Once a physics professor at Desert State University, Dr. Geoffrey Crawford had the privilege of molding the intellectual mind of Bruce Banner. Several years later, Dr. Crawford had become ill because of a degenerative nerve disease that confined him to a wheelchair and would one day end his life. However, he kept his mind active and was determined to keep on working until he no longer could. One fateful day, Crawford was visited by his former student who was looking for a way to end his curse, brought about by a gamma bomb that he created, but Crawford saw a way to end his own suffering as well.
Enticing Bruce to examine a machine he invented even before Banner was a student of his, Geoffrey Crawford offered the chance of a promising cure to Banner's Hulk problem. The device was called a Telepod System, and it looked like it was straight out of a science fiction movie. The machine was intended for transportation by first changing matter into pure energy in one pod, and then restoring it to its original form in another. Crawford theorized he could use his invention to filter out the gamma radiation from Banner's body, permanently separating him from the Hulk, but first, he needed to map Bruce's unique genetic makeup, and then he would restore it to a normal human's. Ultimately, Crawford had another agenda, which Bruce soon discovered, when the dying professor used Banner's DNA map to reconfigure his own and infuse it with gamma radiation, so he could take the power of the Hulk as his own. Dr. Geoffrey Crawford became an intellectual powerhouse who preferred the name Ravage, and his first meeting with the Hulk ended in victory.
What Ravage didn't count on was reverting back to the frail form of Crawford's at daybreak. Hulk, also back in his civilian identity, helped his mentor back to his lab with a promise of curing them both. Dr. Crawford thought Bruce had gone mad. After all, why would he want to give up the one thing that would allow him to cheat death? No, Geoffrey wouldn't permit this to happen, so he betrayed Banner to his enemies, General Ross and Major Glenn Talbot. Now in the custody of the U.S. military, Banner was helpless when Crawford triggered his transformation a second time, and Ravage cut a path of destruction in a nearby town just because he felt they pitied him while he was sick. Ross had no choice but to free his captive.
Ross accompanied Banner to Crawford's lab where they were soon discovered by Ravage after he made quick work of a Hulkbuster unit sent to take him into custody. Bruce was intending to use the Telepod System against Ravage to make him Crawford again, but Ravage destroyed the device. Ravage also revealed to Banner he has a prototype hidden in a location he only knows, and he already used it to permanently keep him in his gamma powered form. Hearing how Crawford solidified his victory and destroyed yet another chance for Banner to be free of the Hulk enraged the mild mannered scientist so much so that the Hulk was released and a clash of titans began anew. During the battle, Ross' life was threatened when the lab was caving in, but Hulk whisked him away to safety. Ravage wasn't finished with his foes, but once he showed his face outside, Major Talbot was there with an experimental weapon which froze Ravage in a state of suspended animation. When Talbot wanted to turn the machine on the Hulk, Ross stalled long enough for Hulk to destroy the device and get away, to repay Banner for saving his life. Ravage was transported back to Gamma Base for study.
