A/N: Darker stuff, based on the movie (with a twist), but will eventually go AU. I had a little plot bunny hopping around about the complex nature of the relationship of Gamora and Ronan and it manifested itself as this story. It is a 'what if?' story, and probably can be described as, most of all, a romance story with a darker tone. Hopefully you like it! :)

Summary: Betraying her so-called father she could take, but betraying Ronan was never easy for Gamora. Neither was it for him.

Rated: M for (non-explicit) adult themes/situations and violence.

Stand Accused

by ajaton

Part 1: Passion

There she stood, by the tall mirrors, which extended for the full length of the back wall of her quarters aboard the Dark Aster. The purpose of their existence was not to provide her means to admire her beauty – she was not a woman of that kind, of such insignificant and useless desires.

Instead Gamora could spend hours practicing; embracing the darkness, silence and the solitude of the small room she had been given. She would use her own reflection to perfect her strikes, to ensure that each and every tip of her every finger was placed correctly during a hit or the angle her ankle followed the furious flow of her kick. She would maneuver amidst a wave of unseen, non-existent enemies until exhaustion burned in her muscles and set her lungs on fire. Hundreds, a thousand hours she had battled there, alone, striving for perfection and never being freed by such.

And nothing less did she expect of herself.

Her labored breath, lungs thirsting for air. The vicious beat of her heart like a lone drum inside her ribcage. Usually only those sounds accompanied her. The feeling of moistness gathering to her hairline and to her back; the thin cloth of her shirt following the shape of her body and sticking to her skin. Countless times she had sought for her utmost limits alone and finally collapsed to her knees whilst gasping for air, strangely satiated by the knowledge that she had given everything she got…but yet feeling as hollow as before the exercise.

Gamora had followed those routines of sweat and battle set by herself every day she had been aboard the flagship of Ronan the Accuser. Unless she was traversing the galaxy due to a mission the Kree had sent her to, she had used her time to practice… and to dwell in the loneliness she instinctively so heavily desired for.

But…

But there had been one deviation.

Once he had sat there, behind her, on her bed. It had been the sole occasion he had visited her quarters. The room had shrunk in size close to being almost suffocating due to the presence of the tall, armored man whose natural aura was nothing less than oppressive.

The Kree had commanded her to continue with her routines. And she had done so, feeling the gaze of the piercing eyes in her back. Two blue strikingly sharp and often so condemning blades.

In the end he had stated that he found enjoyment in watching her practice. Seeing the fire within her soul and the determination and passion she used to rain that exact same flame of pain upon her enemies.

Their enemies, he had stressed.

…Only during this one occasion had the dark, powerful voice been soft…

It likely was the closest thing to a compliment he had ever given to her. To anyone. Ronan was not a man who shared such words lightly. Or rather at all. Rarely anything not related to what Gamora had defined as his faith and sentences born of his ideology, tactics and mechanisms of battle left his lips.

- Not towards the direction of his slaves at least.

A slave. That was how she had formulated the cruel position within her mind. She had been given as a loaned property to a man, to an anarchist, to a zealot. A lunatic. A psychopath delivering those twisted ways he deemed as justice. The man had many names and all equally damning.

And when she had laid her eyes upon the tall, blue-skinned, muscularly framed and heavily armored Kree for the first time at the bridge of the Aster, there had been no words radiating even the smallest hint of appreciation in her mind.

She had stood there with her so-called sister, Nebula, then. Together, armed and armored, two beautifully packed and deadly presents given away by the man who insisted on being called their father. The man who they both despised and feared, equally.

It had been a moment of mutual evaluation. The black-clad man, the Kree known as Ronan the Accuser, had eyed them long, scrutinized them thoroughly. Sharp dark blue eyes somewhere amidst the darkness and the black paint had followed curves of their bodies, explored every inch. Although far from being so, Gamora had felt naked under the dark, judgmental gaze and unresponsive expression.

"Your father says you are his most skilled Lieutenants," the man in black armor had stated, lips twisting.

"Let me see."

…And the Kree had lunged into a fierce attack. Taken aback by the sudden turn of events, Gamora's sharp reflexes betrayed her. The first lash of the open palm landed on her cheek and she fell down onto her knees, tasting the iron of blood in her mouth. The dark, metallic floor had felt cool, unpleasant and revolting under her fingers.

Adrenaline had flooded her system. She rolled out of the way of the next attack, seeing the black armored boot slip past her pelvis mere millimeters away, feeling the flow of air following in its wake. Gamora had backed towards the further end of the bridge, fingers bending around the hilt of her blade. Preparing for another attack, she had witnessed Ronan toss Nebula effortlessly to the floor like a marionette, which had its strings cut.

Posture tense and features twisting in disdain, fully clad in the black armor, the Kree was Death materialized.

"Take this as a lesson. Where I will send you, there is no place…no excuse for being unprepared," the Kree had growled.

The man's eyes were two dark stones inside the blackness. The black paint around his eyes, which followed his cheeks to the end of his jaw and lower lip, was a mask of fury.

"I am not impressed!"

The half a shout, half a statement had concluded the short meeting. The Kree had dismissed them with a fierce gesture hinting of frustration and disappointment in their performance. Gamora had wiped the blood from her lips with the back of her hand. Red had stained the green skin. She had offered her hand to her adopted Luphomoid sister and they had left the bridge, mentally and physically beaten.

Ronan expected them to give every ounce of their essences. Otherwise they were worthless to him.

…Vermin. Insects.

Gamora had no reason to believe otherwise. But what she had not foreseen were his plans related to their skills.

Unexpectedly, during the first weeks of their stay, the tall Kree Accuser did start taking interest in their training. He would watch the two sisters spar for a while, for a few minutes at most. His face was always an expressionless, blank wall on the way of his thoughts, and after a moment of silence he would take his leave on them.

Although no words said, there always was a shroud of judgment and evaluation present.

…As if they were nothing, but goods he had acquired and was constructing plans on using them.

Until, one day, after weeks of silent observation the Kree had proposed to spar with them. His intent was to train them. To hone their skills. The way he explained, the cold words stated; they were no value to him unless he saw them making progress. Yes – he saw them as weapons nonetheless, but instead of defeating men he wanted them to put down armies.

Gamora had accepted the challenge. Three times she was hit to the ground. And that exact amount of times she had gotten back up and charged against the Kree, ignoring the pain and complaints shrieked by her beaten muscles.

Finally he bound her against the wall of the training area, immobilizing her efficiently with his iron grip and sheer weight.

"Do you yield?" he pushed, eyes directed straight towards hers and mouth only a finger's width away from her lips. Gamora felt the heat of his breath on her skin.

Do you think that's all I got?

She had thought and pressed her lips against his.

She saw his eyes loose a portion of their obdurate focus and enlarge as a sign of surprise. The grip holding her still loosened, just slightly.

This resulting short moment of hesitation was all she needed to shift the direction of the battle. To turn it to the actual opposite. Locking the Kree's leg with her own, she used the wall behind her back as a support and pulled legs under the armored man. Black armor hit the ground with a loud clank as the Kree lost his balance. Gamora did not wait. In a blink of an eye she was sitting over her opponent, placing the blade of her retractable sword against the blue, exposed skin of his neck.

"Being unprepared is unacceptable," she had hissed, leaning over the Kree.

"You dare to…?!" Ronan boomed, red hot rage flaring in his eyes. But the sentence was cut short when the Kree was once again on top of his emotions and seemed to make the connection to his own prior statement.

He pushed the blade from his throat nonchalantly and was quickly back on his feet.

"You win this round, Gamora. I do not expect anything less from myself than from you," the Kree had told her whilst correcting the bindings of his armor.

"But I must stress that tactics like this benefit you only once."

There had been a hint of amusement behind the words.

It had been curious, intriguing in an undefined manner. Under all the armor, paint and strict unbending ideology was still a man.

A man - with weaknesses of a man.

He had tasted… far less repelling than she would have anticipated. In fact feelings like that had not crossed her mind during the kiss or afterwards.

Although there was nothing romantic in the kiss she had given – it was a split second decision and purely a tactical one – a small well-hidden part of her still caressed the memory. An action so simple and so far from violent… and she had been able to utilize it to her advance and gain a lone victory over a being so powerful. So strong and so untamed.

It felt…thrilling. She could not put it any other way.

She seemed to have gained a portion of the Accuser's respect after her flexible utilization of personal weaponry because some unstated details of their arrangement changed. Gamora was often summoned over her sister to accompany the Kree on the battlefield or to stand as a silent witness to many of those deadly, blood-tinted, stomach-turning proceedings that took place aboard the Aster.

"You stand accused for crimes against the Kree Empire."

Those were the dull, cold, resolute words often spoken by her master, true to the essence of an Accuser. There was only one type of punishment the Kree offered. Death.

"You will never rule over Xandar!"

Some of the people brought aboard the Aster were brave during the final moments of their lives. Like the Nova Corps soldier who had shouted those exact words at the Kree, thrown them at his face.

"No - I will cure it!" the Kree had responded, voice loud and coarse due to anger, before swinging the tall hammer he used as the means for delivering his justice.

Eerie crack of a skull was the noise, which ended any forms of conversation between a captive and the capturer. Blood and grey brain matter discolored the dark surfaces so often that the stains could not be washed away. Gamora did not twitch once due to the disgust nagging at the back of her mind during those countless times she was present.

During those occasions she did not see a man.

The being she saw was a bloodthirsty monster beyond anything even distinctively representing humane.

So tightly embraced by his beliefs and the war he saw as the only road worth taking, the Kree was a dark wind of Death sweeping through crowds of Xandarian people. And she was obliged to follow, because of her father, because of her duty.

Only rarely, during those sole moments when the battle had quieted down and there was no grim justice to spread, she did see hints of tiredness. Of a burden. Those manifested as small details breaking the steel strong walls surrounding his persona. Tiniest of cracks. Such as a lone second-long empty look in his eyes. The way he sometimes used a nearby wall to support his weight for a minute or two.

Ronan was a complex being.

She never enquired why the Kree had decided to visit her during that one night. Likely he would not have answered had she asked. He was an unexpected visitor behind her door. Dark eyes had lingered on her skin, which was moist due to the thin layer of sweat.

And she never quite understood why she had invited him inside her quarters.

Why she had let him stay.

…To watch her practice.

He was her master in the sense, yes. But there were actions she was not expected to perform – actions she never would have submitted herself to.

But that night there had been softness in his voice.

"The passion you use to enhance your movement…" he had said and stood up. "Because of the passion you truly are alive, Gamora. I see huge potential in you."

She had watched the tall Kree in silence. Seen once again, for this short period of time, the man beneath the threatening paint and the armor. Remembered the look of genuine surprise in the blue eyes during the single, unplanned kiss she had used as a diversion. Recalled the thrill.

…And she had thought,

What the heck.

Determined, she had pushed the Kree back to her bed and went for the bindings of his armor. Their lips had met once again and this time there was no lack of response. When the large metal plates forming his armor were released from their fixings and her fingers explored the blue skin hidden underneath, she was already fully engulfed by the passion he had praised her of.

That exact night they had sparred for dominance. Eventually, neither of them had lost this battle.

…The mirrors of her room reminded her of those nightly hours at such a deep level. The mirrors in front of her.

Amidst the darkness, she had seen their reflections there. How the blue and the green were entwined.

their breaths, the rhythm, the sweat…

fingers buried into her hair…

the lips caressing her neck…

those well-defined muscles she had sought and found…

the fulfillment…

The sound leaving her lips was full of rage and anguish, almost near inhumane. The fierce kick was directed towards her own reflection - towards a mirror and she saw it shatter to thousands of pieces. A rain of glass showered the floor.

It was not the man she was unable to stay with. It was the man-shaped monster who she could not allow to proceed any further. Because, ultimately, Ronan already had been consumed by his ideals and actions and the galaxy would burn where ever he set his foot.

Gamora walked out of the room and did not look back. She would not return, but would pay the price.

…Because due to her actions he would proceed to hunt her down...until she stood accused in front of him.