Name: Dr. Elizabeth ‘Betty’ Ross
Face Claim: Caroline Dhavernas
Affiliations: Stark Industries
Growing up as the only daughter of General Thaddeus E. “Thunderbolt” Ross, Betty spent much of her time living up to her father’s strict standards. He ran his family like he did his squadron; he was in charge and anyone questioning his rules would be put in their place. As a child, Betty would point out more logical, streamlined ways to do things, but after being told to drop and give her father twenty a few times, she stopped. Betty became more introverted and insular, often disagreeing with her father and finding her escape in science, her true passion.
When it came time for college, Betty was more than happy to be on her own, living how she wanted to and being able to voice her opinions, even if it took awhile to get used to being allowed to. It was in college that she first ran into Bruce Banner. They met in a class, were assigned to each other as lab partners. He had been shy at first, but as soon as the conversation turned to science, Bruce would suddenly shift to speaking with confidence, not even pausing to take a breath. Betty related to his finding his voice through his passion and was more than happy to listen to him speak when he chose to and sharing silence with him when he didn’t, or taking her own turns at excited scientific thoughts.
She knew about Bruce’s experiments, or as much as she was allowed to know without being a part of the project herself. He’d call her from time to time, late at night, wanting to hear her opinion or bounce ideas off of her. Her own work called her to leave the country on a research trip, right as he felt he was coming close to finally solving his problems with the serum. They corresponded for a while in letters and emails, but one day, they abruptly stopped. Betty called, but Bruce didn’t answer. Her lab was in the Amazon, removed from most people and technology that wasn’t for lab work, so she didn’t hear about the accident until months after it happened. She returned home as soon as she could and searched for Bruce, but everyone said he had left town, possibly the country, and no one was sure of his whereabouts.
It wasn’t until the Battle of New York that she saw him again, giant and green, taking down aliens and saving the world. There was so much anger and aggression in the beast on her television that Betty almost couldn’t believe he was the soft spoken man she’d known in college. She went to New York once the roads and skies were open again, trying to find him, but it was all for naught. He had disappeared again.
It wasn’t long after the battle that Betty received a call from Stark Industries, asking her for an interview at their base in Los Angeles. She accepted, knowing that Tony Stark was Iron Man, and part of the Avengers. Maybe she’d find a way to meet him and through him find Bruce, be able to talk to him, see if they could discover some way to help him. They had always made a great team. Until then, it was enticing enough, as Stark Industries became more interested in helping mankind than blowing it up and had almost limitless resources.
Works at Stark Industries with Nolan Williams
Employed by Pepper Potts and Tony Stark
Personality Traits: Passionate, persistent, caring, somewhat introverted, protective, kind
World’s second leading expert in gamma radiation
Doctorate in cellular biology