.
Blonsky's mind filled with white-hot violence. Pure, overwhelming rage. He'd been so certain he could control it, that his training and discipline would let him master the power. He'd been wrong. The destructive urges crashed over him like a tsunami, drowning his rational thoughts.
The noise drew attention. Soldiers burst into the lab, saw the massive creature, and made the obvious assumption. "It's the Hulk! Open fire!"
The pop-pop-pop of rifles was deafening. Bullets pinged harmlessly off Abomination's new armored hide, doing no damage whatsoever. But each impact fed the rage, pushed him further toward losing control completely.
Blonsky's last coherent thought was simple: destroy everything.
He smashed through the laboratory wall like it was paper and charged out into the street in a cloud of concrete dust.
Above Manhattan
Ross sat in the vibrating helicopter with Betty and the unconscious Bruce. They were minutes from the military base when a soldier leaned forward, holding out a radio headset.
"General, you need to hear this."
Ross took the headset and pressed it to his ear. A panicked, static-filled voice crackled through. "We have Hulk on the streets! Repeat, Hulk is loose in Manhattan!"
Ross's head snapped around. He stared at Bruce, still shackled and unconscious on the stretcher. That was impossible. There was no way...
"Calm down and give me your position, soldier."
"121st Street, moving north on Broadway!"
Ross grabbed the pilot's shoulder. "Turn us around. Now!"
The helicopter banked hard, throwing them against their straps. Bruce stirred slightly, groggy from the tranquilizer, confused by the sudden movement. "Why... why are we turning back?"
Ross ignored him. "Get me a visual feed! I want eyes on this thing immediately!"
The communications officer worked quickly. Within seconds, a grainy video feed from a street-level traffic camera appeared on the monitor.
121st Street
The Abomination shrugged off an RPG blast like it was a firecracker. The explosion only seemed to excite him further. He grabbed a parked sedan and hurled it through a storefront window, then picked up a taxi and used it as a club against the surrounding buildings.
Through the haze of rage, a single thought drove him forward. He needed to fight. He needed to prove himself against the strongest opponents he could find.
His voice came out as a guttural, inhuman roar. "Where are they? I need a real fight!"
He bellowed the names like a challenge. "Hulk! Smith Doyle! Iron Man!"
He then resumed his rampage. Cars flew through the air. Storefronts collapsed. His former comrades tried to contain him, and he swatted them aside like insects.
Helicopter
Bruce, more awake now, pushed past the soldiers restraining him and got a clear view of the monitor. His face went pale. Betty looked over his shoulder and gasped, her hand flying to her mouth.
Ross stared at the screen, his mind racing. How had this happened? Who was that?
Bruce's voice cut through the chaos in the helicopter, low and accusing. "This was your experiment, wasn't it?"
Betty turned on her father, horror and fury mixing in her expression. "Oh my God. What have you done?"
Ross met their eyes for a brief, terrible moment, then looked away. He picked up the radio again. "All units, fall back. I repeat, all units withdraw immediately! Do not engage!"
But he knew, watching the destruction on the screen, it was already too late.