Rosie was cleared to get back to her normal schedule within the next three days by Dr. Banner. The first time she'd met him, it had taken a full five minutes for her to confirm the fact that Dr. Bruce Banner was actually standing in front of her and he was the one who'd bandaged her head. She just stared, jaw open, as he held out a hand for her to shake. "Hello, Miss Rhodes, it's nice to meet you. Tony's talked a lot about your brilliance, and I must say that I'm quite looking forward to working with you."

That managed to bring her back to reality. "Work... with me?"

"Tony offered to let me stay with all of you in the Tower, and I accepted a couple of days ago. I understand if you don't-"

"That's amazing! I've always wanted to work with a real scientist!"

There was a shout from the next room. "Hey! What am I, chopped liver?" It was Tony.

"You're family! You don't count!" She retorted. "I've been working on getting A.I into the medical field for ages, and once I'm done with my degree, people will take my work seriously. Can you please help with such projects?"

"Of course, Miss Rhodes."

"Please don't call me that. As much as I love Dad, he's the only Rhodes around here. I'm just Rosie."

Tony walked in at that exact moment. "Well then, Just Rosie, want some toast?"

She had introduced Dr. Banner, who insisted she called him Bruce, to MARLENE, and he had been fascinated by how realistic she was. The two of them had persuaded Tony to let them open a new line of StarkBots, specially targeted at Children's Hospitals. Rosie had remembered how lonely the kids at the Pediatric Ward were during her short time at the Hospital. Their parents couldn't spend all their time entertaining the kids, and reading books soon got old when you were stuck in the same room all day, everyday.

She remembered how happily they had greeted her when she'd been in her wheelchair and some of the long-term patients had been so excited when she had let them draw on her cast. Many of them were too weak to play around or even have very long conversations and the nurses couldn't afford to spend all day with such kids. This was where the idea of building companion robots came in.

They could keep the kids company and monitor their vitals, allowing the staff to tend to other patients. Within three weeks of them working together, Rosie, Tony and Bruce had managed to produce their first prototypes. Investors had loved the idea, and they were on trial basis at a few of the Stark-owned hospitals in the area.

Rosie had created an A.I system in each robot and programmed them to respond to whatever name each individual child had given. The kids all had a great time giving the bots silly names and giggling each time they called the bots that. Officially, the bots were given serial numbers for names, but no one other than the manufacturing division used those. The cute little bots were a big hit and she'd already begun searching for ways to make them cheaper and easier to mass-produce.

Just one day before Rosie was scheduled to return to MIT, there was a Code Green. She had been working in the lab with Bruce and Tony was doing something in his garage when the robot he was tinkering with suddenly short-circuited and exploded, startling Bruce and raising his heart-rate sufficiently enough to bring out the other guy. Code green had been activated and the lab was shut down, but Rosie couldn't leave within the set time limit. She was trapped in the room with Bruce who was hulking out.

Rosie had seen the footage of how Natasha had almost calmed down the Hulk back at the Helicarrier and started to speak to him. Tony had shown her that video when she had asked for his help in finding a solution to help Dr. Banner.

"Shhhhh... Nothing's wrong. It's completely safe, big guy. You're fine. No need to freak out. It's just me, Rosie. You know me, right? I'm not going to hurt you, but you need to calm down before you hurt someone else, okay? Shhhh..." She slowly moved towards him, whispering to J.A.R.V.I.S. and telling him to soundproof the room. Rosie did not want any external sounds to spook the Hulk any further.

Bruce seemed to be wrestling for control with the Hulk, seeing that his skin kept switching from green to normal. It looked like Hulk was winning, though.

Rosie abandoned her efforts to stop the Hulk from coming out, when she saw that, though. "Hey Hulk? You can come out if you want to, but you have to let Bruce keep some control over you so that you don't hurt anyone, okay? Will you let Bruce have one hand on the wheel?"

There were a few growls, before she heard a, "Promise!" That surprised her. She hadn't expected the Hulk to speak so clearly. Without letting that faze her, Rosie replied, "That's awesome! Now can you turn around and show me your face? I'd love to meet you properly."

The big guy hesitantly turned and Rosie internally cheered when she noticed that he was smaller and his face looked more human than what she had seen from the footage. That fact that he could speak was another plus, she decided. Maybe it was possible for Hulk and Bruce to work together... She held out a hand. "It's awesome to finally meet you, big guy. My name's Rosie. What's yours?"

The other man/Hulk shook her hand with a gentleness she thought was impossible. "Rosie nice. Me Hulk. Hulk like Rosie."

"Aww... Thanks buddy. Rosie likes you too. Ya wanna do something?"

"Rosie play! Hulk play!" He looked so much like a lost puppy that it melted Rosie's heart. It reaffirmed her belief that Hulk was Bruce's way of letting off steam. She suspected that he'd been treated badly in his childhood, and that fear and insecurity had been hidden away until he injected himself with the super-soldier serum.

The serum supposed to enhance all aspects of a person, right? It was quite possible then, that the serum had managed to save him from the gamma radiation by fusing with it and forming the Hulk, making him a sort of stronger alter-ego that came out when Bruce felt threatened. In a way the Hulk was like a small child throwing a tantrum - confused, out-of-control and cranky. This meant that it was possible to calm him down, much like you would do to an angry child. Rosie was determined to research on this and come up with a solution

She thanked god that they were in the lab kept aside for building the children's robots. It had loads of games they had stocked up on to see if the robots could be programmed to play them with someone else. She led him over to the shelves. "Which one do you want to play?"

"I choose?"

"Yeah. You choose."

He looked at all of them for some time, before pointing to a mini foosball table they had bought as a joke a few weeks earlier. "Y'know how to play that?" He nodded. Picking teams, the two began to play. Hulk handled the controls with a cautiousness that seemed impossible for his huge hands. After he got bored, they moved to another game, then another one. They played together for ages and Rosie forgot all about the time, until Hulk let out a large yawn. "You sleepy, big guy?"

"Hulk tired. Want a nap!" He declared. She held his hand again, and guided him towards a heap of blankets and pillows in a corner. Tony had arranged for those in most of the labs so that the workers could take power naps and get right back to work. In his opinion, it was highly annoying to have to leave the lab for such 'trivial pursuits as sleep when I'm in the middle of a breakthrough'. The Hulk snuggled into the blankets and shut his eyes, slowly falling asleep. Gently covering him with a blanket, Rosie watched as he turned back into Bruce without waking up.

J.A.R.V.I.S automatically lifted the shutters and Rosie snuck out without waking him up. Tony came running over as soon as she walked out of the lab and engulfed her in a hug. She covered his mouth before he spoke and led him away, only letting him talk once they were out of earshot.

"I was so worried! J.A.R.V.I.S didn't have cameras in the room, so I couldn't even see what was happening. Short-stack, you gotta remember that I've got a heart condition here. I don't need anymore heart attacks!"

"Don't freak out, I'm fine. We played games for a while until he got tired and fell asleep. It was like keeping a small child company. Bruce seemed to be in there somewhere as well - the big guy didn't look as big as he did during the Chitauri thing. "

She told him about the conclusions she had drawn while interacting with the Hulk. He wasn't very enthusiastic about the way she'd gone about it, but he did agree with her hypothesis, promising to look into it with Bruce. Suddenly, Rosie felt the strength leave her legs and she stumbled, falling into Tony who caught her before she hit the floor. The adrenaline rush was fading and exhaustion began to creep in.

The events of the day caught up with her and she realised how hungry she was. "What time is it? I'm starving." Tony put an arm around her waist and let her lean on him as he helped her to the kitchen. "I should think so. You've been in that room for twelve hours straight, five of those with the Big Guy."

Sitting her down on a seat at the dining table, Tony bustled around in the kitchen, putting food on a plate and placing it in front of her before falling into the chair beside her. He muttered plans to himself about how he had to add in overrides to the Code Green protocol to allow the people in the area to get to safety. "You just shaved five years off my lifespan today - I don't care if you can keep the Hulk under control. The next time there's a Code Green, you're getting the hell out of there, no matter what."

"You don't understand, Uncle Tony!" she argued, fighting to suppress a yawn. "If the Hulk has someone he can see in a positive light, then it's possible that the same connection can be made with more than one person. We can help him, Tony, don't you see? During the alien invasion, he was in control because of his anger at Loki. What if we can convince him that we're not a threat, but his friends? He'll be more rational and focused, which can limit the collateral damage when Bruce Hulks out. "

He looked intrigued by the idea despite his earlier protests, so Rosie continued. "I have to get back to college tomorrow, so I'm trusting you and Auntie Tasha to remember what I just said just in case of a Code Green. Stay calm, talk to him like he's a young child, try to engage him with some fun activity till he gets tired and falls asleep. He'll probably change back to Bruce without waking up, just like today."