nostalgiabomb: (215)
Peter Quill ([personal profile] nostalgiabomb) wrote in [community profile] riverview2017-08-08 01:57 pm

video; @star.lord

[ Distinguished and not-so distinguished residents of Riverview, hello.

Currently, you are graced with a mugshot of one Peter “Space-Duke” Quill and a view of the messier half of his shared apartment. In his hand is his trusty mp3 player – which boasts at least three hundred songs, holy crap, y’all – and while he has one bud in his ear, the other dangles from the wire. ]


So. Apparently if nothing else, this place has, like, all the music ever. So if I’ve gotta be stuck here, might as well make the most of it, right?

I’m on the hunt for somethin’ new. Tryin’ to play a whole lot of catch up. If anyone’s got any music recommendations, I’m all ears. Songs, artists, albums, weird, avant-garde stuff with a guy saying “number nine” over and over – hit me with your best shot. I’ll try anything once.

Also, uh.

[ A pause, and he turns the mp3 player’s face toward the camera. The screen happily displays the album art of The Best of Earth, Wind & Fire, Vol. 1 while “September” plays. Zunes, man!! Aren’t they rad? ]

Don’t suppose anyone here’s familiar enough with this that they can show me how to add stuff?
godslay: (226)

[personal profile] godslay 2017-08-13 04:04 am (UTC)(link)
[ The silence stretches between them. Gamora isn't inclined to break it, not when he's clearly lost to his own thoughts, because that drop in his expression, the distance in his gaze— it doesn't escape her.

They haven't talked about this. She doesn't know if Peter is ready to talk about it (or if he ever will be?), but— ]


Peter.

[ It's not an agreement, not following the thread of a conversation he's clearly trying to recover in order to push beyond that span of quiet. She could let this continue to lie, leave it be. Or she could offer that opportunity for discussion, to stop pushing everything that happened to the side. It's not healthy, but then again, when have any of them been particularly "healthy" in their coping mechanisms? She isn't one to talk, given that she hasn't ventured into bringing up her own heavy weights left in the wake of dealing with Nebula, but—

Peter lost far more than she did. That bears acknowledgment.

Her voice is soft, careful when she asks, ]


What happened to your Walkman?
godslay: (051)

[personal profile] godslay 2017-08-13 07:01 am (UTC)(link)
[ She lets him have the moment that he needs, not pushing him to speak too soon or before he wants to.

It broke.

She— assumed, if she's honest. She doesn't know how Peter would part with something so precious otherwise. ]


... When?

[ Another tentative question, lightly probing to let him take it at his own pace. She's surprised he admitted that much already, that he hasn't simply walked away or shut the conversation down.

She's grateful that he hasn't. ]
godslay: (185)

[personal profile] godslay 2017-08-13 08:36 am (UTC)(link)
[ ... Well, that's certainly the obvious answer. It had to have happened in between the time she'd disappeared (and nearly been blown to pieces by her own sister), since they'd been dancing to a song playing from his mother's tape just before they fought.

She debates simply changing the subject, leaving it alone, but— ]


So are we not discussing this?

[ A point-blank question. It isn't an effort to pry the answer from him, though, or a demand that he be more forthcoming; rather, it's an option to cut the conversation off where he likes. He can elaborate if he feels like it, if he's willing to go further, but if not, she can thoroughly drop it.

(Even if she thinks he should talk about it. Running from the reality didn't erase what happened.) ]
godslay: (088)

[personal profile] godslay 2017-08-13 08:54 am (UTC)(link)
[ She's momentarily taken aback by the way he snaps back at her, the knife-edge of his tone. Maybe she still needs to put more work into her own abrasiveness, given her ability to be confrontational without intending to be, but... well, he asked.

She frowns, crossing her arms over her chest as she watches him carefully. ]


You could tell me what happened after I left. I know nothing about the time between— [ Our fight. ] —stepping away from the castle and coming back for you.

[ ... You could tell me, but you don't have to, she almost adds. ]
godslay: (062)

[personal profile] godslay 2017-08-13 09:37 am (UTC)(link)
[ She doesn't take the bait; instead of snapping back with heat, she keeps him leveled with that intense look in her eyes. It's not quite a challenge, but it's also not bowing to the way he snaps and snarls like a cornered animal. ]

You didn't ask.

[ Which— she didn't ask about Ego, either. Too soon, too sore, too much – and she'd been trying to give Peter the time he needs to heal.

Nebula is... a sore spot. An uncertainty that now she has no chance to confront because they've left their universe behind and her sister with it.

(But Gamora blames herself for more than she can truly articulate, and that's probably why she hasn't offered it up, hasn't tried to give him any explanations.

She's ashamed.) ]
godslay: (045)

[personal profile] godslay 2017-08-13 10:12 am (UTC)(link)
[ There's a flicker of— something in Gamora's eyes. Guilt? Uncertainty?

("You were the one who wanted to win—

—and I just wanted a sister."
)

Part of her has to wonder: is there something she's trying to win here too?

"I asked first," would probably be an attempt to regain the upperhand, to deflect away from herself.

"Then why don't you answer?" would be much the same. ]


I was trying to let you grieve.

[ And that's honest, at least. The things she'd dealt with on Ego's planet, everything in regards to her sister? And she'd still left with that sister intact. Nebula lived, even if it felt like little was solved between them.

Peter had lost— so much. ]
godslay: (048)

[personal profile] godslay 2017-08-14 12:51 am (UTC)(link)
[ Mantis had explained that Ego wanted Peter to power the Expansion, just like the other children that he'd murdered, that he'd needed Peter's Celestial genes to make it all come together. She can't imagine how that conversation could have gone for Peter, but Mantis had said Ego would have "won Peter to his side."

She still isn't certain what that might have meant. ]


No.

[ Another bit of honesty, short as it is, because she has so many questions about what happened, about everything Peter endured, but she can see the tension in the set of his shoulders, the way his jaw clenches and how tightly curled his fingers are, and—

He doesn't want to talk about this.

She doesn't think he's even prepared to. ]


But you don't have to tell me anything more.

[ She should have said that earlier, really. She should have given him a better, clearer out instead of letting this bubble and boil higher and higher, but she doesn't want to devolve into another argument. She doesn't want this to turn into another shouting match when they haven't even tended to the wounds from the last one.

Ego isn't worth fighting over again.

She's tentative, careful, ready to pull back if she needs to, but she reaches out to Peter, reaches for his hand and his too-tight fist. She's trying to get better at this, at offering comfort in the ways that she can (hugging Nebula on the Quadrant, wrapping her arm around Peter's waist after Yondu's funeral, touching his shoulder as tears fell from his eyes—), but it's still foreign to her.

She's... trying. Genuinely trying. ]
godslay: (062)

[personal profile] godslay 2017-08-14 05:47 am (UTC)(link)
[ ... Of course it was Ego. Of course the walkman was one more thing he destroyed in his wake.

She isn't surprised, but she is— angry. For Peter, more than anything, and at Ego, and— a little bit at herself.

("What if this man is your Hasslehoff?")

She'd told him to go. She'd told him to give Ego a chance, and look where they'd ended up. Look at everything Peter had lost. ]


Peter...

[ Quiet, almost apologetic. She doesn't pull her hand away from his, instead gently trying to coax the tension away, trying to get him to unclench his fist as the rest of him tries to relax. ]

... I'm sorry for all he took from you.

[ Because for some of it, she feels responsible. She still remembers Peter shouting at her, that she told him to go.

("You're the one that wanted me to come here!"

"Why are you trying to take this away from me?"
) ]
godslay: (108)

[personal profile] godslay 2017-08-14 06:40 am (UTC)(link)
[ And Gamora sees all of it, plain as day: all of the wreckage left behind, everything that's wrung Peter out and left him gutted and lost.

"Displaced" is what the people here had called it.

She can understand that even more clearly now.

"Shit happens" still seems to be one of the worst possible ways to brush this all aside, but— if she's learned anything about Peter, it remains that this is how he'll handle it. Tuck it away. Hide it somewhere out of reach for when he can look at it without letting this sea of anguish swallow him whole.

If he ever can.

But his hand unfurls, their palms making contact, and she doesn't recoil or draw away from him. Something in the set of her shoulders starts to unwind, and she doesn't hesitate to lace their fingers properly together. ]


I would never have let him.

[ And she says it with the same certainty she'd had on Berhert – that promise to kill Ego if he revealed himself to be anything less than what he should be.

... And, well, they had killed him, so perhaps she'd kept that promise against all odds. ]
godslay: (167)

[personal profile] godslay 2017-08-14 07:35 am (UTC)(link)
[ It's almost strange to her how she feels no inclination to pull away from Peter. She doesn't intend to drop his hand or suddenly back away like she hasn't reached out to him like she had on Berhert, and that's enough to help her see that things have changed. A lot has flipped so wildly in the last few months, before this strange new city and after their arrival, and Gamora has found herself easing into a new part of herself, a new life. Where before, contact would have earned suspicion, it comforts her now. Where she had shunned the idea of friendship, now she has family.

And she has Peter.

And whatever this unspoken thing is between them.

She offers a gentle squeeze in return, her thumb brushing over the back of his hand. ]


There was too much going on. [ Peter had so much to deal with, and... well, she hadn't exactly volunteered the information herself. ] We had other concerns.

[ And unlike Yondu, unlike Ego, Nebula is still alive. That much is different. ]
godslay: (046)

[personal profile] godslay 2017-08-14 07:41 pm (UTC)(link)
[ There's a touch of hesitation in Gamora's eyes, but she nods, glancing down to where their hands are joined. ]

I don't think it matters now that we are here.

[ Nebula isn't, after all, and there's no guarantee they'll ever make it out of this city. So much happened with her sister, and so much was brought to the surface from their pasts, and it's— a lot to process for herself.

Especially since she can't seem to shake the weight of that responsibility.

She was a child, trying to survive just as much as Nebula, but something twinges with failure when she thinks of all Nebula endured alone. ]
godslay: (087)

[personal profile] godslay 2017-08-15 02:54 am (UTC)(link)
[ ... He has an incredibly good point, and Gamora is only mildly annoyed by the fact that he's right. Maybe not something she would admit to him being often, but right now?

He's making an excellent argument.

Her lips purse in momentary displeasure, before she grudgingly nods in agreement. ]


A fair point.

Then is now really the best time for it?

[ He's still a prickling ball of emotion, after all, and discussing everything with Ego is... immense. Wounds that didn't need reopening yet, but she'd prodded at, nonetheless. Or, she supposes, it could provide a distraction in the wake of something so heavy, even if she would rather distract him with something less fraught with her own emotional baggage. She's spent so long trying to deny it exists that confronting it for herself isn't an enjoyable task.

Terrifying, is more like it. ]
Edited 2017-08-15 02:55 (UTC)
godslay: (080)

[personal profile] godslay 2017-08-15 05:03 am (UTC)(link)
[ Gamora watches his reactions quietly, studying him in that intense way of hers. She's so used to watching her enemies for tells, for twitches and telegraphs of their moves, and she still applies that with her friends, even in situations where she doesn't need to.

She shakes her head gently, giving his hand another reassuring squeeze. ]


We could go somewhere. Get out of this place.

[ She gives a light wave of her hand to the rest of the apartment. It's not small, not when compared to the living space they'd made do with on the Milano (with so many damn people), but it's still enclosed, and she knows well enough how suffocating that can feel. ]

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