“It’s alright, Lot’s of people think I’m helpless without my armor.” Tony grinned smugly.
They’d run into an escaped villain while out and about on a normal errand, and Tony realized he’d left the device he used to summon his armor at home. He didn’t want Bruce to hulk out in the middle of the city due to the liability issues, and he was too embarrassed to call for help, so finally, he hid behind a pillar with a huge rock and slung it at the villain’s head. Surprisingly, it worked.
One doesn’t have the imagine the reaction he got from the crowd of admiring fans, or his teammate’s reaction for that matter. Everyone was surprised. Perhaps he just had a huge rush of adrenaline, because he didn’t think he was that strong either, but hey, he wasn’t complaining. Now he had something new to boast about.
Bruce wasn’t a coward by any means. Paranoid and concerned yes, cowardly no. He knew that he in was one of the worst possible places to change and was aware just how many lives were at stake. So as much as he felt the itch to change when they encountered the escaped convict, he repressed it. While he and Tony hid behind the pillar he looked around for a way to help that didn’t involve shredding the nice shirt he was wearing. He ended up throwing something at a cart, knocking it over and holding the villain’s attention long enough for Tony’s rock to hit him.
After the aftermath had died down, he’d made the comment rather casually and shrugged at Tony’s answer. “Nothing to do with helplessness. Probably more to do with the fact that my ability to measure physical strength is probably thrown off by the Other Guy.”