JJ's POV
"Look at this! Where's the other half of our ship?!" Gamora screamed as everyone gathered around to survey the damage the Milano took.
"My ship." Quill corrected, only to get yelled at,
"Either one of you could have gotten us through that field, if you had flown with what's between your ears instead of what's between your legs!"
"If what's between my legs had a hand on it, I guarantee I could have landed this ship."
"I still say you both would've crashed us either way..." I mumbled, earning a swat to the back of my head from Gora.
"Peter. We almost died because of your arrogance."
"More like because he stole Anulax batteries!" Quill pointed to Rocket in accusation and Gora and I each glared at him before she swatted him.
"They're called Harbulary batteries." Drax argued before Quill argued back,
"No, they're not!"
"You know why I did it, Star-Munch? Huh?" Rocket sassed.
"I'm not going to answer to 'Star-Munch.'"
"I did it because I wanted to."
"Dick." Quill grumbled before Rocket yelled,
"What are we even talking about this for? We just had a little man save us by blowing up fifty ships!"
"How little?"
Rocket roughly measured with his finger and thumb, which added up to an inch,
"Like this?"
"A little one-inch man saved us?" Gamora questioned skeptically.
"Well, if he got closer I'm sure he'd be much larger." Rocket's response made me facepalm and groan internally as Quill stated,
"Yeah that's how eyesight works, you stupid raccoon."
"Don't call me a raccoon!"
"I'm sorry, I took it too far... I meant 'trash panda.'"
Rocket looks at me and Drax unsurely.
"Is that better?"
"I don't know." Drax responded and I just shrugged with my arms crossed.
"It's worse. It's so much worse." Quill smirked.
"You son-of-a-!" Rocket jumped forward and tried to snap at Quill as I told everyone,
"It's true, I saw him too."
"Of course you agree with him." Drax stated like it was obvious.
"What's that s'posed to mean?" I looked to Drax in irritated annoyance.
"Is he not your master? Like a pet?"
"I ain't no one's pet!" I was about to fry some sense into his hollow noggin when I felt Gora's spines snag both my wrists as sparks crackled around my fists.
"Don't!" Gora shouted as she struggled to keep me from frying Drax as Rocket kept trying to bite Quill before Nebula pointed out to us,
"Someone followed you through the jump point."
Sure enough, the blue psychopath was right and the white, ovalish spaceship from before was coming down from the sky. We all stop fighting and get in a circle back to back; sparks crackled above my palms, Rocket cocked his gun, Drax got the gun he used before ready, Quill got out his blasters, and Gamora kept ahold of her sister when she tried to bargain with us,
"Set me free. You'll need my help."
"I'm not a fool, Nebula." Gamora declined.
"You're a fool if you deprive yourself a hand in combat."
"You'll attack me the moment I let you go."
"No, I won't."
"Y'know you'd think an evil supervillain would learn how to properly lie." Quill pointed out.
"Or at least know that she's not in a position to not be making deals with us." Gora added as the ship came closer to the ground to land.
"I bet it's the one-inch man!" Drax declared before I heard some shuffling behind me and Gora and we turned to see Groot coming out from the ship and climbing down from the ramp to the ground.
"I am Groot?" He questioned.
"No Groot, we aren't safe yet. Gora?" I told him before turning to Gora.
"Got'im." Gora reached over and kept him on her back and he started to entertain himself by batting her antennae around.
The ship finally landed in front of us by half burying itself into the ground and the yellow liquid stuff on the side suddenly opened making us all prepare ourselves. From inside, two shadows revealed themselves to be a man in old-looking clothing with frizzy white hair and a beard and a woman in green clothing that frankly looked like a humanoid bug with antennae that were similar to Gora's and huge black eyes that averted the man's gaze as he smiled before he spoke,
"After all these years, I've found you."
"Who the hell are you?" Quill asked.
"I figured my rugged good looks would make that obvious. My name is Ego. And I'm your Dad, Peter."
Quill stared at him as everyone backed away a little and I muttered,
"Just when I thought today couldn't get any more weird..."
Time Skip to Night
Just before the sun fully set on the planet and the moons rose, we all managed to get a fire going and were gathered around it. Drax was eating a bowl of blue, glowing mush while Rocket sat across from him on a log like everyone else and Groot was in my lap trying to catch the small lights that flew from my fingers every time I clicked my fingers together and Gora sat next to me grooming herself for the millionth time as Ego started eating at the same time as he started with his life story,
"I hired Yondu to pick you up when your mother passed away. but instead of returning you, Yondu kept you. I have no clue as to why."
"Oh I'll tell you why. Because I was a skinny little kid who could squeeze into places adults couldn't, it made it easier for thieving." Quill explained.
"Well I've been trying to track you down ever since."
"I thought Yondu was your father." Drax spoke up making Quill, and frankly everyone else, look at him weirdly.
"What? We've been together this whole time and you thought Yondu was my actual, blood relative?"
"You look exactly alike."
"Yon's blue." Rocket pointed out in disbelief.
"No he's not my father. Yondu was the guy who abducted me, kicked the crap out of me so I could learn how to fight, and he kept me in terror by threatening to eat me."
"Eat you?!"
"Yeah."
"Oh that son-of-a-"
"Hey! Child present!" I scolded as I put my hands on the sides of Groot's head as he looked at them with his mouth open.
"How'd you locate us now?" Gamora asked.
"Well even where I reside, out past the edge of what's known, we've heard tell of the man they call Star Lord."
He stands up after putting his dish down before saying,
"Say we head out that way now? Your associates are welcome, even that triangle-faced monkey there."
Pointing to Rocket at the end of his sentence, making him touch his nose while looking self-conscious about it until I lightly punched his arm with one hand and shook my head.
"I promise you, it's like no place you've ever seen. And there I can explain your very special heritage, and finally be the father I've always wanted to be."
There was a silence before he spoke again to say,
"'Scuse me. I gotta take a whizz."
And walked away to take care of his business, leaving us to consider our options.
"I'm not buying it." Quill whispered before Gamora suggested they go take a walk and off they went.
I sat with Groot starting to fall asleep in my lap as I gently patted his back while Gora was fully asleep next to me with her tail blanketing her so I carefully snuck Groot underneath her tail and they both snoozed away.
Then, I went to, carefully, sit on the log close to Nebula as Drax was still eating before the bug-lady from before introduced herself,
"I am Mantis."
Smiling so wide it was really creepy and I leaned back a little as Drax questioned,
"What are you doing?"
"Smiling. I hear it is the thing to do to make people like you."
"Not if you do it like that."
"Oh. I was raised alone on Ego's planet. I do not understand the intricacies of social interaction."
"Well Lesson #1: No one says 'intricacies of social interaction'." I tried to offer that piece of advice until she responded with,
"What is Lesson #2?"
"Nevermind…" I put my head in my hands in exhaustion, both from the battle earlier and this conversation.
"Can I pet your puppy? It is adorable." I looked back up to see Mantis was talking about Rocket as he was cleaning himself by licking his paws and I looked over with an arched eyebrow as Drax nodded and answered,
"Yes…"
She went to pet Rocket and managed to touch his head before he whirled around and tried to snap at her hand as she screamed,
"AHH!"
Before pulling her hand back to see if she had been bitten before Drax laughed raucously before saying,
"That is called a practical joke!"
Making Mantis giggle in response as she admitted,
"I liked it very much!"
"I just made it up."
They both continued to laugh together while Nebula shook her head with disbelief.
"I know what you're thinking," I leaned over to whisper to Nebula, "And yes, he's always like this. 'Biggest idiots in the galaxy' as Gamora said once."
She just scoffed in response and turned away, making me half shrug and ask,
"What'd I say?"
"Guardians." Quill called out as he and Gamora came back from their walk.
The five of us gathered around further away from Ego, Mantis, and Nebula and Gora and Groot still slept on the log to hear what Quill had to say,
"New plan." He started looking at all of us.
Cut to Morning
"You're leaving me with that fox?!" Nebula yelled angrily as Gamora passed her with her bag on her back.
Behind her, Rocket was using nanites to fix the ship while I was working on fixing the ship's telemetry system's circuits.
"He's not a fox." Gamora shot back to her sister before telling Rocket, "Shoot her if she does anything suspicious. Or if you feel like it."
"Ok." He told her without even looking up from his work before I gave her a thumbs up for him before snarking to Nebula as soon as Gamora was out of hearing range,
"Hey it's not exactly a fun time for us either."
Before looking over to see Gamora saying goodbye to Groot as he started shedding a few tears.
"Hey it'll just be a couple days. We'll be back before Rocket and JJ are finished fixing the ship."
Groot sadly waved bye before Gora reached up to him and helped him onto her back as she watched them leave as well with a waving spine. Just as Quill was leaving the ship with Drax in front of him, he stopped near Rocket, who told him straight up,
"Hope daddy isn't as big of a dick as you, orphan boy."
"What is your goal here? To get everyone to hate you? 'Cause it's working." Quill asked before leaving with Gamora and Drax to go with Quill's dad and Mantis, the song that was playing in the ship's lyrics getting to my head, making me wonder,
Is our chain breaking…?
AN- Sorry about the delay, Friday was my little sister's birthday and then yesterday I got my phone taken away so I had to wait until today to publish this chapter without drawing too much attention to myself for it.