Hulk Peter David (best motivational novels txt) 📖

Ross, watching from C and C, saw it all, even as he received a report from one of the Laramie units. “C two, 04, he’s moving topside, out.”

“Break, break, all units, flashpoint, authorized weapons release, any means necessary,” said Ross. “C and C, out . . .”

The monitor on which Ross was watching the skirmish came alive with flash fire as the soldiers blasted the Angry Man’s departing form with everything they had in their arsenal. Ross desperately hoped that the circumstances, which he already thought were inevitable, wouldn’t, in fact, come to pass.

Then, from high above, he heard the sound of earth crumbling, a pause, and then a rumbling of the ground, similar to the sound of an earthquake but more focused.

He knew. Even as confirmation came from the surface through on-site witnesses, he knew what had happened. His heart sank, and he glanced once more at the dead body of Glen Talbot, lying splayed and bloody in the hallway. His mood black, he thought, Talbot, you arrogant ass, even as he announced, “Javelin 6, this is C2,” said Ross. “He has breached. Move on Sector Five, X-ray.”

The Hulk had dug through the ground, broken the surface, and leaped away. He was gone, and there was a better-than-even chance that nothing was going to be able to stop him.

Free . . . free . . . free . . . place . . . peace . . .

The Hulk landed in the deserted, quiet neighborhood. His first instinct—and it was purely instinct on which he was operating, not reason—was to look around and see if more men with the sticks that spit hurtful pellets were hiding somewhere around. But there was no one around; his flared nostrils told him that.

One of the houses caught his attention. He had no comprehension that he had once resided there. He had very little understanding of the world in terms of how it related to him, or he to it, beyond pain and anger and a desire to crush anyone or anything that he saw as a threat. All he knew was that he felt drawn to it on a fundamental level that he couldn’t understand.

Pulled by a power greater than his own—the power of a shattered memory—he approached the house and peered in through one of the windows, studying the dusty interior. The sound of vehicles rose, but it was difficult to know whether they were real or originating from some fragment of memory. A ghostly glimpse of the past swept through him, and there was glittering from within. A small green spruce tree was festooned with decorations. He saw a small boy, and the boy looked vaguely familiar but was also extremely irritating, and the Hulk wanted to just come right through the wall and crush the young boy in his oversize hands. He wanted to do it because he sensed that if that happened, he would be free of the annoying voice of reason which kept trying to intrude on his activities.

Then the wind howled as if it were trying to warn him of something, and abruptly the whole place erupted in flames as missile fire was let loose on the neighborhood. The Hulk, still trying to sort fact from fiction, was caught unawares, and wound up being blasted back by the force of the explosions. He landed hard in the dunes, sending up a plume of sand.

As he got up, a group of LAVs—fast-moving desert attack vehicles—closed in on him. He was disoriented for a moment, but only for a moment. Then he jumped in front of one of them and grabbed the short tow chain attached to its bumper. The car jerked to a stop. The driver leaped clear, but there was a machine gun perched on the back, and a gunner seated right behind it. The gunner swung the weapon around, aimed it at the Hulk . . .

And suddenly the gunner was in the air. For the Hulk, with a grunt, had yanked on the chain and sent the vehicle whipping around like the hammer in a track-and-field event. He swung the vehicle through the air and the machine gunner, desperately trying to aim, wound up firing in all directions. Soldiers and vehicles scattered to get out of the way, and then the Hulk released his grip on the chain and sent the vehicle and the gunner both flying. The gunner was still firing.

Finally the machine gunner tumbled out, falling clear, which turned out to be his good fortune. For the vehicle’s course caused it to land on one of the Abrams tanks that was quickly approaching. The tank had begun blasting away with huge amounts of firepower, but the flung jeep landed atop it, immobilizing it.

A second tank rolled past, trying to target the fast-moving green figure, but it had no luck, blowing up real estate all around the Hulk without once managing to hit him. The Hulk made it to the tank unscathed and lifted the gun turret, twisting off the entire top of the vehicle. Hoisting the turret clear, he smashed it repeatedly into the ground, reducing it to a mass of bent and twisted metal as he continued to roar and howl defiance. The tank tried to back up, but the Hulk—having grown bored with venting his rage on the turret—grabbed the rest of the tank and upended it, much in the way a child would shake loose the prizes from a box of cereal. This caused the soldiers inside to tumble out. They watched in astonishment and horror as the Hulk lifted the tank completely over his head, and needed no further incentive to bolt and run. They had side arms in their holsters, but they didn’t even bother to go for them. Somehow there seemed to be very little point.

Ground troops had been moving in behind the tanks, but when they saw the uncontrollable monster flinging a tank around like a shoe box,