WHO: Peter Quill & Gamora WHEN: Friday morning, roughly around the time of Rocket & Groot's memory upgrade WHERE: Guardians House WHAT: Memories of Infinity War. WARNINGS: Spoilers
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It had happened once before, memories clawing at her like the scratches of a beast’s mighty talons along exposed skin. Unfolding before her eyes, wide awake and caught astride, Gamora caught herself against the doorframe, slid down, and let them take her into slumber. Horrible visions of Thanos greeted Gamora’s eyes. Terror, dread, and the need to sacrifice herself to save the galaxy invaded her to the point of physical paralysis.
Her captor, tormentor, destroyer of worlds, Thanos came for her and ripped Gamora from the guardians. Death at the hands of Peter would have been a kinder fate than the one awaiting her on Vormir. Ultimately swallowed in darkness, Gamora awoke with a start and ragged gasp for air. Somehow she still felt like she was falling.
Clutching the frame as she attempted to stand, tears welling in her eyes, she grasped it to the point of wood creaking under the weight of her anguish. Nebula had cautioned her not to give in, to not tell Thanos where the Soul Stone was located. Peter had pulled the trigger for the sake of the universe; she should have done the same.
Peter.
Dragging the back of her hand across her eyes, she straightened and tried to clench down the hopeless feeling on the rise. Desperately wanting to see him, she ran to his room fully expecting him to be there and not right around the corner of the hallway. Colliding into his chest, she instinctively reached out to grab him by the front of his shirt and held herself against him.
“Peter,” she whispered sadly, not daring to look up at his face for fear that he would have remembered the same experience. Whether he remembered those brand new times together before Thanos raked them across coals didn’t matter. He knew she felt something more for him and that was enough to keep her pressed tightly against him. “Would you hold me? Just for a little while. Please don’t ask me why.”
'Quill...'
It was the last flash of memory that tore at Peter before he had too much. It had all come flooding at him, in the middle of the night, as he laid in bed of the wee hours of the morning. There was plenty that was making him toss and turn against the mattress, his subconscious just on the brink of waking him through it all, as he began protesting against everything that was being shown to him. Pleads of 'no' had escaped from his sleeping form and tears were fresh at the corners of his eyes, brought forth from the very real pain of seeing Gamora in Thanos' grasp, his blaster held at the ready, and Thanos goading him on while Gamora pleaded with him for a merciful death.
One of which he had been unable to grant her. Even though he'd finally delivered what should have been the kill shot, Thanos' abilities prevented him from succeeding, and Gamora was pulled from Knowhere in his grasp.
And because of his inability to do as she'd pleaded sooner, she was instead sacrificed for Thanos' conquest and domination. Thanos had confirmed this himself as he tried to act as though he was in mourning. It had sent Peter reeling and he lost control. Rage had filled him and any sense of logical thought was impossible as he lashed out against Thanos. Everything had gone so fast from there.
They lost.
He knew they'd lost because Mantis had drifted away from sight and Drax was in the process of doing so, speaking Quill's name with a sense of confusion.
It forced Peter to full consciousness and he was out of the bed instantly. Lost in his own terrors from the memories, Quill did not take note of the frantic sounds of the rest of the house. He was set on one person and one person only. Gamora. He needed to find Gamora and to see if she were alive and well here. He didn't register the sounds of Rocket's similar position and thus didn't rush towards those sounds to check on him. He didn't know.
Instead, he collided with Gamora not long after his pursuit began. She was against his chest and she was asking to be held. Quill, trying to calm the shaking he was feeling, wrapped his arms around her in a way he'd not done yet on Terra, with a sense of familiarity that he now knew as their regular. Eyes shut tight and he swallowed. He didn't have words. He didn't feel as though he could trust himself to say much of anything. Instead, he nodded his head in agreement, keeping her in his arms against him.
It was foreign and familiar all at once. A bittersweet bonus to the terrible psychological torture she’d been forced to endure by whatever monstrosity that controlled their memories of extra-lives still existing across the vagrant borders of each universe. Before Thanos had influenced her dreams, love for Peter had bloomed, and now it flourished in melancholy splendor.
She cried into his chest without concern for volume or propriety. The moment Thanos had turned and apologized for giving her up in the name of “saving” the universe, she knew all hope was lost. Gamora was falling still, but at least Peter was there to catch her. They didn’t have that luxury in the nightmare awaiting them at home. She had failed the Guardians, and worse still -- she had failed more than just a mere galaxy.
If she managed to speak any other words, they never consciously registered on her own ears. She did, though, plead with him not to let her go and spackled endless apologies in between the sobs. How she had wished his face could have been the last one she saw before darkness finally swallowed her whole.
Ultimately, she found one coherent thing to voice above the cries afflicting her frame, “My room, take me there?” As she didn’t have the strength, nor the heart, to move.
His face scrunched up as he tried to keep his emotions in check. Grief was spreading through him as memories tore at him of her loss and the loss of Mantis and Drax just before the memories stopped. And coupled with the grief was the guilt that was already starting to dawn on him before the others he loved and cared about began to fade away. They'd lost. They'd had him, in their grasp, and he'd let his own grief take hold of him and stop him from following through with the plan. If he'd just kept himself in check, maybe...maybe Thanos wouldn't have succeeded. Maybe Mantis and Drax and the trillions of others wouldn't have begun to fade away.
A noise escaped from the back of his throat and his knees felt weak. Having her in his hold was one of the only things anchoring him at this moment, preventing him from falling completely. Arms tightened around her tighter and he bowed his head to rest in the crook between her shoulder and neck, his own tears escaping from him. A hand slipped up, entwining in her hair, as he cradled her close.
He'd not have dared to show her this type of affection just the day prior. They'd been building up to displays of affection, taking their time, because that was how he'd interpreted Gamora wanting them to proceed. But he'd stopped giving anyone else attention of this sort. He'd committed himself to Gamora and they'd been figuring things out. Now? Now he had memories of years together and knowing love for her that had been built over time.
When she did speak, he stirred in her arms, the side of his head leaning to rest against hers. He nodded again. "Yeah," was what he was able to say, his own voice strained and foreign sounding, full of a grief that hadn't been shown in this capacity for a very, very long time.
Still, he pulled back and his arms moved to swipe at his face, rubbing at the tears. And then, he shifted, arms coming up to scoop Gamora up in them, just as he'd once done in the weightlessness of space, cradling her close to his form. It didn't take long to move around the corner of the house, push the door open and enter her room. He shoved the door shut behind them and when he went to sit on the bed, his knees nearly gave out on him, but he sat on the edge.
A hand moved to rest against her cheek and he swallowed, looking into her eyes now. "You don't go leaving, you hear me? We can't leave," he spoke, voice cracking. This place had held charm for Peter ever since Yondu's arrival. It was a place where he could keep his loved ones no matter what happened back home. And now?
There was no question. He and Gamora couldn't ever leave this world. He had no way of stopping it, and his pleas to her now were pointless because she couldn't either, but logic wasn't here with Peter right now. He couldn't lose her.
Somehow it all felt natural, the simple of act of being lifted into his arms. She instinctively wrapped her arms around his neck, latched on and not about to let go of him. The world could stop spinning around them and she wouldn’t notice a thing, not as long as long as she could exist in his orbit. They’d had years together, years vacant and unknown to them both. It all culminated into tragedy, because she couldn’t bear to see her sister tortured anymore than Peter could bear whatever burdens weighed him down now. One suspicion was confirmed as soon as they were safely hidden away in her quarters: he knew she had died.
It should have been jarring in its own way, remembering intimacy with him, guard wholly dropped in favor of reveling in his companionship. She had struggled to face her feelings, felt deep in her heart of hearts that he could do so much better, and still awoke with a love for Peter Quill that Thanos himself could not snap into mere dust.
But, he had taken time away from them.
Fingers digging into his shoulder, grip unrelenting, she lifted her free hand to clasp his against her cheek. Willing watery eyes to glimpse his face at last, she felt the last of her heart strings break. He had suffered so much, now his pain was magnified. One silver lining glimmered on the precipice of tarnishing: they could share it now.
“Peter...” Gamora lamented, fingers drifting to find purchase on his scruffy cheek. “We’re here together, now, and that’s… all that matters,” though she spoke in trepidation. Gamora’s heart was not in the statement, but conviction emerged from the ashes swiftly as she pressed her forehead suddenly against his own. “No, what matters more is remembering that I love you more than anything.”
He gave a nod of agreement to her words. He didn't know if that was going to be enough to keep his mind from drifting to over analyzing every action that had been taken those days leading up to the confrontation with Thanos but it was something to hold onto for here. It could center him and remind him of what needed to be reminded. They were here together, with a portion of their family also in this house, and they didn't have time stolen from them here.
When her forehead pressed against his, he shifted to let his hand drop from her cheek and envelope her back in his arms, leaning against her as he did. "I ain't going to go forgetting that, 'Mora," he said, swallowing as he did. He remained there safe in the stillness of her company.
"I love you, Gamora," he then returned, voice dangerous close to cracking just as it had been the last time he spoke it to her. Eyes clenched tighter shut before he shifted, moving to lay back against the bed, and bringing her down with him. He didn't want to let her go ever again.
It should have been jarring, feeling so much more for him than she did but a day ago. Instead it made perfect sense, and that love she held for Peter was what lent strength to weary bones. Now, she didn’t feel like she was falling so much as landing right in his arms. If only that was how it could have ended, falling into each other rather than falling to her finality alone.
She died. Peter knew she had died. Yet here they were, laying back on the bed and curling into one another, close as two people could be. She nestled into his arms, warm and inviting, and not even Thanos himself could move her from that spot beside Peter. Latched onto him with everything she had, body fatigued from the promise of death, she buried her face in the crook of his neck and breathed him in one more time.
Just to ensure he was real, that they were truly there together, and perhaps come the morning she would be convinced everything would be alright.