It might not be something he can carry around with him like this, but he imagines they might be able to think up something more portable based on it, and that might not be too bad, even if he's on the fence about leaving the Other Guy behind entirely. If they had had something that could keep him from transforming on the helicarrier, he could have used it to keep from playing right into Loki's hands. Coulson would still be alive. Natasha wouldn't have been traumatized. The Chitauri might not have even showed up, if they'd managed to focus on finding Selvig before he'd completed the setup that had been used to bring them there, rather than trying desperately to mourn their dead and regroup.
On the other hand, though -- and this, too, occurs to him after a moment -- while something like that has the potential to help, it also has the potential to be a weapon. If it had existed before he came aboard the helicarrier, what if Loki had gotten his hands on it? Would the Hulk have been there to save Stark's life? Would he have been able to fight, to help at all? And now that he has, now that he knows the Hulk is capable of more than just mindless destruction, if they were to put something together and it was used against him, would he be able to forgive himself if something happened because of it? Because his friends suddenly needed to protect Bruce Banner when they should be fighting with the Hulk?
Would he be able to forgive himself if he and Betty manage to permanently strip him of his alter ego and someone -- Thor, Steve, Tony, Betty, some civilian somewhere -- ends up hurt or dead because he wasn't there? Or would he devote the rest of his life to trying to chase down the other half of him that he purposefully cut out?
Frowning, he flips the file closed, slowly and deliberately. "I'm not going to stop you, if you want to keep working on something, but ... I think I remember why I stopped."
He wants to help. It's all he's ever wanted. If the Hulk can lend a hand there, and God, he's shown he can and on more than one occasion, than maybe he should stick with it. He doubts it'll be easy, but maybe Tony had had a point when he'd been ranting about terrible privilege.
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On the other hand, though -- and this, too, occurs to him after a moment -- while something like that has the potential to help, it also has the potential to be a weapon. If it had existed before he came aboard the helicarrier, what if Loki had gotten his hands on it? Would the Hulk have been there to save Stark's life? Would he have been able to fight, to help at all? And now that he has, now that he knows the Hulk is capable of more than just mindless destruction, if they were to put something together and it was used against him, would he be able to forgive himself if something happened because of it? Because his friends suddenly needed to protect Bruce Banner when they should be fighting with the Hulk?
Would he be able to forgive himself if he and Betty manage to permanently strip him of his alter ego and someone -- Thor, Steve, Tony, Betty, some civilian somewhere -- ends up hurt or dead because he wasn't there? Or would he devote the rest of his life to trying to chase down the other half of him that he purposefully cut out?
Frowning, he flips the file closed, slowly and deliberately. "I'm not going to stop you, if you want to keep working on something, but ... I think I remember why I stopped."
He wants to help. It's all he's ever wanted. If the Hulk can lend a hand there, and God, he's shown he can and on more than one occasion, than maybe he should stick with it. He doubts it'll be easy, but maybe Tony had had a point when he'd been ranting about terrible privilege.