The Incredible Hulk Vol 1 Issue 1

## Summary

In New Mexico the American army is set to test a Gamma Bomb developed by Dr. Bruce Banner. Bruce and fellow scientist Igor are arguing about the creation of the bomb when General Thunderbolt Ross appears. Ross admonishes Bruce for the constant delays in testing the bomb but is stopped by his daughter Betty. Bruce then prepares to start the countdown process to test the bomb, although he and Igor get in another argument over the fact that only Bruce knows how the Gamma Bomb works and if he got his calculations wrong he could destroy half the continent. Bruce disregards Igor’s arguments and starts the countdown, but notices that a teenage boy is driving into the testing zone. Bruce tells Igor to stop the countdown while he drives to get the boy out of the testing zone. Igor thinks that this is the perfect opportunity for Bruce to die and for him to steal all of Bruce’s secrets. Bruce reaches the teen, who snuck into the area because of a bet, and tells him about the bomb and dragging him to safety. Bruce pushes the teen into a trench that is safe from the radiation but the bomb goes off before Bruce has the opportunity to get in himself. Miraculously, Bruce survives the radiation but is reduced to a state of screaming in pain. The teen, named Rick Jones, drove Bruce to a doctor at the base. Bruce regains consciousness but is kept in the infirmary with Rick, who expresses his thanks to Bruce for saving his life. The two are kept in the infirmary for the rest of the day, with Bruce theorizing that the others are waiting for him to die from the radiation. As the night begins, a geiger counter near Bruce begins ticking more and more, showing that radiation is coming from Bruce. Bruce then begins transforming into a muscular, gray, human-like monster. This monster knocks Rick away from him and smashes through the wall of the infirmary in a state of panic. The monster is then hit by an army jeep before running into the desert looking for a place to hide, however Rick chases after the monster. The monster hides from the soldiers pursuing it who name it the Hulk. Back at the base the army believes that the Hulk has kidnapped both Bruce and Rick. The Hulk then begins journeying towards Bruce’s apartment with Rick. As the two enter the house they spot Igor who is tearing through it in search of the secret of the Gamma Bomb. Igor shoots at the Hulk, but the bullets do nothing to it. The Hulk then destroys the gun and throws Igor onto his desk. Rick then finds the report on the Gamma Bomb and the Hulk sees a picture of Bruce and is disgusted by the frail appearance as well as being confused as to why he remembers Bruce. The Hulk remembers how he transformed with the help of Rick, but lashes out at him when Rick insinuates that the transformation was a bad thing. Hulk then realizes that Rick is the only other person aware of his origin but daybreak comes and he transforms back into Bruce Banner before he can act on this information. Rick helps Bruce up, as the Military Police arrive. The MPs tracked the Hulk to Bruce’s home but did not see him. They discover Igor and realize that he is a Soviet spy they had been searching for. One of the MPs questions how Bruce left the infirmary and why he is injured but the other MPs state that they saw the Hulk first hand and denote that Bruce could not be involved. The MPs then take the gamma bomb research for safekeeping because of Igor’s search. Bruce is then comforted by both Rick and Betty. Bruce escorts Betty out of his house and he and Rick begin speaking about his transformation into the Hulk. Bruce realizes that he transformed because of the night and is terrified by the prospect that he will transform once again when the night comes. Meanwhile, Igor is imprisoned but he uses a hidden transmitter to send a message to the Soviet Union. The message contained information about the Hulk which was deemed important enough to warrant the attention of the Gargoyle, a high-ranking and feared Soviet agent. The Gargoyle intends to either kill or capture the Hulk and orders a rocket-carrying submarine to reach America. The submarine reaches the coast and fires a manned rocket into the air. The army shoots down the rocket, but the Gargoyle lands at his destination before the explosion. Back at the Base, Bruce and Rick are driving off to the desert so that Bruce may transform into the Hulk without incident. As Bruce is driving he transforms into the Hulk and wrecks the car. The Hulk realizes that Betty lives nearby and begins making his way to her house despite Rick’s protests; unbeknownst to the pair the Gargoyle has spotted and begun trailing them. Betty takes a walk at the insistence of her father because of her panic about Bruce’s condition, the appearance of the Hulk, and the various strange events of the world. As Betty is on her walk, the Hulk appears before her, causing her to faint. Rick admonishes the Hulk for coming to see her, when the Gargoyle appears before them. The Gargoyle pulls out a gun loaded with a bullet that takes control of the person it hits. The Hulk moves to attack the Gargoyle but is shot before he can land a blow and then shoots Rick. The Gargoyle then takes the pair with him in a commandeered military truck. Betty awakens and is found by her father, who resolves he will stop at nothing in his pursuit of the Hulk. The Gargoyle reaches the coast and a team takes them into a jet plane in order to take them to the Soviet Union. It becomes day when the plane lands and the Hulk reverts back into Bruce Banner. The mind control effect of the bullets wears off and the Gargoyle sees that the Hulk is nowhere to be seen and only Bruce Banner is found. The Gargoyle then puts two and two together and realizes that Banner is the Hulk. The Gargoyle has Bruce and Rick put in prison and questions why Bruce would want to be a monster before having a breakdown about his own mutated condition. Bruce explains he did not become the Hulk by choice and is unsure if he can cure it, however he is certain that the Gargoyle’s condition can be cured, however he will lose his enhanced intellect. The Gargoyle states that becoming a normal human again is worth losing that part of his intellect. Bruce successfully reverts the Gargoyle back into a human and vows defiance to Nikita Khrushchev and the Soviet Union as a whole. Elsewhere in the base the commanders contact Khrushchev with the information that Banner is in their custody when a soldier arrives to tell them that Bruce and Rick have escaped using the Gargoyle’s rocket. The Soviet commanders and some soldiers run to the Gargoyle’s office to find clues and see the Gargoyle’s unmutated form. The Gargoyle reveals that he has a large bomb hooked up to destroy the base and is ready to die as a man. Bruce and Rick take the rocket back to the United States and see the explosion from the air. Bruce contemplates the death of the Gargoyle and the prospective fall of the Soviet Union.