Chapter 1: Ariel
~Way on the other side of the Hudson~
~ Deep in the bosom of suburbia~
~I met a young girl~
~She sang mighty fine~
~Tears on my pillow and Ave Maria~
- Dean Friedman, 1977
Lotiara, 2016
A green sun crested over the planet Lotiara and cast its light upon the Milano III. Peter Quill watched it fill the wide canopy of the cockpit. In the future, the ship's owner mused, he would need to get more creative with his names. After all, the outlaw turned slightly-less-out-of-law hero known as "Star Lord" was now the owner of a small fleet of vessels. It was one last gift from his former mentor, Yondu.
His daydreams were brought to an end by the arrival of a green skinned woman - a trait that would have otherwise stood out if not for the hue of the dawn outside. She tossed a backpack to Peter.
"The Sisters of Badoon are expecting us just after dawn. We don't want to be late."
"Sorry about that," Peter said sheepishly. "Hell of a view out there. Got me distracted."
"You'll need all the focus you can muster on this mission," Gamora replied in her typically serious tone. "Especially given your circumstances of your gender."
"My gender? What's their problem with men?"
"You really don't know?"
"I know the Badoon have been in a civil war for like ten thousand years. Come to think of it, I've never seen a lizard guy and a lizard lady together."
"The Male and Female Badoon have been at war with each other for their entire existence. The entire planet is split between them."
Peter snickered. "Sounds like a nasty divorce."
"No, I mean they literally split it - look there."
As the planet turned below them they came upon a chasm of truly unfathomable proportions. It was several hundred miles wide and penetrated all the way through the core of the planet, so that once they were directly over it they could see stars twinkle on the other side.
"Holy shit," he breathed. "So it's going to be you and two dudes in a room full of warrior chicks who blew their planet in half to keep the men away?"
She thought about it for a moment.
"You might want to let me do the talking on this one."
"Were the Brothers of Badoon hiring?"
"They were outbid," Gamora said with a grin.
Peter shook his head. "Can't we all just get along?"
"Peter, you know as well as I do that that's impossible for some people. They can carry a grudge a long way."
The sunlight now fully split the two halves of the planet down the middle. The two Guardians grabbed their packs and moved downstairs to meet with Drax. Gamora took one last look at the bizarre green dawn.
"Still, it's nice to imagine."
Far away from Peter and Gamora, there was a woman.
She sat on the bed in her chambers, her hair released from its tight bun underneath her headdress. She was staring intently, as she had for several months now, at the pod before her. Soon it would open, and her creation would live. The perfect organism.
Her darling Adam.
~Tears on my pillow and Ave Maria~
~Tears on my pillow and Ave Maria~
((((|The Guardians of the Galaxy|))))
in
((((| Third From the Sun |))))
4 Years Later
Gamora was nearly knocked from her seat by an explosion.
"Grah! I hate the Badoon!"
The Estefan surged through a hail of plasma bolts as it descended into the Lotiaran Rift.
"Why… again… are we doing this?" Mantis asked between bouts of turbulence. The insectoid empath was holding onto her control console for dear life.
In front of her a raccoon (if Mantis knew what a raccoon was) was frantically pulling levers on the helm.
"Yes, Gamora," Rocket shouted. "Do enlighten us!"
Nebula ran her fingers through her hair and groaned. She had been working with the Guardians alongside her sister for about three years now, and could call them trusted allies. Perhaps even friends, if the mood struck her. She liked to think her father's defeat had allowed her to move beyond her previously hateful demeanor. But patience was still not her strong suit.
"Let's go over this one more time."
She pulled up a schematic of the planet. A series of red posts interlaced the two halves.
"Planets are meant to be round. The rift that separates Sisterhood Lotiara from Brotherhood Lotiara is stabilized by a series of Gravity Pillars. Only the Badoon have spent so much time fighting each other that nobody has been bothering to perform the calibration sequences on them."
Gamora zoomed the model in on one of the pillars.
"The Spartoi Zoological Committee declared the Badoon an ecologically significant species. If the Grav Pillars go, the two halves of the planet will smash together and eliminate 90% of the population. They're paying us quite handsomely to recalibrate the gravitons."
"It helps that we're the only ones stupid enough to take the job," Rocket grumbled.
"I am Groot," said Groot.
"It's true," Drax said. "We have worked with the female lizard people before. Surely they will welcome our aid again."
"They don't know we're coming," Gamora explained. "The Brotherhood took down their communications array six weeks ago, and then the Sisterhood took theirs down a week after that in retaliation."
"We will be the first vessel to make contact since then," Nebula added.
"Then how will they know who we are and what we're there for?"
Nebula transferred weapons control to Gamora and headed belowdecks.
"Start the music Rocket. We will let them know."