Ship, interior. Somewhere in Kree space.
“So... I realize that some of you are going to need an explanation as to what, exactly, is going on here.” Kitty began, pacing back and forth a bit uncomfortably as the rest of the team looked up at her from their seats in Ship's central lounge.
“Not really,” came the first retort almost immediately, from the flame-haired goddess that Kitty knew only as “Angela,” a huntress and assassin from Heven that Gamora had highly recommended for the reforged team. “I came to fight on behalf of the Guardians of the Galaxy. I plan to do that. No further explanation is really necessary.”
There was a moment of silence – Gamora shrugged her shoulders, having already had things explained to her earlier. Carol Danvers seemed more urgent to get her own goals underway than to hear a spiel about teamwork. But after several long seconds passed, the team's most unlikely member – Gwen Stacy – slowly raised her hand.
“I'd love an explanation, actually,” the girl said, drawing her hood back around her shoulders. Kitty tried to ignore the way it melded immediately with the rest of the suit, leaving Gwen's face exposed as the suit retracted away from her, a living, breathing, thinking thing that Kitty had no way to adequately predict. “Firstly, how did you know where I was? Why did you come and find me? Who are any of these people? Why are we in space? And...” she paused, furrowing her brow in thought. “That's it I guess. Just those.”
Shadowcat – no, Star-Lady, she was a Guardian now, not an X-Man – nodded her head slowly, taking a deep breath. “I used Ship's sensors to locate possible recruits for the new team. It picked up an energy signature belonging to the Venom symbiote last belonging to a man named Flash Thompson–”
“–I know him–”
“–Who Ship claimed used to be one of the Gee-Oh-Tee-Gee. While I didn't know it was you that had been captured, I have to admit that finding you on that ship was an extremely pleasant surprise.”
Gwen nodded, slowly, a look of mild turmoil on her face as the symbiote raged within her. They seek usss, not you, it whispered into her mind, unheard by the rest of the new Guardians. You thought your friend sought to rescue you. She wantsss only your power. The power you get from usss....
“Got it. Accidental rescue. Thanks.”
Kitty frowned. “I didn't know anything had happened to you, Gwen. If I had, I would have come looking for you.” She sighed, leaning back against the control panel that operated the snack bar, a bag of M&M's accidentally falling out into the little chute below her. “As to why we're still in space – we're space's last hope now. Peter's gone, Drax is in Asgard, Rocket and Groot are who-knows-where. The fact that I managed to find Gamora – or make her find me, I guess – is the only reason we have any Guardian cred at all. But whether or not we're a bunch of losers, we're all the galaxy has right now. So yeah, we're staying in space.”
Gwen Stacy paused, then shrugged. “Fair enough. I've actually been really enjoying the food anyway. What's that thing with the green squiggles? Something Vietnamese?”
“Gellorian Womb-Noodles, formed from fermented Gellorian unborn,” Gamora offered. “You have fine taste, Miss Stacy.”
“Thanks, and please remind me to never touch those ever again.”
“As for who everyone is...” Kitty continued, gesturing around to the gathered five women. “That's part of the reason why I wanted everyone in the same place for a little bit. I think we should at least introduce ourselves, right? My name's Kitty Pryde. I am – or was – an X-Man, but since Peter vanished I've taken up the mantle of Star-Lady. I can phase at will.”
“Do not say such things, Kitty Pryde,” Angela said firmly, thinking for a moment before finally seeming to decide that she understood. “I have known others like you, and I accept you for the woman you are. To me, you are no ex-man.”
Kitty was silent for a long moment before her brain digested what the asgardian had said, and smiled. “I meant X-Man, as in one of the students of Xavier, but thanks for being so open-minded.”
“...Oh. You are welcome, then.”
Carol, who'd been more or less silent up until now, intervened in the ensuing quiet to introduce herself next. “My name's Carol Danvers, currently going by Miss Marvel. I'm hybridized with Kree DNA, and have a portion of... actually, you know what, my backstory's a mess. I'm strong, fly, and shoot energy blasts.”
“Wait, I thought you went by Captain Marvel? And didn't you have like a mohawk thing going on?” Gwen interjected, tilting her head and curling up on her own seat, looking at the tall, statuesque superheroine.
“Yeah. I decided that if I wanted to stand out from my predecessor, maybe emulating him and taking on his name wasn't the best idea.” Carol shrugged, folding one long, booted leg over the other and laying back, though she was still visibly anxious, ready for the chit-chat to be over so she could get to what was important. Still, formalities had to take place.
“I am Angela, daughter of Odin, huntress of Heven,” Angela stated proudly, putting one fist to her chest in a brief salute.
Kitty's eyes widened for a moment, glancing over to Gamora who relaxed beside her with that lazy, lethal grace of hers. “You didn't tell me she was an asgardian!” she whispered frantically. “Isn't she a bit above our paygrade?”
“Last I checked, we don't pay,” Gamora answered simply. “I've fought beside Angela before. She's worthy.”
“Wait, like, for the hammer thing?”
“No! No, not that. Just normal worthy.”
“Oh, whew. Phrasing.”
Angela grumbled, glancing over at the other two before folding her arms across her chest and sitting back again. “I might be worthy. You don't know.”
“Well, I'm Gwen Stacy,” the blonde human girl said, shrugging a little. “I was top of my class in like... well, pretty much all of my classes, actually. Used to be Spider-Man's girlfriend. Aaand now I'm bonded with a bloodthirsty psychotic alien parasite who loves chocolate even more than I do. Which I assume is why I wasn't drop-shipped back to Earth at the earliest opportunity.” They still might, the symbiote whispered to her. Prove to them that you are more than just girl, and symbiote. Show them who we are. Show them Venom.
Gwen winced, squeezing her eyes shut for a moment as she tried to shut out the voices, looking away from the other women for a moment. “Sorry, I've, uh, been kinda crabby. This thing's like the roommate I never wanted. Up all night, makes messes, never shuts up.”
“We can take you back to Earth if you want us to, Gwen,” Kitty said softly. “But you're welcome to stay if you want to be a Guardian. We could really use you.”
“Thanks. I'll... give it a shot, I guess.” Gwen offered a small smile, hugging herself around her knees and breathing out softly.
The green-skinned assassin inhaled, standing up and looking around at the others. “I suppose that leaves me. Many of you I've met before, but for those I have not...” she paused. “...I'm Gamora.” She sat back down, her piece said and the last introduction made. For some reason, introducing herself as the most dangerous woman in the universe seemed a bit tasteless.
Now, with each member introduced to each other member, silence descended for a long moment, thick and uncomfortable, the silence that could only be shared by five people who didn't know each other, and currently had very little to unite one another besides a fancy name. “So...” Kitty attempted a weak smile. “Anyone want snacks?”
As both Angela and Gwen began to raise their hands, Carol cleared her throat. “Actually, I'd like to talk about the reason I signed on to this team. Remember, the rising surge of cosmic power that threatens to grow so large that it could consume us? It seems kind of important.”
“Ship hasn't picked up anything like that on its censors, and I've been looking around pretty hard for anything that looks like it needs tending to,” Kitty replied, furrowing her brow with the expression of someone who was perplexed, but not distrustful. She was certain that Carol had seen what she'd seen – hell, Carol had been on more teams than the rest of their group put together as Miss Marvel. She wasn't exactly an amateur. “Where did you find it?”
“S.H.I.E.L.D.'s readings showed it deep in the core of the universe, hidden under layers and layers of dark matter like a blanket covering a child. It's not a matter of where it is, so much as how deep.” Carol bit her lip as she tried to explain in a way that would make the others understand, specifically Kitty, who seemed understandably troubled. “Our first step will have to be actually finding it.”
Kitty stood up fully, gesturing to the navigation room. “Let's go see if we can find it with Ship's radar. I don't know how it stacks up to S.H.I.E.L.D.'s, but it's worth a shot.” She halted for a moment, looking around at the rest of the lounge. “Where did Angela and Gwen go?”
o-o-o-o-o-o-o
The Kitchen
“It is a very dishonorable thing to speak of snacks without providing them,” Angela mused, setting her winged golden helm at the counter beside her as she began to rifle through the refrigerator, pushing various things aside as she searched for something she wanted. “Fortunately we will be of no use to their planning, nor do I care to be. Oooh.” Reaching in, the asgardian warrior withdrew what appeared to be a long metal stick with several small, grilled creatures skewered on it, congealed grease coating each fully-intact entity. A gurgle of her stomach heralded a massive bite as Angela gnawed a bloated, betentacled critter from the end of the skewer and began to chew. “Would you care for one, monster-girl?”
“I'd really prefer Gwen, and no, I'm–” her eyes widened, locking onto the skewered creatures as the symbiote thrashed within her, causing her skin and clothing to ripple anxiously. Food! Flesh! Brain and bone and blood! You must feed usss! You mussst! “A-actually I'd really like some.” She extended one hand to pull off a piece, only for thin black tendrils to extend from her fingertips and coil around one of the little grilled abdomen and drawing it close, a tiny maw of snapping jaws forming and devouring the thing before Gwen herself could get it to her own mouth.
Angela blinked, still chewing as she watched the alien feed itself, her eyes moving back towards Gwen's face. “That was very unsettling.”
“Sorry. I'm having a hard time controlling it. For as much of a complete asshat as Flash was – the Flash I knew in high school, anyway – I'm a little embarassed that he seemed to have so little trouble with it. It just wants, all the time.” Gwen plucked off another piece from the skewer, only for the symbiote to devour it as well, black and white tendrils squirming over her body as the Other fed itself.
“So this is where you two got to,” came Gamora's voice from the doorway, the assassin's movements distractingly sensuous, especially when her cloak was off. “The humans are discussing strategy in the nav room.”
“I happen to be human, thank you very much,” Gwen commented. “More than either of them, actually.”
“I suppose you're right,” Gamora relented immediately, not considering it worth any discussion whatsoever. “Ooh, you found kari ik'thass,” she said, gesturing to the skewer Angela still held. “Delicious, though I've always found the process of boiling them in durshaphas urine to be a bit unnecessary. May I take one?”
Gwen slowly retracted her hand from the skewer. Angela finished chewing, swallowing loudly and extending the stick towards the emerald killer. “All yours.”
o-o-o-o-o-o-o
Navigation Room
“You see? Just here? This... pulsation?”
Kitty squinted, trying to see it. It was faint, but it was there, Ship's technology struggling to pick it up. A strange throbbing, rippling out from the center of the galaxy. They'd blown the view out to take in as much of this stretch of civilized space as possible, and the energy signature Carol had spoken of seemed to encompass all of it. “I see it. What do you think it is?”
“S.H.I.E.L.D.'s readings suggested that it was a sort of funnel, drawing in cosmic energy. Like your ship, it had trouble defining what it was picking up, but if something is gathering power we need to stop it.” Miss Marvel looked down at the teen mutant, for a moment realizing just how small she was. It almost seemed wrong to have her on a team this dangerous, much less leading it. “How old are you, Miss Pryde?”
“Nineteen,” Kitty answered off-handedly, scratching her chin as she continued to peruse the nav screen. “If it's right at the center of the galaxy then we can get the coordinates for it. We just need a way to dig inside.”
“Aren't you a little young for this? How long have you even been a hero?” Carol's expression grew to one of concern, no longer looking at the screen, but at the young mutant.
“Since I was thirteen.” Kitty glanced from the nav screen to Carol, a small smirk on her face. “You don't need to worry about me. I've faced down way more apocalypses – not to mention Apocalypses – than most long-term Avengers can shake a stick at; no offense. We may not be Earth's Mightiest Heroes, but I was one of the X-Men. That still counts for something.” Her face grew serious again, her gaze returning to the pulsing core of the map. “I actually think I know exactly who we need to get through this. And he's not gonna come willingly. Ship–” she turned her attention to the vessel around her. “Run a scan for the last sighting of the Juggernaut. I hope the team's ready for a hell of a fight.”
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