nexus_crossings | Remembering the Dead

"If you are sure. My stuff works pretty fast..." Harley leans back a little.

She smiles at his compliment. "Ah, thanks. I did it all myself. I am just so glad they let me play with my makeup again. It was boring being all... bland."

"Less it can make the healing go fast, think I just gotta live with the itchin'." That sort of dermal stimulation was way too expensive for them, especially after losing the Eclector. He had near bankrupted himself getting the work done.

"Who's 'they'?"

"Maybe I should be more to the point. It can heal injuries fast." Harley laughed softly. She forgets sometimes people don't know about her world here. Or about the neat little toys that Red gave her.

"The guards." She shrugs. "They sort of enjoyed me, being in that cell, all bland and washed out."

"F'r real?" He gives her a skeptical look. "How much? I ain't got much since the mut'ny... Oh, yer' a jailbird. I hate jail, sucks, ain't nuthin' to do until ya bust out again."

There's a certain solidarity in having been in prison. It at least means she's not like the white uniformed jackass.

"I would give a demonstration, but don't much feel like it right now." Harley leans closer to him. She really should wear a warning label, about getting into people's personal space quickly, and without warning.

"What kind of cell did you have?"

"And from one criminal to another, we will call it even-steven."

Kraglin's sense of personal space is as good as non-existent after decades living in spaceships with a lot of other people. He doesn't flinch back, just stays still and where he is. "D'pends. Kyln, y' don't get cells, really. Get a bed in a box but no one sleeps there. Too cold. Hrax was bunks, fight for space. Got put in iso once 'cause I got a nasty bite."

He doesn't entirely trust freely offered things. But he also wants his implant healed up so he can start practising. Another moment and he reaches up, carefully peeling off the bandaging to reveal the newly implanted cybernetics. The fin would be fitted in later, once it was healed.

"At least they gave you a bed. Or a bunk." Harley frowned for a moment. She shivered for a moment. They didn't trust her with anything in her cell.

She places her hand gently at his chin when he mentions his nasty bite. "But I betcha ya'got a lovely smile."

She waits until he peels off the bandaging to reveal the cybernetics. It is not the weirdest thing for her to see. But she is respectful all the same. Harley arches up, reaching into her pocket where she pulls out a small vial from her pocket.

"This better not be an excuse for me to run my fingers through your hair honey." She opens the vial to pour a little of the mixture in her hand, and then gently runs it over his wounds, careful to not let it touch any of the cybernetics. His scalp will tingle slightly as it starts to work. "Ya' trying to be the next Million Dollar Man, or something?"

Kraglin wasn't well known, not compared to the fearsome visage of his Captain. He was unassuming and didn't look dangerous. But he lets her lift his chin and gives her a crooked grin. "And twice'a' sharp since I got the replacements. Cap'n even paid special for anaesthetic when they put'em in."

Allegedly, because he couldn't have a first mate with a gummy smile.

"Ain't got much hair left after gettin' that done." Despite his general level of grime, the wounds are clean and healing neatly, though he gives a shiver at the sensation. "Ooh, tingly. An' buyin' these ain't the way to get a million creds. Got it 'cause Cap'n wanted me to have his arrow. So, gotta get this to use it."

"He must have cared a great deal for you." Harley gives a playful little snap of her own pearly whites. She knew his smile would remind her of someone she had to leave behind. And her touch lingers just a little because of that.

"Is that how you are respecting his memory?"

"I wish I had something of my friend... to honor."

Kraglin's face makes an unpleasant expression, a twist of grief and guilt and a flash of fondness despite that. Losing Yondu is too raw to not pull everything forward at the mere mention.

"Yeah. Ain't nuthin' else to do but use his arrow t' protect Petey." Peter was worth dying for, so it's Kraglin's duty to keep him safe. For the Cap'n. "Most'a his stuff we put on the pyre to go with him. Or got blown up when he blew up the ship after the mut'ny."

Her snap makes him chuckles softly. His own bite can shear through most bones with relative ease, so he doesn't tend to play bite and snap because it's pretty threatening to anyone who knows his species. "You ain't gotta have a thing. Y' honour what they died for. Cap'n died for Petey, so I gotta keep protectin' his dumb ass."

"Petey." Harley repeats. She likes nicknames. And she likes Kraglin a little bit more, because he uses nicknames.

"Diablo died to protect us all." Harley leans into him a little bit more. She needs to be close to someone right now.

"And the Day of the Dead is coming up."

"Maybe I could find something to do... someone to protect, like what you are doing to honour your Captain."

Physical affection is pretty alien to Kraglin. It tends to come in the form of punching each other and not drawing blood and big hugs after a heist goes well. He does his best; he leans back into her a bit. He doesn't smell great, a lot of grease and oil and sweat.

"Yeah... your people have a day for the dead?" Hrax doesn't bother. The dead outnumber the living. "Tullk'd get ink for thin's that mattered. Diablo same species as you?"

Harley on the other hand smells like cotton candy, candied apples, and a vanilla-scented perfume.

And she is very comfortable with physical affection, judging by the way she just relaxes against him.

"We are both enhanced humans." She blinks at him for a moment. "From Earth. My world hasn't gotten too much into space travel yet. No other species to meet, or to interact with."

"Oh! That's where we got Petey, after his Momma died." That had been more incidental than planned. "You Terrans are kinda weird. We got a few out in Xandarian space, but most'a them got kidnapped or had accidents."

Accidents that ended with them in space. Clearly.

"How's you enhanced?"

"Maybe him and I could meet some day. If he ain't got other Terrans around." Harley grins. And she takes being called weird a compliment.

"Well, I can handle any kind of toxin or poison. I am super flexible and agile. And I think outside of the box... but not everyone handles that well."

She tilts her head again. "What kind of species are you?"

"Mabbe." Kraglin isn't planning on showing this place to anyone, but he also figures Peter's just as likely to find his own way in. Maybe by the same doorway.

It sounds a bit like Gamora. Like a less violent version of upgrades on Gamora.

"Xandarian. Though my da was Hraxian, hence the chompers. Where I grew up. S'all part'a the Nova Empire. Guess it ain't bad, compared t' most." He reaches up to poke at his head, which is distinctly hurting less.

Harley doesn't go into the details about how she got super-enhanced. But her own story was pretty violent, in her own way.

"So you get to explore space. That must be pretty exciting. An adventure."

She pauses a moment. Remembering what he told her before. And takes one of his hands in her own. "I'm sorry you have lost people during that adventure."

"... less explore an' more plunder, pirate and party."

Space isn't exploring to him, but he remembers the way Peter reacted and he thinks he can sort of get why it seems that way to a planetbound people. To someone who hasn't ever heard of anyone going off world.

She takes his hand and he looks... panicked? Confused? Lost? He has big hands, heavily calloused and scarred form decades of engineering and fighting. "S'okay. Was my fault. Di'n't mean ta, but I started the mut'ny."

"Nothin' like a good plundering party." Harley gets a happy look in her eyes. Like a shiny gleam of a child right before Christmas.

She keeps his hand in hers for a moment, tracing a finger over those callouses and scars. "I used to be at fault all the time. For bad things that happened."

"I know how that feels."

"Yeah. Last big hit we made, we must'a stole the income for a city for a year." Yondu had found a small, carved, black cat which had joined the ranks by the captain's chair. Kraglin had found a knife that was useless, but burst into rainbow light when exposed to sound.

"I challenged Cap'n. Weren't meant to be like that. Jus'... wanted him t' stop bein' soft on Quill. Puttin' him above all'a us. But Taserface took it t' mean mut'ny and... it all got fucked."

"You were a little jealous, maybe? That he was paying attention to someone else..." Harley also knows that feeling.

"For me... My ex-Pudding paid more attention to a vigilante, who went by the name of Batman. And they were both obsessed with each other."

"And poor Harley was just a play toy they forget about." She frowns for a moment. Then laughs. "Oh. That's me, by the way. Harley."

Ouch, Harley. Way to hit the nail on the head. Kraglin's startled look probably gives away that that is at least part of what was bugging him about it all.

"We pretty much raised Quill. Peter. Since we took 'im on Earth." Yondu was the closest to a dad, but Kraglin had been there the whole time, maybe like a... brother? Or something. Uncle?

"Kraglin. Kraglin Obfonteri, former First mate of the Eclector of the 99th Ravagers." He sighs. "Don't mean much now. Everyone's dead and the ship's gone. Good to meet'cha, Harley."

She might not have her shrink license anymore, but she still sees these things pretty clearly. Plus she had her 'love of her life', who didn't care about her.

"Kraglin." Harley repeats. Smiling. "The 99th Ravagers. Don't know what that means... but it sounds really cool."

"Ravagers. Mercs. Pirates. Both? Yeah. Both. Though I were always better at thievin' than blazin' blaster fights."

Or knifing people in the back. He was great at that, literally.

"Yondu got exiled 'n' I went with him. Bunch'a us did." He wrinkles his nose with distaste; being soft and talking about stupid, old stuff. "Who were y' puddin'? An' what you done time for?"

"Hey! I am a Mercenary too! Maybe I could teach you a few thievin' tricks."

She frowns slightly at his next question. "His name was Joker. And he sort of made me... who I am now. I lived for him. I died for him."

"He just used me up, until I couldn't do it anymore."

"A lot of different stuff. I was the Queen of Gotham once upon a time, until Batman thought me and Mistah J... Joker... were abusing our power. Batsy put me away into my gilded cage."

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i'm off for the night but will be back in m morning.

good good... I love this thread so much