Kitty stilled herself. She sat. She closed her eyes.
'You can do this,' she thought. 'Just breathe, Kitty. Breathe.'
She took a deep breath, eyes squeezed shut and slowly counted in her head.
'One...'
She was a Guardian of the Galaxy now.
'Two...'
She was engaged to a great guy.
'Three...'
She was...she was...
'Four...'
She was...she couldn't do this.
She was having a panic attack. She thought she had beaten the whole deathly-fear-of-space thing. She could breathe in space, now. Hell, she could fly. She was made of stars!
But all that didn't seem to matter; when it came down to it, Kitty was still scared. The time inside the blank metal walls of that bullet still haunted her. It felt like years, years of her life gone. Sacrificed. Sure, it was for the greater good (sincerely, no quotation marks required), but it was the most terrifying, helpless experience. Hands pressed flat against the cold floor, sweat matting her hair, brow tight in concentration and exhaustion seeping in.
Sometimes she woke up from that nightmare, even sleeping next to Peter, the world's best...no Kitty's best security blanket. Even wrapped tight in his arms at night, safe, it came to her, made her shake, made her quiver and sweat, and even though she didn't want to wake him up, she did, and he held her and kissed her forehead tenderly, but ultimately he didn't get it. He loved space, and he understood her fear, but it seemed like he had never had that feeling, never been helpless and alone and powerless except to keep concentrating on everyone else in the universe.
Or maybe he had, and he was just good at hiding it.
She opened her eyes and blinked when she heard Lockheed's soft coo. Kitty scooped him up into her lap, and he rested a clawed paw on her chest gently. She smiled; he was telling her to breathe. She tried again, closing her eyes.
She took a deep breathe. Lockheed purred a count softly to her.
"Coo."
She was a Guardian of the Galaxy now.
"Prrt."
She was engaged to a great guy.
"Crrr."
She had friends her. Ben was here, which meant Sue would call a lot. She liked Sue. Sue always helped her.
"Prrf."
And she had Lockheed, too.
He cooed at her and blinked when she opened her eyes. She stroked his head, scratching under his chin. She could breathe again.
"Thank you, Locke."
He huffed a little noise, blowing air in her face before crawling up to rest on her shoulders.
"Yeah, we should get going. Rocket's going to need us."
Lockheed chirped softly.
"Right, the galaxy needs us."