DISCLAIMER: I do not own any of the characters from Guardians of the Galaxy, either in its movie or comic incarnation. I own any OC I can invent, though. I am not making a £ out of this. It is just for shits and giggles.
Warnings: this chapter contains language, sarcasm and violence.
Thanks to EmilyEverlasting, and diarmour for the reviews and the compliments. I am really humbled by the responses I am having to this fic.
I am surely doing things right if people care enough about the characters to threaten to hunt me down if I kill them off...
Oh and by the way, if you like Ronan/Peter, you should definitely check out diarmour's fics "The Eternity of Everything" and "Cell 42" on AO3.
So, back to the story, in this chapter Spartax's very own Red Wedding continues and more surprises are in store for the Guardians!
Enjoy, and please don't shout at me!
When they get separated at the beginning of the battle, Gamora is not overly worried about Ronan. He is a born and bred warrior, fierce and fearless, and it makes sense to split up to cover more ground.
As she engages with the blind Incursors, she loses track of him for a moment, too busy chopping the bendy, sinewy creatures down to size to look around.
Next time she sees him, he is in the thick of it already, next to the main altar. She hears him shouting orders to his former subordinates and her heart leaps a bit in pride as she sees them rushing to obey. Peter is a proper prince, but Ronan seems no less regal at the moment.
"Admiring the scenery?" Peter teases, rushing in to steal her kill.
"Did you manage to flash the whole Temple, already?" she teases back, giving his tunic a pointed look.
Peter laughs and falls in step with her, thinning the herd of incoming targets to allow her to dispatch the rest with ease. A few steps away, Peter's father, Drax and Rocket are fighting in a similar unit, mowing down the Incursors almost as quickly as they come through the portals. Almost being the key word.
Armed sentients are starting to appear as well, gleefully returning fire.
"Bloody great..." Gamora comments quietly.
"We need to find the ameter who keeps on opening these bloody portals and rip them a new one!" Helenai shouts, from where her and Gladiator are fighting. With the arrival of more sentient foes, the situation is becoming stickier by the minute.
"I hear you, good-sister! - Gamora agrees - Any idea on who it might be?" she retorts, slicing yet one more surviving Incursor. Her dress is all stained with their oily black ichor.
It's a pity, she really liked it.
"We have a reading!" one of the Nova shouts.
"Rhomann Dey?! Fancy seeing you here!" Peter exclaims, as the knot of Xandarian soldiers picks its way closer to the Spartoi/Guardians mixed contingent.
"Star-Lord! Who invited you at the wedding? And what the hell are you wearing?" Dey asks, as the two groups merge.
"I'm the brother of the bride! - Peter retorts - And these clothes are fabulous, thank you very much." he adds sassily, without missing a beat. Dey looks flabbergasted.
Gamora would have found it funny, if they weren't in the middle of a fight.
"What did you say about that reading?" she asks.
"Someone is phasing in and out all over the Temple. - Dey replies - Our sensors have been picking it up since this whole portal gig started. It might be them." he explains.
"A phase-shifter?" Gamora enquires.
"Seems most likely." Dey replies.
"Everyman... - she whispers, feeling herself shiver with worry - It must be him."
"And that's bad news, right?" Peter asks.
"Very, very bad. He is a sadist." Gamora replies curtly.
"Everyone! Take cover!" someone shouts.
Instinctively, Gamora hits the floor, dragging Peter down with her by the tunic.
Flaming spheres fly over their head, hitting a few of the Xandarians and the Spartoi, those who were too slow to kiss the flagstones, and setting them on fire.
"What the fuck is this?!" Rocket yells, brandishing one of his biggest guns.
"I don't know!" Gamora yells back.
A creature made of flames has appeared in the Temple and is sowing panic and confusion all over the place, giving Thanos' footsoldiers the openings they need to press their attack.
The fiery newcomer is moving towards the altar, flowing rather than walking. As most of the Kree delegation has left with the non-combatant ladies, and the Skrulls have split from the group, Ronan has been left mostly alone up there, with just a few Accusers and officers.
Faced with that flaming mostrosity, he seems frozen in terror.
The creature seems to know it and launches a fireball towards him, setting his clothes on fire and throwing him against the far wall.
"Ronan! No!" Gamora screams, and tries to run towards him, heedless of the danger. She cannot leave him alone to face his worst fear. She has to help him, she tells herself.
The flaming thing, however, seems to have a different idea of how things should pass, and turns back towards them, unleashing a heavy barrage of fireballs.
"Gamora! Watch out!" Peter shouts, tackling her to the ground, just in the nick of time.
"Hold your positions, soldiers of Spartax! - Helenai shouts - Concentrate your fire on the flaming bastard!" she instructs. The fire-creature retreats under the heavy barrage, giving the two time to regroup.
"Ronan...he is..." Gamora gasps, more than a little panicky.
"I know. - Peter replies, also quite shocked - We will help him. But focus! We need to get this guy sorted first." he warns, helping her to get back to her feet.
Gamora nods, feeling exceedingly silly about her panic, but she cannot clear her head from the idea that something bad is happening. The fire-creature... and Everyman... she knows what he is capable of, and it does not bode well. It just does not.
Gritting her teeth, Gamora picks up her swords and gets back into the fray, slicing at the backup while the Praetorians shower the fire-thing with plasma bolts.
It seems to be working, at least it has stopped it and prevented it from setting more stuff on fire, Gamora thinks. One of the Praetorians approaches, chanting and waving her hands, and a barrier of some sort starts to appear around the thing.
"This should get it out of the way! - Gladiator shouts, while he holds the fire-thing up with his own self-produced plasma ray - We need to concentrate on this Everyman person! This circus has lasted long enough!" he instructs.
It's a nice plan, a sound plan. Gamora couldn't agree more.
But then three more fire-creatures appear out of the blue, and it all goes to hell.
The Shi'ar Praetorian who was raising the barrier is shot down by a fireball. The somewhat battered, original fire-bastard is free once more, and now they are facing four of them, and they are surrounded.
"Shit! Isn't this place supposed to have a fucking fire-fighting system of some sort?!" Peter yells to no one in particular, exhasperated and frightened. Gamora ignores his attempt at humour.
"Scatter! Don't give them an easy target!" she shouts instead, grabbing Peter's hand and dashing into an opening between two fire-creatures. They tumble out in the open, but as she rolls back to her feet, sword in hand, one of their foes has already managed to turn around, flowing like liquid fire, and there is nothing she can do to avoid the swing of his fiery hand.
"Oh, no! You don't!" Nebula yells, bulling into Gamora's side as she rains a hail of heavy ordnance against the creature. Explosive bullets, Gamora registers peripherically as she falls to the ground once again.
That seems to give the thing some pause.
Some... barely enough for the two sisters to get back to their feet and regroup with Peter.
"Thanks..." Gamora pants, trying to form a defensive strategy. Those things are fast, and deadly, and very nearly immune to most of what the defenders can throw at them. How are they supposed to fight them?!
"Any time now would be ideal, sweetheart!" Nebula shouts, completely out of context, leaving Gamora totally baffled.
Space distorts again, and a man in a green cape and bronze armour appears, drawing the attention of the fire-creature. The stranger is tall and lean, and looks like a Spartoi or maybe a Terran, with pale pink skin and shoulder-length dark hair.
"Anything for my lady..." he drawls, smiling broadly, apparently unconcerned by the situation.
With a theatrical flourish, the stranger produces a small, bright blue cube out of, well, apparently nowhere.
The cube starts floating between his palms, and swells, from the size of maybe a die to at least a couple of inches by side. The stranger's skin turns bright blue, patterned in slightly paler ridges, like scarifications, highlighting his sharp, elegant features, and his eyes turn from bright, sparkling green to burning red.
"A Kree?" Gamora thinks, blinking repeatedly. He even looks slightly like Ronan. It must be the high, sharp cheekbones, or the fact that they are both damn handsome.
"Johtunn!" the fire-thing roars, flowing furiously against the stranger.
"Well, yes. And you're doomed." he drawls calmly.
The air vibrates, high and sharp, almost musical, as the cube takes further life. An icy blast hits the fire-creature head-on and it screams in agony as the man's power freezes it in place, making it crackle and splinter. Gamora has never heard a more beautiful sound.
"I could use a hand, if you please..." the stranger says in a slightly strangled voice. The rest of the fire-creatures have converged on them, and look very, very angry. Well, as angry as a walking ball of fire can look.
"Yes, right! Of course!" Peter exclaims, and starts shooting at the freezing one. Chips and chunks of ice start flying all around.
"Move out!" Rocket shouts. Peter ducks as a massive projectile spews from the Raccoon's equally huge gun. The fire-creature shatters in a shower of icy shards that tinkle merrily on the ground.
"Impressive, very impressive..." the stranger comments quietly, a pleased smile on his face.
"You're not too bad either, Icicle!" Rocket exclaims, giggling to himself. His suit is all charred and his fur is standing on end. Now he looks a lot more like his usual self.
"Sorry to interrupt your male bonding moment, but we got three more to put in the ground!" Nebula yells, intercepting the charge of one of the fire-creatures with a hail of bullets.
"Ah, bugger! - she exclaims in a moment, dropping her weapons - Out of ammo! Can we get a move?" she adds, unsheathing her knives.
"Sorry, dear! - the stranger yells back - I was just greeting the in-laws!" he adds, chuckling quietly, as he blasts another fire-creature with his ice-ray.
"They're not my family!" Nebula shouts, exhasperated.
"Of course, love! - the stranger calls back, between gritted teeth - Can you just get those two out of my way?" he asks, jerking his head towards the other two fire-creatures.
"On it! - Nebula agrees - Alright boys and girls! Let's keep those things busy until he's ready to put them down! " she orders.
"Guardians! With me! - she adds, moving to intercept again - Furry, stay with Loki and blast those bastards when they're frozen!"
"Hey! What gave the idea that you can call the shots?!" Rocket objects.
"The fact that my boyfriend just saved your sorry arses?" Nebula retorts archly.
"The crazy blue woman has a point." Drax intervenes calmly, stepping in to cover Nebula's side.
"I am not crazy!" Nebula protests, but flows in the movement, allowing Gamora and Peter to swing out towards the other creature.
"Oh, and congratulations, good-sister! - Peter intervenes as he passes close to Nebula - Did you meet him at Villains Anonymous?" he teases. Over the chaos of the battle, Gamora hears Nebula growl.
"Can we can it for a while?! - Gamora shouts - Business first, banter later!" she chides.
"Yes, shut your trap, Star-Lord!" Nebula yells.
"Well, at least I can still agree on something with my sister... - Gamora thinks - Baby steps, as they say..." she muses wryly.