open 💫 lights out tonight

[furibund]

Who: nebula & you
When: post event 18
Where: solvunn, horizon
What: may-june catch all
Warnings: None intended but it's Nebula. Mentions of past trauma/non-consensual body modifications/child abuse are always possible (but will be warned for).

Feel free to make up your own prompts/adust as needed/wildcard/or reach out to plot with me! These are all just backbone for whatever. hopewillbloom or discor are the best ways to reach out to me!

Comments

[respiting]

I don't know.

[ Rocket's voice is quiet. It's tired and uncertain, with a sharp edge of tamped down frustration laced into it. He keeps his arms crossed by the door of her room, as though purposefully keeping his distance, guarded, from Nebula even if he doesn't have to.

Of everyone he's ever known in his whole life, Nebula is the one person he probably doesn't have to. ]

I don't fucking know.

[furibund]

[ I don't know, he says and it feels like they've taken twelve steps back. More even. It's not like either of them are the sort who needs closeness to understand each other, but she can tell when he's closing himself off. It's too similar to her own ways. ]

[ Nebula remains rooted in place, stewing. Knows how she'd respond with sympathy or empathy. Knows he'd chew it up and proverbially spit in her face - there is no answer with words. There is no answer with actions. She stews and then after a moment jams out: ]

It's not this.

[ She's not even certain what she means by "this" herself. Freezing? Giving up? Being swallowed up by everything? It's too complex. Once she did think the only way to survive was to keep going without looking back. Had practically implied it here, because she'd said as much. We keep moving but she hadn't - ]

[ - She hadn't meant it in the same way. In the way where she'd known if she'd look back she could lose herself, suffocate under a softness that was once weakness. What she means now is something else. "This," had always been the fear of weakness, of showing emotion, of seeing the damage she'd done. Now it's... ]

It's okay to not be okay.

[respiting]

Well. [ Rocket huffs out the admission like it's poison in his mouth and he has to relinquish it from his body or he'll perish.

It's bitter and reluctant but it's the most honest thing he's said in so long. ] I'm not okay.

[ He's trying, because the alternative is to embrace that guarded wall again and head back up to his workshop so he can hammer at something and swear and yell at the cat, and then yell at Wanda for yelling at the cat, and then yell at Nebula when no one else can handle him besides her.

It's what he'd usually do.

He can feel that itch again, beneath the fur and the skin and the bits of metal stitched and melded into his flesh. ]

Those memories were fake and I wish they never happened, but they happened and I — it was good there.

[furibund]

[ Nebula says nothing, because there is nothing to say. ]

[ Knows as well as herself that that little phrase could be a breaking point, a too difficult admission on a too difficult day. ]

[ The silence isn't meant as disrespectful, but accepting and understanding. Admitting it is enough. She breathes out as he finds words again, ]

I know.

[ The phrase feels leaden, bearing more weight than she can punctuate. They're here, same as they ever were. That alone was a pretty damning sign that they were not real. Yet, the memories themselves were fresh - hardly muddled - like it'd been a true experience. Like they'd both healed in their various ways. ]

We aren't those people. We are those people, too. It's messed up.

[ Finding the words for it feels too jarring, like the image will go up in smoke. Or maybe this will, even though it hadn't in that too long time. She judges and then says, as much for him: ]

We'll never have what they had.

[respiting]

I can remember every goddamned thing that happened in those fake decades like they happened yesterday. How is that possible?

[ Nebula's being so understanding, because she would be, because she knows. If anyone knows how he feels, it's Nebula.

But the calmness in her voice only grates at him, like he expects her to be just as irritated and angry as he is and she isn't and somehow that's wrong. Like, shouldn't the rest of the freakin' Summoned be as angry as he is? Why aren't they? Why is he the only one reacting like the Singularity personally slighted him? ]

I don't want to remember. I don't want to know what it's like to have temples and be revered and have all this power, to be somethin' better, only to come back to being —

[ He doesn't finish the sentence, doesn't say being this, because it feels too goddamned real. He'd rather shoot something with a really, really big gun. He'd rather drink something so strong it makes him forget his name.

He exhales with a frustrated groan instead, claws clenched into fists. ]

Fuck!

[furibund]

[ Nebula knows anger. She knows it better than herself - than the her she is now - better than even the kindest hearts in the universe. She knows it, because for so long anger was all she saw. It blotted the skies an inky red, bleeding into every crook and cranny it could. She knew anger, because that was the blood that had moved in her veins. It was the very reason she was alive today. ]

[ Nebula had been filled with so. much. anger. Anger that had a single purpose: to kill her father (to kill Gamora). Why? So she may live, so he (they) could feel all the pain that had been her miserable existence. The pain and the trauma that had her wishing for the day her sister would end it all by taking her life. She had surpassed that anger for - ]

[ - Freedom. Herself. Family.]

[ She is angry, the feeling pulsates inside of her ready to boil over. How easy it would be to decide to fall into its embrace, to utilize the reason she was allowed to live - she was made for. It'd be easy, to be so angry to take the lives of every villager who forced them into that mess. Except... She doesn't want to be angry. Not that way. And most importantly he's hurting. ]

[ So she listens, feeling helpless, and swallows hard when time passes. ]

[ There is nothing to shoot. Only her, and she could take it. ]

Something better?

[ She hisses out the word in retaliation, breath sharp. ] Is that what you think?

[ The question is rhetorical - of course he thinks that. Some part of her agrees. She hates herself. That person was able to live - be free - in a way she could not be. She didn't know the damage she had done. Nebula lives with it and the pain and the knowledge. That stupid knowledge that she will always be weak and one step behind. Maybe forgetting would be easier. ]

Who you are now is fine. [ The word comes out near venomously - it doesn't sit right. ] Whatever - whoever - was behind it is messing with our heads. It wants you to feel like shit.

[ She thinks. Probably. Not that she (they) don't always feel like shit and in this case - it was some glimmer of hope, possibility, that was yanked away after it bloomed. She swallows it down. ]

I don't care how they think they can make you better - [ This word is definitely full of poison. Maybe, this too, is why she so much does not forgive her other self; So much of her had been forcibly changed under what was best for her. So much of him too. ] Fuck them, the greatest version of you is standing right before me.

[respiting]

[ Rocket swallows. Every last retort, every argument, every angry word and insult and sudden need to push her away because it's easy, and it's comfortable, and it's all he knows — all of it crumbles with those last words.

He doesn't even know what to say, but the anger deflates until he feels hollow, like he isn't sure what to think anymore.

No one's ever said shit like that to him before. Mostly 'cause he wouldn't let them, but also because no one's ever had a reason to. This misshapen, unnatural monster of a creature — usually called as such; to his face sometimes, even — who could possibly think he was any version of good or great? Who could think he was the ideal when his very maker had told him he wasn't worth saving before he killed Rocket's entire family just for existing?

His clenched fists release and his shoulders sag, and he keeps his focus on the ground at his feet instead. It takes another moment ... two ... before he finally speaks again. ]

He's gone, Nebs. And not like when they send you back gone, but gone. With a body still here and everything.

[ The room just down the hall where Nero used to occupy it with his stupid cheese wheels, and his cool weapons, and iterations of drawings and doodles suddenly feels unreachable. ]

And when we were in that fake bullshit world, I didn't remember any of it. I didn't remember all the people we lost, I didn't remember how much it fuckin' hurts.

[furibund]

[ Nebula isn't good at this. At any of this. She's not good at patience, kindness, or gentleness. How could she be when every inch of her was trained to be as deadly and sharp as the knife that can take a life? Quietly, resolutely, in a mantra that has become more important in the years she tells herself: You can be a knife or you can be a guardian. ]

[ And for Rocket - with him especially - she wants to be the latter. ]

[ She only half knows who he's talking about from some message in that headache inducing form of communication. Or the heavy way she thinks the others walk in this treehouse and the vague feeling of being a replacement - always a replacement. It's funny that way. She listens and she thinks before exhaling: ]

Then you do something for him, in the way we couldn't have for Gamora.

[ Because he separates them: those who were Snapped and those who were lost. Because at least for them, Gamora had really been gone - dead, at the bottom of Vormir for the sin of trying to be a good sister. Nebula's fault. For once, she does not let herself dwell on it. ]

You do something and you remember, because he's someone you can do that with.

[respiting]

There could be something for him here. Maybe in the Tertiary Settlement.

[ He speaks slowly, as though the suggestion is something even he isn't too sure of right now. He's sure Wanda and Himeka have already thought of something. And any of Nero's friends, those who had known him before Rocket even arrived here, they'd probably want something too.

He could ask them, see what they thought. ]

And something in the Horizon. [ That can be something he could host. His Horizon isn't all that built up yet, and he can clear the ship parts away for now too. ] With fireworks, like a Ravager's funeral.

[furibund]

[ Nebula doesn't immediately respond to the first part. She's quiet - stewing - and letting him come to his own conclusions. It's difficult to have a lot to give for someone you never met.]

[ But she has plenty to give for Rocket and she can see how important this is to him - how important this man was to him. ]

[ ( She ignores that egging jealousy that always comes with her feelings). Instead, she nods, and offers a simple: ]



Sure. I'll help. [ A beat, ] In whatever capacity.

[respiting]

[ Rocket nods, something warm and full, like the feeling after a good meal, settling into his chest. It might be gratitude, in fact that's probably (exactly) what it is.

He doesn't want to shout or yell or provoke a fight anymore. He's tired. He wants to sleep. He wants to forget about the alternate history he could have had; he wants to focus on the here and now.

He steps into her room now, casual, like he's just looking around nonchalantly before he eventually pauses just steps away from where she is. ]

I'm — [ Rocket hesitates because moments like these ones make him deeply uncomfortable. Bad things happen when he lets people in, usually to the people in question but often to him too, and it would stand to reason that the best thing to do right now is to push every freakin' person away. Forcefully if needed.

But this place has worn down those edges ever-so-slightly, making him more accustomed to the push and pull of helping and being helped. Maybe the Guardians got to him; maybe the Avengers did. Maybe it was five years spent with the actualization of his idea of the worst possible reality that he never wants anything like that loneliness ever again; followed closely by the acceptance that as far as Abraxas is concerned he isn't going anywhere. ] I — uh. I never got a chance to tell you how glad I am that you're here. [ On Abraxas, in Solvunn. ] It ain't fair that you are, or that I am, but I'm glad anyway.

[furibund]

[ Nebula's head dips as her mouth does a low bow. Uncomfortable is a word to describe this for the both of them. She has no regrets in saying anything she has - she'd say it again, if she had to - but she's uncomfortable with tenderness as a general rule. The vulnerability of admitting she cared about or liked him another, even if they both knew it. ]

[ Even if them being a family to each other had been cemented when Stark and she had arrived back on Earth all those years ago (without Gamora's interference, or perhaps in ways because of it). Neither of them are the kind to speak those words, or if they were the kind it was a part of them shattered long ago. Shattered so deeply that the pieces weren't all back together, they might never be even as they tried to put them together. ]

[ So she feels him come in, but doesn't say anything. She doesn't look up even if she has nothing to busy herself with to pretend she doesn't notice - because she does notice - in this room that's too empty and new. Hers, but not really. Not yet (maybe never). He starts and stops and she stiffens, the only sign she's listening. She waits. Lets him formulate what he wants to say and — ]

[ — Swallows thickly. ]

[ There's a silence as he finishes. As her heart betrays her in her chest. Once, letting the soft flutter of - hope? - something that thrummed in it she'd call a mistake. She'd try to forcibly rip out and stomp on the ground, a weakness. It'd get her killed one day. Maybe it would one day, if she gave it away too freely, but this is him. This is Rocket. And if there's anyone who wasn't Gamora who'd say such a thing she'd believe... it was him. ]

[ A different her would be alarmed at how easily she trusted, believed, and agreed with him. This her is... stunned, frozen because even if it's Rocket no one's ever said they're glad she's anything. For so much of her life, she was a disappointment and her coming back alive nearly just as much. If she'd died in battle, it'd be better than her coming back - that's what she thought sometimes. ]

[ Most days she hadn't disagreed. ]

[ She almost forgets to say anything, in the way her heart, mind, and tongue freezes. In the way she can't give her gratefulness for the words, she gives a sharp nod of her head. Tries to find what she wants - should - say and after a moment the words come out gruffly: ]

Shit planet or not, I wouldn't abandon you.

[ It's not quite what she means. Or maybe it is. She doesn't have a choice - neither of them do - but she means the intonation. Means she doesn't regret it even if she glances away once more and shakes her head: ]

That's not what family does.


[ A lesson she learned from Drax. Unironically, Drax. ]

[respiting]

[ Somehow, somewhere deep inside of him, Rocket understands Nebula's statement to be real. He believes her wholeheartedly, without a doubt, that she ain't lying when she tells him that she wouldn't abandon him.

He nods.

Something happened when he (and Groot) met Quill and Gamora; something happened when Drax and Mantis joined the team. The Guardians of the Galaxy solidified when Nebula joined them, and now he's got something he never really got to have for longer than a blink of an eye: a real goddamned family.

He thinks on Lylla, Teefs and Floor, and he thinks of how unfair it had been to be brought into this universe only to be discarded before they really had a chance.

He takes a breath now and releases it. ]

Anyway, enough of all that mushy shit, right?

[furibund]

[ Nebula doesn't have a lot of words left. No, that's not it. She's always had words. Too many, locked up in the place where she was safest. Where she'd tricked herself into believing her father wouldn't find - only half a lie. Her thoughts were her own, her memories weren't. So much of her would never be hers, that the one grace being her mind - her thoughts was a blessing she had kept many words in. ]

[ All the words that had to be locked away had pooled together so deeply that it feels at times like her heart will burst. The too fragile, soft heart that had to be shut down for survival. The one so desperate for love and family — It's filled every crevice of the dam she tried to trap it in and now rammed against the walls to find escape. Escape, because though her life now meant there was no imminent danger in all of those unspoken words... the bruised and battered remains of the heart she'd kept told a different story. She was both ready and not ready to share those things that had been hidden so deeply. ]

[ The mentions now were a lot, so much more than she would have a few months ago even if she felt them (knew) them so deeply. It felt if there was a moment longer that dam would burst - ]

[ - It doesn't. Because he clams up and it's a blessing for him, for both of them. That part of her that so desperately wants to protect itself is quick to grab that lifeline he offers. She nods curtly, swallowing hard. ]

[ And then she snorts adding with the petulance of someone who's always been a younger sibling: ]

You started it.

[ It's gruff, that sound of someone's dry humor with the hint of something - Something he might read. Recognition that he went that far in the first place, that they both could after so long. She does not need to say it, does not need to say more. Because this is enough. It was enough for him to just be there, as it always had been. ]

[ Neither one of them had ever liked talking. She rolls her shoulder and jerks her head: ]

Come check on my arm. Please.

[ They didn't need to say more, but she still wanted (needed) him there. ]