I can't sleep alone because there's something in here

[ceptme]

Afterwards, that short span of time he spends back on Earth with Peter doesn't feel real.

They carve out a solid couple of days for themselves where they don't do a whole lot of anything that'd oblige them to put real clothes on, or stumble any further than the galley. It's a warm and hazy space, a world removed from anything that came before or after. It's tempting to curl a little closer into that warmth, to pretend that as long as they're here together like this, nothing else could possibly touch them.

But the fact is he's gone and got himself some fucking responsibilities these days. He can't hide from them here forever, no matter how badly part of him kind of wants to try. They've already stuck around probably longer than they should have; there's going to be a dozen different flavors of crisis waiting for them back on Knowhere, and that's if everything's gone well. They say their goodbyes and get ready to head out, and as they prep for departure, there's a certain edge to the silence in the cockpit.

"Shut up," Rocket says eventually.

"I didn't say anything," Nebula replies.

He shoots her an unimpressed sideways glance, which she meets with absolute impassivity. She doesn't need to say a damn word. The whole crew are family, but after everything, no-one else knows him like she does. Five years living in each others' pockets, no-one to lean on but each other, and he can hear her fucking thinking it. After a long moment she snorts, shakes her head, and returns her attention to the pre-flight checks.

"I hope you know what you're doing," she says, quieter, her gaze firmly focused on the console in front of her.

Rocket sighs and gives a shadow of a grin, closing his eyes and letting his head fall back against the headrest of the copilot's seat. "I know you know I don't."

That is, mercifully, the closest he comes to needing to have any kind of heart-to-heart about the whole thing. By the time they make it back to Knowhere, enough time has passed that the bites and bruises have faded, and the whole thing is starting to feel kind of like a dream. There's not exactly time to think about it either, not when the aforementioned crises are ambushing them the second they walk out of the fucking airlock. There's always a million things to do, both right here on Knowhere and further afield, and as the sucker nominally in charge every last bit of it's his problem. Never mind dwelling on anything, it's enough of a challenge finding time to sleep.

But...there are quieter moments, here and there. Lying in bed with the lights outside dimmed for the station's night cycle, too bone tired to do anything more than stare at the ceiling but still buzzing with too many thoughts to sleep; those are the moments he finds himself thinking, idle and pointless, about a world where maybe there isn't nothing but a cold expanse of empty sheets on the other side of the bed. It's not regret, nor is it hope, really. It's just...a daydream, maybe, about a world where things went down a little different.

He picks up his comm, looking at the conversation sitting on the screen tempting as a big red button. He doesn't type I can't fucking believe you made me do this without you, much as the thought crosses his mind about a dozen times a day even now. He doesn't type I miss you either, although it's fucking true.

What he does do, in the end, is flick on a lamp to cast some low, warm light across the room, and open the camera. The shot he takes is bordering on tasteful, largely by dint of being intended to tease; it's mostly bare torso, cutting off below the hipbones just as happy trail starts to thicken into denser hair, although the positioning of his free hand where it disappears out of frame is distinctly suggestive. He smirks at the lens as he snaps the shot, and sends it off before he has time to second-guess himself.

>> thinkin of you

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Worth the wait 🫶

[ceptme]

There's a place deep in his chest where his crew fit. He was aware of it in a nebulous sort of way before, but it was brought into sharp, inescapable relief in the five years when they were gone. He'll never forget how the coldness of that empty space felt, the raw edges of that wound catching painfully on the moments where he moved automatically to reach for something that wasn't there.

It's different now. But the scar tissue that built up around it is still there, even if they're mostly all where they're supposed to be again, and there's still that moment of heart-stopping fear every time he turns around to make some stupid dickhead joke and Peter isn't there. The word promise makes his chest tighten, even as some part of him wants to snap then why did you leave, why aren't you here? Part of him knows that isn't fair, but a bigger and much more stubborn part of him doesn't care. Peter's supposed to be here with him. They're supposed to be a team. He wasn't supposed to just leave.

But it is what it is, and it's not the first time the universe has decided to drive home the lesson that what he wants doesn't mean shit. He breathes out a long, slow exhale that isn't quite a sigh and doesn't respond. It turns into a huff of a laugh at the follow-up innuendo, and— and yeah, maybe it's better to move past it and keep things light. Dwelling on the empty space by his side sure ain't gonna get him off.

He closes his eyes and swallows everything else down, focusing on the warm, teasing sound of Peter's voice in his ears and the shocks of pleasure shuddering through him with every slightest movement of his hands. "Fuck yeah," he hisses out, rocking his hips up into his own grip around his cock as he presses his fingers in a little deeper. "I want your teeth at my throat and your fingers inside me." He twists his hips and gives a full-throated moan, absolutely shameless. It won't take much more. "Fuck, Peter—"

Thank you, love ♥♥♥

[spacedisaster]

Peter knows that he will never be able to compensate Rocket and Nebula enough for the lost years—hell, he probably owes the universe as a whole—and it's something that has often eaten at him. They all lost so much. So much time, so many people. He also knows all too well what it's like to feel desperately alone in the universe, and he doesn't wish that on Rocket or anyone he cares about. Maybe once they see each other again in person, they can have a conversation about it. If they don't jump each other's bones the moment they cross sights, that's it.

It happens to him too. Peter brings up something that happened while they were on some sort of mission or shares an inside joke, and it makes no sense to anyone but him. Every time, it leaves him with a heavy feeling in his chest that lasts for days, if not weeks. All the more reason to make the best of the present moments when he can hear Rocket. It's not as good as having him close, feeling his hot breath against his skin, the warmth of his body, and the little cold metal against him that sometimes makes him shudder, but it's better than both of them being completely alone.

He didn't expect a reply from Rocket, and maybe it's for the best. Peter is notoriously famous for saying whatever thing crosses his mind, no matter how crude, obnoxious, or cheesy it can be. Sometimes he even manages to do the three of them together, truly a talent. Hearing Rocket's huff a laugh pleases him enough, and all the other sounds the man is making are getting branded into Peter's memory, his skin prickling with heat. He's not much far behind Rocket, a low burn that settles in the pit of his stomach as his hand tightens on his dick. There's a hitch in his breath, and his voice is just a little lower, gone deep on the other end of the line, when he replies.

“Gods, yes. You know I'd love to scrape my teeth against your neck, right down on the juncture between the softer skin and the shoulder. There, where I can leave a mark that might still sting the next day."

Peter bites his lip to keep in a whimper, then realizes there's no point in that and moans loudly. His hand is moving faster over his cock, a squeeze at the base, a twist at the tip.

"Hear that? Kriff, I am so fuckin’ hard right now, and it's all because of you. As soon as I can, I'm going to finger you open until you're a pleased mess, find that sweet spot of yours, and then hit it nonstop as I fuck you until you're begging to come."

[ceptme]

As pleasure overwhelms his senses, for a moment he can forget the tinny, electronic edge to that voice and almost imagine he can feel Peter's lips brushing over his ear, breath stirring his hair. Every word is hooked straight into a live wire in his spine, sparks shivering under his skin for the images they provoke. He wants every murmured promise and more: wants the slide of skin and the heat of their bodies pressed against each other, wants a strong grip leaving fingerprint bruises over his hips and to get lost in the feeling of Peter moving inside him instead of having to make do with his own fingers.

"I want you so fucking bad," he breathes, low and ragged, the words tumbling gracelessly over each other all thoughtless need as the lust under his skin builds and builds until he doesn't know if he can fucking take any more. "I wanna come on your dick, I wana feel you come inside me, fuck, fuck—"

In an instant not enough tips over into too much and he arches up with a sharp cry as he comes in a hot rush over his curled fist, grinding down greedily onto the fingers buried inside him. It's shocking in its intensity,the sweet ache of it throbbing through his entire body as he goes tight around them, pleasure prickling over his skin in feverish waves. There's a long, low moan on his lips as he melts back into the mattress, catching sharply on a hitched breath as any slightest movement sends fresh aftershocks rippling through him.

And then the moment passes, and once again he's alone, sprawled out on the sweat-damp sheets with nothing but come cooling stickily on his skin and his wrist starting to cramp from the awkward angle. He gives a low breath of a sigh and eases his fingers free, staring sightlessly up at the ceiling as he wipes them off thoughtlessly on some random discarded piece of clothing. He closes his eyes.

"...wish you were here," he admits, almost inaudibly soft.

[spacedisaster]

The words and the sounds Rocket is making are filthy and perfect, but it's the emotions Peter can sense behind them that undo him. It's the way Rocket says he wants him, as if Peter truly is worth keeping as a partner. It's the sharp cry that follows, so hot and so obvious about what's happening, and he can just see him, clear in his mind like the light of day. Rocket's back arching, his expression twisted in pleasure, mouth hanging open. Beautiful and perfect.

Peter is only a few seconds behind him, his thighs shaking as he comes, a mantra of 'fuck' and 'Rocket' and 'ohgodsIwishyouwerehere' dropping from his lips until he can't make coherent sounds. It all tapers into a kind of low moaning and gasping Rocket might be even more familiar with than the curses. Peter has always been loud. He makes a mess of his chest and stomach, but he couldn't care less. He falls back against his pillows, head dropping back and brushing against the cold wall with one last groan. It helps a bit to clear his head.

"I'd be soooo annoying if I were there with you." The blond answers just as softly after a few seconds pass, his breath still uneven and sounding as wrecked as Rocket feels. It's clear that he's longing just as much as his lover.

"I'd cover you in kisses and hickeys, then cuddle you to death in bed. And then you'd complain about my beard being scratchy and say that I'm a big oaf that's just too much of a furnace to sleep next to."

And they would both enjoy every second of it.

[ceptme]

"Yeah you would," he agrees, and maybe the utter lack of hesitation might sting if his tone wasn't so impossibly fond. They're all real fucking annoying, every last one of these dipshits he calls his crew, and he wouldn't have it any other way. Life would be boring as hell if he didn't have them driving him nuts at every opportunity. Being crammed into the same space, all tangled up in each other's bullshit...it's made him realize he was never really built to be alone.

And yet here he is, the empty side of the bed cold beside him, nothing but a tinny comm link for company. There's some grand kind of irony in their sense of timing. They could've hooked up at any point in the last five years, and instead here they are, finally figuring their shit out when they're on opposite sides of the fucking universe.

(They couldn't have, realistically. He knows that. It's only in the last few months he's finally made it to a place where he can even think of going for something like this without some animal part of his brain freaking out and hitting the emergency escape, and Peter's had plenty of his own shit to deal with. But still. It's hard not to look back and see wasted time)

He still doesn't entirely understand why Peter's not here, what it is he feels he has to do back on Earth. Not really. Family, as he's come to understand it, means the people who're with you through thick and thin, the ones you turn to when shit hits the fan. He doesn't really get how or why you're supposed to apply the idea to someone you haven't seen for decades just because you happen to share some DNA. But there's no point going through all that again. He doesn't need to understand it to have Peter's back, and right now, mostly that means swallowing down the urge to be a dick about thinking it's stupid.

"Just you wait," he says instead. "You're gonna be laughin' on the other side of your face when you're findin' bolts in your sheets and homemade grenades under your pillow."

[spacedisaster]

Peter isn't at all offended by the fast reply; he expected nothing less from Rocket. This is just what they do, and the fondness is hard to miss.

"But at least I don't snore. That should earn me brownie points. Drax could wake up a mummy with the ruckus he makes; he sounds like a dying moose." Does Rocket know what a moose is? Peter doesn't know, but the description is accurate if you ask him.

As he listens to Rocket, one of Peter's hands paws around the bed until he finds his shirt to clean the worst of the mess off of him, too boneless to move much more than that. Holy shit, it's been a while since he's had any action because it's also been a while since Rocket was here, and he now feels lazy in that kind of good way you only get after a sex high, but he also feels colder than ever. He too wishes that Rocket were here or that he were there to kiss and cuddle him for real. Maybe bite him a little, as promised.

As much as Peter regrets the last few years of not doing this with his best friend, none of them were in the right place for that. Peter had a plethora of emotional issues piled on top of one another, and Rocket did not deserve to be any kind of rebound after losing Gamora. Now that he's learned to let go of the shadow of her—not the memories or love they shared, some things will stay with him forever; he deserves at least to keep that—he is in a much better headspace for a relationship.

Peter is no longer getting too drunk to function and reliving the greatest hits of the worst moments of his life, and he knows he owes that to Rocket and the other guardians. In his journey of trying to better himself, he realized that Mantis was right about why and for how long he had been avoiding Earth and his last remaining family, and he too wants to amend the relationship with Jason before it's too late, and he loses yet another member of his family. He's not trying to be cruel to Rocket and torture them both on purpose.

"Just make sure not to leave a bomb countdown timer anywhere near my bed where I can confuse it with my alarm clock. My neighbors won't like waking up to the building falling down on them."

He wants to keep Rocket talking. First, because he imagines the other man is feeling the distance between them more than ever before, just like Peter is doing, and because...hell, just because he likes listening to Rocket's voice and annoying him a little.

"Now, if only all those skills with mechanics translated to the kitchen I would not have to be the one cooking all the time. remind me to teach you how to make lasagna the next time you visit, I think you'd like it."