11928/Suddenly, Star-Lord

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Suddenly, Star-Lord
Date of Scene: 06 August 2020
Location: Common Area - Milano
Synopsis: Wherein there is goo and a serenade.
Cast of Characters: Star-Lord, Gamora




Star-Lord has posed:
Rapping his knuckles on the doorframe, Peter Quill hooks his head into the barracks area. Generally Quill sticks to his own quarters, but it isn't unusual for him to come to the other areas, should he see a need. Or feel a need. The door wasn't closed or locked, it was ajar. Even so, he's careful; sneaking up on assassins isn't something he works to include into his life goals.

"Gamora? Hey. Just checking in. I saw that Krix'l spit up into your face. I didn't want to bring it up in front of the others, but. If you need anything? I can hold your hair while you puke. It was pretty gnarly. Just. You know. I'm here," Peter rambles from the other side of the door. He adjusts his footing, talking to the slightly ajar open spot of her door, and wiggles his thumbs a little in the pockets of his pants. He changed his clothes after the messy encounter, but it wasn't Peter that got the goo in the face and hair.

Gamora has posed:
There's certainly no surprise there when Gamora hears the voice, and there seems to be no rush to shut the door and keep him out. "I can honestly say that's not the worst thing that's spit up on me," she notes. There's the slight sound of movement before she opens the door entirely. Fresh clothes are a given, and her hair's wet. Likely a matter of her just entirely submerging her head to get it all off. "It certainly has an... aroma to it, though." She makes a face.

She stands there, the towel slung over one shoulder occasionally being used to pat at damp hair. She makes no motion to move, her position neither encouraging him to enter nor trying to shoo him off.

Star-Lord has posed:
"Not the worst thing? There's a story here," Peter says curiously, pushing the flat of one hand to slide the door open just a little more. With caution. No need to lose the limb yet, and he respects Gamora's privacy. There's reasons for that. But this Peter /can/ be trained.

"And as we're not eating, and Drax isn't here to attempt to one-up you, I gotta ask." It's conversational, and curious. "And uh, hang on." Quill steps forward, and attempts to reach towards her hair near her ear on one side. "A bit of entrail there. Just let me---" Quill is probably more grossed out than she is; his nose is wrinkled as he extends two fingers to try to pluck it loose. Ug.

Gamora has posed:
"You want a story?" Gamora raises an eyebrow just slightly. As he reaches forward, she moves back the tiniest bit until she figures out exactly what he's trying to do. She holds still, waiting for him to de-entrail her hair. The thought of a story seems to have her thinking before she quirks a little half-smile. "Alright, if that's what you want, I'll give you a story, Peter."

She finally moves aside, not waiting for him to enter before she moves over to take a seat. She slides into it, making herself comfortable without a second thought. "Make yourself at home."

Star-Lord has posed:
Peter got the globby thing. Now it's on his hand. "Oh, god, ugh," Peter says, disgusted, and unsure what to do with it now that he's got it on his fingers. He looks around uncertainly, while giving her a percentage of his attention.

"Yeah, I mean, I'd like to hear about it," Peter continues. He gets to the sink and attempts to kind of fling it off down into the bowl. It won't move at first. Two more flings gets it off with a *SPAK* noise.

And then Peter makes the bad choice of briefly smelling his fingers and nearly vomits himself. HE might need his 'hair held.' "That is ..." deep breath, holding onto the basin. "stepping really hard on the gag reflex there. Just, wow." He swallows, eyes watering, and with his free hand gives her the 'go ahead' movement of wrist.

"But your story? Yeah?"

Gamora has posed:
"I warned you about the smell," Gamora points out, tilting her head slightly to the side as she observes him. The towel, still resting over her shoulder, is balled up and tossed in his direction. "You might want to use that." Should he actually bother with the towel, it's soon obvious that she wasn't just using it to dry her hair--it's got a scent to it, something sweet, that seems to be doing a pretty good job of masking or diffusing the stench. She doesn't wait for him, leaning back a little in her chair.

"I was young, it was one of the first assignments I had on my own to eliminate someone... problematic. I didn't know why or what any of it meant, just that my quarry was on some backwater swamp planet that took /forever/ to get to. And the place was awful. The putrid scent of the place would just keep overwhelming your senses every time the mucous colored swamp bubbled..." Her gaze slides sideways to watch him.

Star-Lord has posed:
Peter is alert and listening, but he's also using the sink to wash his hand. He keeps turning to look at her with a 'yes you have my full attention' intent look of concern and focus. He catches the towel out of the air and flips it across his shoulder temporarily, since he's actively washing.

That done he smells his hand again carefully, looks disgusted, and then sniffs the towel, and begins to wipe his hand off with clear relief. He's still looking at her, though, and comes over while drying his hand.

"Mucous planet. Gotcha," Quill says, but it's just a prompt for her to keep going while he sits down next to her. "Sort of a 'Bog of Eternal Stench' kind of situation."

Gamora has posed:
"So this planet was already awful, what with the bubbling swamp and these rust-colored trees that just seemed to passively drip when you walked by them. Everywhere you went it just seemed like it was completely inhospitable. So imagine my surprise when I trekked through the trees only to find an entire city just planted in the middle, as if somehow they had not realized how horrid the place was," Gamora is certainly detailing her story, but she seems entirely casual about it. Other than the way she keeps shooting tiny glances in his direction, watching.

"The city was massive, with some kind of canopy that blocked out the sun. I imagined it was likely there because of the weather, but I later found out that it was used for something else entirely. I knew if I had to find my quarry, I'd have to determine if they were in the city or if they had wandered out. Mind you, I had little information at all to go off of."

Star-Lord has posed:
"Rust colored; wow, yeah," Peter says, agreeably. He isn't being sarcastic; he's just going along with that it must have been pretty bad, being part of the conversation: a concerned listener involved in the story being told.

"But you had some information, right? Knew what they looked like, or something?" Peter suggests when she pauses. It's conversational, he isn't rushing her. Peter finishes drying his hands, and then leans past her to put the towel on the surface just past her. It's a subtle move, but then ends with his elbow resting on the top of the cushion seat near her shoulder. He's good at sort of sidling in. In case he needs to comfort her, obviously.

Gamora has posed:
Gamora gives him a measured look at the 'casual' move, but it doesn't interfere with her story. "I had a name and a vague description but I had no image or even knowledge of who this person might be. So I thought, of course, to ask around, to listen to hear what the people in the city had to say. But as soon as I approached, these people looked at me, then quietly returned to their homes and shops and closed. There was no fear. They did not run. They just left. I hadn't even said a word."

Her gaze moves to Peter again, as if assessing him, before she continues the story. "If they would not speak with me willingly, I would have to find some other means to get information. So I set about this city to find somewhere I could quietly break into a building to interrogate the occupants. "

Star-Lord has posed:
"I'm guessing your universal translator wasn't broken," Peter says with a quick grin, but then politely stops asking stupid questions and props his head on his hand, supported by the elbow on the couch behind her. He hasn't done anything really other than make himself comfortable on the very edge of her personal space bubble.

Peter is looking at her, and clearly /seeming/ to be interested in the story, though if he's thinking about something else while looking at her - well, hard to tell for sure. Otherwise he listens.

Gamora has posed:
"I knew if I could get in I could talk to one of them, that I could find this person's location. I made my way to the back of what I thought was a restaurant and just sort of decided it didn't matter if I was loud. Who would come after me, after all?" Gamora holds up a finger. "That would come back to haunt me." He's given another casual glance. What is she looking for? Is she just looking? Is there a reason?

"Once I got inside, I searched the place. Nothing in the front, the kitchen, the storage, I didn't find anything. Bad luck, I thought. So I moved to another building, this one a house. Upstairs and downstairs were completely empty. It took me quite some time until I realized they had all gone underground. It didn't take long to find a way down but there were a maze of underground pipes and tunnels, some well made and others looking as if they had been dug out by hand."

Star-Lord has posed:
Peter is just listening, though he does shift position to be a little more comfortable, slightly slouched, displaying his usual casual quality. They're having a private conversation about something uncomfortable in her past, and Peter's aware of it. She's opening up to him, and he will treat that fact with respect.

"But not a sewer?" Peter questions. "More like escape tunnels?"

Gamora has posed:
Gamora glances over at him. There's a pause in the story while she gives him a look as if she's trying to read him like a book that she can't focus on the words of, but it ends up curving into a smile. "Peter... I'm trying to be funny. You asked for a story." She gives him the slightest nudge with her elbow before looking up at the ceiling. "The real 'story' is less exciting and more 'there was a flower that spat acid'. The stench is certainly a little easier to deal with. I did not think you would care for that one. You wanted a story."

There's a sudden pause as it occurs to her why, exactly, she was actually telling the story.

Star-Lord has posed:
Peter blinks at her twice, confused, and then his features curve into a smile, then a laugh. "What? Oh, hell. You had me going; all of that sounded entirely realistic. You could've gone on to tell me that the town worshipped your epic digging skills," Peter teases back.

"You don't need to make up stories to impress me. I'm already really impressed, with the whole badass, sexy assassin sword-wielding persona you have going on," Peter explains, lifting one hand to gesture to sort of the whole of her, and then drops the hand to attempt to curve the fingers over the back of her hand. Smooth, very smooth.

"..... a flower? Audrey II with a cold?" Peter chuckles, and translates, "Man-eating venus flytrap spit? Sounds like a bad day, but maybe a good musical."

Gamora has posed:
Gamora's smile turns into more of a grin. "I /am/ those things, it's not much of a persona. What you see is what you get." Well, that's not entirely accurate, at least not in his case. She pointedly pretends not to notice that his hand has moved, or perhaps she just chooses not to call attention to its new location. There's certainly no protest on her part, though she glances back over at him.

"It was yellow and certainly looked like a pretty flower until you got close and the whole thing opened up and it certainly did look like the inside of someone's mouth." She glances towards him. "What do you mean by musical?"

Star-Lord has posed:
"Musicals are like... stories with a lot of song in them, usually to help convey the emotional struggle the heroes are in," Peter explains readily. "Though there's some musicals that they don't sing. Footloose is an example. Kevin Bacon didn't do any singing that I remember. Just used dance."

Peter leans back some, his eyes moving toawrds the ceiling. "Let's see. Um." He clears his throat, a big grin flowing out. He knows he's being stupid, and doesn't care. "Suuuuuddenly Star-Lord," he sings, "Is standing beside you."

"Ya don't need no makeup, don't have to pre-teeeeeeeeeend; Suddenly Star-Lord.... is here to provide you...."

"Sweet Understanding. Star-Lord's your friiiiiend." ~~

Gamora has posed:
There are some things a well-trained assassin is prepared for. Star-Lord singing is certainly not one of them. Gamora's expression is a confused mix of a lot of things at once that comes out looking vaguely amused but also somewhat bewildered. There is a little laugh, though, and she ends up smiling, but her hand comes over to pat his knee.

"Okay, musicals, I get it. Okay." That's an indication that it's entirely okay to stop with the singing. If he's paying attention to that, of course.

Star-Lord has posed:
"I know another verse," Peter warns. He needs a second, looking at the ceiling.

"It's a duet normally. Uh." He snaps his fingers a few more times, trying to remember the rest of it.

"Tell me this feeling, lasts till forever, tell me the bad times are clean washed away..." Urgh. "Crap, how does this go." Peter got distracted with his perfection of the song. He gives up trying to make it coherent, just jump to the end. With that, he climbs off the edge of the seat, to kneel by her leg, but still retaining her hand. It's important to do such a sweet ballad /properly/. And his grin showcases that he's having a goofy fun time with this. Oh, he heard that she wants him to stop. He's just not stopping. Like every awkward serenade ever.

"Suddenly Star-Lord, he purified you; Suddenly Star-Lord, showed you that you /cannnnn/.... learn how to be more...."

"The girl that's in-siiiiide you; with sweet understanding...."

"With sweet understanding: Star-Lord's yooooourrrrr....

... Deep breath: "//Maaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaan//!"

Gamora has posed:
This was not how Gamora had seen this conversation going. He brings a bucketload of new experiences and this was certainly one of them. The continuation of the song brings less confusion and more of being unsure of how to react. There's serenading, and that's certainly something that's never happened before. But his goofiness and the fun he's having are particularly infectious and she cracks the slightest smile at his antics. It's small, but it's there.

"... those are the words? In the musical?" It's clear that somehow, admist the singing and the silly, the lyrics struck some kind of chord.

Star-Lord has posed:
"I mean, the guy's name is Seymour, not Star-Lord, but those are the song lyrics, pretty close," Peter agrees from the floor, before he drops one hand to the seat cushion to leverage himself back up to standing. "It's basically about this guy that's showing the woman he likes that he's there for her, when nobody else was. There's also a man-eating plant alien, but that's not really important to that song specifically."

Peter starts to sit down, but the ship gives a lurch, and he looks up and towards the door. REALLY? Right now? "Way to be a wing-man, whoever that was," Peter comments. "Um. Hold that emotion and thought. I'll be right back."

Peter gives a huffing breath and heads off to go see what interrupted his magical moment. It better be a near-death situation!