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jedibuttercup) wrote2022-07-03 04:50 pm
jedibuttercup) wrote2022-07-03 04:50 pm
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Fic: Just Call My Name (I'll Be There in a Hurry) - T; B:tVS x GotG 2
T; B:tVS x GotG 2. 2800w, for ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
intoabar. Follow-up to Intergalatic Priority Mail.
Buffy might look harmless for her species, dressed in impractical fabrics with even more impractical wedges stuck to the heels of her boots, but Rocket recognized another fun-sized agent of annihilation when he saw one.
Title: Just Call My Name (I'll Be There in a Hurry)
Author: Jedi Buttercup
Disclaimer: The words are mine; the worlds are not.
Spoilers: B:tVS and Guardians of the Galaxy 2 (post-canon for B:tVS; canon-divergent for GotG)
Notes: Follow-up to Intergalatic Priority Mail. For the "Ficathon Goes Into a Bar" challenge, for "Buffy Summers goes into a bar and meets... Rocket (Guardians of the Galaxy)!" Title from the lyrics of "Ain't No Mountain High Enough", from Awesome Mix Vol. 1.
Summary: Buffy might look harmless for her species, dressed in impractical fabrics with even more impractical wedges stuck to the heels of her boots, but Rocket recognized another fun-sized agent of annihilation when he saw one. 2800 words.
"Okay," the blonde humie said, both of her deadly hands wrapped safely around a bottle and an entire metal table, fully secured to the floor of the Milano's galley, between her and Rocket. "I'm here, I'm sitting, you've beered me. I'm not gonna get any more patient the longer you wait to break it to me. I can see the ship, you know. Where's my sister? Why the red-alert summons?"
The two of them could only very loosely be called acquaintances, and Rocket would have been perfectly happy for it to stay that way. Alas, events had not been so kind.
Not long after the dance-off with Ronan the Accuser, Quill had received an inexplicable letter from Terra addressed to him as 'the living heir of Meredith Quill'. The crew had gone to investigate; it had turned out his mom had been something called a 'Potential Slayer', Quill's granddad had actually been her 'Watcher', and the folks who'd taken over the organization they'd belonged to were doing some redistribution of assets. If that had been it-- collecting a bunch of free units just for showing up, or better yet a hold full of convertible goods-- Rocket would have written the brief stop off as just another boring detour, like collecting a not particularly challenging bounty. But then Quill had shaken the hand of the Slayer Queen's little sister, and things had gone from boring to too interesting in a heartbeat.
Turned out, channeling the power of an Infinity Stone left a person sensitive to the others. Including the one that had somehow been incarnated as a humie named Dawn Summers: endless power, squishy little carapace. If the Collector hadn't already been mostly out of business, the payoff for that one would probably have been astronomical... not that Rocket would have ever tried to collect, because the living Soul Stone came with her own superpowered sibling. Buffy might look harmless for her species, dressed in impractical fabrics with even more impractical wedges stuck to the heels of her boots, but Rocket recognized another fun-sized agent of annihilation when he saw one. And this one had paid them to keep her sister far away from the likes of Thanos.
Well, technically to investigate her own origins; but with a garnish of 'too many Stones have been on Earth the last few orbits, we don't want the world-destroying egomaniac interested in collecting them to find her.' Some dude literally named Ego who'd just wiped out a whole fleet of Sovereign warships in an extremely theatrical, overkill fashion? Didn't seem a whole lot more appealing by that metric. So yeah, he'd ratted on their newest crewmate. Too bad her sister had completely missed the hint to bring more backup.
"So, you remember the part where Quill's only half Terran," he said leadingly.
"Me, and every other Slayer and her Watcher," Buffy replied in an acerbic tone of voice. "Willow had to add a whole new chapter on 'so you might be vibing because they're not human, not just because you're into them; know the signs' to Slayer Sex Ed when the news came out. And the footnotes grew footnotes after I started going off-world with Sif. I really could have done without being Exhibit B."
She didn't explain what that last sentence meant, but Rocket was pretty sure he didn't want to know. Humie mating rituals in general were not his favorite topic of conversation... well, unless Quill was busy making an idiot of himself in front of Gamora. That was usually funny enough to make an exception.
"And you know we were running that totally not dangerous battery protection mission for the Sovereign. Just to get your sister's feet wet in the Galaxy Guarding business," he added, warily.
The Slayer stiffened in her seat, predator's eyes locking onto him. "Not seeing the connection here. How do we get from your half-alien buddy to interdimensional beast hunting to-- this?" She gestured towards the walls of the galley. Which was fair; even after several hours of nanorepair courtesy of his amazing skills, the ship still looked like it had been wrecked hard and opened to atmosphere. "Where's my sister, Rocket?"
The fur on the back of his neck stiffened at her sharp tone; Rocket shook it off irritably and bared his teeth in her direction. "Off on another adventure," he said, dryly. "With the guy who flew to our rescue when the Sovereign totally unreasonably sent a fleet after us for allegedly walking off with some of those batteries. He said he was Quill's Dad, talked a lot about his 'very special heritage', made creepy comments about your sister's 'vibrant energy', then invited the pair of them for a visit while I finished the repairs. Gamora and Drax went with them, of course, because they're not idiots, but Quill and Sunrise said yes, because they definitely are. And now I'm stuck here with Groot and Gamora's crazy assassin sister one jump away from where the fleet went boom, and somehow not a one of them considered it might be a bad idea to divide our forces."
Buffy's eyebrows crept up her forehead as he summarized; by the time he'd finished she looked a lot less angry with him and a lot more inclined to swear at the universe in general. "Dawn, I swear," she growled under her breath, then finally took a gulp of beer... and paused to give the bottle a surprised look. "Hey. Alcohol and I aren't usually very mixy, but that's not half bad."
Well, at least that gambit had worked. "I know, right?" Rocket snorted. "You try sourcing tasty alcohol for a crew where no two of us are the same species. Stick around, I'll send some of Quill's share home with you."
"Maybe. After you explain why on-- whatever this planet's name is-- you didn't give me a little more detail over the comm," Buffy returned to her theme, narrowing her eyes again. "What kind of forces are the Sovereign likely to send after you? And please tell me running off with Star-Bro was the only stupid thing Dawn did; I didn't like the sound of that 'allegedly'."
"You want me to narrate the whole mission, or you want me to get to the point?" Rocket skipped hastily past the question of fault. "Though, side note? If that's allegedly something not off-brand for her, you might not want to tell Quill; he's half-serious about recruiting her as a proper Ravager already. Submitting her name back to Yondu for the official roster despite the fact that he's after our necks, the works. Anyway. I didn't know if Ego had some way of intercepting the message, all right? I kinda thought the reinforcements would be implied by 'your sister needs you', or that at the very least you'd bring a ship, and not just have your girlfriend send you off over the Rainbow Bridge. And the whole point of the beast-hunting job was that the Sovereign don't get their own hands dirty. They'll hire some scumbags to do it for them. But if I know my scumbags, let me just reiterate the part about the ones already after our necks."
The edge of the table crumpled ever-so-slightly under Buffy's grip, and Rocket's ears flattened back in instinctive reaction. "I thought you meant for, like, sister time! You know how she is about Drax, and I've been thinking she doth protest too much about the whole existential crisis thing for a while now. Not that she was actually in physical danger, since the whole point of sending her off-Earth was to keep her safe. Tell me you at least have something plan-like in mind. Sif's off with Thor and the rest of the Hangers-On Three right now doing something for the All-Father, so even if Heimdall could get permission to burn enough energy to reach all the way out here again, he'd have to relay people from Earth, and my comm doesn't have that kind of range. If someone had actually warned me, I might have been better prepared."
Somewhere up in orbit, one of the drone sensors he'd planted must have tripped, because an urgent alert chose that moment to start flashing on the comm screen. "Speaking of preparations...." Rocket tapped the controls until the take from the nearest camera over Berhert appeared, showing an image of Yondu's flagship coming into range. "Yeah, I have maybe twelve percent of a plan? I've already laid several trap fields, and I was planning on broadcasting Quill's music over the speakers while I went out to stun a few more. Knock as many down as I could, so I could get to their Captain. I wasn't sure what I was going to do about him yet, though. The minute Yondu draws his arrow and whistles, it's all over. I figured that part's where you come in."
"I'm guessing since Peter's still in contact with them, and you're talking traps instead of bombs, you don't want these guys actually dead despite the fact that they're after you," she said, skeptically. "What gives?"
Rocket shrugged. "Well, for all he complains the guy kidnapped him and let his crew threaten to eat him on a regular basis, Quill's weirdly sentimental about Yondu. Also, you know, vice versa, otherwise there's no explanation for how Quill's still alive. I figured maybe if I can stall him long enough to convince him Quill's in danger, his weirdly sentimental streak will kick in and he'll take us to him. You might not have brought your own backup, but Yondu comes with a whole clan of Ravagers."
Buffy sat back, staring at him, then heaved a long sigh and tipped the bottle back again. "It really is a Tuesday, isn't it. At least it's not an apocalypse this time."
Something on her belt beeped before she'd even set the empty bottle back on the table-- some kind of secondary communicator? Buffy frowned at the chiming sound, then picked it up, thumbed the controls, and went even paler. "Wow, I take that back. 'It's no moon, it's a Glory, and I think he's trying to pull a Palpatine on Peter'. Crap."
Holy incomprehensible metaphors, Star-Lord. But at least she was aimed the right direction now. "I understood maybe one word of that," Rocket replied. "The milquetoast swear word. Guessing that part was you and not Soul-Girl; you're the fussiest weapon of mass destruction I've ever met. Are we getting to the inevitable disaster part of the plan yet?"
"I should introduce you to Faith sometime. Or better yet, never," she said tartly as she typed something back, then looked up, jaw set tensely. "And like you had to ask. You better be right about this Yondu guy. How will I know which one's him?"
Rocket blew a frustrated breath, then keyed another image up on the screen. "He's Centaurian. Blue skin, snaggly teeth, metal fin on his head. You can't miss him. No, I mean it; you can't miss him, or we'll have a much bigger hole to dig ourselves out of afterward. I don't think he'd kill us, but he'd definitely lock us up and throw away the key for a while, and I doubt Quill has that kind of time."
Buffy gave him a toothy smile of her own, then rose and held out a hand. "You'll be eating those words in a minute. But I didn't bring any tasers with me. Got anything I can use?"
"If you manage to put your units where your mouth is, you can try to make me. Here." He picked a few choice items out of the stash he'd been amassing and tossed them over. "Enjoy."
"You, too." She pulled a stretchy band out of her pocket and tamed her blonde mane back into a tail with a few quick motions, then slipped out of the ship and started heading for the trees.
Rocket cued up the speakers, made sure Groot was safe, then followed her out into the night-time forest. What was peril without a little fun?
+
Thirty minutes and a whole lot of bruised and lightly broken Ravagers later-- Yondu among them, knocked out and carried back to the Milano over the shoulder of his much shorter opponent-- quite a bit of fun had indeed been had. The assassin had escaped, but eh, with an epic grudgematch backstory like hers Rocket was pretty sure she'd find Gamora again later, and nobody had actually died. He set two more beers out, poked Yondu awake, waited out the swearing and threats, and then laid the story out for him too.
Yondu listened, disgusted expression deepening as the explanation developed, then gave a frustrated sigh. "The hell was that kid thinking? There's a reason I never delivered him to that jackass."
"You tell him that outright? Or leave him to make his own assumptions?" Rocket scoffed. "Sorry to have to break it to you, but he kind of failed at learning the 'read the room' skill in Ravager school."
"Don't I fuckin' know it. Tell me you at least still have the batteries the Sovereign said y'all took," Yondu replied, stabbing a blue finger over the table. "If we're going to give up the bounty and fight a planet, it's the least you're gonna owe us."
"Let's face it, you weren't going to take the bounty anyway," Rocket began to sneer, then paused. "Wait, what do you mean planet?"
"He's a Celestial," Yondu replied dryly, as if that said it all.
He wasn't wrong. They were probably lucky Ego was a planet, and not a being on the scale that Knowhere had been when it was alive. At least he stayed in one place. "A Celestial. Great. We're doomed."
"You're just now figuring that out, boy?" Yondu rolled his eyes. "Shoulda never taken that first call from him. Oughta known it would come to this eventually."
"No moon, right," Buffy scoffed, shaking her head. "I'm supposed to be the One Girl in All the World, not the One Girl Versus the World. Please tell me you have planet-busting weapons, or at least moon-cracky ones. If he really is the 'rule the universe' type, I kinda doubt he's going to let our people go just because we say 'please'."
Rocket thought about it a moment, eyed Yondu, contemplated the kinds of armaments the Eclector might have, and reluctantly considered other uses for the batteries that had started the whole mess. "...Maybe?"
She snorted. "Is that twelve percent of a maybe?"
Rocket gave her a dirty look. "If you got any better ideas, feel free to volunteer."
"Well, unless this planet happens to come with stabbable vital organs...." She touched the axe-shaped weapon sheathed on her back.
"Yeah, you wish," Rocket said dryly. "There's a reason they're called Celestials, not Terrestrials."
Buffy frowned. "Now that? One step too far. The last thing we need is a w-word in this situation."
"That's what's one step too far." Yondu gave a rusty chuckle. "I like your style, girl. Best we get going, though; we'll have to figure out the rest along the way. Ego's seven hundred jumps from here, and I'll have to leave half the crew someplace if I don't want 'em mutinying. They think I cut Quill too much slack as it is."
"Yeah? Well, that's what you do for family. Not the kind who made you, but the kind you chose. Right, Rocket?" Buffy said, pointedly.
Ain't no thing like me but me, Rocket had once told Quill. Literally, that was still true. But looked at another way, they were all a bunch of misfits, weren't they? He'd been waiting ever since the escape from the Kyln for the Guardians to get fed up with him, but that hadn't happened. And maybe never would, if they could keep other forces from prying the crew apart. Like that jackass, Ego.
"Right," he agreed. "Let's go save Quill, then... and probably the Galaxy again while we're at it."
"Sounds like a plan."
+
(Not that the others weren't halfway to saving themselves already when they got there. And thanks to the fact that the planet actually did turn out to have a stabbable vital organ, they even all made it out alive.
Though not unchanged. No-one had considered what a half-Celestial taught how to channel a source of near-infinite power and the source of infinite power already on his crew might get up to if they got creative.
But that would be another story; one that didn't end with a party on the Eclector and Quill's crew seeing Dawn's sister off with a hug, a call to Heimdall, and a case of beer.)
+
"Next time, just tell me to bring the kitchen sink, okay? But-- thanks, Rocket."
"No problem, Slayer."
+
(x-posted @ AO3)
intoabar. Follow-up to Intergalatic Priority Mail.Buffy might look harmless for her species, dressed in impractical fabrics with even more impractical wedges stuck to the heels of her boots, but Rocket recognized another fun-sized agent of annihilation when he saw one.
Title: Just Call My Name (I'll Be There in a Hurry)
Author: Jedi Buttercup
Disclaimer: The words are mine; the worlds are not.
Spoilers: B:tVS and Guardians of the Galaxy 2 (post-canon for B:tVS; canon-divergent for GotG)
Notes: Follow-up to Intergalatic Priority Mail. For the "Ficathon Goes Into a Bar" challenge, for "Buffy Summers goes into a bar and meets... Rocket (Guardians of the Galaxy)!" Title from the lyrics of "Ain't No Mountain High Enough", from Awesome Mix Vol. 1.
Summary: Buffy might look harmless for her species, dressed in impractical fabrics with even more impractical wedges stuck to the heels of her boots, but Rocket recognized another fun-sized agent of annihilation when he saw one. 2800 words.
"Okay," the blonde humie said, both of her deadly hands wrapped safely around a bottle and an entire metal table, fully secured to the floor of the Milano's galley, between her and Rocket. "I'm here, I'm sitting, you've beered me. I'm not gonna get any more patient the longer you wait to break it to me. I can see the ship, you know. Where's my sister? Why the red-alert summons?"
The two of them could only very loosely be called acquaintances, and Rocket would have been perfectly happy for it to stay that way. Alas, events had not been so kind.
Not long after the dance-off with Ronan the Accuser, Quill had received an inexplicable letter from Terra addressed to him as 'the living heir of Meredith Quill'. The crew had gone to investigate; it had turned out his mom had been something called a 'Potential Slayer', Quill's granddad had actually been her 'Watcher', and the folks who'd taken over the organization they'd belonged to were doing some redistribution of assets. If that had been it-- collecting a bunch of free units just for showing up, or better yet a hold full of convertible goods-- Rocket would have written the brief stop off as just another boring detour, like collecting a not particularly challenging bounty. But then Quill had shaken the hand of the Slayer Queen's little sister, and things had gone from boring to too interesting in a heartbeat.
Turned out, channeling the power of an Infinity Stone left a person sensitive to the others. Including the one that had somehow been incarnated as a humie named Dawn Summers: endless power, squishy little carapace. If the Collector hadn't already been mostly out of business, the payoff for that one would probably have been astronomical... not that Rocket would have ever tried to collect, because the living Soul Stone came with her own superpowered sibling. Buffy might look harmless for her species, dressed in impractical fabrics with even more impractical wedges stuck to the heels of her boots, but Rocket recognized another fun-sized agent of annihilation when he saw one. And this one had paid them to keep her sister far away from the likes of Thanos.
Well, technically to investigate her own origins; but with a garnish of 'too many Stones have been on Earth the last few orbits, we don't want the world-destroying egomaniac interested in collecting them to find her.' Some dude literally named Ego who'd just wiped out a whole fleet of Sovereign warships in an extremely theatrical, overkill fashion? Didn't seem a whole lot more appealing by that metric. So yeah, he'd ratted on their newest crewmate. Too bad her sister had completely missed the hint to bring more backup.
"So, you remember the part where Quill's only half Terran," he said leadingly.
"Me, and every other Slayer and her Watcher," Buffy replied in an acerbic tone of voice. "Willow had to add a whole new chapter on 'so you might be vibing because they're not human, not just because you're into them; know the signs' to Slayer Sex Ed when the news came out. And the footnotes grew footnotes after I started going off-world with Sif. I really could have done without being Exhibit B."
She didn't explain what that last sentence meant, but Rocket was pretty sure he didn't want to know. Humie mating rituals in general were not his favorite topic of conversation... well, unless Quill was busy making an idiot of himself in front of Gamora. That was usually funny enough to make an exception.
"And you know we were running that totally not dangerous battery protection mission for the Sovereign. Just to get your sister's feet wet in the Galaxy Guarding business," he added, warily.
The Slayer stiffened in her seat, predator's eyes locking onto him. "Not seeing the connection here. How do we get from your half-alien buddy to interdimensional beast hunting to-- this?" She gestured towards the walls of the galley. Which was fair; even after several hours of nanorepair courtesy of his amazing skills, the ship still looked like it had been wrecked hard and opened to atmosphere. "Where's my sister, Rocket?"
The fur on the back of his neck stiffened at her sharp tone; Rocket shook it off irritably and bared his teeth in her direction. "Off on another adventure," he said, dryly. "With the guy who flew to our rescue when the Sovereign totally unreasonably sent a fleet after us for allegedly walking off with some of those batteries. He said he was Quill's Dad, talked a lot about his 'very special heritage', made creepy comments about your sister's 'vibrant energy', then invited the pair of them for a visit while I finished the repairs. Gamora and Drax went with them, of course, because they're not idiots, but Quill and Sunrise said yes, because they definitely are. And now I'm stuck here with Groot and Gamora's crazy assassin sister one jump away from where the fleet went boom, and somehow not a one of them considered it might be a bad idea to divide our forces."
Buffy's eyebrows crept up her forehead as he summarized; by the time he'd finished she looked a lot less angry with him and a lot more inclined to swear at the universe in general. "Dawn, I swear," she growled under her breath, then finally took a gulp of beer... and paused to give the bottle a surprised look. "Hey. Alcohol and I aren't usually very mixy, but that's not half bad."
Well, at least that gambit had worked. "I know, right?" Rocket snorted. "You try sourcing tasty alcohol for a crew where no two of us are the same species. Stick around, I'll send some of Quill's share home with you."
"Maybe. After you explain why on-- whatever this planet's name is-- you didn't give me a little more detail over the comm," Buffy returned to her theme, narrowing her eyes again. "What kind of forces are the Sovereign likely to send after you? And please tell me running off with Star-Bro was the only stupid thing Dawn did; I didn't like the sound of that 'allegedly'."
"You want me to narrate the whole mission, or you want me to get to the point?" Rocket skipped hastily past the question of fault. "Though, side note? If that's allegedly something not off-brand for her, you might not want to tell Quill; he's half-serious about recruiting her as a proper Ravager already. Submitting her name back to Yondu for the official roster despite the fact that he's after our necks, the works. Anyway. I didn't know if Ego had some way of intercepting the message, all right? I kinda thought the reinforcements would be implied by 'your sister needs you', or that at the very least you'd bring a ship, and not just have your girlfriend send you off over the Rainbow Bridge. And the whole point of the beast-hunting job was that the Sovereign don't get their own hands dirty. They'll hire some scumbags to do it for them. But if I know my scumbags, let me just reiterate the part about the ones already after our necks."
The edge of the table crumpled ever-so-slightly under Buffy's grip, and Rocket's ears flattened back in instinctive reaction. "I thought you meant for, like, sister time! You know how she is about Drax, and I've been thinking she doth protest too much about the whole existential crisis thing for a while now. Not that she was actually in physical danger, since the whole point of sending her off-Earth was to keep her safe. Tell me you at least have something plan-like in mind. Sif's off with Thor and the rest of the Hangers-On Three right now doing something for the All-Father, so even if Heimdall could get permission to burn enough energy to reach all the way out here again, he'd have to relay people from Earth, and my comm doesn't have that kind of range. If someone had actually warned me, I might have been better prepared."
Somewhere up in orbit, one of the drone sensors he'd planted must have tripped, because an urgent alert chose that moment to start flashing on the comm screen. "Speaking of preparations...." Rocket tapped the controls until the take from the nearest camera over Berhert appeared, showing an image of Yondu's flagship coming into range. "Yeah, I have maybe twelve percent of a plan? I've already laid several trap fields, and I was planning on broadcasting Quill's music over the speakers while I went out to stun a few more. Knock as many down as I could, so I could get to their Captain. I wasn't sure what I was going to do about him yet, though. The minute Yondu draws his arrow and whistles, it's all over. I figured that part's where you come in."
"I'm guessing since Peter's still in contact with them, and you're talking traps instead of bombs, you don't want these guys actually dead despite the fact that they're after you," she said, skeptically. "What gives?"
Rocket shrugged. "Well, for all he complains the guy kidnapped him and let his crew threaten to eat him on a regular basis, Quill's weirdly sentimental about Yondu. Also, you know, vice versa, otherwise there's no explanation for how Quill's still alive. I figured maybe if I can stall him long enough to convince him Quill's in danger, his weirdly sentimental streak will kick in and he'll take us to him. You might not have brought your own backup, but Yondu comes with a whole clan of Ravagers."
Buffy sat back, staring at him, then heaved a long sigh and tipped the bottle back again. "It really is a Tuesday, isn't it. At least it's not an apocalypse this time."
Something on her belt beeped before she'd even set the empty bottle back on the table-- some kind of secondary communicator? Buffy frowned at the chiming sound, then picked it up, thumbed the controls, and went even paler. "Wow, I take that back. 'It's no moon, it's a Glory, and I think he's trying to pull a Palpatine on Peter'. Crap."
Holy incomprehensible metaphors, Star-Lord. But at least she was aimed the right direction now. "I understood maybe one word of that," Rocket replied. "The milquetoast swear word. Guessing that part was you and not Soul-Girl; you're the fussiest weapon of mass destruction I've ever met. Are we getting to the inevitable disaster part of the plan yet?"
"I should introduce you to Faith sometime. Or better yet, never," she said tartly as she typed something back, then looked up, jaw set tensely. "And like you had to ask. You better be right about this Yondu guy. How will I know which one's him?"
Rocket blew a frustrated breath, then keyed another image up on the screen. "He's Centaurian. Blue skin, snaggly teeth, metal fin on his head. You can't miss him. No, I mean it; you can't miss him, or we'll have a much bigger hole to dig ourselves out of afterward. I don't think he'd kill us, but he'd definitely lock us up and throw away the key for a while, and I doubt Quill has that kind of time."
Buffy gave him a toothy smile of her own, then rose and held out a hand. "You'll be eating those words in a minute. But I didn't bring any tasers with me. Got anything I can use?"
"If you manage to put your units where your mouth is, you can try to make me. Here." He picked a few choice items out of the stash he'd been amassing and tossed them over. "Enjoy."
"You, too." She pulled a stretchy band out of her pocket and tamed her blonde mane back into a tail with a few quick motions, then slipped out of the ship and started heading for the trees.
Rocket cued up the speakers, made sure Groot was safe, then followed her out into the night-time forest. What was peril without a little fun?
+
Thirty minutes and a whole lot of bruised and lightly broken Ravagers later-- Yondu among them, knocked out and carried back to the Milano over the shoulder of his much shorter opponent-- quite a bit of fun had indeed been had. The assassin had escaped, but eh, with an epic grudgematch backstory like hers Rocket was pretty sure she'd find Gamora again later, and nobody had actually died. He set two more beers out, poked Yondu awake, waited out the swearing and threats, and then laid the story out for him too.
Yondu listened, disgusted expression deepening as the explanation developed, then gave a frustrated sigh. "The hell was that kid thinking? There's a reason I never delivered him to that jackass."
"You tell him that outright? Or leave him to make his own assumptions?" Rocket scoffed. "Sorry to have to break it to you, but he kind of failed at learning the 'read the room' skill in Ravager school."
"Don't I fuckin' know it. Tell me you at least still have the batteries the Sovereign said y'all took," Yondu replied, stabbing a blue finger over the table. "If we're going to give up the bounty and fight a planet, it's the least you're gonna owe us."
"Let's face it, you weren't going to take the bounty anyway," Rocket began to sneer, then paused. "Wait, what do you mean planet?"
"He's a Celestial," Yondu replied dryly, as if that said it all.
He wasn't wrong. They were probably lucky Ego was a planet, and not a being on the scale that Knowhere had been when it was alive. At least he stayed in one place. "A Celestial. Great. We're doomed."
"You're just now figuring that out, boy?" Yondu rolled his eyes. "Shoulda never taken that first call from him. Oughta known it would come to this eventually."
"No moon, right," Buffy scoffed, shaking her head. "I'm supposed to be the One Girl in All the World, not the One Girl Versus the World. Please tell me you have planet-busting weapons, or at least moon-cracky ones. If he really is the 'rule the universe' type, I kinda doubt he's going to let our people go just because we say 'please'."
Rocket thought about it a moment, eyed Yondu, contemplated the kinds of armaments the Eclector might have, and reluctantly considered other uses for the batteries that had started the whole mess. "...Maybe?"
She snorted. "Is that twelve percent of a maybe?"
Rocket gave her a dirty look. "If you got any better ideas, feel free to volunteer."
"Well, unless this planet happens to come with stabbable vital organs...." She touched the axe-shaped weapon sheathed on her back.
"Yeah, you wish," Rocket said dryly. "There's a reason they're called Celestials, not Terrestrials."
Buffy frowned. "Now that? One step too far. The last thing we need is a w-word in this situation."
"That's what's one step too far." Yondu gave a rusty chuckle. "I like your style, girl. Best we get going, though; we'll have to figure out the rest along the way. Ego's seven hundred jumps from here, and I'll have to leave half the crew someplace if I don't want 'em mutinying. They think I cut Quill too much slack as it is."
"Yeah? Well, that's what you do for family. Not the kind who made you, but the kind you chose. Right, Rocket?" Buffy said, pointedly.
Ain't no thing like me but me, Rocket had once told Quill. Literally, that was still true. But looked at another way, they were all a bunch of misfits, weren't they? He'd been waiting ever since the escape from the Kyln for the Guardians to get fed up with him, but that hadn't happened. And maybe never would, if they could keep other forces from prying the crew apart. Like that jackass, Ego.
"Right," he agreed. "Let's go save Quill, then... and probably the Galaxy again while we're at it."
"Sounds like a plan."
+
(Not that the others weren't halfway to saving themselves already when they got there. And thanks to the fact that the planet actually did turn out to have a stabbable vital organ, they even all made it out alive.
Though not unchanged. No-one had considered what a half-Celestial taught how to channel a source of near-infinite power and the source of infinite power already on his crew might get up to if they got creative.
But that would be another story; one that didn't end with a party on the Eclector and Quill's crew seeing Dawn's sister off with a hug, a call to Heimdall, and a case of beer.)
+
"Next time, just tell me to bring the kitchen sink, okay? But-- thanks, Rocket."
"No problem, Slayer."
+
(x-posted @ AO3)