And like that my writers block is dead and I am once again EMOTIONALLY COMPROMISED BY STARMORA. I went into this movie expecting an amazing time and came out BRUTALLY DESTROYED BY FEELINGS. All I want is to wrap Peter in a giant fluffy blanket and let him sit with his family who loves him because EGO IS A GIANT ASSHOLE AND I AM SO ANGRY RIGHT NOW AGH.

It's quiet in the ship, the unnatural sort of quiet that follows the loud clamor of battle, usually leaving empty echoes of blaster fire and explosions ringing in Gamora's ears. This time, however, the echoes are drowned out by the steady thump of a half-human heart beneath her cheek, a simple sound that brings her more happiness than she'd thought something so small could.

Her arms tighten imperceptibly where they're wrapped around Peter's chest, and she lives in the steady rise and fall of his chest. She's sprawled on top of him, carefully positioned to avoid the various injuries they collected.

It's more for his benefit than hers.

To his credit, the worst of the visible injuries he's sporting is the jagged gash that spans his forehead to cheek, from where Ego's hit cracked his mask open. She takes a moment to both hate the Celestial with a fiery passion and remind herself that they need to get a replacement for that mask sooner than later.

Peter has a penchant for trouble like that.

Apart from the same scrapes and bruises the rest of them are sporting, and the red rawness of his hands, Peter appears mostly unharmed. Gamora's fingers ghost over the center of his chest before coming to rest, reminding herself that the skin beneath is smooth and unblemished, not burned and bloody and speared through with light-

Her grip tightens, and she has to remind herself to relax before she wakes him up. Much as she would love to see his eyes, the bright shade of green devoid of any of Ego's toxic light, Peter needs rest to the point that it's worrying. She's still unsure of what exactly Ego did to him, but gathering that he was in the process of draining Peter's life force, it makes sense that he'd be utterly exhausted. Which he was, barely making it two steps before collapsing heavily against her, the little color left in his face draining abruptly. So she lets him sleep where the others have left them in one of the ship's old bunks, Peter's arm a comforting where he clings to her waist in sleep.

She still wishes he would open his eyes. Her head is flicking between images of Peter strung up on Ego's light, the ship exploding, and Peter's lifeless body floating in space. Selfishly, maybe, but she'd really like Peter to drive those images away by flirting obnoxiously or telling her more stories about Terra.

It is sad, she thinks, that he often has to be drunk to tell those stories. She loves hearing of his childhood, imagining a smaller, gangly, more innocent Peter running around the fractured images she imagines Terra to look like. The only other times he tells her them are when his guard is completely down, his normally cocky grin unsure and almost timid as he opens up to her. She loves those moments.

Which is why she doesn't understand why she's always been so fast to walk away from them, especially when now, it's a near possibility Peter will never open up to anyone again.

She takes a shuddering breath. That's not true, and she knows it. Peter is far stronger than she gives him credit for, and he'll bounce back. He'll open up to her again because he's stubborn and foolish and never knows when to quit, not when it comes to their family – to her.

Much unlike herself.

Gamora bites the inside of her cheek. It's no secret that she's guarded herself between tightly enforced walls formed from years under Thanos. She had to, to survive. The pain of those years is slow to fade, and she often fears his touch is something she'll never shake.

She shudders, again taking comfort in the warmth of Peter beneath her.

She had to have those walls. To survive. It's something she's been telling herself, every moment since Nebula screamed at her in the caves of Ego's planet.

You wanted to win. I just wanted a sister.

Is it true? Years of anger and pain and fighting and struggling to survive beneath Thanos, and Nebula had still wanted her as a sister?

And if it's true…how could Gamora have failed to notice?

It's a wake-up call, the uncomfortable, guilty painful kind. She's prided herself for moving beyond her past, for keeping some semblance of the girl her parents raised all those years under Thanos. Through modification after modification, she prided herself on remaining Gamora. And she liked to think Gamora could, someday, be a person worthy of the love of her family.

But Nebula. She failed her, she failed her so badly. All those years and she never, not once, saw the struggle of her sister, made an effort to reach out to the girl just as wronged by Thanos as she was. She had to survive, yes, but-

If she had looked. If she had just reached out once to Nebula - maybe she wouldn't have had to do it alone.

And that's where her walls are leaving her, aren't they? Alone. Like the little girl cowering in corner from Thanos and the grown woman staring at the destruction of a ship, every unspoken thing going up in flames. Leaving her and her walls alone.

A stinging warmth floods her eyes, and Gamora is horrified to find her nose running and her eyes blurry with welling tears. She takes a gasping breath, trying vainly to stop the shuddering of her chest as the past days crash down on her in full.

Warm fingertips brush gently beneath her eyes, and the arm around her back tightens. Gamora stiffens, glancing up to see the Peter's bleary, sleepy eyes staring back at her.

"Hey," he whispers, his voice cracked from sleep. "Gamora, what's wrong?"

She takes another shuddering breath, blinking furiously against the tears. "Nothing," she says, offering him a tremulous smile. "Go back to sleep, Peter."

He shakes his head, awareness creeping slowly into his eyes. "No," he murmurs. "Y're a liar."

She has a sharp retort, one she knows will silence him until he's drifted back to sleep. But it dies on her tongue, between the images of the ship exploding and the reminder of being alone.

"I'm just glad," she finally says. "That you're alive."

Peter's expression softens, and it takes everything in her not to pull away at the emotion she sees written across his face. Because Peter is more precious to her than words, but love is something she is so utterly unprepared to deal with it's-

"M' glad, too," Peter murmurs, already drifting back under the pull of heavy exhaustion. "Glad you're alive."

Gamora shifts, making to rise and leave him to sleep more comfortably, but his arm tightens around her waist, the other coming up to trap her soundly against his chest.

Gamora feels a touch of exasperation to the whirl of emotions inside her. Though something inside her rebels at the idea of leaving his warmth, the steady sound of his heartbeat beneath her head - she's already left part of his shirt damp with tears, and the last thing he needs is her lying on top of his probably-bruised ribs any longer. She prepares to wrestle her way out of his grasp – she's stronger than him even when he's not half-unconscious – but his words, barely audible as they're whispered, stop her dead.

"Can't lose you, too. Never."

Gamora feels the traitorous tears build up behind her eyes again. She's not the only one who fears being left alone.

In the end, it's the stubborn pull to Peter inside her, the one that's been growing stronger and stronger with each passing day since Xandar, that wins out. She sighs, letting herself go limp and her head finds the spot on his chest where she can best hear his heartbeat again. Stupid, loving, beautiful idiot-

The sounds of the other Guardians moving around filter through the ship, muffled where they reach the bunks. Peter's heart beats a steady drum in her ears, and she feels her own eyes flutter closed.

She's not alone. It might do her good, she thinks, to enjoy that.