"Tony!"
"Tony!"
"Is he okay?"
"What happened?"
"Will he be okay?"
A blond man with haunted eyes, a man with darkened hair that was greying. A blonde lady whose face was spotted with blue droplets that Nebula recognised being from her father's "children", a man with a small amount of dark hair wearing a suit whose design suspiciously resembled Tony's. A man with dark blond hair and an eye that wasn't quite right, a young woman with beautiful dark braids.
Upon their ship landing, a group of what Nebula assumed were Tony's team mates greeted them. A million voices yelled around her, a million questions being thrown around, but Nebula was unable to answer any of them.
"We had a run-in with Thanos, he needs proper medical attention," she said curtly, supporting her companion down the ship's ramp and easing him onto a stretcher which was then brisked away. Nebula wondered if, when they would meet again.
"Hey! Hey you!" She turned to see a hairy little creature that she couldn't quite remember the name of walking up to her. "Where's everyone else? Quill? Gamora? Drax?" Nebula shook her head, wincing slightly at the mention of her sister. She immediately felt annoyed with herself, her sister's name was not a dirty word, why would she flinch at it?
"None of them made it?"
She shook her head again, suddenly feeling her own sadness threatening to overwhelm her. She immediately quashed it down, and instead watched the creature's eyes fill with tears. "No," he said quietly. Then he punched the ground. "No no no!" the creature howled.
Sensing that the creature – she now remembered his name was Rocket – was best left alone, Nebula took stock of her surroundings for the first time. Green hills littered with the remnants of battle surrounded her, sweeping open plains that had presumably once been filled with wildlife were now decorated with parts, weapons, and blood, so much blood. It was tragically still beautiful.
"Hey, we need to get inside," a voice said from behind her. Nebula turned to see the blond man who was wearing a ridiculous blue suit standing a couple of metres behind her. "Those children of Thanos creatures are still roaming about. We need to regroup, when you're ready." On another day, Nebula would've told this man to fuck off. But on another day, she wouldn't have saved an irritating stranger, on another day she wouldn't be seeking to avenge her sister, on another day she wouldn't let a human tell her what to do.
This day was not like other days.
/Line Break/
They were inside what Nebula had learned was Wakanda's central building. Normally surrounded by defences that would have impressed even her, they were currently sitting ducks, although even her father's so-called children seemed to recognise that this battle was over. Everything around them seemed to have gone still.
They were currently in some sort of lounge, with some of them sprawled, exhausted, on a couch, while others preferred to stand. The dull hum of the medical centre at work below them permeated the exhausted silence that lay around them.
"Alright, so whose whereabouts are unknown?" the blond man wearing a ridiculous blue suit asked finally, rousing them.
"I've managed to get in contact with Clint, he's alive but unwilling to leave what's left of his family. Nothing from Scott," Natasha replied. "Have you heard from Sharon?"
"She's safe," he said, a ghost of a smile almost appearing on his lips.
"Has anyone heard from Pepper?" a soft voice asked from the hallway. Nebula turned to see Tony standing in the doorway, tilting slightly to the left but otherwise walking unaccompanied. Nebula knew the medical team had confined him to bed rest for at least two days, but decided to keep that information to herself.
"Tony, you're up!" a man that Nebula had heard be referred to as 'Rhodey' exclaimed, walking up and clapping Tony on the back.
"Miss me, Rhode?" Tony grinned. It was the first time Nebula had seen him smile.
The blond man had paused, seemingly startled, before nodding, "She's safe, Tony," he said reassuringly. "She's at the tower, offered to come here but I said it's probably safer where she is."
Tony's shoulders noticeably relaxed. "That was a good call."
Nebula watched him glance around the room, presumably taking note of everyone there.
"Okay so let's do a headcount, we have: me," Tony said, pointing to his chest. Nebula rolled her eyes. "You," he said, pinching Rhodey's shoulder. "You," he said, pointing at the blond man whom Nebula had learned was Thor, the God of Thunder. She had heard he had a legendary hammer, but she couldn't see any such object in sight. He was holding a suspicious looking axe, however. "Nat, Hulk, or maybe not Hulk at the moment, we need to get that sorted out, Bruce." More rolling of the eyes. "Her," he said, pointing at a lady with dark braids.
"My name is Shuri, I am T'Challa's sister," she said quietly but confidently, stepping forward.
"We have Shuri," Tony smiled at her. "You," he gestured to Nebula. It suddenly dawned on her that Tony didn't know her name. "You," he said, looking at the raccoon.
"The name's Rocket, just so you all know."
"And him," Tony said, gesturing to the other blond man with the horrible suit.
"Steve," the man said, nodding at Nebula and Rocket.
"I hate to ask, but who do we know of that did not live?" the God of Thunder asked.
"T'Challa," Shuri said sadly. "Okoye saw it happen."
"I'm sorry," the man in the horrible suit said.
"Thank you."
"Quill, Gamora, Drax, Mantis."
"Peter, or Spiderman," Tony said quietly. "Also, the wizard guy, referred to himself as Doctor Strange."
"My brother, Loki," Thor said quietly. Nebula frowned. She knew this name, her father had mentioned a Loki once or twice.
"Wanda and Vision," Nat said in a voice just above a whisper.
"Damn it," Tony muttered.
"Hey, what about that metal arm guy?" Rocket asked.
Steve sighed, closing his eyes. "He's dead. So is Sam."
Silence descended upon them once again. The brief motivation that had momentarily graced them faded away. All momentum was lost, as if once they stopped talking they would never be able to start again, being now faced with the reality that so many dear friends were gone. Even Nebula, who obviously did not care about these humans' issues, felt a deep sadness in her chest. Her sister was dead. Her sister's friends were dead. Half of life in the universe was dead, and her father had all six infinity stones.
Fuck.
/Line break/
Silently, one by one they had all left, to where Nebula didn't know. Now it was only her, left alone with her thoughts.
My sister is dead.
My sister.
Is dead.
He won.
He…damn it, Thanos won. Nebula punched the bench-top she was leaning on. Throughout her life, she had often wondered if she was capable of crying. She hadn't been able to when she was younger, she would get upset sure, but she'd never been able to produce tears, and as she'd gotten older and Thanos had gotten crueller, the urge to produce visible signs of discomfort had significantly lessened.
She was a patchwork body, made up of stray parts that had been stitched together. Not alive enough to truly be alive. But not dead, either. Not robotic enough to be a robot. She was just…her, Nebula, waste of parts and (future) destroyer of Thanos.
And a sister.
Or was she? Was she still a sister, even when her sister, the person whose very existence classified her as a sister, was dead? Or was being 'a sister' a temporary label?
It turns out, she could cry after all.
/Line break/
She wasn't sure how long she remained there, standing above the wooden bench that was now stained with teardrops. Distantly, she could hear a screeching voice accompanied with instruments. These humans really don't like silence.
There's nothing you can do that can't be done
Nothing you can sing that can't be sung
Aside from its lyrics pointing out the glaring obvious, the song was rather catchy, even to Nebula. What was the word? It had good drums? Time? Beat? Yes, that was it, it had a good beat. Nebula sighed, reminiscing that Gamora had always been the musical one. Perhaps that was why her and Quill had gotten on so well.
It's easy
All you need is love
What? That's not true.
All you need is love
Fuck love.
Nebula marched down the hallway towards what she vaguely remembered was called 'the living area', located the offending device that was playing such monstrosity, and promptly threw her knife at it, silencing the damned thing once and for all.
"Hey! What was that for?" Tony glared at her.
"That song was untruthful," Nebula responded.
"Well if you don't like the song, all you had to do was ask to change it. You didn't need to destroy the whole damned thing." The angry man who had trouble turning green (Tony's words, not hers) said irritably. Nebula marched forward and pulled her knife out of the wrecked- what was it? A disc player? A speaker? She couldn't even tell given the damage it had sustained. Good riddance, her knife was worth at least ten times more than that piece of junk. It was a beautiful knife actually, it's edge elegantly serrated, it's chocolate brown handle worn smooth with use.
"I'm sure you'll survive," Nebula said calmly.
"That's not the point! You can't just wreck other people's stuff-" Tony started.
"Oh please, you're rich, aren't you? You can just buy another one," Nebula snapped. She vaguely realised that maybe she had, well, reacted a little too strongly. Taking a deep breath, she said, "If you never play that damned song again, then I won't destroy any more of your…toys." She began walking out the door.
"Hey! We're not finished! Come ba-"
"Leave her, Tony," Steve said calmly.
"Why? She can't just go around destroying the furniture. It's not even mine and the person who's it was, is probably dead. She needs to respect-"
Steve sighed. "I get that, but we have bigger issues to worry about at the moment."
"Like what?"
"Like finding out who's missing."
"Well currently Scott's whereabouts are still unknown. Haven't heard from Fury, anyone heard anything?" Nat asked. Nebula was currently standing in the doorway, torn between her desire to get the hell away from these people, and her desire to undo this shithole of a situation (a desire which might have a chance of being fulfilled if she stayed and listened to these bickering creatures).
"Hold on, I'm checking now," Shuri spoke up, holding some sort of electronic pad.
"He appears to have turned to dust as well, so too has an Agent Hill? I'm assuming she's someone of importance?" The lady who Nebula assumed was Okoye said, reading over Shuri's shoulder.
"Yes, she is. Or was," Steve responded dejectedly.
"He did, however, manage to send out a distress signal, to a Carol Danvers, goes by the codename Captain Marvel? Does anyone know who that is?"
Captain Marvel? What kind of name was that? Nebula saw that everyone was shaking their head except Nat, who furrowed her brow sceptically.
"I've heard of her. She was around in the 90's, pretty amazing what she could do but she hasn't been seen in years. She's presumed dead."
"What kind of amazing exactly?" Steve asked.
"Being able to fly around without a suit, stronger than you, kind of amazing."
"We could really use her help."
"And she's probably dead. Even if she wasn't dead before and just decided to live as a hermit, there's a 50/50 chance she was killed in the rip," Tony piped up. Steve glared at him. "What? Don't look at me like that, we all know that's the most likely scenario, especially given our luck. Face it, this is it. We have basically next to no chance of undoing this." Nebula honestly agreed with him, which she hated. The man on the ship-ride here had possessed a child-like enthusiasm, a sense of faith that somehow things would turn out okay.
Perhaps that man was still there somewhere in the person standing before her, but Nebula couldn't see him.
They were either doomed to live out the rest of their (most-likely short) lives in this shithole of a world or die trying to change it.
"This is it," Tony repeated softly.
Despite her own despair, Nebula felt a familiar rage spark within her. "No, you know what? Fuck it, I'm not going to sit by and just pathetically accept this shitshow."
"What can we do? It's over, they're dead. There's nothing we can do."
Nebula sighed. "If we can get the time stone, we might have a chance."
"Even if we could somehow get the stone from your daddy dearest, none of us know how to wield it. Doctor Strange could and he's dead."
The Hulk man (he didn't look like much of a Hulk to Nebula) spoke up. "Yeah, but what about that other wizard guy? Wong, wasn't it? Maybe he knows a thing or two."
"If he wasn't killed in the rip," Thor pointed out.
"Well given our luck, he probably was. Everyone was killed in the rip."
"Loki wasn't."
"Neither was Gamora."
"She wasn't?" Rocket spoke up. "Then how-"
"Thanos murdered her to get the soul stone."
"Father of the year," Tony muttered.
"I'm sorry to hear that," Rocket said quietly.
"Yeah well…if we can get the time stone then you won't need to be sorry."
"Why do we need the time stone specifically? If we can get the reality stone then we can just change reality to however we want, right?" Rocket asked.
"Because if Thanos still has the time stone, then he can just go back in time and make sure we never get the reality stone in the first place. We might end up needing the reality stone, maybe we'll need all those damned stones. All I know is that we will definitely need the time stone," Nebula explained.
"We'll have to get his gauntlet then. Once that's off, we might have a chance. Although we have no idea where the bastard is. Speaking of which…" Rocket continued talking but the sound seemed to fade away. She just felt so tired. She didn't want to give up, she wouldn't, but man she was tired. That brief burst of rage-fuelled energy had worn off as quickly as it had come.
Nothing had truly been shit before now and yet everything had been so shit for so long. Why would things change now? There was no reason to believe that Lady Luck would suddenly act in her favour.
Nebula silently walked out the door and this time continued walking.
/Line break/
After several turns, she found herself in an empty room with large windows overlooking what was left of Wakanda. Several chairs were scattered around half-assedly, but Nebula sat on the floor, staring out at the view before her. She heard a pair of footsteps approaching but did not get up.
"Hey, I'm sorry to disturb you."
Then why are you here?
"I'm Steve, I'm sorry I didn't catch your name?"
"Nebula," she said, the word sounding oddly foreign to her ears, as she realised that was a word she hadn't said aloud in a long time. In her experience, asking for her name was not something people often did.
"That's a beautiful name," the man said. Nebula felt anger rising within her, urging her to lash out at the oddly kind human. But she also remembered advice she'd been told not so long ago, that apparently, she had a tendency to lash out whenever she felt uncomfortable or vulnerable. Gamora knew her well.
"Thank you."
The man sat down beside her. "This 'Gamora' that Rocket was talking about, she was your sister?"
"Yes," Nebula said, not quite sure why she was even answering him. She wasn't exactly a fan of humans, but somehow it felt wrong to not talk about her sister when given the chance. "We were both adopted by Thanos when we were children."
"You have my condolences."
Nebula almost chuckled. "She was his favourite. Not that it did her any good in the end, but…she loved us both, despite everything." Crap, had she just admitted that she and Thanos had something in common? No, no of course not.
"She'd be proud of you."
"Oh really?" Nebula said, her voice low despite the rage that fuelled within. Typical human, thinking he knew everything. He knew nothing, nothing about her relationship with Gamora.
"I'm a killer, and I'm not sorry for it. I'm going to kill our father and it's not because he killed my sister or half the freaking universe, it's because I fucking hate him." She paused, trying to keep her emotions under control. She wasn't even sure whether her words were true or not, in that moment all she knew was the rage that was always simmering just beneath the surface. She couldn't share the same universe that he lived in any longer, she felt like she couldn't even breathe knowing he does.
"You lot may think I'm doing this to avenge Gamora, that is what you do isn't it?" Nebula sneered. "Well I'm not. I'm doing this for me and only me, so don't think you know a single thing about me or my sister because you don't."
The human was quiet for several moments.
"I'm sorry, I know I don't know much about you or your sister," the human said carefully, quietly, as if afraid she would snap his neck if he raised his voice too loud. Which she probably would.
"But I meant that she would've been proud of you, for what you did for Tony."
Oh.
"You saved him when you didn't have to, which we are all incredibly thankful for, by the way. Doing that, it…yes, you may be a killer, you may have done terrible things in the past, but there's more to you than that."
This human seemed so sure of himself, so sure of his belief in her despite not even knowing her. How could anyone believe in a coldblooded killer?
"I never had the pleasure of meeting Gamora but from the sounds of it, she believed in you even when you didn't. I think she would've been proud."
Nebula decided then and there that this human was pissing her off. Not because he was wrong, he was annoyingly accurate in his observations. Damn him.
A/N Of the three chapters (this story is going to be three chapters, by the way), I had the most trouble with this chapter (I'd written all this dialogue and all these interactions that I wanted to happen, but I wasn't sure how to connect it all together). Anyways, I hope it turned out okay. Chapter three is mostly written and should be up in the next week or so. Also, the song mentioned is 'All You Need Is Love' by The Beatles (which I have nothing against, by the way. I just felt like Nebula wouldn't take too kindly to its message considering what happened to Gamora).
Until next time,