Chapter Text
The last Peter Quill saw of Adam Warlock before accepting that mission from Shuri, he was among the other Guardians in Knowhere. Now, he stands before Quill on Klyntar with the company of Rocket, Groot, and a new ally, Venom. While Rocket was busy lecturing Peter about crashing his—well, technically Peter's—ship, Adam could only focus on Peter. Uncaring of the slightly unfamiliar tone of his voice or the subtle difference in the way his hair was parted, Adam watched Peter with fondness. Yet, the more he watched, the more he noticed. Peter’s skin sat differently on his face, his eyes were growing more foreign, he was distorting into someone else entirely, and Adam didn’t know who. Peter’s soul was unfamiliar, and Adam could feel it. Adam could hear it, he heard Peter’s soul screaming at him, telling him it wasn’t his.
Adam opened his eyes to see the walls of the Milano. It wasn’t a dream, since he didn’t sleep, it was just Adam, once again overthinking during meditation. He scolded himself under his breath. The gem in his head gave him a headache at that moment.
“‘Morning Goldie, sleep good?” Rocket spoke behind him. Adam got up off the ground of Drax’s room, not bothering to correct Rocket’s grammar. He’d been using Drax’s room since he found the Guardians again during the timestream entanglement. He didn’t really need a room, but he did appreciate the privacy.
“I don’t require sleep, but my time wasn’t unpleasant,” Adam lied. He knew Rocket didn’t care much.
Rocket paused in doubt. “Yeah, well, we got something,” he responded as he walked out of Adam’s room. The Guardians had been looking for their other members ever since the timestream entanglement started. They haven’t had a single clue as to where they could be until now.
Adam joined Rocket in the flight deck of the Milano, and they were greeted by Mantis, Groot, and Peter. Stood by the half-alien’s side, Adam looked to him with a curious expression.
“We programmed the system to detect specific disturbances in the galaxy that could be the timestream entanglement—which does mean we’ve been getting a lot of pings—but, this time I think it might be them,” Peter explained as Mantis stepped in.
“It’s a bigger ping than we’ve gotten before, so if it’s not them, it's something else, and we must stay vigilant.”
Rocket sat down in his seat. “Alright, so now what? We jump to the planet and dive in to save some pretty princesses, that it? ‘Cause I very much wanna kill somethin’ today.”
“I am Groot.”
“I know, Groot, I wanna save ‘em too… But, I would also like to kill things.”
“Alright, that’s enough. Strap in Guardians, this could get ugly.”
The planet they landed on gave the guardians an unsettling dystopian feeling. In this universe, somehow, many Kree worlds such as the one they stood on, had been completely rid of life. They stepped onto the eerily empty world of Kree-Pama expectantly.
“Are you sure you landed on the right planet, Pete?” Rocket asked.
“I did! I checked.”
Adam stepped out of the Milano last. “Be wary, this planet is no longer familiar to us.”
Despite Adam’s warning, it didn’t take long until they were under attack. Though, the strangest part was, they were under attack courtesy of the Badoon. Peter cursed under his breath as he swiftly pulled out his element guns and began to fight back.
“Where the flark did the Badoon crawl out of?!” Rocket yelled out as he shot one of the Badoon soldiers from behind Peter. A burst of cosmic energy knocked down a Badoon soldier that was headed for Mantis, though she was too busy stunning two other soldiers to notice.
With the help of Rocket and Groot, Peter successfully took down four other soldiers. “No clue, just keep shooting!”
Adam’s staff shot two more soldiers while Peter dodged projectiles with the help of his jet boots. Vines pierced through the rest of the Badoon as the Guardians put away their weapons. Peter held back a sigh of relief and instead glanced at Mantis for clarification. “Don’t fret, that was most definitely the last of them.” Like opening up a dam, relief washed over the team. Though they still had room to worry and more questions than questions answered.
“So… why the Badoon? And why here?”
Rocket tweaked with the monitors in the flight deck. “Well, we gots a big signal,” he turned to face Peter, “we gots a problem with the timeline stuffs.” There was an awkward silence. If that signal was completely unrelated to them, it could be near impossible to find the rest of the team again. They all knew that.
“We'll find them,” Adam said with a distant expression, “we have to.”
The team looked around at each other after Adam walked off. They shared glances as if they were all asking “alright who's going after him” to each other. Luckily they didn't need to ask. “I'll get him.” Peter said with a sigh.
Adam was sitting on the couch in the common area. He looked down at the floor in thought. Peter walked over to the armrest of the couch to talk. Adam simply sighed. “Sorry Peter. I just—we just need to focus on finding Gamora and Drax and halt these worrying thoughts. It’s unnecessary.”
“I know, Adam,” Peter said with unease, “We can’t help it, y’know.”
A minute of awkward silence took over the room. Peter knew there was something Adam wasn’t telling him. Dealing with the emotions of the team is the hardest part about being a leader, Peter thought.
“Is this about Gamora?”
“What?”
Peter was then unsure, but he already said it so why not just ask. “Y’know. You guys had a thing or whatever. Before the Guardians, even.”
Adam paused in shock. “What? Of course not, that was a long time ago. I don’t yearn over a lost love as long as you do, Peter Quill.”
“Hey, don’t bring Kitty into this! I’m just saying, you seem more hung up about this than everyone else.”
Adam looked up at him with questioning eyes. “Are you jealous, Peter?”
Peter looked at Adam with unmatched confusion. He stood there for a while, just considering it. “I—that’s not—no? Why would I be?”
Adam tilted his head in curiosity. He had an amused look on his face from teasing Peter. He scolded himself for the distraction. “We—”
“Pete, Adam, ‘nother signal,” Rocket interrupted, peeking his head out from the staircase leading up to the flight deck. Peter sighed with relief and headed up.
“C’mon Adam, this could be it,” Peter called out as he climbed the stairs. Adam hesitated, he wondered when he and Peter would ever get time to themselves again. He got up and walked towards the stairs.
“Same planet? It’s probably just more of the Badoon.” Peter said.
Mantis looked back at him from her seat. “I know, it’s fairly suspicious. However, that's all we have currently.”
“Flark that, I don’t feel like fightin’ the Badoon no more!”
“I am Groot?”
“Yeah, I did say that. Don’t mean the Badoon ain’t annoying.”
As they all walked back out on Kree-Pama they could hear fighting from a distance. “Is there someone here other than the Badoon?” Peter wondered aloud.
Adam gestured to the fight in the distance, which was seemingly growing closer to them. “I believe your question will be answered sooner than you think.”
“Well, waiting ain't gonna do scut,” Rocket said before running straight into the fight. The Guardians followed.
Peter closed up his mask and charged into the fight, gesturing to the team to attack the Badoon from the back. Rocket crawled on top of Groot to scope things out, seeing only one person fighting the Badoon, which wasn’t as impressive when he realized they were losing. Mantis swept two soldiers as Peter shot them down. Groot grabbed two with his branches and threw them at two others. Rocket was on his shoulder shooting at the rest. While Adam took down three Badoon soldiers, he caught a glimpse of who was fighting the Badoon alone. He paused in shock, giving one of the soldiers an opening to take him down. Its scaly hands gripped Adam's throat as his arm extended out for his staff, which was knocked only a few inches out of his reach. Adam kicked off the soldier and rolled over to his staff, then shooting cosmic rays at the reptilian soldier. Adam dusted himself off and watched the woman kill the rest of the Badoon.
Gamora caught her breath for a minute. “Where have you guys been, could've used that help a couple hundred clicks ago.”