The silence that followed was strange.
No explosions. No screaming. Just the crackle of distant fires and the hum of the Stone in Peter's hand.
Gamora produced a container—a small orb, designed to hold what should not be held. Peter dropped the Stone inside. It clicked shut.
The purple light died.
For a moment, no one moved.
Then Yondu's Ravagers descended from the clouds, their ships roaring overhead. Yondu himself landed nearby, his arrow whistling at his side.
He looked at the orb in Gamora's hand, eyes hungry. "That's what we came for."
Peter and Gamora exchanged a look.
Peter reached into his pocket and pulled out a small sphere—a toy, something he'd picked up on some planet somewhere. He tossed it to Yondu.
"There you go. Stone's all yours."
Yondu caught it and left with his ships and when he wasn't that of a long distance from Xander he looked at the orb and frowning.He examined it. Shook it. Nothing happened. It was hollow. Empty.
He looked up. Peter was already walking away, Gamora beside him, the real orb hidden somewhere no Ravager would find it.
Yondu stared at the toy.
Then at Peter.
Then back at the toy.
Then he smiled. A real smile, the kind anyone hadn't seen on his face before.
"You son of a bitch," Yondu muttered, but there was warmth in it.
Peter and Gamora stood apart from the others, the moment settling between them. Gamora was looking at him with something new in her eyes—something that hadn't been there before.
"You caught it," she said quietly. "With your bare hand."
Peter shrugged, wincing. "Yeah. It was a thing that happened."
"You almost died."
"Almost. Didn't though."
Gamora shook her head, something almost like a smile tugging at her lips.
"That was the dumbest thing I've ever seen."
"You've seen a lot of dumb things."
"I have."
"Top five though, right?"
She looked at him for a long moment. Then: "Top three."
Peter grinned. It hurt. He didn't care.
Across the battlefield, the others were regrouping. Drax stood tall, finally satisfied, a quiet dignity in his bearing. Groot was humming something to himself, a small branch swaying. Rocket was counting the ammo he had left and muttering about expenses, about how no one appreciated the genius of his plans, about how he was going to start charging for his services.
Then Rocket's voice cut through the celebration, sharp and alarmed:
"Eli! Are you okay?! What's happening to you?!"
Everyone turned.
Eli was still standing.
Barely.
But he was glowing.
Purple light pulsed beneath his skin, crawling up his neck, across his face. His hands trembled. His whole body trembled. The energy he'd absorbed—the Stone's power he'd taken into himself—wasn't stabilizing. It was building.
"Eli!" Gamora moved toward him.
He held up a hand. "Don't—don't come closer."
He could feel it. The pressure. The expansion. He was a container that had been filled past its limit, and the walls were starting to break.
He had to let it out.
Now.
He shot upward.
The ground fell away beneath him. The city shrank. The smoke, the fires, the people—all of it becoming smaller, smaller, until Xandar was just a curve of blue and green below him.
He kept going.
The sky turned dark. Stars appeared. The pressure inside him was unbearable now, a sun trying to be born in his chest.
He stopped.
Closed his eyes.
And released.
The explosion was silent.
In the vacuum of space, there was no sound to carry it—just light. Pure, blinding, purple light that bloomed outward like a flower, like a supernova, like something beautiful and terrible all at once.
It was a miniature sun, hanging in the void for just a moment.
Then it faded.
Eli hung in the aftermath, breathing hard, body cooling. The cracks in his skin were healing—slowly, too slowly—but the glow was gone. The energy was gone.
He was empty again.
But alive.
---
He descended slowly, the atmosphere wrapping around him again, sound and color returning to the world. He landed heavily, boots scraping against broken pavement.
The Guardians gathered around him.
His clothes were shredded. Blood was still drying on his face. His white coat was barely recognizable. He looked like he'd been through a war.
Because he had.
Peter reached him first. "What happened?"
Eli blinked, trying to focus. "Just some excess energy. Nothing more."
The silence that followed was heavy.
No one believed him. The explosion had been massive—a purple sun in the sky that everyone on Xandar had seen. That wasn't "excess energy." That was something else.
But they didn't press.
Not now.
Rocket crossed his arms, tail flicking. "You're a weird one, Whitey."
"It's Eli."
"Sure it is."
Groot walked up to Eli and placed a small hand on his leg. "I am Groot."
Eli looked down. He didn't understand the words, but he understood the meaning.
He smiled tiredly. "Thanks, buddy."
Above them, Nova Corps ships began to descend. The cleanup was starting. Xandar was still standing.
Eli looked at the wreckage of the Dark Aster, then at the city beyond it. Buildings were gone. Streets were destroyed. People had died.
But more had lived.
The Guardians had won.
And Eli… had endured.
He was still thinking about regeneration, though.
Definitely going to ask Groot for a cutting later.