Somewhere on Knowhere: Book Three

18

Thor was still pacing up and down the ship. He'd probably been at it for half an hour or something now, and both Quill and Rocket were afraid to make a sound while he was in this mood – Stormbreaker was also in the room, and Quill preferred his ship in one piece (yeah, Groot).

Quill wouldn't mind so much, but his music had finished playing by this point and Thor had stared at him when he stood up, so he hadn't had chance to turn it on again.

Quill didn't know a lot about Thor's past, if he was being honest. (Thor normally confided in Rocket for a lot of things, maybe because they were both so annoying they got along perfectly.) So he didn't know much about what was going on, nor was Thor giving any hints while he was silently pacing the ship.

"Thor?" Rocket started, breaking up the awkward tension. Thor turned towards him but didn't say anything. "Do you mind explaining why you're trying your best to pace a hole into the floor of my ship?"

Quill coughed. "My ship," he corrected, staring at the cybernetically engineered raccoon.

Thor ended their argument before it began, sitting down and not wasting a minute in telling them. Quill listened, amazed and also horrified and also surprised at what Thor was telling them. Parts he knew, like when they'd found him drifting in space after Thanos had attacked them, but Thor had only told Rocket a lot about what happened, especially about the people on the ship.

"And that's why," Thor concluded afterwards, standing up again, "I have to go find him."

Thor was halfway to the escape pod before Quill stood up and stopped him. That took guts, because that guy could be hot-tempered and explosive at times. Before he could get explosive, Quill said, "You aren't going alone." Hell, why not? They had nothing better to do. And this could be fun.

It wasn't because he actually wanted to help Thor. Nope. Not at all. OK, maybe a little.

"Besides," Quill said, taking a hand off Thor's shoulder he didn't realise was there, "you don't know where he is, and you aren't going to get far in an escape pod."

Thor was silent for a minute. Quill was thinking, well, this is it. Here comes the axe. Nice knowing you, head!

But instead, Thor put his own hand on Quill's shoulder and smiled. "Thank you, friend Quail. That means a lot."

Quill didn't even correct him that time.

Though to be fair, it was mostly because he was fed up with correcting him.