Art of War
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▶• lıllılı.ıllı.ılılıılıı.lllııılı. Now Playing [Bad Moon Rising] 0:03 ———♡——— 2:18 ◁◁ ▐ ▌ ▷▷
I see the bad moon a-rising ♫
I see trouble on the way ♫
♫ I see earthquakes and lightning ♫
I see bad times today —♫
[ 𝙸𝙽𝚃𝙴𝚁𝚁𝚄𝙿𝚃𝙴𝙳 ]
[𝚂𝚈𝚂𝚃𝙴𝙼] ▷▷ 𝚂𝚔𝚒𝚙𝚙𝚒𝚗𝚐...
▶• lıllılı.ıllı.ılılıılıı.lllııılı. Now Playing [Separate Ways (Worlds Apart)] 0:27 ———♡——— 4:26 ◁◁ ▐ ▌ ▷▷
♫ Feeling that it's gone
♫ Can't change your mind
♫ If we can't go on
♫To survive the tide ♫
♫ Love divides —
[ 𝙸𝙽𝚃𝙴𝚁𝚁𝚄𝙿𝚃𝙴𝙳 ]
[𝚂𝚈𝚂𝚃𝙴𝙼] ▷▷ 𝚂𝚔𝚒𝚙𝚙𝚒𝚗𝚐...
▶• lıllılı.ıllı.ılılıılıı.lllııılı. Now Playing [Who'll Stop The Rain] 0:14 ———♡——— 2:30 ◁◁ ▐ ▌ ▷▷
♫ Long as I remember
The rain been comin' down ♫
♫ Clouds of myst'ry pourin' ♫
Confusion on the ground ♫
♫ Good men through the ages, tried to find the sun ♫
♫ And I wonder, still I wonder
♫ Who'll stop the rain —
"Dude. Dude!"
Quill leaned forward in his chair, his eyes glued on the music player resting in the palm of his hand, all while the medley of Creedence Clearwater Revival drifted quietly through the medbay room he occupied.
His grin was wide enough to be vaguely concerning.
"…dude!"
Perched atop the cushioned window bay across from him, Gamora had long since decided the autumn leaves drifting by outside were considerably more interesting than the conversation happening behind her.
"You have said that seventeen times now," she responded dryly, never once looking his way.
Quill practically cackled as his thumb flicked through another endless stretch of songs.
"It just keeps going!" His attention remained entirely fixed on the device in his hands. If Gamora's growing annoyance registered at all, he gave no indication of it. "This thing is insane! I swear, I thought I hit the end like twenty minutes ago — and then there were more songs. Then more songs after those songs! I'm four hundred songs past what my Zune had, this thing is awesome!"
Propped upright beneath a nest of blankets and pillows that took up nearly half the bed, Peter looked up from the raised tray stretched over his him and the bowl of soup that sat atop it. The steam from inside curled lazily toward the ceiling with a stack of crackers left untouched to the side.
"I mean…Mr. Stark did build an entire clean-energy grid that powers most, if not like…all of New York City." Peter fiddled with the handle of his spoon, his red fingerless gloves nearly disappearing beneath the bunched sleeves of an oversized gray hoodie that looked several sizes too big for him. "Hate to say it, but a new music player feels a little tame by comparison."
"Yeah, yeah, cool, energy grid and stuff, got it." Quill waved the comment away without even looking up from the screen. "Can your energy grid play Boston while I'm six galaxies away from Earth? Yeah, didn't think so." He grinned ear-to-ear as he settled back in his chair, all while gesturing to the palm-sized device. "This wins — hands down."
Peter snorted, the best he could muster up for a laugh. His attention dropped back to the bowl as he carefully guided another spoonful toward his mouth, focusing just enough to make sure it actually arrived there instead of ending up somewhere considerably more embarrassing.
The effort felt ridiculous. Every movement required way more concentration than it ever should have.
Peter really hated that about himself right about now.
"I am Groot."
The familiar voice pulled his attention away from the bowl.
Groot hung from the edge of the tray with both arms, his tiny legs bicycling furiously through empty air as he fought his way upward.
After a moment of determined effort, he finally hauled himself up with a triumphant huff before stomping directly through the scattered cracker packets on his way toward Peter.
"I am Groot," he repeated, this time with a firmer voice, all but puffing his chest outward along the way.
Despite himself, a small smile tugged at Peter's mouth.
The little guy had been hovering around him for most of the afternoon, repeatedly abandoning whatever had briefly captured his attention elsewhere only to return a few minutes later. More often than not, he seemed to come back carrying something he'd decided would improve Peter's recovery.
At one point, Groot had proudly presented him with a brightly colored get-well-soon card he'd acquired from somewhere in the medical wing. The card had been addressed to someone named Cadet Williams.
For as lousy as he'd been feeling lately, the effort was oddly comforting.
"How many songs are on it?" Peter finally asked, managing a swallow of his soup, if only at Groot's encouragement.
Quill barked a gleeful laugh.
"I don't know!" He raised the device triumphantly. "It's an infinite mix-tape. It just goes on and on, it doesn't ever end!"
"That's nonsense," Gamora chimed in, barely looking over her shoulder at the two of them. "It must end at some point. All things must end."
Cradling the spoon a moment longer than necessary, Peter found himself smiling despite the effort it took just to eat.
"Mr. Stark's tech is pretty awesome," he defended, going for the soup again only to back off from the heat with a wince. "I wouldn't be too surprised if he managed to find a way."
"Pretty awesome?" Quill huffed. "That doesn't even begin to touch this thing —this thing is way better than my Zune, and I loved my Zune. But this thing's insane! Do you have any idea what it's gonna do once we leave Earth? It can still get new music. New music, bro! While I'm flying through space!"
Groot followed the movement of the music player with surprising interest from atop the tray, eyes tracking it as Quill waved it around for emphasis.
"Every time I asked how it works — 'Stark satellites.' Like that explained literally anything for me. The guy just pointed up all smug and stuff and said, 'Stark satellites.' I didn't even understand half the words he used — he hit me with about twenty made-up science words, they had to be made up words. I understood maybe six of 'em. But this thing's got more songs on it than I could listen to in a dozen lifetimes, so I am not complaining!"
Quill leaned back in his chair, the excitement never really leaving him. His thumb continued flicking through the endless stream of songs while the occasional artist name earned a nod of approval, a scoff, or an enthusiastic grin.
"There's no way I'm not finding your song now, Little Peter," Quill declared, jabbing the player in his direction. The silver gunmetal reflected a shine off the overhead lights, catching on the orange strip that ran down the side. "Not with this much music. Somewhere in here is the one. The song that makes you go, 'That's me. That's my entire deal in three minutes and thirty-six seconds.' I refuse to believe it doesn't exist. Everyone has a song, just you wait and see."
Peter rolled his eyes and lowered his attention back down to the tray. Balancing the spoon carefully between gloved fingers, he scooped up another mouthful and brought it toward his face. The steam curling from the bowl should have been warning enough.
It wasn't. The second the soup touched his tongue, he immediately regretted the decision.
"Ah — hot."
Peter lowered the spoon with a grimace, making a face while trying very hard not to spit the soup back into the bowl. Recovery royally sucked.
"Oh, that's definitely not your song."
"Quill." Gamora finally looked away from the window, one brow arched upward against the emerald of her skin, her gaze shifting away from Peter's obvious discomfort to the music player still clutched in Quill's hand. "You have somehow become even more insufferable since Stark gave you that thing. Can you not see that this boy is recovering? He can barely manage to feed himself a proper meal. Leave him to rest in peace."
"Heyyy—!" Peter's weak protest came at the same time as Quill's, "Whaa? No!"
Any attempt Peter made to defend himself was promptly bulldozed beneath Quill's considerably louder objection.
"There's no time to waste," he insisted. "I gotta find Little Pete's song now before we leave!"
Quill reclined deeper into his chair, eyes never leaving the music player as another wave of songs slipped beneath his thumb. Whatever mission he'd assigned himself, he appeared fully committed to it.
Across the room, Gamora's expression flattened.
"Then do it in silence," she insisted, turning back toward the window just in time for Quill to completely ignore her and crank the volume up another notch, rocking and bouncing in his chair to the beat.
♫ Still the rain kept pourin',
Fallin' on my ears ♫
♫ And I wonder, still I wonder ♫
Who'll stop the rain ♫
Across the tray, Groot had apparently taken a renewed interest in Peter's soup. The little tree leaned over the spoon hovering in Peter's hand and blew a determined stream of air across the surface.
Peter watched him for a moment before deciding not to question it.
The second spoonful went noticeably better, arriving at a temperature that no longer felt determined to strip the skin from the roof of his mouth.
"Sucks you guys gotta leave," he said, his throat bouncing hard with a swallow as he followed up with, "feels like you just got here."
Without looking up from the screen, Quill pointed vaguely in Peter's direction with the hand not holding his new music player.
"To be fair, you spent a decent chunk of that time trying not to die," he said, almost too nonchalantly. "That usually makes the weeks blur together."
Peter immediately made a face at him. The expression lasted only a second before he buried it behind another spoonful of soup, pre-cooled down by the tiny tree on his tray.
Across the room, Gamora let her gaze linger briefly on Peter and the increasingly absurd scene unfolding in the room she occupied — Groot dutifully blowing tiny puffs of air across each spoonful before Peter took a sip — until she finally pushed herself away from the window bay.
"I'll be back," she said, smoothing a loose strand of dark mix-toned hair behind one ear as she headed for the door. "Drax can't be left unattended for too long."
That finally pulled Quill's attention away from the music player.
"What? Why?" He frowned, following Gamora across the room with only his eyes. "I've been left unattended since Colonel Party Pooper bailed, and I've been doing great. I've only made, like... three questionable decisions. Drax can't be that much worse."
By the time Quill spoke, Gamora had already reached the far side of the medbay. The automated glass doors parted at her approach with a soft mechanical hiss.
She paused, one hand resting against the frame. "The last time he was left alone, he challenged one of Stark's robotic vacuum cleaners to honorable combat."
The room briefly fell silent.
"...who won?" Peter finally asked.
For a long moment, Gamora said nothing. The room settled into an awkward silence filled only by the music playing softly from Quill's speakers and the muted sounds of the medical wing from behind the doors.
"I believe in no such thing as winners in a situation like that," Gamora answered, not saying another word as she pushed away from the doorway and disappeared into the corridor. The glass doors slid shut behind her with a quiet hiss, leaving only the distant sounds of the medical wing and the music still drifting from Quill's speakers.
Peter watched the doors for another second before a weak chuckle finally escaped him. "I can't imagine Mr. Stark's upset that you guys are leaving."
"Actually…" Quill was quick to start, "he was pretty torn up about it. Kept talking about how the Avengers would never recover from losing our combined expertise. Called us the backbone of the operation. I think there were tears." He held up the player, tilting it just enough for the orange stripe along the side to catch the light. "Then he gave me this as a farewell gift. Said he wanted me to remember him when the planet realized what it had lost."
Across the tray, Groot slowly turned to look at Quill.
Peter did the same.
For a moment, neither of them said anything. One, a recovering teenager wrapped in enough blankets to survive winter, and the other, a six-inch tree standing amongst cracker packets — both appeared equally unconvinced.
"Right," Peter murmured, shifting himself deeper into the raised bed with a grunt. Across the tray, Groot remained planted beside the bowl, cheeks puffing as he continued blowing a steady stream of air across the soup with all the focus of someone defusing a bomb.
Sufficiently cooled to Groot's standards, Peter dug his spoon back in.
"Thanks again..by the way. For helping save me and all," he mentioned, nudging the spoon through the broth before finally scooping up another mouthful. "That was so crazy."
"Oh man, was it." Beside the bed, Quill's attention drifted between Peter and the music player in his hands. His thumb continued flicking through song after song, occasionally stopping just long enough for him to make a face before moving on. "I haven't seen a rescue go that sideways since a Ravager crew tried extracting a guy from a Kylos prison. Whole thing ended with three ships totaled and some guy getting stabbed with a cafeteria tray."
Only the monitors continued their steady rhythm as the conversation stalled.
Peter's spoon slowed halfway back toward the bowl. The brief smile he'd managed earlier had vanished, leaving him staring down into the broth instead. His shoulders had tightened beneath the oversized hoodie, the hand holding the spoon lingering motionless for a beat too long.
Quill happened to look up just in time to catch it. The movement of his thumb slowed, then stopped altogether against the screen.
"But I mean, we've gone through way crazier stuff, you know," he quickly countered, looking for a different approach to lightening the room — the way Peter had gone quiet told him he'd accidentally stepped in something. "You gotta understand man, we're the Guardians of the Galaxy. Sure, Groot was about three seconds and two fire balls away from becoming the galaxy's biggest burnt toothpick —"
"I am Groot!"
Quill pointed at the little tree without missing a beat. "Which Groot says totally wouldn't have been your fault anyway!"
Something in Peter's expression tightened. His eyes fell back to the soup, the spoon having stopped moving altogether, suspended above the bowl as heat shimmered above the broth.
The steam continued to rise in slow, twisting ribbons. Peter stared straight through it, unmoving, the utensil still suspended in his hand while the broth beneath it settled.
Quill frowned.
"Hey." He reached over and gave the edge of the tray a gentle bump with his fist. "Don't start doing that thing."
The tray shifted slightly beneath the bump. Peter startled just enough for the spoon to slip from his fingers and fall back into the bowl.
Across from him, Groot wobbled and threw both arms out to steady himself.
"That thing?" Peter blinked once.
"Yeah, that thing. I know what that thing is. The whole 'if only I'd zigged instead of zagged' thing that you're doing in your head." Quill waved his hand vaguely. "Trust me, that road goes nowhere good. I should know. You don't think I haven't replayed every dumb decision I've ever made? I'd never get anything done if I was always doing that. At some point you've gotta stop treating every bad thing that happens like it was your fault. So I don't know how much responsibility you're assigning yourself for the whole getting-kidnapped part of it all, but from one abducted kid to another? First time it happened to me I woke up in a spaceship, in another galaxy. Sometimes life just decides you're having a weird day."
Peter looked down at the spoon, then slowly wrapped his fingers back around the handle. He didn't look convinced, his attention remaining fixed on the bowl while Groot settled down beside it, his legs going on to dangle over the edge of the tray.
Quill watched both of them for a moment, a frown pulling at his mouth as he caught the look on Peter's face.
"Dude, come on." He pointed toward Peter with the music player. "For a guy who'd fought this hard to stay alive, you sure are spending an awful lot of energy acting like it's a bad thing. You know, I've seen Ravagers get themselves taken out by stuff so unbelievably dumb it should be illegal. Bad airlock seals. Bar fights. One guy somehow got trapped in his own cargo lift for three days, died of dehydration — not a smart fella."
Quill let the words hang for a second.
"Listen. I don't know how to explain this to you, but getting abducted by a giant green bean meanie murder-monster is not usually considered a skill issue. The fact that you got turned into a limited-edition Capri Sun and you're sitting here eating soup instead of being a tragic cautionary tale is already a pretty awesome outcome, in my honest opinion." He gestured toward the bowl. "So maybe stop trying to make this into one big L and instead focus on getting through lunch. Gamora was kinda right, you know. You're not doing too good there. Wasn't gunna say anything at first. But here we are."
Peter's grip tightened around the spoon for a moment before a reluctant smile finally tugged at the corner of his mouth.
"Yeah...Mr. Stark said the same thing." He stirred the soup once before adding, "A few times, actually."
"Smart guy." Quill immediately pointed across the room with the hand holding the music player, as if gesturing to the man not present. "Massively arrogant, completely conceited, way too pleased with himself most of the time — but if that's the guy giving out these things?" His thumb was already moving again before he'd finished the sentence, flicking through another stretch of songs. "Well, I'm willing to overlook a lot."
Peter huffed a quiet laugh through his nose. It faded almost as quickly as it had appeared, a tight brow creasing at his forehead as he looked back down.
The spoon drifted through the broth in a slow circle before tapping softly against the side, and he watched the ripples spread across the surface, his partially-gloved thumb rubbing absently against the handle.
"It's just that…I dunno, man. Everything's been going wrong lately. Like, all the time." Peter nudged a floating noodle beneath the surface. And then another after that. "All year long I keep…I keep messing things up. Big time. I keep making the wrong call, or thinking I've got something handled and then I really don't…I know I'm still figuring this stuff out, but it'd be nice if I got at least one thing right once in a while." His grip tightened slightly around the spoon as a dry huff escaped him. "Absolutely none of this would happen to Mr. Stark. He'd never let himself get chloroformed in a freaking parking garage—"
"— you really look up to this guy, don't you?"
For the first time in several minutes, Quill set the device aside. The music player settled into his lap as he looked across at Peter.
Peter's eyes lifted from the soup. The look he gave Quill suggested he was preparing an argument, right up until he realized he didn't actually have one.
"He looks up to you too, you know," Quill added, as if noticing as much.
Peter rolled his eyes so hard it looked physically painful.
"No, really. That's good, that's healthy." Quill shrugged, as if it were the most obvious thing to be said. "You don't want one guy doing all the idolizing—"
"It's not idolizing." Peter's grip tightened around the spoon as he shot Quill an irritated look.
"Oh no, it's definitely not," Quill didn't so much as hesitate, nodding with exaggerated seriousness, already fighting a grin. "No reason to unpack any of that. Not your dad-dad, obviously." He looked down at the screen of the music player with an obvious smirk. "That's why every story starts with 'Mr. Stark' and ends with…'Mr. Stark.'"
The irritation from Peter was immediate, but so was the uncomfortable realization that arguing the point would only make Quill's grin worse.
After all, it was difficult to dispute the optics when Mr. Stark had apparently looked at Earth's Mightiest Heroes, and the Guardians of the Galaxy, and decided all were needed to rescue one kid from Queens.
Sitting there beneath a pile of blankets with a bowl of soup, Peter felt a lot closer to Groot's height than theirs. The comparison wasn't doing much for his confidence.
His spoon drifted through the broth in a slow circle, the motion carrying on for a few seconds without Peter even realizing he was doing it.
"Hey, you know — did we ever tell you Groot's story?" Quill suddenly asked, looking up from the music player just as abruptly.
Peter's attention lifted from the soup, the spoon slowing to a stop halfway through another idle stir as he gave a quiet shake of his head.
"I am Groot!"
Across the tray, Groot immediately straightened to his full six-inch height. Tiny wooden feet planted against the tray while he looked between Quill and Peter — one branch-like hand even rose halfway into the air.
"Yeah, yeah, you." Quill waved him off. "Well, technically you, but also not you. It's complicated."
Groot looked deeply offended.
Quill ignored him.
"See, when I first met Groot, he was..." Quill's thumb paused against the screen of the music player. His gaze drifted briefly toward the little tree perched beside Peter's bowl. "Actually, this is already confusing. There's this Groot, but before him, we had a bigger guy. Well, we didn't have — Rocket had…you know, yeah — let's just call him Rocket's Groot."
"I am Groot!"
"Anyway, Rocket's Groot was different." Quill rolled the music player idly between his hands, a small smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. "Bigger. Talked less. Hit people with other people. Great guy, really, miss him to pieces."
Across the tray, Groot puffed out his chest proudly. Peter glanced from the tiny tree to Quill, then back again.
"Point is, when this little dude showed up, everybody kept looking at him and comparing him to Rocket's Groot," Quill kept on. "None of us knew — was he going to be as strong? Is he gunna be as smart? Is he gonna grow the same? Does he…you know, does he remember the same stuff? Any of the same stuff?"
"I am Groot."
Quill snapped his fingers and pointed at him. "Right, and then about after three months, we stopped doing all of that."
Peter frowned. "Why?"
"Because this Groot kept trying to eat batteries," Quill ticked the first item off on his fingers, "flushed the ship keys. Stole Gamora's soap, and then ate Gamora's soap, and then we had to start changing sap diapers for about nine weeks straight." He shrugged, all while Peter's brows climbed a little higher with each example. "Turns out it's pretty hard to compare somebody to a legend when they're busy trying to glue themselves to furniture."
"I am Groot!"
Across the tray, Groot threw both arms into the air in protest, nearly losing his balance in the process.
Quill gave him a look. "Don't act like that didn't happen."
Peter looked across the tray, where Groot was standing with both arms folded across his chest, looking every bit as offended as a six-inch-tall tree could manage.
"Thing is, everybody kept looking at him and expecting the old Groot to come back. But he never did." With the music play forgotten in his lap, Quill's attention lingered on the tiny tree for a moment longer, a faint smile eventually breaking the pause. "Because he wasn't the old Groot. He came from him, sure. Shared pieces of him and all. But that never meant he had to spend his whole life trying to live up to him, you know? Wouldn't be fair. Wouldn't give him a shot to be…you know, him. At the end of the day, he's his own…tree..thing."
Peter's gaze drifted back toward the little tree standing atop the tray. Groot looked nothing like the towering version Quill had described, and yet nobody in the room seemed bothered that he wasn't. Not Rocket. Not Quill. Not any of the others.
The thought lingered longer than he wanted it to. His spoon sat forgotten in the bowl while a knot tightened somewhere behind his ribs.
"What happened?" Peter cleared his throat to clarify. "To Rocket's Groot? You said he's gone?"
For a moment, Quill didn't answer. His fingers drummed against the armrest of the chair, the easy humor he'd been carrying through the conversation fading just a little.
"Yeah…yeah. He, uh…he died. Saving us..we lost him in that mission…" Quill's gaze drifted toward the floor. "Afterward, Rocket, he — uh, well, he planted a cutting from him. And then, this little knucklehead showed up." Quill looked up, finding Groot still standing atop the tray with his arms stubbornly folded. "He's just a baby right now, but…he's growing. And one day, he's gonna grow to be his own big fella, aren'tcha?"
Quill reached over and poked Groot in the side.
The little tree shot him an annoyed look that didn't last long.
"So will you. Trust me," Quill mentioned to Peter, letting his hand fall back to the music player with a small shrug. "But it's kinda hard to figure out who you're gonna be when you're busy measuring yourself against somebody who's already got like, a forty years head start."
A pause fell between them as Peter watched Groot for a moment, the little tree having wandered back toward the bowl, peering over the rim with both hands resting against the edge.
Peter looked down at it too, the spoon shifting slightly in his hand as something uncomfortable began fitting together in the back of his mind.
He realized, thinking on Quill's story — nobody seemed to look at Groot and compare him to the one they'd lost. Nobody expected him to live up to somebody else's legacy. Somehow, being connected to someone else had never turned into an obligation to become them.
Peter found himself staring at the little tree a moment longer, quietly wondering when he'd decided the same rule didn't apply to him.
"I died, too," he finally heard himself say. "Mr. Stark had them bring me back to life."
"Yeah, exactly." Quill glanced down at the music player again, idly scrolling through the playlist as though the conversation had already reached a perfectly reasonable conclusion. "See? That's why this metaphor is working so well."
Peter didn't answer. His gaze dropped back toward the bowl, the spoon drifting once through the broth before going still again. The realization settled somewhere deep in his chest with uncomfortable clarity.
Across from him, Quill's thumb drifted across the scroll wheel for another second before stopping.
"...wait." A frown pulled at his face as he looked to Peter. "Is that what this is about?"
Peter's head snapped up so fast it was almost jarring.
One hand left the spoon and swept sharply around the room — the IV stands beside the bed, the tubing still tethering him to machines. The gesture was quick, frustrated, and entirely wordless.
"Oh." Quill's eyes briefly followed the gesture, that single syllable carrying considerably more understanding than the last few minutes of conversation combined. "You think you're blowing that second shot they gave you."
Peter didn't answer.
His hand fell back to the tray.
He didn't have to.
Fingers drummed persistently against the armrest of the chair, as Quill's gaze lingered in an empty space between Groot and Peter, and whatever crackers had been discarded on the tray.
"Okay…" Quill exhaled slowly through his nose and sank deeper into the chair, his free hand rubbing against his beard. "Yeah…that, uh…that-that is actually a lot, little dude."
The room fell quiet.
For a few seconds, only the distant hum of the medbay and the occasional clink of Peter's spoon against the bowl filled the space.
"Well. Honestly?" Quill cleared his throat, his thumb resuming drifting through the endless library in his hands. "That just means finding your song is way more important than I thought."
Suddenly, Peter creased his forehead. "What?"
"Think about it." Quill pointed at him with the device. "You've got all this crazy stuff rattling around in your head. Green-meanie monster near-death experiences, identity complexes, weird mentor issues. All that and you're practically a whole album at this point. We find you that song, and it'll all start to make sense."
Peter rolled his eyes. Quill ignored him, leaning forward in his chair, his attention dropping fully to the music player.
His thumb spun the wheel faster now, scrolling through artists and albums at a pace that suggested he wasn't wasting anymore time.
Across the tray, Groot's head tilted. The little tree abandoned his post beside the soup and hurried across the plastic surface, weaving around cracker packets and Peter's bowl before stopping at the edge nearest Quill's chair.
"I am Groot!"
Quill looked down, his gaze following the tiny tree as he pointed insistently at the device. "No, Groot, I'm not playing the Macarena."
Stretching up onto the tips of his roots, he pointed insistently at the music player.
"I am Groot!"
"Yeah, dude, I know you like that song, but I'm looking for something —"
"—I am Groot!" Groot immediately stretched after the device, nearly losing his balance in his determination.
Quill stared at him.
Groot stared right back.
A beat passed, with the standoff somehow feeling far more serious than Peter ever thought an argument regarding music could ever get.
"Okay, fine." Quill gave in with a long-suffering sigh, shaking his head as he pressed the button and surrendered control of the playlist.
A second later, the familiar opening notes spilled from the speakers, and the little tree immediately shot to his feet atop the tray.
Peter barely had time to set his spoon down before Groot launched into an enthusiastic, wildly exaggerated rendition of the Macarena dance — a performance that, judging by Quill's complete lack of surprise, was hardly a new development.
Tiny wooden arms swung left, right, up, and over his head while he stomped from one side of the tray to the other with complete musical confidence.
▶• lıllılı.ıllı.ılılıılıı.lllııılı. Now Playing [Macarena] 0:23 ———♡——— 2:18 ◁◁ ▐ ▌ ▷▷
♫ Dale a tu cuerpo alegria Macarena
'Que tu cuerpo es pa' darle alegria y cosa buena ♫
♫ Dale a tu cuerpo alegria, Macarena ♫
Hey, Macarena ♫
¡Ay! ♫
♫ I was born by the river in a little tent ♫
♫ Oh, and just like the river
I've been a-runnin' ever since ♫
♫ It's been a long, a long time comin' ♫
but I know, oh-oo-oh ♫
a change gon' come, oh yes, it will ♫
The timeless sound of Sam Cooke drifted through the room as Tony made another slow lap through Steve's quarters, snapping his fingers along to the warm, crackling rhythm of music until it carried him all the way to the record player near the window.
At first glance it looked straight from the 1940's — a dark wooden gramophone, brass fittings, and a flower-shaped horn rising above the turntable. But a slim digital display glowing beneath the lid quietly betrayed the decades hidden inside.
His fingertips brushed across the polished wood surrounding the speaker, tracing the smooth edge of the cabinet. The thing was exactly the kind of purchase he imagined Steve would make; modern technology disguised as something familiar. Old enough to remind him of home, new enough to actually work.
The more Tony looked around, the less the record player stood out. If anything, it fit the living space a little too well.
♫ It's been too hard livin'
♫ but I'm afraid to die
♫ 'cause I don't know what's up there
beyond the sky ♫
His attention wandered from the record player to the rest of the room, lingering on details he'd stopped noticing years ago. Books sat in uneven stacks beside an oversizeds armchair, others lay open atop side tables as though they'd only been set down an hour ago. Framed photographs crowded the shelves, tucked between old war memorabilia, notebooks, and little odds and ends that had no business surviving as many moves as Rogers had made.
Nothing matched. None of it was arranged for appearances. It simply looked lived in.
Tony found himself smiling despite himself. Most people treated their assigned quarters like a hotel room — somewhere to sleep until the next mission called them away. Steve never had. Somehow, over years of deployments, relocations, and near-apocalypses, he’d quietly turned four walls the government happened to assign him into something that actually belonged to him.
Home.
Tony’s own spaces had always been functional first; workshops with beds, penthouses with laboratories, houses that revolved around projects instead of people. Ever since Malibu, he’d kept telling himself he'd get around to finding another place that felt permanent. He never had. Steve, on the other hand, hadn’t needed an oceanfront mansion or a state-of-the-art workshop. He’d built a permanence out of photographs, old books, and a record player that looked like it'd been lifted straight out of 1943.
♫ It's been a long, a long time comin' ♫
but I know, oh-oo-oh ♫
a change gon' come, oh yes, it will ♫
Beyond the living room and inside the bedroom, the steady rush of water faded from behind the bathroom door. Tony’s gaze drifted that way just as it opened, a curl of steam spilling ahead of whoever stood on the other side.
The first thing he noticed was the towel, working its way through damp blond hair before its owner followed. The second thing he noticed was that Steve looked absolutely, undeniably terrible — so much so that Tony could only hope his reaction wasn’t as obvious as it felt.
Dressed in a plain t-shirt and sweatpants, Steve slowly stepped out of the bathroom while still working the towel gently through damp hair. His movements lacked their usual certainty, sluggish and more deliberate than normal, and when the towel finally lowered there was a paleness to his face that had nothing to do with the steam clinging to his skin. The gray light of a cloudy sky filtering through the windows wasn’t exactly doing him any favors either, leaving every trace of exhaustion plainly visible.
Despite looking very much like he should’ve gone straight back to bed, Steve still managed a small grin when he caught Tony staring.
"Sorry," he said, tossing the towel over one shoulder. "Didn’t mean to keep you waiting."
Tony opened his mouth to respond.
"Don’t go apologizing to him."
The opportunity vanished almost immediately as another voice cut in from deeper inside.
"It’s been eighty years and he still hasn’t delivered on that flying car we were promised." Bucky emerged from the far side of the bedroom carrying a jacket folded over his arm. He reached Steve a second later and held it out without a word, switching out for the towel in turn; the motion so practiced it looked like part of a routine. "Feels personal at this point, if you ask me."
Steve accepted the navy blue jacket and pulled it on without argument, the exchange carrying the effortless familiarity neither man needed to think about anymore. By the time Tony reached the insides of the bedroom, Steve was already zipping it closed, leaving the increasingly offended look he aimed at Bucky to go completely unnoticed.
"The first patent for a flying car was filed in nineteen fourteen." Tony made a face as he crossed the rest of the distance into the bedroom. "If we’re being historically accurate, you’re actually owed a little over one hundred years of disappointment."
Bucky paused just long enough to give Tony an unimpressed look.
"One hundred years later and you’re still making excuses."
Without so much as a glance in Tony's direction, he disappeared into the bathroom and began gathering up the damp towels left behind from Steve’s shower, treating the task with the same matter-of-fact efficiency he'd approached everything else that week.
Steve turned toward the corner of the bedroom where an armchair waited beside the window. As he crossed past the foot of the bed, Tony found himself watching more closely than he’d intended — what should’ve been a short walk seemed to take its time.
The slower pace was obvious up close. So was the faint tightness around Steve’s eyes, and the way his shoulders seemed to carry more weight than they had before.
Tony frowned, giving him a slow once-over before gesturing vaguely toward his own jaw.
"Are you making a statement with the beard, or are we just not shaving through this round of near-death heroism?"
The corner of Steve’s mouth twitched upward. He lifted a hand to his jaw, fingers brushing across the rough stubble as though he'd forgotten it was even there.
"Trying to save my energy for what matters," he managed, the fatigue in his voice making the point for him.
Tony’s eyes lingered on him for another moment before he closed some of the distance between them, crossing a few steps through the bedroom to get there.
"Doesn’t look half-bad," he admitted, knocking the side of Steve’s bicep with the back of his hand before wandering a few steps away, unable to stay in one place for too long. "Just don’t go stealing my style."
Steve rolled his eyes, though the faint smile lingered as he continued toward the window.
Tony let him go the rest of the way on his own.
The room settled into a brief quiet as Steve reached the armchair beside the window. He eased himself down carefully, one hand lingering on the armrest before leaning back into the cushion.
For a moment, Tony found himself watching. If he didn’t know better, he would’ve thought Steve was trying to soak up what little warmth the cloudy day had to offer.
"You know, that reminds me…" A distant voice drifted out of the bathroom. "The guy I remember would’ve been pacing the floor by now, reminding everybody, 'Early is on time, and on time is late.' Now he’s the reason the whole damn meeting’s running late. Never thought I’d see that day come."
The bathroom door swung open behind them as Bucky stepped out carrying the last of the damp towels, dropping them into the laundry basket before nudging the door shut with his foot. He looked across the room toward Steve, one eyebrow lifting ever so slightly — the kind of look only someone who’d known him for nearly a century could give.
Steve didn’t even have to look up to know the expression Bucky was wearing. It was familiar enough to earn a reluctant smile — and, despite the exhaustion washing his face out, the faintest hint of color managed to find its way back.
"Thanks for meeting me here," he said, leaving the joke where it was as he turned his attention back to Tony, who had already resumed his slow pacing through the bedroom. "I know it’s a bit… unconventional. I appreciate everyone making the adjustment."
A familiar voice answered before anyone else could.
"Cap, it’s good." Sam stepped through the doorway a moment later, moving from the living room into the bedroom with the easy familiarity of someone who knew the quarters almost as well as Steve did. One hand caught the frame as he entered, his gaze immediately finding Steve by the window. "Don’t worry about it. We got you."
Steve’s expression softened, the corners of his mouth lifting just enough to let Sam know the reassurance had landed. Before he could answer, another set of footsteps crossed the hardwood from the living room.
"Besides," Natasha said as she slipped through the doorway with a mug balanced loosely in one hand, "getting you to the conference room would’ve taken another seventy years with the way you’re moving, colossal fossil."
Quietly, Bruce followed a step behind the others, his eyes briefly settling on Steve before offering a small, almost relieved nod.
"Oh, great. You’re looking... slightly less terrible," he mentioned, shoulders inward as he navigated around the furniture and the growing number of people gathering in the room.
The bedroom was beginning to feel smaller the more of them that gathered.
Watching Natasha make herself at home with a coffee in hand, Steve pulled a face somewhere between exasperation and reluctant acceptance.
"Good to know everyone’s confidence in me is holding strong," he remarked, dryer than usual.
Across the room, Tony let out a quiet snort, one hand disappearing into his pocket as he rocked back onto his heels.
"Strong as you are stubborn," he answered with an easy shrug.
"Stupid as he is stubborn," Bucky muttered, shifting his weight against the wall next to the bathroom, folding his arms tighter across his chest without ever taking his eyes off Steve.
A quiet huff escaped Sam as he wandered farther into the bedroom, claiming the corner of a nearby dresser with practiced ease.
The corner of Steve’s mouth held onto a tired smile as he settled a little deeper into the armchair, one forearm resting against the armrest while the other idly smoothed the sleeve of Bucky’s jacket. Even sitting still looked like it demanded more from him than it should have.
Around the room, everyone settled without much thought. Sam remained perched against the dresser while Bruce lingered near the foot of the bed, hands tucked into his trouser pockets, his eyes darting between Steve and Tony without ever landing on one for too long. Natasha rested one shoulder against the wall beside the doorway, coffee still warming her hands. All while Bucky never moved from his post near the bathroom.
It happened so naturally that nobody seemed to notice. Within a minute, Steve’s bedroom had quietly transformed into the team’s conference room. The easy familiarity of it all stood in sharp contrast to the reason they'd gathered.
Everyone was getting comfortable. Which usually meant things were about to get uncomfortable.
Steve let his gaze drift slowly across each familiar face gathered around the room, taking a quiet count before finally looking back up.
"Clint on grounds?" When he spoke, his voice came out rougher and softer than he’d intended, forcing him to clear his throat.
Natasha shifted her attention from the coffee warming her hands and gave a single, unhurried shake of her head.
"I'll get him the notes," she said, the mug still cradled between both palms. "He needed to be in Iowa."
Tony’s head snapped around so quickly it looked like the words had physically caught him off guard.
"You gotta be kidding me," he scoffed, staring at her with open disbelief.
Natasha didn’t so much as blink. She lifted the mug for another unhurried sip, letting the silence stretch just long enough before lowering it again and meeting his stare over the rim.
"Choose your next words wisely."
A faint groan escaped Sam as he tipped his head back toward the ceiling.
Bruce let out a quiet sigh, rubbing the back of his neck before shifting his weight where he stood near the foot of the bed.
"Forgive me for being a little irritated by everyone’s remarkably inconvenient use of personal time," Tony bit out, the words coming sharper than he’d intended. He paced another few restless steps through the middle of the bedroom. "Funny how that works. My honeymoon to the beaches of Cancún gets canceled, but Barton gets to go star in Little House on the Prairie, while the Hybrid Union still get to frolic through the Scottish countryside." He cut himself off mid-stride, turning to face the room as exasperation finally caught up with him. "Am I the only one punching the clock here? During a crisis?"
The room settled into an uneasy silence.
Sam’s easy posture against the dresser disappeared almost immediately. His arms folded across his chest as he stared down at the floor, jaw working slightly as though he’d thought about saying something before deciding against it.
Bruce shifted beside the foot of the bed, rubbing one thumb absentmindedly against the opposite palm. Natasha remained exactly where she was, her mug cradled between both hands, though the look she leveled at Tony over the rim had lost what little heat it once held.
Near the doorway, Bucky’s attention drifted quietly from Tony back to Steve. He didn’t speak.
By the window, Steve let the silence sit for another moment before releasing a slow, measured breath.
"Tony..." When he finally spoke, his voice was quiet, carrying none of the edge it might once have. The resolve behind it, however, hadn’t changed. "We can’t go there."
Tony pulled a face, already knowing exactly where the conversation was headed— and already not liking it.
"We can’t go where? Avenging?" He looked around the room before throwing a hand toward the ceiling. "Because I was under the impression that was the whole point of the, oh I don’t know — the Avengers."
Steve didn’t answer right away.
Instead, he leaned forward in the armchair, resting his forearms across his knees as his hands loosely folded together. It was an ordinary movement by anyone else’s standards, but Tony still caught the brief tightening along Steve's jaw once he’d settled there.
The silence lingered.
Whatever warmth the window had promised wasn’t arriving. Outside, a ceiling of low clouds smothered the afternoon, leaving only a dull wash of light to spill across the room. It caught Steve full on, bleaching what little color had managed to return to his face beneath the navy jacket.
For a moment, Tony found himself distracted by it. Even through his irritation and his own bone-deep exhaustion, there was something profoundly unsettling about seeing Steve Rogers look tired.
"You’re right," Steve said, at last. His voice was quieter than it used to be, the words carried more by conviction than strength. "There’ll always be another fight." He held Tony's gaze for a beat before slowly, leaning back into the chair. "That’s the problem."
Tony's brow furrowed.
He looked away at first, turning another slow lap through the bedroom before stopping near the foot of the bed — ignoring Bruce completely, even at close proximity. One hand settled on his hip while the other drummed absently against his side, restless energy refusing to let him stand still.
Steve watched him quietly. After a moment, he continued.
"We can’t ask Wanda to put her life on hold every time something goes wrong, Tony." His eyes never left Tony, even as Tony refused to meet them. "If she waits for the world to stop needing her, she’ll be waiting forever. And you and I both agreed when she came onto the team that she deserved more than that."
Sam shifted against the dresser, his folded arms tightening across his chest as Natasha lowered her mug just enough to study the rooms occupants over the rim.
Tony dragged a hand down his face before throwing it outward in exasperation, already pacing again before the gesture had finished.
"I’m just saying," he muttered, his shoulders rising in a tired shrug as one hand drifted toward Steve in a gesture that lacked most of its earlier fire. "It would’ve been real considerate if everybody waited until after we dealt with Osborn's Frankenstein gargoyle before they took a sabbatical."
For a moment, Steve simply watched him pace. He let the silence linger just long enough to acknowledge the frustration without trying to dismiss it.
"The work doesn’t stop. It never has…and I’m not sure it ever will." His voice never rose. If anything, it grew quieter, forcing the room to lean into what he was saying. "After all that happened in Wakanda, it wasn’t easy for Wanda to ask for this. She’s finally looking to build a life that’s hers, away from this place. When I approved their leave, I gave her our word she’d have the chance to see where that life takes her. I don’t think we should be the ones to take that away... especially when we’ve already seen that even she and Vision combined couldn’t turn the tide against that creature. We already know what didn’t stop it. Keeping them here only keeps us looking backward, when we need to be looking for what comes next."
His gaze drifted briefly around the room before settling back on Tony.
"If we keep asking people to put their lives on hold until the world’s finally safe, we’re only asking them to wait for something that’s never coming."
The room fell quiet.
Natasha lowered her mug into both hands. Even Bucky, still planted against the wall near the bathroom, remained silent.
Tony’s shoulders sagged almost imperceptibly.
Nobody argued.
The silence stretched just long enough for the room to settle back into itself.
One hand still planted against his hip while the other rubbed slowly across the back of his neck. Tony’s eyes wandered toward the floor before drifting to the window, lingering there for a beat as though searching for one last counterargument that never came.
A quiet breath escaped through his nose.
"Alright." He waved a hand through the air in reluctant surrender, rolling one shoulder as though physically shrugging off the conversation. "Fine."
His gaze swept around the bedroom, taking stock of everyone who was present.
"Attendance taken." A beat passed. "Let's get starte—"
"—I knew it!"
Heavy footsteps immediately followed the sudden shout, pounding across the hardwood with absolutely no concern for the fact that someone else’s home was supposed to have indoor voices.
"I knew I heard Sam Cooke! And you said I was imagining things!" Quill rounded the doorway a heartbeat later, still pointing triumphantly over one shoulder toward the living room as though presenting evidence in a courtroom— gesturing toward the digital record player, its final notes having long since faded into silence.
Drax followed behind him, his pace unhurried, looking entirely unconcerned by Quill’s victory.
"You frequently mistake your imagination for reality," he said with complete sincerity. "I simply believed that was happening again."
Tony pivoted so quickly he nearly walked himself back the way he’d come.
"Hey, hey!" he all but shouted, throwing an emphatic finger toward the doorway they’d just entered through. "Uh-uh. No. Absolutely not. Get out, now."
From the armchair inside his own bedroom, Steve let out a weary sigh.
"Tony —"
"Go away." Tony flicked both hands toward the hallway in a brisk ushering motion, as though physically sweeping the two newcomers back out the door. "Shoo. No room in the inn."
Before he could take another step, something small shot between his legs, darting into the room with all the subtlety of a missile.
"Relax, Tin Can, we ain’t stayin'," Rocket grumbled as he scrambled onto the bed without so much as asking. "We could hear Quill hollerin’ from three rooms away. At that point, it stops bein’ his problem and starts bein’ everybody's problem."
Tony whipped around just in time to find Rocket making himself comfortable atop the blankets.
"What the —" Tony pointed accusingly at the raccoon, who had already settled onto the bed as though he’d been invited. "Excuse me. The meeting roster is already full. Space tourists were not on the guest list. Proceed back the way you came from."
Steve tried again. "Tony—"
"We were told to come."
Gamora stepped through the doorway with the unhurried confidence of someone completely unfazed by Tony’s protest. Her arms remained folded across her chest as she crossed to the wall beside Natasha, settling against it with the easy certainty of someone who had no intention of leaving.
"You were told to —" Tony whipped around toward Steve before the sentence could finish, only to catch the unmistakable look already waiting for him.
Steve didn’t bother feigning innocence.
Tony pointed a thumb over his shoulder as he turned to face the others. "I was under the impression we’d suspended Grandpa’s decision-making privileges until further notice."
"Hey, we agree on something for once," Bucky dryly remarked, shifting his weight against the wall with one shoulder settling a little deeper into the door-frame.
"Now, hold on." Steve lifted one hand in a small, calming gesture toward Tony. "Natasha raised a point earlier that I think we should all hear out."
Natasha didn’t react beyond lifting her mug for another sip, her eyes never leaving Steve over the rim; which told Tony that she’d probably been making the same point for the better part of the day.
Steve’s hand fell back to his knee as he took in the room for a quiet moment, his eyes moving slowly between the familiar faces of his team.
"We’ve all spent the last week trying to understand what happened during that fight. And every theory we’ve come up with is still mostly guesswork. Whatever that thing was, none of us recognized it in the moment. We didn’t beat it. We didn’t stop it." He gave a small shake of his head. "We barely survived it."
The words settled heavily over the room.
Rocket’s ears lowered a fraction. Quill’s easy grin faded without him seeming to notice. Even Tony stopped pacing, the restless tapping of his fingers falling still as the bedroom slipped into silence.
"Difference is…" Steve's attention drifted toward the Guardians gathered near the doorway. "They were crazy enough to charge it, head on, without any hesitation. And from what I saw, they sure fought like they’d gotten into that kind of mess before."
Quill immediately jabbed a thumb against his own chest. "Thank you."
Steve’s brow knit together into quiet confusion, as though he couldn’t quite understand how that’d been interpreted as praise.
His gaze swept across the room once more before settling on his own team.
"They’ve spent their whole lives fighting things like that — those kind of creatures. If that’s what being Guardians of the Galaxy demands, we’d be making a mistake not to learn their strategies before they leave." His eyes lingered on each of them in turn before returning to Tony. "That perspective may be the only advantage we have against whatever Norman turned himself into."
Nobody spoke.
The room seemed to settle around the thought. Even Rocket, perched on the bed with his tail lazily swaying over the blankets, held his tongue. Outside the bedroom window, the wind stirred softly through the trees, the only sound that dared interrupt the silence hanging between them.
Quill broke it almost immediately.
"See, that’s nice and all, but I gotta be honest —" The music player was already back in his hand before anyone noticed him reaching for it, and he held it up between two fingers. "I already got my reward. Seriously, you don’t have to keep thanking us."
Sam made a face. "You weren’t the only ones in that fight, you know."
Gamora’s eyes drifted toward Quill for barely a moment before she folded her arms tighter across her chest. "He has spent the last hour showing this thing to people who did not ask instead of packing for our departure."
Quill looked genuinely offended. "I’ve been sharing my joy."
Tony answered with nothing more than an exaggerated roll of his eyes. "Glad we’re focusing on the important issues."
Quill remained completely unfazed. Turning the player over in his hands, he caught the light along its brushed metal casing before proudly angling the orange accent stripe toward Tony.
"I’m capable of multitasking." He gestured toward the stripe running along the side. "Case in point — that orange accent you added? Beautiful. Bold. Tasteful. Has a very Milano vibe going on. I’m appreciating the craftsmanship, my dude."
Tony didn’t so much as blink.
"That's because orange is space ugly," he said without missing a beat. "I figured it’d make you feel at home."
Drax nodded with obvious satisfaction.
"This man has implied that your ship is ugly." He folded his arms with unmistakable confidence. "It is what humans call a backhanded compliment. I am becoming very good at recognizing them."
Quill’s head turned toward Drax with deliberate slowness before drifting back to Tony. He narrowed his eyes ever so slightly, now far less convinced the conversation had gone in his favor.
Across the room, Gamora didn’t bother correcting him.
Tony motioned toward the player with an absent wave. "Just remember to occasionally fly through this galaxy if you want the updates. My network doesn’t exactly reach the other side of the universe."
Quill looked back down at the device like he’d just been handed a winning lottery ticket. "And the battery?"
"The miniature arc reactor keeping it alive?" Tony gave an easy shrug and a toss of his hand. "Eighty years. Give or take. Try not to need a replacement."
Rocket’s ears twitched.
"Eighty?" he muttered under his breath, sounding almost offended on behalf of modern engineering.
Tony turned away as if the conversation were over.
"Hey, hey—! Hold up!" It wasn't. Quill fell into step beside him before he’d managed two single strides. "Little Pete's Playlist, the one you put on here…does this thing ever end?"
Tony wandered back toward the bedroom window, slowing beside Steve’s chair before folding his arms.
"Probably not. Parker doesn’t understand moderation, and apparently neither do his little mini-mes. Far as I can tell," he continued, "they’ve collectively decided every song ever recorded deserves representation."
From the armchair beside him, Steve’s expression softened into a brief, tired smile.
Quill looked genuinely impressed. "You know what? I respect that."
"It's frakin' crowded in here!" Rocket craned his head around the room as though only now realizing how many people had squeezed themselves inside. "Where am I supposed to sit?"
Tony furrowed his brows. "You’re the size of a Build-A-Bear, find a corner and situate."
Sam snorted into the back of his hand.
"Rude." Rocket muttered something else under his breath that sounded suspiciously like an insult before squeezing between Bruce and the footboard with practiced ease, disappearing somewhere behind the scientist where only the occasional flick of his tail remained visible.
Steve watched the exchange in silence, the faint smile lingering only a moment before his attention returned to the room.
"Tony…whether any of us want to admit it or not," he started, drawing the room’s attention back toward him, "I don't think we’d all be standing here without them."
Tony immediately made a face, the corners of his mouth pulling tight. "That’s a little dramatic."
Gamora didn't even look at him. "Is it?"
Tony glanced toward her. She remained exactly where she’d planted herself beside Natasha, one shoulder resting lightly against the wall, her posture never shifting.
"We didn’t kill it either," Quill pointed out, gesturing with the hand holding his new music player. "Just saying. If this is turning into a gratitude ceremony, we’re probably setting expectations a little too high."
The player nearly slipped from his grip during the gesture before he caught it against his palm without missing a beat.
Sam let out a quiet huff through his nose.
"Glad you acknowledged it," he muttered.
"No, he is right," Drax agreed. He folded his arms across his broad chest, his expression never wavering. "The beast ultimately survived."
His gaze moved slowly across the assembled Avengers, meeting each pair of eyes in turn before speaking again. "Based on what I witnessed, you Terrans are not equipped to kill such a creature."
Sam rolled his eyes. "Encouraging."
"I am serious," Drax said, not a trace of humor crossing his face.
Bruce gave a small, knowing nod. "We know."
"That’s the concerning part." Sam glanced between the two of them before rubbing a bent knuckle at his brow, exhaustion and irritation mixing into one.
Behind Bruce, something shifted.
"We didn’t bring the ugly mug down because it wasn't playing by the usual rules!" Rocket jabbed a claw to the ceiling at Sam’s remark, planting both legs against the mattress as he pushed himself upright in one quick motion. "That psycho shot himself up with some kinda magic monster juice before we ever got there!"
Tony pinched the bridge of his nose before letting out an immediate groan.
"It wasn’t magic."
Rocket spread both paws in surrender, looking completely unconvinced.
"Far as I’m concerned, if it’s vomitin’ fire one second and tryin’ to bite my head off the next, you can slap whatever label you want on it — I'm callin’ it magic!"
"Don't call it magic." He jabbed the finger once for emphasis. "You’re gonna piss off the actual wizard."
Sam shifted his weight against the dresser, one eyebrow climbing as he looked between Tony and Rocket.
"I'm with the furry guy on this one. Tell me again why not even a Supreme Sorcerer could put that thing down?" His gaze drifted around the room. "Or is that title about as reliable as Domino’s Pizza?"
Natasha lowered her mug with deliberate care, her fingers settling around it as it came to rest against her palm.
"Wanda threw everything she had at it." Her eyes found Steve for only a moment before returning to the others. "She wasn’t holding back. It barely slowed the thing down."
Bruce’s eyes remained fixed on the floor for a beat before he gave a quiet nod.
"Neither did Vision's Stone," he added quietly. "Direct energy output, sustained contact...it should’ve caused catastrophic tissue damage —"
Bucky let out a quiet scoff, pushing himself away from the wall just enough to uncross one arm.
"Those two combined didn’t do jack squat —"
Quill lifted a finger, eager to contribute.
"Mantis couldn’t even put the thing to sleep —"
Gamora spoke over him.
"My sword broke."
Every conversation in the room stopped. Heads turned almost as one.
She glanced briefly toward the empty place at her hip, her hand instinctively drifting toward the vacant space before stopping short.
"The Godslayer has cut through Kree armor. Sakaaran warships. Chitauri Leviathans." Her eyes lifted, sweeping across the room. "It was forged to kill Gods. And that…thing…broke it."
Nobody interrupted.
The words seemed to hang in the room.
Tony’s gaze lingered on the empty place at Gamora’s side before dropping to the floor. Even Quill, who’d rarely let silence survive more than a few seconds, said nothing. Across the room, Rocket’s ears lowered a fraction, while Bruce absently rubbed at the side of his thumb with his forefinger, his mind already turning the impossible over.
Outside the bedroom window, a gust of wind stirred the branches against the glass, filling the silence no one seemed willing to break.
"I want to know how," Gamora finally demanded.
Steve drew a slow breath, one hand rubbing absently across his thigh before settling there.
"That’s why we’re here."
His eyes shifted toward Tony, and for just a moment the corner of his mouth threatened the ghost of a smile.
"Tony…" he managed a small nod. "Mind taking the lead on this one?"
Tony answered with a quiet exhale through his nose as he pushed away from the window. Crossing in front of Steve’s chair, he gave the Captain’s shoulder a familiar pat in passing before reaching down to the end table beside the bed. His fingers closed around the magazine, and with one practiced flick he tossed it onto the blankets between them.
"With volatile pleasure," Tony said. The glossy cover slid to a stop with FORBES splashed across the top, and Norman Osborn’s confident smile staring back at the room.
"You asked, Ratchet. We deliver." Tony gestured toward the cover. "Meet the man who figured four billion years of evolution could use a second opinion. The great Norman Stormin’ Virgil Osborn."
The last name left his mouth with enough sarcasm to qualify as its own punctuation.
Rocket was already moving. He scrambled over the bed with practiced ease, planting both paws on either side of the magazine as he leaned so close his nose nearly hovered over Norman’s photograph.
"No way." His ears flicked once. "This guy? You seriously talkin’ about this guy?" His eyes darted from Norman's polished smile to the Avengers gathered around the room, then back again as if waiting for someone to admit it was a joke. "You're kiddin’ me. This polished pretty boy looks like he'd break a nail throwin’ a punch! This guy don't even look like he'd survive a stiff breeze!"
Tony didn’t even spare the magazine another glance.
"He didn’t," he answered, flatly. "That’s why he made sure he never had to again."
Gamora pushed away from the wall beside Natasha, her boots carrying her toward the bed with slow, deliberate steps. She stopped beside Rocket, her attention settling on Norman’s smiling portrait.
"Then your science accomplished something it never should have." Her gaze lifted to Steve. "The creature shattered my sword. No Terran should be capable of such a thing."
Steve leaned forward slightly in his chair, his forearms resting against his knees once more.
"The Godslayer," he started, "you told us it had cut down Asgardians."
Gamora’s eyes returned to the magazine.
"It has," she answered evenly. "It has pierced armor forged for Gods...and slain things far stronger than the man in that photograph." Her fingers curled once against her forearm before relaxing again. "It should not have broken at the hands of a mere mortal man."
Natasha’s gaze lingered on the magazine for another beat before shifting toward Gamora.
"It hit an Asgardian hard enough to leave a crater," she reminded her. "Your sword never stood much of a chance."
Rocket looked up from the cover, his ears giving another small twitch as he a went on to ask,
"What was that thing?"
Tony let the question hang for only a moment. Reaching into his pocket, he thumbed a control on his phone.
Soft light spilled upward between them, washing over the magazine and the faces gathered around it as strands of rotating DNA slowly came to life in midair.
"His name for it," Tony began, "was Oz."
Almost instinctively, the room drew closer.
"He took a drug?" Quill asked, his eyes darting back and forth between Tony and the technology that emitted from his phone.
Tony’s eyes never left the hologram.
"Created one," he corrected. "Oz was supposed to be the next step in human evolution. A genetic reconstruction formula. Rewrites your DNA from the inside out, rebuilding every cell in your body as it goes — repairing what breaks, replacing what doesn’t work, deleting the bad genes and writing better ones in their place. Solid ones, immune to even the destruction of its own molecular structure." His eyes lingered on the hologram. "The promise was simple; cure cancer, eliminate disease, make the body healthier, stronger..." A beat. "Impossible to kill."
The soft light continued to shine off the slow rotation overhead. Nobody seemed eager to interrupt it.
Tony let the silence hang for a moment before swiping another screen into view. A rotating strand of DNA bloomed above the magazine, splitting apart before seamlessly knitting itself back together.
"The problem," he continued, "was that Oz wasn’t designed to work on just anyone."
Rocket’s ears twitched, long since having given up on pretending not to care. "What d’ya mean?"
Bruce leaned forward almost imperceptibly, his attention following the reconstruction one frame at a time.
Tony expanded the DNA strand with two fingers, a second sequence branching away from the first before locking neatly into place. The light grew stronger from the hologram, spreading across the image with a strong tint of teal that bled red at the edges.
"It needed something to build from," he explained. "A stable genetic template, engineered specifically for the formula itself." He paused. "In this case...a spider."
Quill blinked, the pieces clicking together almost instantly. "You’re kidding."
"Wish I was." Tony kept his attention on the hologram. "OsCorp engineered one to carry a mutated genetic sequence — one capable of anchoring the entire reconstruction process."
With another swipe, and the two strands separated. One remained stable while the other immediately twisted into a chaotic tangle.
"Oz tears your DNA apart before it rebuilds it. The spider’s mutated DNA was supposed to keep that process stable — to give the formula a genetic foundation to rebuild from." His eyes followed the unraveling strand, a harsh V creasing his forehead as the light darkened around the image. "Without that foundation..." He let the hologram answer for him as the DNA continued to distort. "The reconstruction doesn’t have anything holding it together. It keeps rewriting itself until the mutations start feeding the next mutation."
Tony watched the stable strand continue its slow rotation above the bed before collapsing it with a flick of his wrist. The room dimmed slightly as half the hologram disappeared, the muted glows of teal and crimson leaving the remaining strand to rotate silently between them — sickly distortion and all.
"Oz was built on a timeless idea..." he went on. "If you could rewrite the human body at the genetic level, you wouldn't just treat disease anymore — you'd eliminate them. You wouldn't just heal injuries, you'd prevent them from ever existing. Of course, the military saw the next super soldier. Osborn, he saw medicine to end terminal illness. On paper..." His eyes drifted briefly toward Norman’s smiling face on the magazine, lit up with a sickly lurid green of the playing hologram. "It would've been one of the most ambitious breakthroughs in modern science."
For a moment, even Rocket had nothing sarcastic to say.
A long, unmistakable yawn drifted through the bedroom. It cut cleanly through the silence.
Heads turned one after another until every eye settled on Drax, who remained exactly where he’d started the conversation. He finished without the slightest hint of embarrassment, blinking once as the attention settled on him.
Tony simply stared.
"Are you yawning?" His free hand lifted in open disbelief before falling uselessly back to his side. "In the middle of this, while I’m breaking it down?"
Drax met his stare without the slightest hint of guilt. "You have explained why the creature exists. You have yet to explain how you intend to kill it. That is the only part worthy of my attention."
"Dude…" Quill pinched the bridge of his nose, his back all but smacking against the wall as he let out a long, defeated sigh. "He literally just got done telling us this thing could be unkillable."
"When?" Drax’s brow creased ever so slightly. "I do not remember hearing such a thing."
Quill threw both hands into the air. "Like, three seconds ago!"
"Oh." A look of genuine understanding crossed Drax’s face. He readjusted his folded arms with complete composure. "I wasn’t listening."
Tony closed his eyes for a long, measured beat, drawing in a slow breath before reaching down and snatching the magazine back off the bed.
"Here’s what you missed," he began, the hologram continuing its slow rotation overhead as he lifted the magazine into the hazy olive light, giving it a small wave through the suspended strands. "Oz finally has the genetic template it was designed around. The spider’s DNA — he stole it right from the last living source." Norman’s smiling face swept across the distorted DNA, momentarily slicing through the twisting helix before the image drifted clear again. "Parker's blood wasn’t just another ingredient, it was the missing piece. The one thing Oz had been waiting on from the very beginning. Without it, every version of that came before — every previous iteration trying to solve the wrong problem — it all failed. The formula kept changing because the one variable it had been built around was never there. Until now."
Quill’s gaze bounced between Norman’s smiling face on the magazine and the distorted DNA twisting around it, trying to reconcile the two.
"Wait, lemme get this straight... you’re saying Goblin McBarf-Fire wasn't the intended outcome?"
Perched atop the bed, Rocket remained frozen for all of half a second before doubling over with a sharp bark of laughter.
"HA!" A sharp bark of laughter escaped him before he could stop it. "Okay — okay, that one’s stickin!"
Gamora closed her eyes, exhaling quietly through her nose. "Hush."
Tony let Rocket’s laughter die before fixing Quill with an utterly unimpressed look.
"That Goblin," he shot back, "was never the endgame."
He gestured toward the twisting DNA suspended in the hologram.
"Norman knew the formula wasn’t ready. He took it anyway, betting that he’d survive long enough to fix it later." Tony lowered the magazine from the olive haze of the hologram and dropped it onto the end table beside the bed with a firm slap. His jaw tightened. "He wasn’t trying to become a monster. He just gambled on his own science before the science was ready." His gaze returned to the hologram. "Now that Oz finally has what it was built around...we don’t know if the creature we fought was the end of the mutation — or just the beginning."
Rocket’s grin slowly disappeared. Standing atop the bed, he looked back to the rotating DNA, his tail giving a single uneasy flick behind him.
"It can get worse than that fire-hackin' green psycho?"
Steve answered before anyone else could.
"Not if we have any say in it." His eyes remained fixed on the hologram, the light catching across his features as it slowly revolved overhead. A blink, and he turned his head towards the bed. "Bruce?"
With a slow exhale, Bruce pushed away from the foot of the bed as he stepped closer to the hologram.
"Tony’s right," he began, quietly. "We’ve gone into completely uncharted territory now." His eyes followed the rotating DNA for a moment. "Everything after Norman took Oz is outside the model, outside any of the information we gathered. The genetic template was supposed to guide the reconstruction from the beginning — not be introduced after the mutation was already underway."
He paused, watching the stable strand continue its endless rotation. "We don’t know how that changes the outcome. A monster like that…there could be no reversing it."
Sam’s brow furrowed. He looked from Steve to the hologram.
"You’re saying this is like Venom? A monster from man? We couldn't separate that thing from Peter because it’d already bonded to his DNA..." Sam’s eyes shifted to Bruce. "You’re telling me it’s the same deal here?"
Bruce didn't answer immediately. His gaze remained fixed on the rotating DNA.
"If the spider’s genetic sequence has fully integrated with Oz..." he chose his words carefully, "then we’re not talking about two separate systems anymore. We’re talking about one genome. At that point, there isn’t anything left to separate."
The room stayed quiet. Bruce folded his arms, one hand absently rubbing at the opposite sleeve as he searched for the right words.
"It’s the same principle we ran into with Venom, yes." His gaze shifted briefly toward Tony before returning to the hologram. "The symbiote didn’t just attach itself to Peter — it adapted to him. It learned his biology until the two became functionally inseparable. No different than how we couldn’t track the symbiote due to foreign DNA markers, the same proves to be the case with Oz. So if Oz has done the same thing with Norman’s DNA..." He gave a small shake of his head. "Then this isn’t a condition. There may not be a Norman left to separate from it. It’s what he is now. "
Nobody spoke.
Tony’s gaze lingered on the rotating DNA, the sight tightening his jaw all over again. "Which means killing the Goblin and killing Norman may no longer be two different problems."
The hologram continued its slow, silent rotation between them, casting faint ribbons of pale olive across the walls as the weight of Tony’s words settled over the room. No one rushed to answer.
After a long moment, Steve finally broke the silence.
"Have you contacted Shuri, to see what help she could offer?" He turned toward Tony, his expression thoughtful.
Tony gave a short nod, his eyes lingering on Norman’s smiling face where the magazine rested atop the end table.
"Already reached out. She’s got the details, she’s going to get back to me." He made a small, absent gesture with one hand. "But you know her, the more information we can get her, the better."
Drax watched the hologram for another moment before shifting his attention back to the Avengers.
"This Venom you speak of, the beast you fought here on Terra…" he started. "This Goblin you name could not be defeated. What earned your victory before?"
Tony let his eyes fall from the hologram to meet Drax’s, an easy shrug answering long before he did.
"We found its weakness," he simply stated.
Sam straightened a little against the dresser. "Then we find this one’s."
Bruce’s eyes remained on the rotating strand as he slowly shook his head. "We don’t know that it’ll have one."
Natasha shifted the mug into both hands, her thumb idly tracing the rim. "If Venom did..."
Bucky eased one shoulder farther off the wall, folding his arms across his chest as his eyes settled on the rotating DNA.
"Everything has a weakness." His gaze remained fixed on the hologram. "It’s just a matter of finding it."
Drax stood silently for a moment, his eyes drifting from the hologram to each Avenger in turn as though weighing their answers.
Then he gave a single, decisive nod.
"Then the answer is simple." He dropped both hands to his hips. "I will remain on Terra until this beast is defeated."
Tony’s head snapped toward him.
"Absolutely not —!"
Natasha let out a quiet sigh into her mug. "You can't —"
Steve lifted a hand before either of them could continue.
"—thank you," he cut in, genuine appreciation softening his expression before regret quickly followed. "I think. But as much as we’d welcome the help —"
"—SHIELD’s already asking when you’re leaving." Natasha picked up the thought without missing a beat, lowering her mug just enough to look directly at the Guardians. She gave a faint shrug. "You’ve stretched the limits of your diplomatic clearance as it is. Colonel Rhodes was your point of contact. With him off-site, nobody wants to be responsible for explaining why six armed extraterrestrials are still walking around their facility. They want you gone. Yesterday."
Tony turned so abruptly he nearly lost his place in the conversation altogether. One finger suddenly shot toward the doorway.
"Where are the other two —?"
Gamora answered without ever looking towards him.
"Mantis remained behind with Groot and the boy." A faint, almost imperceptible softness touched her otherwise even expression. "He refuses to leave the smaller Peter unattended."
Tony tipped his head back just enough for a weary roll of his eyes.
Of course.
Quill frowned. "SHIELD? Your bosses?" He looked between Tony and Steve before spreading both hands. "Why not just tell your bosses we're stayin’ to help? We don't mind lendin’ a hand." He gestured around the room. "Little Pete’s one of ours now. We help our own."
Gamora didn't even look at him. She merely folded her arms a little tighter.
"Peter..." she evenly began. "We have not accepted a contract in nearly three months."
Quill turned toward her. "This is a contract."
She met his look without blinking. "No. It is a favor."
Quill pointed between the Avengers as if the distinction were obvious. "It can become a contract."
"One that pays," she corrected.
Tony pointed toward the hallway with the kind of urgency usually reserved for emergencies. "I will personally finance your expedited return to whatever corner of the galaxy you crawled out of if it gets you out of my life by close of business day."
Quill's head snapped toward Tony so fast it was a wonder he didn't pull something. "Seriously?"
"No." Tony’s expression never changed. "The second SHIELD catches wind that six extraterrestrials are sticking around to hunt a fire-breathing radioactive gargoyle on American soil, this stops being our operation —" he gestured between himself and Steve, "—and it becomes theirs. Oversight committees, jurisdiction fights — enough red tape to keep Norman three steps ahead of us when we're already three steps behind." He pointed squarely at Quill. "So do us all a favor. Get back in your ship, leave on schedule, and let me keep Fury out of this for as long as humanly possible."
Quill held both hands up in immediate surrender.
"Sheesh... okay." He glanced toward Gamora before looking back at Tony. A slow grin tugged at one corner of his mouth despite himself. "I got it, your bosses suck. Message received."
Quill's grin lingered for another second before he let his hands fall back to his sides. Around the room, no one seemed particularly eager to argue with him anymore. The humor faded as quickly as it had arrived, leaving only the quiet hum of technology and the soft rustle of wind brushing the bedroom window.
Tony and Steve exchanged a few quiet words beneath the low hum of the hologram, their voices too soft for anyone else to make out. Tony spoke without taking his eyes off the slowly rotating DNA, earning only a small nod from Steve before the conversation dissolved as quietly as it had begun.
No one else seemed interested in breaking the silence. Bucky stood near the doorway with his arms still folded across his chest, giving a rough sniff through his nose as his gaze remained somewhere on the floor. Across the room, Natasha lifted her mug for another unhurried sip, the faint noise briefly cutting through the room before fading again.
The hologram continued its slow rotation overhead as Quill cleared his throat.
"Maybe…and I'm just spit-balling here," he began to say. "Maybe we could help…away from Terra?"
Sam's brow furrowed as he pushed himself a little straighter away from the dresser.
"How?"
"And why?" Rocket barked, his ears flicking sharply toward Quill. "You don't got any right to volunteer us for jobs we never agreed to, Quill!"
A faint laugh escaped Drax, deep enough to turn a few heads. "It is because Quill has grown attached to the smaller Peter."
Quill immediately pointed at him. "No, I haven't."
"You have."
"I have not."
Drax looked around the room with complete certainty, as though appealing to witnesses. "He speaks of him constantly."
Quill groaned, tugging both sides of his weathered leather jacket into place before throwing his hands out in exasperation.
"You guys said this thing might be unkillable, right?" Quill swept a hand toward Rocket, Gamora, and Drax. "Well...you know, we've run into unkillable before." He hesitated. "So...maybe we've got something that could help."
Gamora's eyes immediately narrowed. Her head turned just enough to fix Quill with a look.
"Peter."
"What?"
She gave a small, deliberate shake of her head. "…don't."
Quill held up a hand, forcing a patient smile that fooled absolutely no one. "Will you just let me finish?"
At the foot of the bed, Rocket's ears shot upright. He turned so quickly he nearly lost his footing on the blankets.
"Is he talking about the Power Stone?" he asked. "Cuz oh boy, we do not have the Power Stone —!"
Quill winced, already seeing where this was headed. "Okay, hold up, hear me out —"
Gamora was three steps towards him before he could finish, her arms still folded tightly across her chest. "Peter—!"
Quill threw both hands higher in surrender. "I said hear me out—!"
"There ain't no frakin' way —!" Rocket looked from Quill to Gamora as though searching for someone to back him up, all while throwing both paws simultaneously into the air. "We can't take the Power Stone, because the Power Stone's still locked away on Xandar under the protection of the Nova Corps!"
Quill waved the objection away with a flick of his hand.
"We wouldn't be taking it, we'd be borrowing it. We'd totally bring it back, long before Nova Prime knows."
Drax shifted his attention to Quill, his expression as earnest as ever. "Why not just ask Nova Prime permission for it in the first place?"
Quill's made a face. "Oh God, she'd never give it to us."
"Stealing the Power Stone from Nova Corps would be a d'ast suicide mission." Rocket stared at him in complete disbelief. His tail lashed once behind him before he planted both paws firmly against the blankets. "I ain't doin' it!"
Quill's head snapped back toward him.
"And why not?" he tossed back. "You brag all the time about breaking into places more secure than Nova Corps —"
Rocket jabbed a claw squarely at his own chest. "Yeah! That don't mean I wanna do it again!"
Quill let out a frustrated breath, both hands rising in surrender.
"Okay, okay — maybe we don't break into Nova Corps." He paused, his eyes darting from Rocket to Gamora before drifting across the rest of the room. "Maybe we...creatively gain temporary access." He spread both hands helplessly. "I'm just throwin' ideas at the wall here, you guys — no one else thinking of solutions. Brainstorm with me!"
"Hold on," Steve interrupted. He leaned forward in the armchair, resting his forearms across his knees. The interruption came calmly, but it was enough to halt the back-and-forth before it could gather any more momentum. "Power Stone? Are you talking about an Infinity Stone?"
Quill answered with an easy shrug, as though the distinction hardly mattered.
"Yeah."
Steve rubbed a tired hand across the side of his face before letting it fall again.
"Whatever you're about to suggest...let's leave Infinity Stones out of it." He shook his head once, and held a firm open palm in the air to stand by his words. "We've spent years dealing with the consequences of those things. I'd rather not invite another one into the middle of this unless there's absolutely no other choice."
"What're you talkin' about?" Quill frowned, looking genuinely puzzled rather than discouraged. He gestured around the room, his hand sweeping from Steve to Tony before circling back again. "You guys already invited 'em. One was sittin' in your robot guys forehead, and the other one was hanging around your wizard guys neck. Seems a little late to start drawing boundaries."
Tony was already shaking his head before Quill had even finished.
"That's not the same thing." He pushed himself away from the window and the armchair near it, all the while pointing one finger squarely at Quill. "Those Stones weren’t weapons we were passing around like a game of hot potatoes— they were responsibilities — big responsibilities, big difference. The people carrying them actually knew what they were doing." He folded his arms tightly. "We've already got a homicidal, borderline-invincible genetic nightmare running loose. The last thing I'm interested in doing is introducing an Infinity Stone into the equation and hoping it somehow makes the math easier."
Quill let out an exaggerated sigh, looking from Tony to Steve with a harsh roll of his eyes.
"That's where you're wrong, Einstein." His gaze swept across the room, catching Rocket atop the bed, Gamora standing rigid beside Natasha, and Bruce quietly watching from only a few feet away. "Everybody keeps tellin’ me to shut up before I even get to the good part, so maybe — just maybe — hear me out first before you go jumping my guns, will ya?"
Rocket dropped his head with theatrical despair, one paw dragging slowly down the side of his face. "I already hate where this is goin’."
Quill pointed at him without hesitation. "You hate every idea I have."
Rocket looked up just enough to level Quill with a flat stare. "Yeah, because they’re all usually terrible!"
Quill ignored him.
"You guys keep hearing Power Stone and thinking weapon." He motioned toward Gamora, Drax, and Rocket in turn. "We've seen it. All of us. We’ve watched the Power Stone do to people what nothing else in the galaxy could. Doesn’t matter how strong you are. Doesn’t matter how hard you are to kill. It doesn't matter how 'unkillable' you think you are," Quill raised both hands, curling two fingers on each into mocking air quotes. "It doesn’t beat you. It erases you. One touch... and there’s nothin’ left. You’re gone."
For the first time since Quill had started talking, none of the Guardians interrupted him. The silence between them carried the unmistakable weight of shared experience.
Gamora’s eyes never left Quill.
"We are not using the Power Stone," she flatly, and firmly, responded.
Quill threw both hands up in exasperation.
"I’m not saying we use it!" he shot back. "I’m saying he does." He thrust a finger toward the magazine and Norman’s face on the cover, as though the answer should’ve been obvious.
Silence followed.
Rocket looked positively horrified.
"That’s somehow worse!" he shouted in turn.
Quill stepped toward the bedside table, leaning over just enough to jab a finger against the glossy material of the cover page.
"You just told us this guy spent years chasing more power. Super soldiers, genetic upgrades — whatever got him closer." His eyes lifted to Tony. "So what do you think he’s gonna do if the most powerful object in the universe suddenly lands in front of him?"
Tony’s reply never came.
His eyes drifted from Quill to magazine, then upward to the twisting strands of DNA revolving through the hazy olive light. The certainty he’d carried through the briefing slipped for the briefest of moments.
Quill caught it immediately.
"Exactly." He pointed between them. "If you can’t fight his strength, then don't. Fight his ego. Let him convince himself he needs one more upgrade...and he’ll reach for it himself."
A long beat settled over the room. Steve’s eyes drifted from Quill to the other Guardians, finding no disagreement among them — only the same uneasy certainty written across every face.
Tony slowly turned away from Quill and looked to Steve instead, extending one hand toward the Guardians.
"How much longer are we planning to entertain this circus?"
Steve met his look without missing a beat. He simply raised an open hand as high as it would go, the same patient hold on gesture he’d been using on Tony for years.
Tony watched the gesture. Then, with all the enthusiasm of a man watching his day spiral beyond repair, he rolled his eyes toward the ceiling.
"This is not an idea, Peter," Gamora finally said. "This is suicide."
Rocket’s ears flattened. "She's right, Quill — this is insane, even by your standards."
Quill let the words hang for a beat before answering.
"…yeah." His gaze drifted toward the magazine on the bedside table, Norman’s face still staring back beneath the slow rotation of Tony's hologram. "Yeah, it is insane. Strappin’ people to tables, turnin’ 'em into test subjects, drainin’ 'em for parts, then having the balls to call it science?" His jaw tightened. "That’s torture, you guys. Plain and simple. And Little Pete?" He looked around the room. "He ain’t the first person this guy’s done it to. He’s just the first one we got back."
The room stayed quiet for a moment, the tense air only broken once Drax gave a slow, approving nod.
"A warrior faces his enemy in battle." His voice remained as steady as ever. "He does not carve pieces from the defenseless."
Rocket’s gaze dropped to the blankets beneath his feet. The bravado he’d carried through the argument ebbed just enough for something quieter to surface.
"Yeah..." he muttered. "Ain’t much of a fight when you’re strapped to a table and somebody else is callin’ all the shots."
Near the doorway, Bucky’s jaw tightened.
"No," he began, his gaze lingering on the magazine for the briefest moment before lifting again. "It isn’t."
Rocket held his look for a moment before glancing away again, his ears lowering just a fraction.
Quill nodded once.
"Exactly." His eyes moved from Drax to Rocket, then finally to Gamora. "And now they're tellin’ us the guy who did it might’ve turned himself into something that can’t even be killed." He spread both hands. "We're the Guardians of the Galaxy, you guys! Not the Guardians of Everywhere-But-Earth. This planet's part of the galaxy too. Call it Terra. Call it Earth. At the end of the day, there’s still people here who need somebody to show up for them. That’s our job, that’s what we do."
Gamora held his gaze without answering right away. Around her, the hazy glow of Tony’s hologram drifted across her face in slow intervals. Her expression softened only slightly, though the resolve behind it never wavered.
"That does not make the Power Stone a solution," she countered, firm but gentle.
Quill gave a reluctant nod, the fight draining from his shoulders for the first time since he'd started arguing.
"No," he admitted. "But it does still make this our problem. And I know you know I’m right about that."
Rocket’s ears flicked once before settling again. Even he didn’t argue with that.
Drax considered the thought for a long moment, his brow knitting with uncommon concentration before he gave a slow, thoughtful nod.
"I like what they call 'salsa.'"
Slowly, Quill blinked. "…I like salsa, too."
Rocket threw both paws into the air.
"You know what I like?" He jabbed a thumb into his own chest. "Bein’ alive! And I ain’t stayin’ that way if we go stealin’ the Power Stone from the Nova Corps—!"
"— we wouldn't be stealing it!" Quill shot back. "We’d be…temporarily relocating it. Then we’d put it right back where we found it. There's, like... at least a seventy-percent success rate to make it happen." A crooked smile tugged at the corner of his mouth as he swept a hand toward the group. "Guys, we’ve made worse plans work!"
Tony’s eyes narrowed as he looked from Quill to Steve. "…you’re not actually considering this."
Steve didn’t answer immediately.
Instead, he leaned back into the armchair, one hand rubbing absently across the edge of his jaw as his eyes settled on the slowly rotating strands of DNA suspended above the bed. The olive green light drifted across his face in steady intervals while the room waited for him to speak.
"When that fight started…" he began, after a long moment of pause. "I looked around, and I saw the strongest people I’ve ever fought beside." His eyes moved from one familiar face to the next. "Wanda. Vision. Thor. Doctor Strange." A second went by, and his gaze settled on the Guardians with a faint hint of a smile. "You, and your team."
He leaned forward slightly, resting his forearms on his knees. His hands clasped together loosely, his gaze falling to the floor for a moment before he drew a quiet breath and looked back up at the room.
"It still wasn’t enough." The admission settled heavily over the bedroom. "We lost."
No one argued with it. Sam’s folded arms tightened across his chest. Bucky’s gaze remained fixed somewhere near the floorboards, while the slow hum of the hologram seemed suddenly louder in the silence.
Tony shifted his weight, already shaking his head.
"Steve —"
"No."
Steve met his eyes with the same calm certainty he’d carried into battle a hundred times before. Tony didn’t look away. After a long beat, the line across his forehead gradually relaxed.
"Right now, we don't have a plan, Tony." He spread one hand toward the room— the rotating DNA suspended overhead, Norman’s magazine lying on the bedside table next to it, the collection of heroes around it all. "We have theories. We have guesses. We have a room full of people trying to explain something none of us fully understand, without any idea of where Norman currently is, or what he’s planning to do next — let alone what Oz has even done to him now."
His fingers curled loosely against his thigh. The silence that followed seemed answer enough.
"All we know is that whatever he’s become..." His eyes drifted briefly toward the hologram before returning to Tony. "We aren’t prepared for it."
His gaze drifted briefly toward Quill before returning to Tony.
"I’m not saying we steal an Infinity Stone." A faint shake of his head followed suit. "I’m saying closing doors before we’ve exhausted every option is how we lose twice. We’re already out of our depth here — we only know what didn’t work, who can’t help. Right now, we don’t have the luxury to decide where the next answers come from."
He let the words linger.
The holograms light continued to revolve lazily across the room, catching the edge of Natasha’s mug, glinting off Bucky’s metal arm, and tracing pale ribbons of sulfurous olive light across the bedroom ceiling.
"If there’s help beyond this planet..." Steve's eyes found the Guardians once more. "I’d rather know what it is before we're standing in front of that creature again."
Bruce’s attention never left the twisting strands of DNA. His brow tightened as another possibility worked its way through his thoughts before he finally looked up at the Guardians.
"Could he absorb it?" he asked, a harsh crease tightening the skin along his brow. "What’s stopping him from absorbing the Stone’s power inste—?"
"— no."
The answer came so quickly it nearly overlapped, every Guardian arriving at the same conclusion before the last word of Bruce’s question had finished echoing through the room.
Gamora was already giving him a firm shake of her head.
"The Power Stone is raw cosmic energy," she said, calm and even. Her dark eyes settled on Bruce with quiet certainty, leaving no room for doubt before she answered. "Without something designed to contain it, it overwhelms the body instantly."
Beside Bruce, Rocket let out a short, humorless snort. "Touch it without somethin’ built to hold it —"
Quill picked up the sentence without missing a beat. "—and you’re gone. Vaporized to dust."
Bruce let the explanation settle. His eyes drifted back to the hologram, following the slow rotation of the DNA as one hand found the back of his neck, absently rubbing at the tension gathering there.
"There's nothing wrong with having a contingency," he said, almost too quiet to be heard. "But before we start planning around Infinity Stones...I’d rather we understand what Oz has become first."
His gaze drifted away from the hologram, sweeping slowly across the room instead.
"The spider DNA was the structural foundation of the serum. Remove it, and the formula shouldn’t function the way it was designed to. If Norman found a way around that, then we’re no longer dealing with the Oz formula we know. Before we do anything else, we first need to understand what that new formula is... " He paused, his jaw tightening almost imperceptibly as the possibility settled in. "And what effect introducing the spider DNA afterward is going to have on his biology."
Natasha pushed herself away from the wall, crossing the bedroom at an unhurried pace.
"Then we go back to where all of this started." As she reached the bed, she leaned forward just enough to set her mug on the nearby endtable, squarely atop Norman’s face on the magazine. She lifted her eyes to the others, her expression unreadable. "Doctor Lucas Murphy."
The room fell quiet again. Tony’s attention followed her as she came to a stop beside the bed, while Steve looked up from the armchair, the name pulling his focus away from the slowly rotating strands of DNA overhead.
"Murphy," he repeated quietly. A flicker of recognition crossed his face before he gave a small, thoughtful nod. "The biologist Norman brought in to build Oz."
"Ever since we traced the formula back to him, Rhodey and I have kept him under strict surveillance." Natasha rested one hand lightly against the footboard of the bed, her gaze moving between the two men before sweeping briefly across the room. "If anyone knows what Norman changed in the formula before he took it — or why he decided it was ready when it wasn’t — it’s going to be Doctor Murphy."
Steve leaned forward in the armchair, forearms settling across his knees as he considered it. "And if Norman kept secrets from his own people?"
Natasha met his eyes without hesitation.
"Scientists keep notes." She gave a slight nod toward the magazine resting beneath her mug. "Whether he wants to help us or not...he’ll know where to start looking."
Tony folded his arms, studying her for a long moment before finally speaking. "You think he’ll actually talk?"
The faintest hint of a smile touched the corner of Natasha's mouth. "I’m going to find out."
"You’re not going alone."
The words came from Bucky before anyone else had a chance.
His voice drew every eye in the room. He hadn’t moved from his place near the doorway, his arms still folded across his chest, but his attention had shifted fully onto Natasha.
Natasha met his gaze head on from across the room. "I don’t need protection."
"No," Bucky agreed. "You need backup."
His expression never changed as he held her eyes, one shoulder still resting lightly against the wall beside the door.
Around them, no one spoke. Steve’s gaze drifted quietly between the two of them while Tony looked on with folded arms, for once saying nothing.
Natasha’s posture softened by only the smallest degree.
"I’ve handled worse."
Bucky gave a single nod.
"So have I."
Neither of them looked away.
The silence that followed carried none of the earlier tension. It was quieter than that — two people who knew exactly what the other was capable of, neither interested in pretending otherwise.
Bruce cleared his throat before either of them could continue.
"Murphy was the lead geneticist behind the Oz project…" he began, quietly. "If Norman left loose ends with-with anyone on that project...we don’t know who else knows could know about them." His gaze shifted toward Natasha. "Having someone watching your back doesn’t seem like a bad idea, all things considered."
Tony let out a slow sigh through his nose, pinching the bridge of it for what felt like the hundredth time that afternoon.
"I hate agreeing with Barnes this often." He pointed toward Natasha without ever looking her way. "Yes, I know you can kill a room full of people four hundred different ways before breakfast."
"Five hundred sixty-four," Natasha automatically corrected.
Tony finally looked at her. Neither of them said anything for a long second.
"..that is somehow less reassuring." He motioned toward Bucky without taking his eyes off her. "Take him anyway."
Natasha’s eyes drifted from Tony to Steve, and stayed there, saying everything her words didn’t.
The room waited.
Steve held her look for only a moment before giving a small, apologetic shrug from the armchair, one corner of his mouth threatening the ghost of a smile.
"Tony’s right," he ultimately said.
Natasha looked between the two of them, lingering on Steve just long enough to realize there would be no changing either of their minds.
"I liked it better when you two fought like an old married couple."
The remark disappeared into the room without so much as a smile. Tony’s attention never left the slowly turning strands of DNA overhead while Steve remained seated in the armchair, his expression unchanged.
Rocket, meanwhile, had reached the end of his patience. Perched atop the bed, his tail lashed behind him as he looked from face to face in the room.
"Are we done here?" he asked, throwing both paws into the air. "'Cause unless somebody’s got another surprise apocalypse tucked in their pocket, I thought we were leavin’. If this Oz thing’s suddenly part of the itinerary, it’d be nice to know before we're halfway to orbit and hafta turn the whole ship around."
Steve raised a hand before anyone else could answer.
"Hold on," he said firmly. "I don’t want anybody acting on anything just yet." His eyes moved deliberately from Gamora, to Rocket, to Quill, lingering on each of them just long enough to make sure they understood he was speaking to all three. "Start getting ready as if this is the worst-case scenario. Make whatever preparations you need to make. But before anyone commits to that course..." He glanced toward Natasha. "We’re going to find out what Murphy knows first. We owe it to ourselves to exhaust every option before we decide this is the only one left."
Tony had already pushed away from the wall, crossing the room before stopping halfway between the armchair and the bed. His attention drifted once more to the slowly rotating strands of DNA suspended overhead, watching them turn for a long moment before giving a quiet nod to himself.
"Exactly." He nodded once. "I’d rather let Shuri spend a little time figuring out whether this thing actually remembers how to die before I start calling in Plan G." His gaze shifted to Rocket, then swept across the rest of the Guardians. "You guys are the contingency. The break-glass-and-pray option. If she comes back and tells me we’ve officially run out of miracles..." He pointed toward Quill, and said nothing else.
Quill frowned. "I don't know if I should be offended by that."
"You should," Rocket answered for him.
"Now that Tony has a way to reach you out there," Steve said, looking toward Quill to keep the subject on hand, "we don’t have to decide today. If every other option fails...we’ll call. Until then, let us see if we can solve this without asking you to gamble with an Infinity Stone."
The decision settled over the room with quiet finality. There were no objections, no alternative ideas left waiting to be voiced.
Around him, the Avengers remained where they were for another moment, each left alone with the same uneasy conclusion.
It wasn’t the answer anyone wanted. It was simply the only one they had.
Silence lingered for one last moment before Tony abruptly brought his hands together, the sharp crack cutting cleanly through the room. He jerked a thumb toward the hallway.
"Now — Arrivederci. Fuori." He clapped his hands once, the sharp report breaking the stillness. "Go. You’ve got a ship to catch. We’ve got our own mess to untangle."
Rocket was already hopping off the bed before Tony finished speaking. He landed lightly on the floor, brushed invisible dust from his vest, and started for the door.
"Works for me." He headed for the hallway, glancing back over one shoulder. "So what, we takin’ the big 'ol goof with us again, or he’d finally find someplace else to bother?"
The question followed Rocket into the hallway, answered only by the sound of boots and footsteps as the Guardians began filing out behind him. Steve watched them disappear one by one, waiting until the last of them had rounded the corner before his attention drifted back across the room to Tony.
"Where is Thor?"
Late autumn had settled over the Avengers Compound, a muted sun lingering behind a blanket of gray clouds, illuminating the acres surrounding the facility while offering little more than a cold, colorless light.
A cool breeze drifted across the open fields, sending clusters of red, gold, and amber leaves skittering through the rain-darkened grass before scattering them across sidewalks and pavement.
Near the edge of a pathway on one of those sidewalks, not far from the sprawling jet hanger and the towering ship docked outside, Thor stood alone on a broad stretch of grass between the compound and the rolling countryside beyond. His back remained turned to the vessel, facing the opposite direction entirely, his gaze fixed on the open land stretching beyond the facility.
A shallow puddle beneath him mirrored the muted sky overhead and the distant outline of his broad-shouldered figure standing motionless. An amber leaf spiraled down from above, landing softly upon the water, creating ripples that rolled outward from the point of impact and broke the reflection apart.
The wind tugged at Thor’s honey-gold hair, sweeping it back from his face while a lone braid near his temple swayed gently with each passing gust. The same breeze stirred his beard, carrying loose strands across his jaw before letting them settle again.
There was a distant quality to his eyes, as though they were fixed on the horizon while searching through memories only he could see. The fields stretched endlessly before him, but it was clear his thoughts had wandered somewhere much farther away.
Tony had noticed that long before approaching him.
It wasn’t until he reached the end of the path that he stopped, folding his arms across the European wool coat that shielded him from the autumn chill. For several quiet moments, neither man spoke.
Then,
"I have received word from this man called Doctor Strange." Thor spared Tony a glance from the corner of his eye, finding him standing with his arms folded against the wind, his gaze never leaving the countryside stretching before them.
Neither seemed particularly interested in wasting time with pleasantries. The words settled between them, carrying all the explanation they needed. There was no greeting, no attempt at small talk.
Thor’s gaze drifted back toward the horizon, following nothing in particular as another cool gust rolled across the open field. Days of relentless rain had finally broken sometime during the night, leaving the earth damp beneath their feet and the air rich with the scent of wet soil and fallen leaves.
Tony had seen that look before. Not after victories. Not after ordinary setbacks. It was the look of a man carrying something heavier than he intended to say aloud.
Whatever had drawn Thor away from the compound, it hadn’t been the autumn air.
"It would seem my brother remains committed to being difficult." A faint smile tugged at the corner of Thor’s mouth, gone almost as quickly as it arrived. "After all that was lost with Asgard, I had hoped he might stay. That we might help our people build something new together. Instead, he…"
His gaze drifted toward the horizon, the wind carrying loose leaves across the open field as gray clouds rolled slowly overhead. His words nearly fell in line with the breeze.
"When he departed, he made certain no one would be able to follow. I do not begrudge my brother for the path he has chosen. The truth is, I ceased trying to choose it for him many years ago." His gaze stayed on the distant trees, the wind carrying loose strands of hair across his face as Tony turned to study him.
The faint trace of warmth disappeared from Thor’s expression. His shoulders settled beneath the weight of his cloak as another gust swept across the field, stirring the grass around his boots.
For a long moment, he simply watched the countryside beyond the compound, as though the answer had been waiting for him somewhere beyond.
"But there is a difference between walking one’s own road... and believing one must walk it alone." At last, Thor looked toward him. The movement was unhurried, but after so long staring into the distance, it drew Tony’s full attention. "It was at my request that Doctor Strange sought any trace of where my brother had gone."
The words lingered between them. Tony said nothing, his eyes narrowing ever so slightly as he searched Thor’s face. He already knew where the conversation was leading. He simply needed Thor to finish saying it.
"And now," he said quietly, his eyes returning to the fields, "he believes he has found one."
Tony’s brow tightened almost imperceptibly. The realization settled in with quiet certainty.
Figures.
The words lingered between them. Tony remained silent, studying Thor for a long moment. He’d already begun assembling the answer before it was spoken. Strange’s name. Loki. A trail. There had only ever been one place this conversation could end.
Strange had already done everything he could here. He had stood against Oz himself, testing every advantage his magic could offer, only to discover it fared no better than Wanda’s abilities or even Mjolnir. Whatever Norman had become, it lay beyond anything the Mystic Arts had managed to unravel.
"This may be the only opportunity I have to find him before he vanishes again." Only then did Thor look to Tony, his expression calm but resolute. "It is with that hope that I must bid my departure."
Another gust rolled across the open field, carrying leaves through the damp grass as silence settled between them once more.
Tony didn’t answer immediately. His arms remained folded across his wool coat, his gaze fixed on the distant tree line where the countryside disappeared beneath the gray sky.
There wasn’t much left to say. Thor had already reached his decision long before either of them stepped outside.
He wished the timing had been different.
Parker would’ve called it royally bad timing.
Tony blew a long breath through puffed cheeks, his shoulders rising and falling beneath the weight of his coat before a tired, lopsided smile finally broke through.
"Not gonna lie, big guy." His eyes drifted from the horizon to Thor. "Could really use the God of Thunder in my corner right about now."
A quiet chuckle escaped Thor, more warm than amused. The sound disappeared into the late afternoon breeze almost as quickly as it came.
"I believe this beast belongs more to your world than mine." His gaze settled briefly on the compound behind them before returning to Tony. "A creature of science is best met by the man who understands science. Not even Mjolnir proved particularly effective in that regard — first when Ultron arrived... and now with the demon you find yourself chasing today."
The wind settled for a moment, leaving only the quiet rustle of leaves tumbling across the damp grass between them. Neither man seemed in any hurry to fill the silence.
Thor stood unmoving, his gaze lingering on the compound for only a heartbeat before returning to the countryside beyond. The answer had already been given. All that remained was accepting it.
Tony watched him from the corner of his eye, recognizing the familiar weight behind his composure as he blew another breath through his cheeks, the corner of his mouth twitching into a tired smile that never quite became one.
"You said it yourself." His eyes drifted toward Mjolnir resting at Thor’s side before finding the god again. "Not even your hammer got through that abomination."
Thor answered with a faint, knowing smile.
"You give yourself too little credit, my friend." He studied Tony for a quiet moment before continuing. "If anyone is capable of facing such a threat, it is surely the team you have built."
His gaze wandered once more across the broad stretch of open fields, where another gust sent amber leaves tumbling through the grass.
Tony remained silent beside him. He had learned long ago that Thor’s quiet moments were rarely empty; they were simply the moments when he chose his words with the greatest care.
"In my years, I have fought beside many warriors." Thor’s voice carried easily across the open countryside. "Some were bound by blood. Others by oath." A gentle grin returned to his face, softer now with memory. "The people who stand beside you would march into battle for one another without hesitation. That is not merely a team, Stark. It is family."
The two of them stood quietly for a moment, watching another gust carry leaves across the open field. Neither felt the need to fill the silence.
"And family is not so easily abandoned." His expression settled into quiet resolve. "Which is why I must find my brother."
Tony was quiet for a moment.
His eyes drifted toward the distant tree line, his jaw shifting almost imperceptibly. A few years ago, he probably would've called it a mistake. Chasing one man across realms when there was a battle waiting here on Earth wasn’t the kind of decision he used to understand. Problems had priorities. Missions had objectives. Personal attachments were the sort of variables that complicated both.
Somewhere along the way, that way of thinking had become harder to hold onto.
He’d spent the last year and a half watching one kid gradually carve out a permanent place in his life. Somewhere between late-night lab sessions, school projects, and impossible situations they’d barely managed to survive, he’d stopped seeing attachment as a liability. It wasn’t always something that got in the way. Sometimes it was the reason people kept going.
Standing beside Thor, watching him look toward a brother who wasn’t even there...Tony couldn’t fault him for making the same choice.
"Yeah." A slow breath escaped him. The corner of his mouth lifted into the faintest hint of a smile. "Fair enough. I get it."
The quiet between them didn’t last.
"Let's go, ya flarkin' slowpokes!" Rocket’s voice echoed across the compound, drawing Tony’s attention toward the hangar. "At this pace we're never leavin’ this galaxy!"
The Guardians had already begun the slow walk back to their ship, while Rocket marched several paces ahead, clearly convinced he was the only one interested in leaving on time.
Tony followed the commotion toward the tarmac, watching Rocket impatiently herd the others along as though they hadn’t all been headed to the same ship from the beginning. He rolled his eyes, not surprised they’d managed to make even leaving look complicated.
"After that?" He turned his head back toward the horizon, his eyes briefly finding Thor along the way. "Where do the two of you go from there?"
The question lingered between them. Like everything that had come before, his answer didn’t arrive immediately. Tony watched Thor’s expression settle into quiet thought, his eyes fixed somewhere beyond the rolling fields as though searching for a future neither of them could yet see.
"Much has changed for us both. The path Loki walks now is not the one he walked before the truth of his birth was laid before him. Nor am I the man I was before my world was reduced to memory." A measured breath escaped him, stirring the edge of his beard in the breeze. His eyes remained fixed ahead, a storm behind them no different than the lightning he’d summon from the skies. "Perhaps neither of us knows precisely where we belong anymore." The admission came without shame, only quiet acceptance. "I would simply have him know that whatever road lies ahead, he need not walk it alone."
Tony gave a quiet nod.
His eyes lingered on the horizon beside Thor’s. The wind carried another handful of leaves across the field, and he made no effort to break the silence.
Somehow, it felt earned.
"Well," he finally settled on saying. "If you’re passing through this side of the galaxy anytime soon, try not to be a stranger. And if you happen to hear thunder while you’re out there, feel free to point it in our direction." A small sigh deflated his chest. "We could use all the help we can get with this one."
A faint smile returned to Thor’s face, lingering only for a moment before the autumn breeze carried it away.
Tony’s words settled into the silence between them. It held for another few seconds before it slowly gave way to the distant scrape of luggage wheels rattling across the tarmac.
Down by the Guardian’s ship, duffel bags and equipment crates disappeared one by one up the cargo ramp as voices drifted lazily across the compound, carrying with them the unmistakable sound of music.
Faint at first, it grew clearer as Peter Quill wandered after the others with his headphones slung loosely around his neck, the tiny speakers carrying farther than he probably realized.
♫ Someone told me long ago
♫ There's a calm before the storm
♫ I know, it's been —
"—coming for some time!" Quill belted, slinging another duffel bag into the ship without missing the beat.
"I'm tellin’ you," Rocket grumbled, planting both boots against the cargo ramp as he wrestled an oversized equipment case upward one stubborn shove at a time. Perched comfortably on top of it was Groot, legs dangling over the edge as he looked up at Rocket with wide, innocent eyes — completely oblivious to the effort beneath him. "If this whole Oz-stealin'-Stone thing doesn't pan out, we're gonna need another payday, ASAP. Groot’s already eaten through half our rations!"
Groot tilted his head. "I am Groot?"
"Don't 'I am Groot' me," Rocket muttered, giving the suitcase another heave. "You ate three bags of dehydrated fruit, half a crate of protein bars, and somehow...somehow...the emergency chocolate!"
Groot looked down at his feet for a moment before quietly patting his stomach. "…I am Groot."
A grin spread across Quill's face as he strolled behind them, one side of his headphones hanging around his neck while the music spilled into the open air.
♫ When it's over so they say
It'll rain a sunny day ♫
♫ I know...shining down like water ♫
"See?" He pointed toward Rocket without missing a beat. "That’s what happens when you let a growing tree snack whenever he wants."
"He gives me the look!" Rocket protested, throwing an arm toward Groot. "What am I supposed to do? Say no to the kid?"
"Yes." Gamora didn’t even bother looking at him. The crate remained balanced against one shoulder as she walked straight past Rocket, disappearing up the cargo ramp without breaking stride.
Rocket watched her go, blinking once.
"...well, now it’s too late!" He threw both hands into the air before pointing accusingly toward the tiny tree still perched atop the equipment case. "And we need a gig. So if we’re gonna go takin' Stones —"
"We are not stealing an Infinity Stone." Gamora’s voice cut through the conversation before Rocket could finish. She stopped halfway up the cargo ramp just long enough to glance back over one shoulder, fixing him with the sort of look that had ended this argument more times than anyone cared to count.
Rocket looked genuinely offended.
"Who said anything about stealing?" He jabbed a thumb toward himself. "I said if we gotta steal the Power Stone."
"We are not stealing an Infinity Stone," came the unanimous reply from every Guardian within earshot.
Quill, meanwhile, wandered obliviously through the middle of the argument, blissfully unconcerned as another lyric carried across the compound.
"I wanna know..." he belted, slinging another bag over his shoulder. "Have you ever seen the rain, comin' down on a sunny day..."
Thor’s smile lingered as the voices drifted across the hangar bay and into the open field where he stood, softened by distance until they became little more than another part of the autumn breeze. For a moment, he simply watched them — the familiar disorder of friends preparing to leave — before turning back toward Tony.
"If I am able to return to assist in your troubles," he said, sincerely, "you have my word that I shall try."
Tony met his eyes, offering a small nod in return.
Thor remained quiet for another moment, his attention wandering beyond the compound. The breeze tugged gently at the crimson folds of his cloak. When he spoke again, his voice carried a different weight. Reflection, rather than a farewell.
"It is a curious thing, my friend. Though our journeys have often carried us in different directions..." A faint smile found him once more. "...they have remained strangely parallel. There was a time when both of us believed the weight of the world was ours alone to bear. We kept those around us at arm’s length, believing it spared them the burden." He paused, watching another gust carry leaves across the grass. "I have since learned that the burden only grows heavier when carried alone."
Only then did his eyes return to Tony.
“I have watched you change." There was no judgment in the words — only certainty. "You no longer stand apart from those who would stand beside you. You trust them. You allow them to share in both your victories and your failures." He inclined his head ever so slightly. "It has not made you weaker, Stark." The corners of his mouth lifted. “It has made you a better man."
Tony held his gaze. For once, no sarcastic remark arrived to rescue him from the moment.
His jaw shifted almost imperceptibly. He looked away for only a heartbeat, eyes tracing the damp path beneath their feet before drifting back to Thor. The corner of his mouth twitched as though he were searching for something lighter to say, some joke that might soften the weight of the compliment.
Nothing came.
He let out a slow breath through his nose, the autumn air cool against his lungs, and gave the smallest of nods.
“...thanks."
The word was quiet. Unpolished. Honest. For a brief moment, the song playing from within the ship, and the rustling wind blended into a kind of peaceful background hum. The weight of goodbyes eased, if only slightly, as life resumed around them.
From down by the ship, Quill’s voice drifted effortlessly across the compound, carried on the same breeze that stirred the leaves between them.
"Yesterday, and days before. Sun is cold and rain is hard," Quill sang, disappearing briefly behind the open cargo door before reemerging with another bag already in hand. "I know, been that way for all my time!"
Tony huffed a quiet laugh through his nose, shaking his head slightly as he stepped closer towards Thor.
“Your age has made you wise, Point Break." He brought a hand down in a firm, familiar clap against Thor's shoulder, holding it there for the briefest moment. All the while, his eyes drifted after the Guardians as they disappeared up the cargo ramp, more out of habit than interest.
Halfway through another absent glance, something buried beneath the growing mountain of duffel bags and equipment crates caught Tony's attention. His brow furrowed.
He leaned forward ever so slightly, trying to make sense of the familiar shape wedged awkwardly between a supply crate and somebody’s luggage bag. Recognition struck all at once.
“...is that my griddle?"
Every bit of movement around the cargo doors seemed to hesitate as the ramp began to lift into the air, closing shut on Rocket's shout of,
“You weren't usin’ it!"
Tony could only give an exasperated shake of his head as the cargo ramp sealed shut.