Archive of Our Own

"Alright, Star-Lord! There's burgers with our names on them!"

"What did Grandpa want?"

The young woman smiled - a special smile that was the brightest the young boy had ever known.

She prepared to gently tell her son not to be rude, but softened at the concerned expression on his face. "Oh, he and I have just been in a game of phone tag for days now," she gave the quick explanation with a wave, tightening her long ponytail and buttoning up her coat. "Boring grown-up stuff. I left him a message, and told him I was takin' you out to celebrate your report card like I promised."

Peter Quill accepted his mother's words, excited for his fast food reward, but inside he was frowning, nervous.

She didn't answer his question.

Grandpa was calling all the time, impatient and frustrated on the machine, not boring and casual like normal Sunday "hello" calls.

These were worried calls, demanding answers and updates from Mom, throwing out the words "test results" and "good news?" and "second opinions." Health fears?

"He'll call back probably while we're out havin' fun," she said playfully. "And again at the crack of dawn tomorrow. Zipper your jacket, honey. It's chilly--ooh." Mom grabbed her head and leaned against the phone table, scrunching her face in obvious pain. She closed her eyes and breathed deeply, swallowing the anxiety she didn't want him to see.

It didn't work. When she opened her eyes, Peter knew she was uncomfortable. Maybe scared. The same fear in his grandpa's voice somehow passed to her face.

At least for a few seconds.

"What's wrong?" he asked in a small voice, feeling dumb the minute he said it. "Did--?"

"Headache," she answered and cleared her throat, placing back on a happy face that lacked its usual spirit. "Dizzy. Annoying. But it's gone now," she lied and straightened back up, still with a hand on the wall. She was winching, faking enthusiasm. "Ready for hamburgers?"

Peter nodded, ignoring whatever that was, because it made him uneasy, and ignoring what made him uneasy and sucking it up was what big boys did.

If Mom was hurt or afraid, she would need for him to be strong.

"Can I get the biggest burger if I'm good?"

"You'll get what we can afford," she reminded, and pointed for him to zipper his red coat. He shrugged and understood. "But we can pick up your favorites from Dairy Queen on the way home if you're really good, and if you can beat me in a race to the driveway," she said the end half of that sentence in a rush and dashed off to win the random game.

The eight-year-old lit up, and made a bolt for the open door that was letting in the sweet, Friday night air.

His sprint faltered when Mom cheated and tickled his sides during her brush past him. Peter curled into himself while giggling "...hehey!" before running to catch up to the voice humming A Spoonful of Sugar in the front yard.

No fair! Star-Lord is faster than anybody!

*

**********

*

"That's disgusting."

Peter shrugged from across the room in casual affirmation. "Yeep."

Gamora wholly expected a furious, passionate agreement, or a long tangent about how "disgusting" was too kind a word to describe this horrible fact.

It was not a prediction that even entered her mind when she'd asked Peter what had happened before they rescued him on Ego. How long that psychotic celestial had been torturing him. If his blood father had jumped straight to literally forcing the light through his body and using him for a strange, sick purpose, or if he'd confessed or explained anything that had caused Peter to snap the hell out of it.

"No worse than what happened to your parents--"

"But we're not talking about them," she replied angrily. No, firmly. Firm but loving, she hoped. Thanos was irrelevant to this news. "We're talking about yours."

She did have a gut feeling, from the look in Peter's eyes and the way he moved. A wild hunch that not-so-wonderful confessions or revelations took place. That he was hiding something painful and draining, his haunted demeanor due to more than the fresh grief of his twenty-six-year Captain, as if that wasn't enough.

He looked to be carrying new information that changed his worldview and altered his memories, that she hoped to only be the positive yet belated paternal feelings from Yondu.

It didn't explain the confusion and fear, though, nor the need to hold back a gag every time he stood in a dark room. The appearance that he would enter a brand new trance if left alone with his thoughts for longer than thirty seconds. The way he pinched the bridge of his nose so hard, like he needed to push away the words or information to continue breathing.

Gamora, his best friend in all of space, wished so strongly to be wrong, to be imagining changes and overstepping her expressions of concern after a traumatizing three days.

"Yeah..." he mumbled, and then cleared his throat. "Mine." The single word was said in a swallowed whisper, contemplating all that it meant. "My...father..."

"No, you don't have to...I'm just...I know how close you were to--"

"It's over," Peter quickly dismissed. "Psh, if anything, it made having to kill him to save the universe a hell of a lot less complicated," he said through what Gamora had come to understand as false bravado. "Not gonna have any fucked-up baggage or regret about annihilating someone who killed--" he tried to scoff, jumping to levity, but looked again like he was going to vomit.

"Peter...it could not have been easy to learn that, after so many years. I cannot imagine..." Gamora tried to be comforting, but it was all so new. She just wanted him to be honest. Peter was nearly unfazeable, but from the moment they met it was clear how much he valued and cherished his long-lost mother. He risked his life for a silly toy that played music all because she gave it to him. He kept her gifts and written words like they were precious gems. He hadn't even wanted to forgive Ego for leaving her, despite wanting a father his entire life. He had a special relationship with that Terran woman, loved her with all his being. The two were unbelievably close during that short phase of his life. It was obvious that Meredith Quill gave him his good, heroic heart.

Learning that she did not die from a natural disease, but was murdered for being loved, that her own naivety was her downfall...

"So where we headed now?" he asked, running fingers through his hair. "I should help Rocket with the autopilot. This system's tricky..."

"Why...why would he tell you?" Gamora asked from the other side of the quiet room. "Was everything a lie?"

"Gamora, stop! There's no point in thinking about it!" he snapped angrily at the reminder, shooting his head up to glare her. Gamora only stepped back, surprised but calm.

There was pain behind his eyes, and she wouldn't forcefully pull it out. Ego had done that enough.

Peter squeezed his eyes shut and cursed under his breath. "I'm sorry, but...thanks for caring. But just because we may be switching to a 'spoken thing'," he said with a wiggle of his eyebrows that felt so insincere, "doesn't mean everything must be spoken," he explained, hiding a plea.

The female Guardian nodded, but didn't believe him. Peter was so chatty, told her more than she assumed he had told anyone in his travels.

But he also wasn't to be pushed. This man went at his own, unique pace. She knew better than to challenge that, would not wish to be nagged about her own familial bitterness.

"Okay," she acknowledged and reached out, touched his shoulder. "I do find that repugnant, though..."

"Hey, at least now I know," he stated the possible upside. "My whole life I wondered...'why her?'. She was perfect. Trust me, perfection. Why did she have to get sick and lose the battle to survive?" he voiced shakily. "Pfft, now I know. It's because she was perfect, and he couldn't handle it. He couldn't choose. Effing moron. He couldn't choose the best woman over his self-inflicted lonely life, and she just...trusted the wrong person," he shrugged, and leaned back in his new cot as though that was the easiest lesson to digest. "That asshole got what he deserved. And I'm okay," he said with a desperate smile.

Gamora gave her best friend a fearful smile back. "Anytime."

"So really, what's in the galley for lunch? And where exactly are we flying next? I may be Captain, but do I gotta decide literally everything now?"

*

**********

*

The walls were paper thin.

"...hmm? ...Mom?"

Always had been super thin, easy to hear everything on the other side, ever since they first moved into the small house when he was two-years-old. Narrow separators that were good for spying, or for keeping him up all night from loud TVs, or for enjoying fun radio tunes past bedtime.

But this night was different.

This night, Peter Quill didn't hear music.

Or television static, or the Angry Tennis Monster down the basement, who would listen through the tiny hole in the wooden floor whenever he said naughty words, who the boy had stopped believing in at age four when he discovered the gurgling was just the clothes washer.

No, tonight he heard a quieter, sadder sound.

Sniffling mixed with soft hiccups. A woman's voice, scared and unhappy.

I think she's...

Well, it was time for a new discovery.

Peter hopped out of the bed where his mother had tucked him into the pirate sheets, just twenty minutes earlier according to his digital clock. He didn't turn on the light switch, plenty used to sneaking around and knowing how to stay invisible. He just tiptoed through his messy bedroom, passed the Charlie Brown border patterns on the door, holding his breath to follow the strange sound.

The journey down the hallway was short, the location of the noise becoming more obvious.

Peter already knew it was Mom's room. Years of being used to thin walls and all.

It just didn't...sound like Mom.

Except it did. And that scared him.

The young boy softly shuffled around the corner, passed the baby grand piano where Mom had been sitting after dinner, carelessly hitting high keys. Peter had rested on his stomach over the hood, listening and finishing up math homework.

She seemed fine.

Didn't she?

He stopped at her white, fresh-painted door. The only other bedroom in their home.

The mysterious noise grew louder, but the other possibilities vanished.

There was no late TV show or movie. There were no pauses for someone else to talk during a phone call.

And the sound of crying wasn't in Peter's imagination.

It was true.

Mom was crying in there.

Why...?

Mom never cried. Mom made him feel better when he was scared and people were jerks.

The third grader knew she was worried about some things, not feeling well. Doctor crap. But she said everything was fine. Insisted it was fine just before tucking him in.

Yet he didn't even need to look through the old keyhole to know she was sobbing in there, muffled cries probably against her hands or a pillow. Soft whimpering and struggles for breath, talking and reminding herself, 'Calm down, it'll be okay. Calm down.' A broken version of her upbeat Southern voice; a weird, unnerving difference from the confident and cheerful mother he knew.

"Pull yourself together, Mer. Peter might hear. You need to be strong for Peter. Peter..." she said his name like it was a revelation, and went back to loudly bawling.

The boy almost jumped, almost slipped in his night socks, stepping backwards at the sudden volume increase of her breakdown.

Overhearing his name spoken so terrified might have added to his worry and confusion.

What's wrong? What's really wrong?

He eventually couldn't stand just listening from the outside, like this was some mean, distorted prank tape, and peeked through the door slits, biting his lip and holding in his own tears.

Mom was definitely crying hard, though not curled up in the bed like he imagined in his head. She was sitting in the wicker stick chair near her dresser, hugging her knees and bare feet, switching between starting at the wall and crying up at the ceiling. Tears covered her face, the comforter and quilt were in shambles, and her hair a wreck.

The woman threw her pink, fluffy Snoopy doll to the corner of the floor with an angry shout, and looked completely devastated.

It was the most bizarre, heartbreaking, saddest, and wrong sight Peter had ever seen.

The only picture missing was a cartoon rain cloud pouring over her head.

"What am I gonna do?" he could hear her speak more clearly, though she didn't know he was there. She assumed he was safe in bed, dreaming of mutant turtles eating pizza. She was choosing to finally be honest when she thought she was alone.

"What am I gonna do?! Dad...and Peter..."

What about me?

"My Peter...my little Peter...poor, innocent Peter..."

I'm fine, Mom.

"God, please let them be wrong! Jesus, I pray, Lord, please let the tests be wrong! Bah! Make the stupid scans and doctors be wrong!" she begged to the Heavens, the vague words sending goosebumps through the little boy's skin. The desperate, bitter prayers in a hollering, choked voice were unlike her quiet, routine, peaceful prayers at church or before meals. "Or at least let me beat it! I will do anything, Lord, if you make this disappear! It...it can't be hopeless! This can't happen to me! I have a son!" she screamed, like she was angry at God, angry at whatever was happening, and caught herself growing too loud and out of control, throwing her hands over her face again to silence the weeping.

All Peter wanted to do was open the door, to run inside and hug her, to comfort her and make her feel all better like she did for him every day. Whenever he was sad about not having a dad to play catch with, when he was worried about a new school year or creepy dreams. He hated seeing her like this, wanted to ask why she was worried about him, what she was praying for so that he could too, what would make her cry so hard and hide it.

But she didn't want him to know. He had busted in before on private moments with the adults, and learned it was never a good thing. Mom was sweet, but said he needed to learn limits. That there was a time and place for the kids, and he shouldn't jump in where he wasn't invited.

This felt different, serious, and she shouldn't be all alone while crying. But she chose to be alone. If any boys barged in on him when he wanted to be alone on the playground, he would want to knock them out, punch them good. Mom wouldn't do that, but probably wouldn't be happy to see him spying.

He couldn't scare her, make her be embarrassed, make her fake happiness like she would probably do during breakfast tomorrow. Make her wipe her eyes and pick up Snoopy like it was a comfortable night, when she obviously wanted to sob and be angry in peace.

He tore his eyes away, lifted his head from the door. Mom hadn't moved from her position for a whole minute, crying over her arm and telling herself to go to sleep.

And Peter decided to leave her, quit watching his favorite person crying for reasons he still didn't understand.

It would be okay. Mom was human. She often said their humanity made them special. Sure, big boys don't cry, but Mom was allowed to be sad, and allowed to keep secrets and forget their house had thin walls.

None of it sounded like the beginning of something good, though.

Peter walked past the large piano again and sighed, the instrument no longer filling him with joy.

During the bleak journey back to his room, he planned to hug his mom tight in the morning, and knew he also wouldn't be getting much sleep that night.

*

**********

*

The walls of The Quadrant rooms were heavy and strong.

Common for spaceships of its magnitude, not built to pick up subtle, quiet sounds. Screaming and crashes, high volume signals and beeping, but not ambient noise or casual conversations in the dead of night.

True, the new inhabitants were a pretty loud bunch, in fighting, laughing, and singing; and they had only been living on the surviving segment of the much larger Ravager spacecraft for less than two weeks. But it still felt unusual to be able to overhear everything on the other side of a door, each bunk's solitary development.

Gamora's sense of hearing, however, was quite powerful.

Powerful enough to detect window tapping and hitched breath from the Captain's Quarters on her way to visit the man she thought may be sleeping.

She visited and talked with him often at night, designated "night" wherever they were flying or landed, a good time to sort out their feelings and attempt to support one another after the complicated ordeal.

The female Guardian's curiosity and slight concern rose at the noise, and she slid open the door to find the room an absolute wreck.

Her peculiar Terran friend's cleaning habits were still practically non-existent, including any practical organizational skills, but this filthy disaster...

Ready to bite out his first name and chastise over the dusty fur blanket and the trash bin components burying the floor, she held back judgment about the mess when she caught his reflection in the long, vertical window.

Staring. Not even acknowledging her entrance. Just staring.

A similar look she saw earlier reflected in the ship's windshield.

"Peter?"

The man had appeared stable and content for most of the day, for the past week. Gamora knew deep down he couldn't be, but presented and acted as such during the prior hours. Sending out contact messages about the information of what took place on Ego, touching base with Nova Corps so they'd know the team was alive, talking extensively to Kraglin about their fallen Captain and informing the Ravager he could stay with them on The Quadrant as long as he needed, helping Mantis adapt to their crew and feel welcome, rummaging through stolen junk throughout the ship, rescuing the remains of The Milano, bragging about '300 new songs!', and winking at Gamora with remarks about the mysterious Cheers.

It wasn't until much later, after Rocket said "goodnight" in a kinder tone than before the loss of the animal experiment's blue friend, that Gamora observed the change.

Peter alone in the cockpit, staring at the stars and void in a confused, almost horrified daze. A daze and change that came at random, entirely unprompted. She didn't notice a song or word to push him into an episode, make him suddenly appear in shock all over again.

Gamora knew his trauma was far from over, possibly never over, but the sight still made her worry.

She hadn't spoken a word then, but now in his bedroom felt a sudden, stronger fear that he was again possessed the way Mantis described. That when she crossed the room and looked into his eyes she would find stars, a beautiful but haunting view of the galaxy, eternity.

"Peter." She kicked through the garbage and moved to where he sat, placed a hand on his shoulder, her head between his own and the window, blocking the reflection.

Black pupils, green irises.

Any twisted euphoria, the white and blue static, remained gone. Luminous expansion, absent. Zero stars.

Normal, human eyes. Real eyes. The eyes she was used to for months, eyes she still loved and trusted.

The warrior sighed in relief, but Peter didn't flinch. He kept staring at the cosmos. Gaze neutral, like a blank-eyed child.

"Peter...? Are you...?" she began and trailed off, unsure what she was asking. His breathing seemed normal, his hands were empty, and he wasn't crying. Just staring. And she did that sometimes, while contemplating, thinking about her life and the past. Yet watching Peter in this state felt wrong. It unnerved her.

Finally, he moved his head, agonizingly slowly. So slowly that if he'd kept moving at that pace it would have taken three hours for their faces to meet. "Ga...Gamora?" he asked, squinting, voice rough, just now registering her presence.

There were still no tears.

"Mmm-hmm..." she answered while nodding. "What did you do to your quarters--?"

"I--I--I...I think I...I th--think..." he stammered, ignoring, likely not hearing her question. "I...I think I lied to you."

Lied?

"Didn't...didn't mean to," he confessed, coming to a gradual realization, guilty, fearful. "I'm...I'm just good at it." His eyes moved to his lap.

Is he drunk?

Gamora took a seat across from him, two windows over. "What type of lie...?" she asked worried, not angry. In fact, despite her insecurities, she already hypothesized the understandable nature of this "lie."

Shaking his head, Peter recited, "I'm not okay."

Well of course not. Unsurprising. She would've never expected him to be "okay" after that event, and Gamora was equal parts saddened by his creepily detached condition, and glad he was admitting to his new emotional baggage.

The theme of his sudden realization and trauma she still did not know. Yondu? Being used as a battery? Knowing Ego's attempt to bond was an evil ruse? Thinking the team, his friends, could be lost? All subjects they had previously discussed to some degree.

"She was murdered," he then spoke in a whisper, and Gamora had her answer. There was no question who "she" meant.

Oh. That.

The sick, sick fact he claimed to be content learning.

Finally sinking in.

"She was killed..." He sounded like he was just understanding this reality.

No 'I knew it' attitude. No confidence. Just broken.

"Yes," Gamora said, and didn't know why, except to assure she was still there, that she knew the weight of these words.

"I don't think I wanna know this," he mumbled. "I thought it was nature, but...I don't wanna know this," he repeated, looking up at her in fear. "I wanna rewind."

Gamora closed her eyes and took his hands like a reflex, could only express compassion and hear him out, knew his desperate, childlike plea was not possible. Even if Mantis could erase memories, it wouldn't be worth the chance of removing more than that one disgusting sentence.

"I know..."

"I thought...I thought I found someone who loved her as much as I do," he said in confusion. And Gamora had felt that excitement and presumed connection, remembered how happy he was on that planet, before their dumb fight, before the truth was revealed. "Loved her...as much as anyone should."

"Peter, I am so sorry I...that he...yes, it's horrible. Shattering. Pure evil," she stated the obvious, and hoped the pieces of communication would coax him out of this trance and help him truly talk. Talk to more than the wall or his lap. "Come on, let's get you a cold drink--"

"'It broke my heart...' That's how he phrased it," he cut her off and spoke. Gamora would have suspected he had already been drinking something of the alcoholic variety, despite the surprising lack of bottles or liquor breath, but soon figured out his sentence was a direct quotation. "Like accidentally running over someone's bike on the sidewalk. Like selling rare baseball cards," he made the foreign comparisons, but Gamora continued to listen. "'But it broke my heart to...to put that tumor...in her...head.'..." he finished the last word with a choke and hard swallow.

That was how the despicable being told him?! So casually? Romantically?

Gamora never learned, before tonight, how Peter discovered the truth of that gross deed. 'It turns out he gave my mother the Terran disease that killed her, ya know, from a distance, I guess, with his powers. So he wouldn't be tempted to visit or live with her,' was all he had explained.

But those words...Gamora wasn't an expert on emotions, but also would not have been surprised if those words amplified the pain of that knowledge by infinity.

"My mom...he killed her, Gamora. On...on purpose." He was speaking less coherent sober than during most of his drunk confession nights. It looked like he was reading a book and swore he must have skipped a page. There was a page missing in his mind. "On purpose..." he repeated and squinted at her face, shaking. It amazed her there was no trace of inebriation.

"I know," she replied firmly but sad, her voice also shaking. "I know."

And then...

"What the FUCK?!" the man in front of her shrieked, all at once cracked by screaming the obscenity so loudly, louder than the warrior knew human lungs were capable. So loud it must have been heard on the planet closest to their floating home, must have woken the entire crew.

The violent, hysterical sobbing wasn't any quieter. Tears that were probably forming over the course of hours sprung from his eyes, and Gamora's only thought was to catch him before he tumbled onto the floor. She pulled him to her body within seconds, awkwardly propped his head against her side, letting the most stubborn person she ever met bawl into her elbow.

She had been waiting for the inevitable, waiting for him to finally cry, to quit mumbling, for the captain, her best friend, to snap the hell out of it.

"How could he?!" Peter Quill wailed in existential agony, so much harder than from Yondu's funeral. "How...how could anyone...WHY?!"

Well. He snapped out of it.

And Gamora only looked and felt ten times more heartbroken, terrified, and lost.

"She suffered for months!" he poured out, almost vomited his thoughts, between gasps for breath and ragged sobs. Poured out the memories that must have been invading and flashing through his brain since the instant Ego spoke those disgusting, disgusting words, reminding himself and Gamora that his mother's death was not quick or painless, grieving not only in the selfish context of wanting her back, but knowing her suffering was unnecessary and meaningless. "She was so scared, and sad, and in pain," Peter grit his teeth at the word. "She was so innocent! So...fucking young!" he cried every adjective, more crushed and horrified at each memory culmination.

It was like a knife being stabbed into Gamora's chest. Peter had shifted from a shell of himself into a tangible example of grief, and she didn't know which appeared worse. She merely held him tight and watched this unfold, rubbed a hand along his back, brown hair itching her face.

What does a person, a friend, say to this revelation?

She knew the universe could be cruel, experienced cruelty every day for most of her life. Watching her own parents die as a child, she understood the loss. Thanos' act was equally barbaric and evil. But that did not change the extreme difference in this situation.

Peter never considered any mystery to the tragedy of his mother's shortened life, had informed Gamora that brain cancer was an unfortunate but common affliction for humans. This revelation twenty-six years later, that a god chose to disrupt their sacred bond, a freak who could have simply let the young, spirited woman be happy and healthy on Terra, decided to plant a ticking bomb into her head, perform some narcissistic sacrifice, it was eating Peter alive.

Gamora desperately wanted to give the explanation he deserved, but could not. She could not answer why his blood father was a monster, a monster who senselessly hurt someone he "loved" so dearly. A monster who killed the woman Peter idolized and missed and loved with every cell in his form.

"And now...now...Yondu's gone too, because of him! A-a-a-a-ann--and there was this...statue of her...statue of my mother. Lovely. I...I don't get it..." he spoke again, voice strained out of physical exhaustion that still couldn't halt his sobbing altogether, as he listed every other detail behind his confusion and breakdown and pain. Gamora heard Rocket in the other room whispering, soothing Groot over the chilling grief piercing throughout the spaceship.

"And...and that sack of shit smashed my Walkman, and her tape, in front of me! Taunting me," Peter explained, tears still streaming down his cheeks. Gamora squeezed his t-shirt in raw anger and protectiveness. "Taunting, mocking, echoing her favorite song lyrics, like...like some message, a s-symbol that I needed to forget her, like she meant n-nothing! It...it felt like...felt like..."

He didn't finish that thought, a stream of consciousness too difficult to describe, or he simply needed to breathe again before passing out.

Gamora couldn't take it. She felt a surge, a need to put an end to this, wanted to do anything to take his pain away. Instead she gave friendship words of comfort, words she could only hope did any good in easing his broken heart. "You didn't lie to me," she foolishly said the first thing she could think to reassure, knowing any guilt he felt over telling her he was 'okay' was at the bottom of the list of reasons for his distraught state. "You were lying to yourself. I'm not angry. In time...you'll adapt to the new information--" she then made the promise of false hope, silently wishing for it to be true. "It...it will get easier..."

"I can't stop hearing his voice!" he shouted through more tears, regaining some strength and crying steadily into his best friend's shoulder, coating the top of her sleeve with snot. "I don't want to know this! It hurts worse than the light!"

That knowledge should have been more surprising. It should have felt like an exaggeration, that twelve hushed words cut worse than the physical agony of being impaled and tortured by a powerful god, that Peter might rather hang in that palace screaming than think about anybody purposely killing his mother. In a way though, Gamora understood. On some level, being orphaned and alone, watching Nebula disappear, watching this insufferable idiot in her arms lose control, it hurt worse than any torture machine Thanos had ever introduced.

"We're here for you. All of us."

I am.

Peter lifted his head for the first time since breaking down. His face was shining wet, twisted in so much pain, and his eyes were bloodshot. He appeared slightly embarrassed, as though he just realized how he was behaving, how much he was stating out loud, the vulnerability he was showing in front of her, but still couldn't stop it. Gamora ignored the taste of tiny human hairs in her mouth. "It--iit...it just feels like...it felt...still feels..."

"Deep breath," Gamora instructed, finally not feeling useless, preventing him from literally choking on his tears and thoughts. "Don't forget to breathe."

He obeyed and nodded, yet continued speaking after the slow exhalation. "It feels like..." he cursed the air and bit down on his tongue.

"Feels like...?" she asked, because her own selfish curiosity was begging him to complete that sentence.

"It..." Peter sighed, and devolved into fresh, honest tears, looking up at her like a bashful child. "It feels like I lost her all over again."

The confession was stated so calm, so sincere, devastated and terrified of what this new feeling meant. Peter immediately resumed weeping into his hands for an indiscernible amount of time, and Gamora just hugged him tighter in the tousled room.

The Guardians leader was still trapped under Ego's spell, haunted by the living planet's words and actions despite the celestial no longer physically existing, stuck reliving the most traumatic moment of his life.

And things would never be the same for Peter again. He would never be the same.

Gamora feared, for better or worse, that Peter Quill, the Peter Quill she finally admitted was a need and a treasure in her life beyond companionship, was never going to be the same.

*

**********

*

The small boy was absolutely giddy riding up the elevator.

He didn't even care about the old couple staring at him, who looked both amused at his dancing and concerned that he was unchaperoned.

Peter hadn't seen his mother in days.

His grandfather had to work late at the lumber mill most of the week, and so had to pick him up late from school. The drive to the hospital would've taken longer than the rest of the time left for visiting hours.

The short phone calls with Mom during homework breaks and before bed were nice, but he could tell from her voice that she was weak and not feeling well, and Peter figured it worked out that he would need to wait until Saturday to see her again. His grandpa told him with a smile that morning that she was having a good day, and really looked forward to seeing them. Mom's close friend and trainee from her job at the grocery store even joined the trip!

The child gobbled up the nasty, stale breakfast bagel he was served downstairs so fast he thought he would puke, and rushed happily to his mother's room the second Grandpa gave him permission to go upstairs on his own. He knew the direction, had her room number memorized. Why shouldn't he get to see Mom first?

Elevator doors flew open, and Peter slid out of the transport like he was skateboarding, jumped through the hallway like he was in a candy store, ignoring harsh glares from the staff. He gripped his knapsack with anticipation, carrying the weight of her surprise and his excitement. He couldn't wait to show her what he found and brought for her - three Petula Clark cassette tapes he got for an amazing bargain, a complete steal of one dollar each, at a nearby thrift shop. Downtown wasn't on any of their album or tape collections at home, but Mom loved it on the radio. She would be thrilled. They were gonna jam. The music would make her feel so much better.

He bet she was already so much stronger than when he last saw her, the annoying medicine finally doing its job, but music was always a great secondary remedy. All the nurses and doctors, and even the janitors agreed their room always had the best nostalgic, classic music, and joked that they didn't want to leave and tend to other patients whose rooms were too quiet or filled with obnoxious soap operas. Those compliments were probably the only funny or good part about this hospital phase.

Peter was happy. He would brag about his spelling test grade, present her with the 60's tapes, maybe even get to see cool radiology photos.

Yeah, the setting could be better, but today was still going to rock.

Room 206. Yippee!

The door was open a crack. An awful sound was coming from the other side. The boy frowned, and pulled the handle to let himself inside.

A welcome noise or sight did not greet him back.

Mom was there, and sitting up in her bed. But she was not smiling, and didn't seem to be waiting for him.

Instead, she was hunched over, throwing up into a large plastic bucket. The back of her white gown and hairless head faced the doorway while she was hacking loudly and violently, panting in exhaustion between every gross and embarrassing release of spit.

She looked absolutely sicker than Peter's worst case of the flu. More miserable than every time he ever had the flu combined.

No music was playing from the boombox.

Peter stepped closer and cleared his throat. "Hi..."

The woman looked up in surprise, though weakly. "Peter!" she croaked, then coughed again, wiping her mouth with a napkin from the rolling table. "Hi...honey," Mom said confused, squinting at him. "What...what're ya doin' here?"

Her son blinked and tilted his head. Did she forget they were coming?

"It's Saturday," he explained, like it would somehow make her stop puking and jump up to hug him. "We were gonna spend the day."

"Right, right, o' course," his mother said in a clogged voice. "I..." she blanched, and held up her hand to signal for Peter to give her a moment, before coughing a few more times into the bucket. "I meant..." she began and looked back up with a fake smile. "Where...where are Grandpa and Aunt Karen?"

"The cafeteria," Peter answered. "Grandpa said I could come upstairs myself, if I knew the way." It was the truth, so why did he feel so nervous? "Ummm...sorry, if--"

"No, don't be sorry, hun, I just...kinda icky this morning, ya know?" she attempted to mock her...condition, but gave only a tiny, microscopic fraction of her usual smile, and she wasn't even trying to make the effort to act happy.

There were dark circles under her watery eyes, her gown was stained with vomit, and tissues were scattered everywhere. The light breakfast and bottle of orange juice on her tray wasn't touched.

Peter knew the strong medicine used to cure this illness made her nauseous a lot. It felt evil and backwards, why she had to feel worse to get better, when she only had a few headaches before. This junk hurt, and made her yucky and sleepy and weak, sometimes too sick to dance or laugh, sometimes even needing Grandma or a nurse to help her use the bathroom. And Peter understood. Mom called it the rainstorm before the sun, the boring news report or politician's meeting before the fun space movie at night, the awful scratching sound on a record player before the magical tunes.

Her health was the new priority, over her job or her hobbies. It took from her so that it could give her more years to live.

The same reason her hair was gone.

It was still super weird seeing Mom bald. The first time Peter walked into the hospital room to see his mom without any blonde, curly hair was a little freaky. And scary. He knew it was her, he couldn't be mean, but he barely recognized her. Mom didn't look like that.

But she had eased his fear, cheered him up with a smile and a joke - said it was awesome looking like a cute Buddhist monk, and that maybe Peter should shave his head to match. He then laughed and decided her appearance didn't matter. Too much.

No, this wasn't the first time Peter saw her sick or throw up from these medicines to get rid of that dangerous clump of cells in her head.

He had just never seen it this bad before.

Wasn't she supposed to get stronger? Eventually? What was taking so long?

"Sweetie, it's just, uh..." his mother spoke when Peter continued to stand awkwardly in the doorway, darting his eyes around the room. She looked confused, trouble concentrating, trouble remembering what she was gonna say. It was another common change. "Symptoms" or "side effects" they called it.

So much was changing.

"It's just early, and this is a..."

"Bad time?" Peter finally asked, getting the picture, trying to hide his disappointment and worry.

His mother nodded, looking to be holding back more nausea and a stomachache, maybe ready to call for a nurse's help once he left. "Why don't you go back to your Grandpa and eat some more with them, and visit the murals on the walls? 'N the three of you come back up after lunch?" she suggested slowly, desperately.

"Yeah..." Peter said slowly, too. He could wait a few more hours. He loved Mom, but the room did smell foul, and not in a funny way. "Yeah, okay!" He waved and moved toward the door, before remembering the surprise. "Ohh, but Mom--" he started excitedly, digging into his backpack. "Guess what I found?!"

"Ugh, what is it now, Peter?" she interrupted with a frustrated sigh, twinges of irritability in her voice, rubbing her forehead and closing her eyes.

Peter froze in shock.

Mom never talked to him like that.

Well, not when he did nothing wrong, when she wasn't correcting.

Not simply 'cause she was tired, too weak or weary to let him talk or show her something. Not acting grouchy just because he was still there, like his company was a burden.

Especially not when he hadn't seen her in days.

But it was all right.

He swallowed, looking down and blinking back his surprise, and embarrassingly pushed the cassette tape back into its hidden pocket in his bag. "Oh. N-n-nothing. Nothing, nevermind. I'm sorry. Uhh...I'll just...see you later! Feel better!"

"Wait, sweetie..." his mother called with forced effort, probably realizing how she sounded. "Moonwalk it back in here, Star-Lord," she ordered kindly until he turned around. Peter looked at her hopefully, gave a sad smile. He wasn't mad. He understood. Just... "I'm sorry. Very sorry," she said and placed a hand over her chest, eyes sparkling with physical pain and guilt. "I did miss you, dear. Give me some time, and I promise I wanna hear whatcha found," she reassured, her smile closer to pretty and real. She meant it.

"Okay." Peter smiled back, relieved and forgiving, though still uneasy, and shuffled into the hallway of loud phones and beeping machines.

"Hey," she called again, and he twisted his head back. "We'll jam later, kiddo," she said with a wink. Her hand was shaking and making a fist into her gown, her other arm preparing the bucket again.

The child nodded and waved, but frowned after he closed the door and she could no longer see his face again. The barfing sounds continued on behind him.

None of this was fair. None of this made sense.

Grandpa said she was having a good day. This was good? Was she that sick and miserable every morning? Humiliated and suffering whenever he was home or at school?

Peter wandered back to the elevator with a lack of zeal, hopes of dancing far from his brain.

The doctors were trying to make her better, so she wouldn't die, so the creepy ball of nature in her head wouldn't kill her.

To be sure his family and the world wouldn't lose her yet.

So why did Peter feel like he already had?

*

**********

*

An explosion of stomach-churning noises greeted half the passengers on the galaxy-saver's mobile home.

"Ugggh...fuck. Fuck it. Gross...so gross..."

The cause, Gamora speculated, was not related to illness, hangovers, or candy consumption, despite the missing stash purchased on their date just several nights before.

She stood in the bedroom doorway to see Peter vomiting into a bucket.

He looked up at her with bleary eyes. "I swear I didn't drink," he mumbled and dropped his head.

"I would hope not, this early," Gamora stated and walked to him, knelt down. Peter looked grateful, before he held up a hand and continued the unpleasant activity. She winced only slightly at the smell.

Peter slid down from the bed, clutching the bucket and breathing heavily, wearing a look of pure disgust that seemed to far exceed embarrassment or discomfort. "I...didn't drink last night either. It's not like that," he told her and shook his head, eyes squeezed shut and physically holding back more contents.

Gamora nodded, and surveyed his features to be certain he wasn't actually sick with a sudden digestive bug. He showed no sign of fever or chills. Although the reaction seemed extreme, she voiced the probable cause. "Dream?"

This time Peter nodded, and his eyes welled. "I wake ya?"

"...Not important," she eventually answered, shrugged. It wasn't intentional. Peter couldn't afford more guilt, and Gamora was used to early rises.

He sighed, and rolled his head on the side of the cot. "Sorry. Others?" he muttered, and coughed again to clear his throat, placing the bucket on the floor. "They must be--"

"Concerned," she corrected his unfinished thought. "They're concerned, but know you'll bounce back. Rocket and Kraglin just assume it's from alcohol." Though Rocket's snarks were less cruel than usual, some actual compassion in his tone. "Or an illness." Groot, still too young to understand the emotional consequences of their latest, tiresome adventure. "Mantis asked about motion sickness." The innocent newcomer seemed unclear on the fact that Peter and the gang spent most of their lives on spaceships and didn't require physiological adjusting.

Regardless, Gamora was the only person aboard to instantly guess the true reason, but respected Peter's privacy enough not to suggest it out loud.

"Yippee," he groaned in a bitter voice. "I can disguise this fucking mess--"

"Peter. None of us are unfamiliar with the concept of nightmares," she firmly reminded, silenced his self-deprecating words. Their entire family, every lost individual now living on this ship, knew what it was like for a personal darkness to consume them at night. "If someone figured you had a nightmare terrible enough to warrant...umm..." she glanced at the bucket, "that, it is alright." The experience had given the odd group some perspective, if only temporarily, if only by a margin.

He remained silent, then shrugged. "I dunno if you could call it a 'nightmare'. Just...dream. Visions? Thoughts. Err, started with thoughts, I mean. Dream eventually, duh. Was doin' a lot of...thinking and imagining while alone, before I conked out." Gamora sighed, but didn't judge. Solitude was cruel that way. Should she have been offering her company more often in the evenings? "By the time I woke up...just 'cause it was a dream tonight didn't make it...unreal," he said, shaking his head and holding in tears, again thwarted remaining vomit. "It was too much. So puke." A dry laugh. "Don't know which is grosser - the dream or that little surprise," he commented and kicked the bucket away without knocking it over.

"What...what was it about?" she asked slowly, rubbing his shoulder.

'This time,' her mind added, sadly. What was the dream about this time?

Kraglin could be heard making Rocket and Groot breakfast, even though they normally would've still been sleeping, if Peter's echoing nausea hadn't woken them.

"It wasn't Yondu, was it?" she asked carefully.

Peter bowed his head and took a deep breath, and for a moment Gamora worried she had ripped at another scar. "No," he answered. "No..."

She was unsure why it felt obvious, why she rarely suspected anymore, that Peter's nightmares or episodes were about the death of his true adoptive father. There were tears. The grief was strong, always present. He missed the man terribly, and was still confused and frustrated at the lack of communication, that Yondu withheld the truth about why he was taken and kept. But Peter was also handling the process much healthier than Gamora expected, going through the stages and accepting this reality, and he claimed the support of the whole weird family really helped.

In addition, he talked about Yondu constantly with Kraglin, chatted about the Ravager Captain endlessly to Rocket, Drax, and Mantis; even Groot was often eager for stories. Peter seemed at peace, overall, about the second worst loss in his life.

The revelations from Ego, the ones surrounding his mother, however...

"He was watching her..." Peter eventually said, and began to stare out the window just like that night she found him. Before he finally broke down and confronted these haunting feelings. Before he calmed enough to thank her, and since then had not hesitated to tell her when the subject was mentally 'screwing with' him again.

"In the dream. He was watching her dying."

This was a common topic for she and Peter, and was not common knowledge around the rest of The Quadrant.

"Tell me?" she asked, wondering if it was wrong to prod for a longer version of such a disturbing dream.

She just...loved his stories. Even the ones he hated, even those Gamora wished were not based in reality.

"I..." he broke off with another sigh, appeared to be calculating how to describe it. "Somehow, like, his face was watching her, from the sky? Voluntarily. Watching her cry, and pray, and...throw up," Peter said, so disheartened, looking at the floor. "Watching her struggle to live, watching her say goodbye to friends, and family. Ego was just...staring with a sad expression. He was shaking his head, I think. Like it was disappointing. A disappointing, unfortunate, great, romantic tragedy!" he punctuated the final word. "But he was the...fucking reason...oh my god..." Peter blanched at the confusing reminder and instantly dove for the bucket.

Gamora watched Peter resume emptying his stomach of possibly everything he had eaten in the past year. She felt horrible and cringed, awkwardly touched the back of his neck above his hidden face. Okay, that was a stupid request.

"I'm sorry," she said once his coughs became quieter. "That...that is gross..." She realized how it sounded before Peter could look up and glare. "The dream, I meant. Ego...that's gross. Not--not you, not this," she clarified.

He ceased retching long enough to nod, slowly lifting his head and gripping the sides of the pail so hard his knuckles turned white. "I wanna kill him again." Gamora had never heard Peter's voice so dark and vengeful, harsh and gritty. He allowed vomit to dribble down his chin and rasped the words, and the tone didn't fit the true Peter at all.

Except in the context of somebody hurting his loved ones, it absolutely did. And this broke Gamora's heart.

"I want to kill him again," he repeated, like this was more than a fantasy, but a new ambition. "Once wasn't enough."

She listened with a mix of sympathy and worry, and pried the bucket from his hands once it was evident he was at least temporarily finished regurgitating. "Peter..." she began, instead of speaking the real words in her head.

So do I.

"I wanna shoot that bastard for every microsecond that she suffered!" he raised his voice at the concept. "You do the math!" Peter told her, trembling in pure rage. "No," he quickly amended, with a hint of a maniacal laugh at the change. "He can do the math!"

"Peter," she said firmly and gripped his hand, fearful at the level it was shaking and thankful the door was closed. "I understand. I do. But he's already gone--"

"Who cares?! We'll find a way! He was a fucking god!" he scoffed at her rationality, murder in his usually buoyant eyes.

"Peter, stop. Slow down," she attempted again, and he only continued to sit on the floor beside her and rattle with fury and disgust. "I understand that feeling. I know you loved her and miss her--"

"Don't you get it?! This is not about me!" he snapped and suddenly directed his rage toward the woman next to him. Gamora flinched, showed her surprise, but didn't stop him, allowed him to finish. He was still feeling too ill and numb from those subconscious images to do anything but yell and vomit. Give him variety. "This is not...not just because I love and miss her and can never see her again! You think this is just because he took her away from me?!" he asked the rhetorical question with a crack in his voice, and some tears involuntarily escaped. "I'm pissed that he's the cause of her suffering!"

"I do get that," Gamora spoke in a calm voice. She truly did understand. Could not comprehend the levels of righteous but terrifying anger currently flooding through his veins, didn't know this sweet maternal victim he wanted to avenge billions of times more, but without a doubt understood the concept and reason. "I do."

"Ugh..." He squeezed his eyes shut, and swallowed back his need for a third round with the bucket. "Sorry," he mumbled, and opened his eyes to reveal the rage was fading. He pressed the heel of his wrist to his eyes and groaned. "It's so damn early. I..." Gamora saw him glance down at their still entwined hands, and she knew he would have smiled if it were possible.

Ego stole that smile.

I hate him, too, I really do.

"He knew she was withering away to nothing!" Peter said and leaned his head onto her shoulder, then embarrassingly wiped the fluids from his mouth with his soiled shirt. His voice was still bitter, but far more calm, confused. "There were days she couldn't even enjoy music!" he emphasized, as though this was the worst, most stunning part of her disease. "Her...her favorite music! Too weak. Too sick." Gamora imagined that, and feared this entire revelation may have the same effect on Peter.

Gamora didn't want to imagine a Peter who didn't light up and annoy her to dance whenever his favorite music played, treating it like a necessity for life. A Peter that didn't insist on filling their ship with upbeat tunes, all because the woman who gave him that passion died for different reasons than he'd always believed.

The signs were already showing. The Zune wasn't touched as often as she first expected, certainly not explored like when Kraglin first introduced the foreign device.

In fact, she hadn't seen Peter switch the music on once since their date night.

What more could Ego really take from him?

"Did that bring him joy?" Peter continued rambling, and Gamora snapped out of her thoughts. "Or...just a tragic side effect, a sacrifice? He said he '...couldn't stand to set foot on an Earth where she wasn't living,' well whose fault was that?!" he pleaded for an answer to this stupidity, this inhumane contradiction. "It was 'out of sight, out of mind' for eight years, I guess. And Mom called him an angel!" he shouted through clenched teeth, whipped around to pound his fists on the bed, biting the word in anger at the universe. Angry at everything except the woman he was quoting. Gamora squeezed his fingers to relax him, which miraculously worked. His forehead remained on the side of the comforter for several long minutes, and she heard his deep breathing gradually slow to normal. Eventually he returned to meet her eyes with a red face.

"She didn't know," Gamora simply reminded him.

"Should've known..." Peter sighed. There was nothing that could be done about that now. "She deserved to know." A few eggs also might have cracked onto the floor out in the galley, but there was nothing to be done about either fact. "I always thought...thought if he was around on Earth, if I at least had a dad after she died, life would be better." Of course. And she had given Peter false hope that he'd actually found his Hasselhoff. "But he's why she died. I couldn't...I couldn't hate anyone more. Why...why torture her?"

Gamora shook her head at his profound contemplations. "That isn't love."

"No." Peter mimicked her sad head shake. "I never saw this coming. The last thing I expected him to say. How..." He tore his eyes from his boxers back up to Gamora. "How do I live with it?" It took a moment to register with Gamora that he wasn't only asking himself. "How do you live knowing Thanos murdered your parents for no good reason?" he asked in awe over such a feat. "That they're gone and it's his fault?"

Oh. She was somewhat surprised, but understood Peter comparing this revelation to what she had told him on Knowhere, when he'd listened with honest compassion and respect rather than judgment.

"Umm...I don't know. Everything happened fast," she answered, best she could from memories she'd worked hard to block. In a blink, both of them were dead. There was little time to mourn. "But--"

"I'm sorry," Peter interrupted, looking ashamed. "That was a shitty thing to ask, you shouldn't have to--"

"No, it's okay. I want to help," she said, not offended by the question. But how she lived knowing a monster killed her parents? In Gamora's opinion, she never did really learn how to cope with that day.

"It's so strange and new to me. I can't wrap my head around it," Peter explained like a child. "I can't make sense of it," he said in a voice that sounded normal, but his expression showed he was scared of a permanent change in his metal state, fearful he literally couldn't experience a full life while bearing this knowledge. An expression and eyes that screamed 'help me'.

Gamora swallowed, saw the crazy, reckless hero - her boyfriend, her best friend - struggling, and dug deep for something to contribute.

"You were wrong."

There was, at least, one statement of Peter's she knew to be false.

He looked up at her with dull, confused eyes. "What?"

"You didn't lose her all over again," she firmly explained. He only sighed and moved his head to the right, clearly embarrassed over that line from his initial breakdown. And Gamora gripped his shoulders and turned him to face her. "I am not judging you for feeling that way, Peter. But you need to know that you didn't. Not really. You cannot give Ego that kind of power."

She knew that type of power. The power she saw destroy the real person inside every body Thanos sculpted to become his own tools. Gamora could not allow Peter to really believe his mother was gone in some new and permanent way, that Ego had taken everything, and there was nothing left but an empty life defined by bitterness, nothing left to do but hate. It would be the worst fate for their captain. She would not stand by and allow him to be consumed by anger and a need for vengeance, identical to her sister's possible fruitless effort to murder the man who ruined her life, who stole their chances at a normal childhood.

The sparks of that thirst, that unquenchable bloodlust in Peter's sweet eyes sparked Gamora to put a stop to it, before it drained and replaced his true self, especially in the case of vengeance against a father who was already dead and could not be shot again and again. "You can't think he has that power. You can't. It's...the first rule, I suppose," she told him, as though she was now a professional counselor, and this was some documented important step in 'Your Evil Parent Murdered the Parent You Loved' grief recovery. "He does not hold that power over you, to take her twice, no matter what he tried. He took her physically, yes, but she will...always be with you." She touched Peter's chest, gently placed a hand over his heart. She saw him holding back tears, maybe wanting to believe her. "Breaking your Walkman didn't erase her memory or significance, Yondu freezing wasn't the same experience, the statue was a false idol, and learning Ego was the reason she became sick and died on Earth...changes nothing about how much she loved you." Peter didn't nod, but wasn't rejecting her words either.

"We already avenged her, Peter. That's over. You fought back and the universe is safe from that freak. He confessed that gross murder to the wrong momma's boy." Now Peter huffed a laugh, and he opened his eyes. They were wet, but still resisted falling into more cries. "To the wrong hero," she amended. "You know she's still with you. Giving Ego the power to take her again, to kill who you are in the process, it's the worst thing you can do right now. You can't be a slave to that thought. What matters is how much you love and remember her." Gamora didn't know if her words were 100% accurate, or how much Peter was absorbing. She spoke purely on instinct. Nobody loved Meredith Quill like Peter did, and that had to count for something. "It's okay to be devastated, but the idea that anyone could take her from you again is absurd. Impossible. You couldn't lose her twice," she said as sincerely as on Berhert, believed this part wholeheartedly. "He failed to make you forget her. That's your power," she concluded in a whisper.

Silence dragged, and Gamora waited several minutes for Peter to shift closer to her for physical comfort, to thank her for the advice or perceived wisdom, to ask a question, to give an unneeded apology, to react and cry, something.

Peter didn't move to hug her, though. Nor did he sob or reach for the bucket. The man gave no sign of agreement or disagreement. He simply stood from the floor to stretch his limbs, yawning like it was any other morning. Gamora stared up at him in concern. His expression was unreadable. Had he been tuning her out? She would not have been angry if he did, but she wished she had known from the start.

"I need a distraction," he mumbled after groaning into his elbow.

Gamora stood as well, eyeing him curiously. "Might be beneficial," she acknowledged. The stench of the bucket contents was growing difficult to ignore. Peter seemed to sense her discomfort and walked it to the bathroom.

"When do we reach that training arena on Nelmeen anyway?" he asked in an exhausted tone after the sound of a toilet flush, exiting while running a hand through his sweaty hair.

"85 hours," she informed with a small smile.

Their leader gave an eye roll at the distance. "Did...Rocket ever fix that busted rig?"

"Yes," Gamora told him, and it was obviously not the answer Peter hoped. "With help from Kraglin."

He sighed, before walking over to a drawer and aimlessly rummaging. Before Gamora could suggest a plethora of other mechanical jobs and problems to take his mind off his emotional issues, her boyfriend turned around and actually grinned, though faint, holding a pack of foreign playing cards.

"Up for a round of Stopgap Hadlock?" he offered with a smirk. "Smuggled the deck outta Nelmeen when I was twelve. Kinda fitting."

Gamora indulged a smile, relieved he at least did not appear angered or insulted by her tough speech. "I do not think I enjoyed the way Rocket and Drax behaved the last time we played as a group," she teased, but was more than willing to participate, if it even temporarily ripped Peter from his funk and vomiting spree.

"Just us," Peter clarified softer, and climbed to sit on the bed. "Or..." he suddenly thought, and looked to her with hope. "Wanna learn an Earth card game?"

She brightened and nodded, and settled across from him on the bedspread where he patted the spot, watching him shuffle the deck and create two player piles.

The rules may have been lost on Gamora the first time, though. Her focus was on Peter's mouth set in a neutral line. Gone was the smirk from when he'd suggested the game minutes earlier; gone was the gorgeous smile that always lit up the atmosphere whenever he introduced a piece of culture from his homeworld. The turn of his lips at each joke felt painfully artificial. Regardless, she picked up the seven dirty and bent alien cards Peter assigned her and began to play along.

Gamora never thought she could hate a man, hate any sentient creature, stronger than she hated Thanos.

But after what Ego did - and was continuing to do - to her best friend? How he sucked the life straight out of the energetic human in more ways than physically...

She didn't think she could ever forgive that being, that thing, for stealing the genuine smile from Peter's perfect face.

And the toughest warrior in the galaxy only wished she held the superpower to bring it back.

*

**********

*

"Thank you," a sweet woman said to the nurse pushing a clear liquid through her IV.

The nurse smiled at the two in the room, and at the 'great music choice' she raved about when she first came in. The patient turned her head back to the little boy beside her. "And you? Go fish."

Peter made an exaggerated frown and picked up a card, eyeballing the syringe and fanning his nose because of the chemical's smell. He didn't know if this medicine would ease the pain or make it worse. Hard to figure. Mom was always polite and thankful toward the hospital staff, even when the treatment results were lousy. And she was good at hiding her pain. Especially when he visited.

"So your grandpa really wants to take you to the zoo tomorrow," Mom continued their Go Fish conversation after the nice nurse left. Peter stared down at his cards and shrugged. "He really wants to do something special with you, and I told him how much you love animals. No school? It could be a fun day."

"Won't you be lonely?"

"Oh, you can still come see me in the morning and evening," she reassured, placing her cards on the warm bed sheets and squeezing his hand. "Have breakfast, suffer through the gross hospital food with me," she said and made him smile, "drive down to the zoo for a few hours, take some pictures with that fancy Polaroid from Aunt Karen, and y'all come back here for dinner. You two can even sneak in some pizza, and tell me all about what stuff you saw."

Peter tried to ignore the idea, and moved his head to the beat of The Fifth Dimension playing from the boombox on the windowsill.

Yeah, the zoo was cool, and Grandpa was fine, but...

It just wasn't fair.

He knew what Mom wanted him to say. She hoped he would agree and be happy. Act like a trip alone with his grandfather was the same as Mom joining them on the adventure. Act like she was making plans for after she was healthy and all better. Act like she was packing suitcases to go home tonight, and next week the three of them would be pointing at tigers and ostriches without a care in the world.

But he knew now she wasn't going to get better, and it was the worst conversation, and it wasn't okay, and any distractions were stupid.

"Peter," she said firmly until he looked up at her.

No, the way she talked quieter and looked stranger didn't matter. He just didn't want her to leave him.

"I know you wanna be with me, angel. I do wanna spend all my time with you, too. All the time in the universe," she promised, and his eyes were stinging. "But it's also good for you to bond with your grandpa. He may not understand everything important to us, why we enjoy the power of the rock 'n roll so," she added until the child gave a half-hearted smirk. "But he loves you, Peter, and wants to help." The boy wasn't trying to be stubborn. He just wasn't in the mood to laugh with anyone else, when nature had decided to take away the best person on Earth, slowly, horribly.

Why go have fun when every day with Mom felt like it was slipping away for no good reason?

"If not the zoo, maybe the park? He's worried about you not making friends..."

"They don't like me," Peter told the truth and looked down. None of the kids at school did anymore. He never had that many friends to start, but the few other boys who used to be nice saw him as weirder and weirder since the new school year.

The woman looked down sadly, understanding. She kept her voice strong, despite the discomfort in her head, in her whole body. "It'll change."

Another shrug. Peter didn't care so much. Every day at school felt like a blur, pointlessly fearing and thinking about an event he didn't want to believe would really happen. Every tick of the clock was a mean countdown...

"Do you have any fives?"

Trying not to a sigh and letting out a smirk, Mom handed him a card from her pile near her Star Wars head cap. "You little thief," she joked. Peter took the card in smug victory.

Good. We don't need to think or talk about when...

"Grandpa also said you guys could get a dog," his mother spoke up. "A puppy, or maybe a rescue? Nice company in that big house. I know you'd take care of it when I'm not around..."

"Mom?!" he shot his head up and pleaded, dropping the cards from his fingers, letting them slip onto the hospital floor.

He knew that was gonna happen. He did. That didn't mean it would be soon, right? Doctors were dumb and wrong sometimes. Why did he need to think about that bad life?

She merely took his chin in her hand and lifted his scared face. "It will be fine. In time, you'll adapt and be fine," she said so nicely.

Why is this happening?

Why her?

He hated cancer.

"I know you want somebody to blame, Peter. You're angry. It's okay. I'm angry, too," she confessed, and reacted to Peter's surprised face. She never seems angry. "I wish I wasn't leaving this life. Not yet. Being ripped away from my boy...?" she paused, and Peter thought for a moment she would cry. Cry just like that night when he overheard sobbing in her bedroom at home.

It felt so long ago. Light years ago.

"But it'll work out how it should," Mom said after a beat. "And it's nobody's fault," she then stressed. "You remember that talk we had with Grandma and Grandpa?" she asked gently 'til he nodded. "This just happens sometimes, Peter. In nature. Cells grow, people get very sick, and no matter how hard the nice doctors try, and no matter how much we pray to God, it isn't always enough to stop it. 'S not because of anything we did. Good or bad person? Not the reason. It's not my fault, your fault, Grandpa or the doctor's fault...understand? It's just...life."

Yes, he remembered that speech, but didn't know why it was supposed to make him feel any better.

"And, Peter?" his mother prompted again, saying the next sentence in a whisper. "It's not your daddy's fault either."

But what if he could help? What if he could...ya know...save you?

What if family's wrong about your stories being delirium?

You said he was magic! Powerful!

And the jerk LEFT.

If he was here, if he knew you were really sick...knew you were...dying...

"I miss him, too. Wishin' he was here, wanting a dad, that's normal. But he's not why I'm sick. He wouldn't hurt us..."

The boy finally looked, really looked at his poor mother, at her bald head and dry lips, and knew talking about anything she was saying, even though she was right, would make him cry.

And big boys don't cry.

"I'll go to the zoo," he finally said what would make her smile. "I'll dance it up for both of us."

She looked so happy for someone who'd gotten nature's worst card deck.

Her soft hand moved to his cheek. "Thank you, for bein' so brave, baby," she said words he didn't get. Mom was the brave one. Puking and hurting every day? Facing this crappy change as a wonderful, delightful person? Trapped in a boring, scary hospital? Worrying about him while she was sick? Accepting death so soon?

Meanwhile, Peter felt too weak for this planet.

"I don't know what I'd do without you," she whispered, probably not because of her physical pain or weakness. "Thanks for being here, Star-Lord." The feeling of her thumb brushing his cheek was so nice. It showed that she felt lucky, grateful, no matter where they were, no matter her pain, or the gloomy future coming around the corner.

"Anytime." He would do anything she asked, to the last minute she was alive, the last second she could talk to him.

She chuckled, and knocked her playing cards onto the floor, pretending it was an accident. "Whoops! This just ain't my game." Giggles filled the clean, chilly room. "Why don't you crank up Rock the Boat and we'll switch to Candy Land?" she suggested and winked at him. "I'll crush ya."

Peter saluted, and skipped to the volume dial on the boombox, and then to the stack of board games and Disney tapes on the nearby chair, ready to make those little colorful gingerbread men dance like no tomorrow.

*

**********

*

"If you could read my miiiiind...my thoughts coulda tell you...somethiiing..."

Gamora strolled into the motel room, and gave an endearing eye roll at her Terran boyfriend, who was singing words to an unknown song and holding a bottle of an orange drink.

"Jus like an old mooovie...movie star...wishin' ghosts..."

A half-empty bottle. And the strange song lyrics may have been a little slurred.

"Never be set freeeee...Dunno where weee went wrrrrong, but feelings're gone..."

Okay, very slurred.

"Why are you torturing yourself?" she asked with a sigh at the seeming melancholy nature of the song, and prepared the large bed for them to sleep.

"'Mm not. I ne'er heard this one," Peter Quill answered, followed by a hiccup and belated shrug. He squinted at the Zune and continued humming along. "I think she woulda liked it, though," he decided aloud, tone wistful but certain. "'S pretty."

Gamora shut her eyes, head turned away, and let her heart clench at the man's reflection.

Perhaps she should have been a touch more concerned that Peter was choosing to consume that amount of alcohol while letting his mind wander to the subject of his mother.

But honestly, she knew his thoughts had gone that route much earlier in the night, long before getting this level of drunk.

"Never thought I coulda...feel thiss waaaay...hmm...wait, lemme...lemme rewind it, this's the good part," Peter mumbled. "Shit, I think Groot took the speakerrr," he then whined through a burp. "Alriigh, G'mora, jus listen. This's pretty."

There had been a minor incident on a parking structure some foolish architects designed atop a high mountain. A parking structure Drax had insisted was close walking distance from his contact's base, Kraglin insisted The Quadrant would fit inside, while Rocket and Mantis insisted they could see all the measurement warning signs plastered around the lot.

None were correct.

Officials promised that the boots would be removed from their goddamn spaceship in the morning. Their team predictably bickered and passed around blame, until they discovered a small motel willing to accept seven individuals, including a cocky leader very fond of playing the 'we saved the galaxy twice' card.

However, the motel was quite cozy - five available bedrooms, a warm lounge, and a lovely view. The group's collective attitude lifted, and Peter was halfway through explaining a ridiculous game titled "Charades" before Rocket found the key to the liquor and snack supply, and turned the "boring" party into a pretty memorable evening.

It was when Mantis commented on the beauty of the shimmering Salcoret bay, filled with docked sailboats outside the window, that Gamora noticed Peter's sad eyes and subtle discomfort, the lump forming in his throat. Drax had begun absently humming the familiar song about the girl named Brandy missing her lost love, an action that months prior would have made Peter so proud and ecstatic, a close friend and comrade remembering and enjoying one of his favorite songs, any of his cherished music. Now though, Gamora knew the lyrics held different symbolism in his mind, and he forever avoided the song, could no longer hear it in the same context.

Tonight his easiest dodge was to rush out the Zune to "make the party complete" and discover some new songs.

Few observed, but it was also the same time he started gulping his drink at a faster pace.

"When ya reach tha part...heartache comes...would be meee..."

Despite the terribly depressing words he was poorly reciting, and as strange as it was to admit, this was the least sad Gamora had seen Peter while mentioning his mother since he learned of Ego's actions.

Throughout the entire past month, Peter's shock and agony over Ego's confession had gradually...dwindled? Lessened? There was certainly less sobbing, less dream-induced vomit. His coping had become a bit more rational. Calmer. Gamora didn't know if it was merely time aiding his wounds, or the strengthening familial bond of the team. Somewhere down the line, his brain and heart caught up to this new information, and he mostly adjusted to the real world. A real world filled with heartache and confusion, alongside laughter and adventure, video games and foreign "sitcom" romance tales.

He could truly smile again. He played music daily again.

And some nights, living in that confusing reality involved the exhausting feat of pushing a heavy spacecraft up a mountain, and hours later cutting loose and getting drunk with friends.

"Eugh, tha Zune's all slippry."

Gamora glanced over. Yes, he was quite drunk and looked tired, but not depressed. He didn't appear to be drinking away the sadness, nor was he drowning in it. She hoped. It was a less-than-ideal distraction tool, but felt unlikely to become a permanent crutch or addiction, a method to wallow in his grief. Peter's mind simply drifted to simple and sorrowful places when he let his guard down, and for now it was a perfectly bearable sight.

For now, she somehow knew he was okay.

"The hero would be me 'n heroes...hmm. Heroes...heroes often fail..."

Her eyes widened slightly, and she turned around from where she was adjusting pillows. "You didn't fail at anything, Peter." Alright, some lyrics did spark Gamora's worry that Peter was falling back into guilt or a depression. "We will get The Quadrant back tomorrow, and it was a group mistake..."

"It's justa soooooooong, G'mora, gooosh!" he interrupted like a petulant teenager, and took a few more swigs of the bottle that couldn't possibly be cold anymore.

Fair enough. The song did not necessarily need to express his true demons. But Peter's history of applying personal significance to his musical choices gave his girlfriend the implication that he was subconsciously feeling like a failure over something stronger than a parking disaster. "Okay, but you did not fail in any of our adventures, you know that, right? You're not some failing hero..."

"Mmm-hmm," he mumbled. "Song's almost overr..." The song was clearly set on a loop, and would never be over. "Ann I will never be set freee...ending's jus too hard to bear...I think..." he sang like he was hardly paying attention and just trying to memorize the lyrics. He pulled the bud out of his left ear and rested against the wall. "Didja want some help in here?" he asked, observing the foreign bedroom.

She shook her head fondly and sat on the mattress. "I think the room is clean enough now."

"It's tooo clllean," he stated and indulged another sip.

"That is debatable," she chuckled. "Peter, want to get ready for--"

"She believed she was goin' to Heaven, ya know."

Gamora paused brushing her hair and looked up at him, allowed her face to become serious.

It was the least sad she had seen Peter talk about his mother since he learned that Ego horrifically murdered the woman.

But his voice was still sad.

"Is that so?" Gamora asked softly, both fearful of the direction of the conversation and compelled to let him speak, for whatever reason that fact entered his memory, whatever reason his drunken mind chose to blurt it out.

Peter nodded simply, eyeing his rough hands. "Believed in the afterlife, all that good 'n happy stuff. Not super religious, but...believed in Heaven. Said she was going to 'a better place'," he choked on the last sentence and coughed. It sounded like he was quoting her words; Gamora vaguely recalled that phrase from reading the woman's deathbed letter. "I think she always knew it wasn't fair, to die so young, but...took comfort in thaa much," he shrugged, thoughtful during the complex topic of his mother's faith.

Gamora didn't feel it was appropriate to suggest that maybe that belief, that possibility could bring him comfort, too. And Peter wasn't asking for advice this night. He was just talking, and it was good. So she smiled sadly and nodded, remembering only pieces of her childhood Zehoberei religion - her culture's dominant faith and rituals; her parents' gratitude and lessons regarding their perceived creator; her father praying in the large temple days before the massacre.

It was difficult, after traveling through the cosmos and seeing so much evil, seeing so many interpretations of gods and even meeting literal ones, to form an opinion on the subject. She imagined it was the same for Peter in his travels and upbringing, even before meeting Ego, before discovering his own god genes.

Before discovering the truth about the origin of his mother's disease, realizing there was no good higher plan in motion, and that medical treatments were useless against a curse given by a celestial who was going to get what he wanted no matter the human technology.

"I dunno if she's up there," he admitted and looked to the motel ceiling. "If there's an 'up there' a'all. Never knew whatta believe, as a kid, or now. Whether it was true." He still looked sad and confused, not accusing his mother of lying, but likely hoping what she was taught was correct, that she received the peaceful second life he believed she deserved. Gamora continued brushing her hair and listened. "I dunno if Yondu's in Ravger Heaven either," he said and slouched in the chair. "Kraglin is so sure. So relieved. Thrilled." At the paternal segue he just sounded desperate, envious of his Ravager brother's metaphysical certainty in a cruel, uncertain universe. "It'd be nice. Fer Yondu. Hope he'snot suffring."

Setting down the brush and removing her rings, she saw Peter pick up the bottle again. "Well--"

"Whatta ya do in Ravger Heaven anyway?" he asked in a lighter, curious tone between swigs. "Sneak 'round 'n...steal e'other's best harps?" Gamora didn't even know what that meant, but found herself smirking. "Not like I wentta...Ravger Sunday School."

"Perhaps the worlds are not separate," she spoke before realizing it was aloud. "I mean...maybe they are in the same place," she said quieter, wanting to imagine a reality where all four of their parents could see them from above. "Maybe..." She grinned and noticed Peter looking at her, inquisitive. "Maybe they're both kicking Ego's ass."

"Heheheh, yeeeeeaaah..." he giggled, laughed at the idea with a mixture of contentment and childlike excitement.

And despite the sound being so frustratingly cute, Gamora couldn't help feeling that her joke and the booze were cheap ways to produce that beautiful laughter.

"Really did look like Mary Poppins..." Peter continued rambling, and Gamora continued her tasks around the small room, grateful he and the other guys would have plenty of time to deal with their inevitable hangovers in the morning before needing to leave the motel. "Pfft, he thought Mary Poppins wassa dude," he snickered and snorted.

Gamora paused, tilted her head.

Wait, Mary Poppins is female?

Interesting.

"She loved Mary Poppins," he then said, tone wistful again. "Her favorite movie."

Oh. More fiction.

"We watched it alltha time in the treatment rooms. Shared a vid tape collection with other patients sometimes. Mom loved alltha music. Every song," he told her, and began a quiet, incoherent rendition of some song about flying kites and feeding birds.

Impulsively, Gamora leaned over to his chair and ruffled his hair in affection, smiling at the sweet stories, taking comfort in Peter remembering somewhat happy memories.

"Did I ev'r mention that?" he asked when she resumed untying her boots. "Tha she loved Mary Poppins?"

"Mmm..." she thought for a moment, then shook her head. "I'm not sure. I don't think so."

"She did!" he emphasized this important passion. "She loved the park, too! My eighth birthday was at the park. Good 'ol Missouri park. St. Charlies has really nice parks. Ga-rate parks. Did I ever mention that?" he asked again, breaking the slurred stream of reminiscence Gamora was absorbing like the night she learned of the Hassellhoff father story. "That my mom loved the park with the lil' stone bridge?"

His girlfriend gave a small laugh, and placed their emergency contact devices on the clean dresser. "Yes, Peter," she reminded him warmly. "I believe you have."

"Oh," he instantly deflated. "Sorry. Talk 'bout her too much."

Gamora spun around in surprise, saw Peter staring at his lap. "No. No, you don't, Peter. I didn't mean it that way. I like learning--"

"It's 'kay to be tired o' the zact same thing. Kraglin always got sick of it when I wassa kid. Even the less asshole Ravgers said I talked 'bout my mom too much..."

Dammit. She squeezed her eyes shut, looking and feeling terrible over his words.

Holding and seizing, verbalizing those positive memories seemed an essential remedy to his broken heart, and she would never want him to stop being a confident, adorable chatterbox. She never wanted him to shut up about his mother.

Gamora knelt in front of him and gently peeled the bottle from his lips; she almost broke at his embarrassed expression. "It is a privilege to remember that much, Peter. And a privilege for me to hear them. Don't stop," she pleaded. The change in his eyes gave her the courage to break away, and she resumed unpacking on the dresser.

"You were right, ya know," he spoke up after a few seconds of quietly swallowing. "You were right, Gamora. You were right." Gamora peered over her shoulder and smiled, curious what she had said or done that he deemed correct. "I didn't lose her allover again," he stated with a sad shake of his head. "That was dumb. Fucker can't take her twice." There was a determined sneer in his tone. "Dumb of me."

She swallowed in remembrance of that morning pep talk one month ago. This was the first time he had mentioned it, never said anything until now. Gamora had wondered if the idea had struck him as disrespectful or stupid, and was relieved he finally felt this way, although it should have been evident from his mental improvement. Still... "Not dumb of you--"

"I was gonna leave alla you to stay with him. Tha's dumb. You're smart. I'mma moron."

"Peter--"

"This's really delicious gin," he changed the subject, his inebriated attention span only a small bit worse than his average, sober attention span. "Mmmm..." He took several more large gulps, letting the remainder of the orange beverage slide down his throat. "Yummy. Want any?" her boyfriend offered the last few drops, and Gamora sighed in amusement and shook her head 'no, thank you', finishing her room preparations and walking toward him. Peter examined the bottle in his hands and squinted at the label. "How do they even have gin in space without juniper berries?" he suddenly pondered, although it could not have been the first time he encountered or consumed the form of liquor in his adult, space-traveling life. "They just...stealin' our vodka names now?"

"Well, I would ask the baby in the next cabin about your liquor questions," Gamora joked, and carefully took the Zune from his right hand, replacing the empty bottle in his left with a steel mug of water, "but I believe the answer would just be 'I am Groot'."

"Hahaha!" Peter laughed hard and spit out much of the water. "Hehehe! You're a-silly!" he declared and playfully tried to swat her arm. "Sssssilly...silly head G'mora. A silly 'Mora," he repeated and giggled. "Ahhh. She was silly," he said, growing thoughtful again.

Gamora held his shoulder and pushed the mug back to him. "Try again," she said patiently, regretting the timing of that humorous comment.

He drank the water successfully, giving a thumbs-up while sipping, though spilled a fair amount from lack of coordination. "Mom was silly. Funny." Then he sighed. "Maybe it's best she didn't know..." Again Gamora glanced in the direction of his voice while drying and wrapping up the Zune, listening sadly and gesturing encouragement for Peter to continue sipping from the mug. "That she always thought he wassa good guy," he clarified the obvious reflection. "Be a horrible waytta die, knowin' you were betrayed like that..." There was heartbreak in that voice, in conceding that his mother's ignorance to Ego's true character, blissful unawareness that her disease wasn't from random chance, her death wasn't a benevolent higher power taking her early, was possibly preferable to living her last moments with the same anger and bitterness that may never fully leave her son.

It was another change in opinion, an open-minded view Gamora was relieved and grateful to hear him acknowledge.

"It's best she didn't know..." The repetition felt like a frustrating, yet peaceful decision.

"I might agree." Gamora gently picked up his hand. "Let's go to sleep, Peter. I think everyone else is. Busy day tomorrow--"

"Why didn't I take her hand?" he asked in the most confused, hushed tone, furrowing his brows and staring at his own hand laced with green.

Crap!

Gamora jumped to help him stand, knowing and fearful that question and subject change would lead into a dangerous area. "Bed, Captain," she emphasized and pulled him from the seat, internally begging him to drop the painful quandary over a past that could not be altered. "Bed." Save it for another night.

The man stumbled and leaned against Gamora for support to prevent falling flat on his face during the short journey to the bed. "Gamora?" he began as they walked, the smell of gin breath strong in her face. "Gamora, I think I've had an--ahaha, no, don't tickle!" he whined, and nearly tripped while trying to squirm away, looking scandalized and childish as if this was done on purpose. Gamora rolled her eyes and apologized, loosening her grip where her fingers had accidentally squeezed his side.

Seconds later her action seemed to have been forgiven and forgotten, and the captain bounced onto the bed. "Gamora, I think...I recenly..." he resumed whatever he had been attempting to communicate. "I recenly had an epi...epiphan..epiphany? Epipomy? E-pip-hony? Yeah. Pifomy."

No. Please, no. No more epiphanies.

Yes, Peter was doing overall better in dealing with his new trauma, yes it was natural for him to reflect about his mother and childhood while drunk, and yes she never wanted to silence something important to him or their friends. But she was also in a pleasant mood despite the day's annoying events, and they all needed to recharge for business tomorrow, and she didn't think she could bear another heartbreaking, painful sentence from the man she...

"If it wasn't for you...if you didn't help me, I...I never coulda gotten through...thisss. Gotten through knowing Ego...killed Mom," he confessed, staring up at her with such earnest, grateful eyes.

What?

"I dunno what I'd do without you, 'Mora."

Those drunken mumblings lost Gamora completely.

He was crediting her as the main reason he was no longer falling apart over this knowledge? Why he no longer felt wholly defeated and numb? Why he could smile and live and be happy again?

What exactly had she done to be considered so vital? What did she do besides run her mouth over topics she had no expertise? What was so remarkable about her presence, when she usually just listened to him ramble and watched him regurgitate, indulged in card games and held him while he cried, offering very few practical solutions?

Gamora didn't feel like this made any sense, that she played a crucial role in Peter's trauma recovery, but she also knew that Peter was being completely honest.

"You're like..." His voice caused her to glance down from where she was hovering over the bed; Peter was already making himself comfortable, ready to hog all the blankets once she joined him. "You're like my guardian angel," he sighed, and smiled into the pillow.

Your what?

"Ha! Get it?" Peter laughed in excitement and opened his eyes. "Guardian? Cuz we're Guardians. Guardian angel! Hehe! You get it?"

Gamora could only shake her head. "No," she answered honestly. She wasn't teasing or frustrated. Just honestly curious. These beings were unfamiliar.

Peter pouted. "You knooooow. Guardian angels," he repeated, like it somehow explained everything, as though it would trigger her non-existent memory of such beings. "Like...with the wings...an' stuff. They help people. Ur mine."

The Earth references Peter commonly used were often difficult to grasp, even when he wasn't sleepy and intoxicated. Sometimes it was because he purposely gave the story a humorous, exaggerated slant. Other times he attempted a genuine, serious explanation, but the strangeness of his homeworld still confused the warrior and other crew members. So trying to understand and imagine these "guarding angels" was twice as difficult for Gamora while Peter was drifting off, and his brain was muddled from Salcoret gin.

Nevertheless, these aiding cherubs sounded much like another religious concept, another belief possibly passed down from his mother and human family.

The concept of winged angels helping people, the idea of a person receiving a special helper to provide guidance, was nice and respectable. Comforting. But Gamora did feel like Peter calling her one was incorrect, placing her too high on a pedestal. That sacred title should probably go to his mother, if being related and deceased were not disqualifiers. Not to Gamora, who despite caring deeply for Peter, despite how much Groot loved her and the team accepted her, and despite doing her best to lead a moral life today, failed to view herself as an 'angel'.

No matter how much Peter insisted that she was the reason he was managing through this tough time, she had still abandoned him after their stupid fight, and allowed that celestial monster to torture the shit out of him before returning. She had still let her damaged sister run off on a terrible vengeance quest, instead of chasing after and convincing her to stay.

She had still spent a majority of her life doing the opposite of 'helping people'.

"I'm not perfect, Peter," she whispered to him, reminded, and pet his hair.

"Not puuurfect," he replied. "Jus...a guardian angel," he shrugged deeper into the comforter. Again, like that was all the explanation necessary. Like Gamora knew the difference. "But alive," he added. "An green. An hot. An a litral Guardian. An with ssswords..."

She smiled at his adorable slurs, and overheard Rocket and Groot still awake in the next room. Peter mumbled unhappily about 'having to use the room close to the noisy rodent' and that he should have swapped his drink with something gross because 'it woulda been funny'. Gamora was merely grateful the tiny tree and his friend were having a less upsetting conversation than the night of Peter's first massive breakdown.

And she thought about her ridiculous, insufferable boyfriend, who would likely remain heartbroken over his mother's fate for the rest of his life, but did not allow it to stop him from having fun. This man who drove Gamora crazy, yet she still listened to whenever he was sad, who she forgave when the group found themselves in a motel due to poor planning, and who she assisted without a second thought when he drank himself to the point of needing help walking to the damn bed.

Because he did the same for all of them.

The way he helped Mantis bandage her injuries and fix her bent antennae following a scuffle, while listening and growing righteously furious about the abuse she had also faced under Ego. The way he grilled Drax to be certain his contact's proposition was legal. The way he helped Rocket keep Groot warm during their journey to find shelter after leaving the mountain. And the way he comforted her about Nebula's departure, comforted Gamora about her own fears, about starting fresh after escaping her former, tyrannical master.

Peter had a determination to fix any problem a friend might have. A real honesty and transparency. A loyalty that felt rare. The least his girlfriend could do was help him move forward, help him get some closure.

He loved his mother so much and without shame, and bravely fought against the father who had tried to erase that maternal love. The father who didn't appreciate what was right in front of him, both with his claimed true romantic love, and again with his amazingly unique son. Peter somehow understood what Ego did not - that real love is about more than idolizing the person and waxing poetic about the past. It means respect and decency, and a lot of hard work. It is about being selfless and caring, and wanting what's best for the other person. A type of love Peter showed Gamora and the team every day.

Gamora's affection for Peter had nothing to do with perfection. She loved their disagreements, and bickering, and squabbles. She loved learning about his past, no matter how troubling. Loved his problems, and flaws, and really annoying habits. Loved his silly drunken persona, obnoxious declarations that he was "bored," and his weird brand of humor.

Because when he needed to be serious and responsible, when he needed to be sweet and understanding, he was the best solace, best friend she ever could have asked. Being in his presence improved her life, sometimes with only a smile and a laugh that made her happy to be alive, made her smile and laugh more than anything.

Maybe that was what Peter meant when he called her his "guardian angel." That perfection was irrelevant to his love and gratitude; that her aid felt more special because she was real rather than a fantasy.

She looked out the window at the bay and docked ships, and tucked the Zune safely under his pillow. "Maybe tomorrow after the contact negotiation we can play the game of Go Fishing," she suggested, the body of water and creatures inside reminding her of the game's name.

"Fiiiiiiiiiissshhh..." he corrected and scrunched his nose at the suffix, eyes still closed.

The green heroine chuckled. "Oh. My mistake."

And she had a possible "epiphany" of her very own.

If being "perfect" was not a requirement for being a guardian angel, then perhaps Peter Quill was her's.

Perhaps Peter Quill was a "guardian angel" for all of the Guardians of the Galaxy.

"I love you," he said after several quiet seconds, and Gamora felt a pang in her chest, touched by the simple honesty in his words, and torn regarding whether to finally voice what she'd known for months. "Thanks for bein' here...here with me..." he then muttered, and buried further into the strange bed, already beginning to snore like a siren.

She decided to save those three reciprocal words for when her boyfriend was sober and conscious enough to fully appreciate them.

Instead, for now, Gamora kissed the back of his hand, and then his forehead.

"Anytime, Star-Lord."