//------------------------------// // Dance Partners // Story: The Road Trip of A-Holes! // by Sense of Humor //------------------------------// "Alright, let’s get baldy here to Xandar and collect that bounty!" Nebula growled at the raccoon with all the anger she could muster, but it meant nothing under the glare of her sister, much to Maud’s slightly dolorous feelings. Trixie followed her onto the ship, eyes blank as she thought about what Ayesha said. A hybrid--her exact words were so. She was not one hundred percent pony like she originally thought her whole life. The idea was saddening at first; she liked the idea of being a pony, or at least having parents from Equestria. But more time to think left her with an interested mind, full of new questions and possibilities. Her parents--or at least one of them--had to be really powerful, especially for their child to let off magic like that lightning bolt. But who or what could it be? Trixie wanted to believe that one of her parents just so happened to be a really powerful alicorn, but she’d have wings in that case. Ew--what if one of her parents wasn’t even a pony? The thought of a pony falling in love with a bizarre creature like that annoying raccoon made her a little queasy. She shook it off and considered one final question: Why was she left alone on Equestria? All those years of her life with untouched, raw power when she could have been trained to use it. No more The Great and Powerful Trixie! More like, The Tremendous and Almighty Trixie! Yes, that name had quite the-- Her scrambling thoughts distracted her from noticing where she was walking, and she ended up trotting face-first into a wall of the ship--Hard. Rubbing her injured, sore snout, the mare heard a specific pair of shoes slowing to a halt beside her. “Yeeeah, Let’s not put any dents in my ship, Trix.” Quill glanced down at her. From the look of his eyes, it was clear he was at least a little anxious about the identity of one of his parents. Or perhaps defensive--Trixie was still learning how to read his emotions. “I kinda need it.” Huffing in amusement, she stroked back her hair with a hoof. “ You could do better than this rust bucket, Quill.” She smirked as an amusing thought sprung up. “Maybe if Trixie can get the hang of her newfound power, she’ll just make a new one for you.” The human considered with surprising thoughtfulness. “A side vehicle does sound pretty good. But also costly.” Trixie hummed as he walked over to a storage compartment and removed his transforming helmet with a few whirs and clicks. She trotted up to his side and looked up expectantly. “So, what are the chances of two hybrids running into each other! Ya wonder who our parents are?” “Pftt. I know who my mom is and my father was like David Hasselhoff. So, no. I don’t wonder...Uh…”He gave her a wincing, apologetic look. “Sorry. That came out mean.” She rolled her eyes. “Pfft. I've heard a lot of parent comments a hundred times before.” “Uh...how does that happen?” “Children can be cruel.  Especially in Trixie’s childhood.” She shrugged off biting memories of little fillies teasing and insulting the foal with no parents. She could laugh in their faces now, every last one of them. “They were probably all jealous of Trixie’s potential lineage. And now look at me--us!  Maybe your father, whoever he is, has really cool powers too and they're just inside of you!” Quill scoffed and busied himself. “Yeah, sure.” The reaction confirmed her earlier suspicions--he was definitely not eager. At least, not on her level. “Uh...that's good news. Like, cheering news. You know just a little bit more about your father now!” If Quill was ever going to respond to that, Gamora beat him to it. “He doesn't share your eagerness.” She shoved Nebula into the middle of the ship, where a ceiling restraint lay in place for her. His father is a sensitive subject, Trixie. He doesn't like to talk about it.” When a curious Trixie turned back for confirmation, Quill shook his head with a cross between a laugh and a scoff. “What? I'm not sensitive about it! I just don't like to think about him. That much. “ “Now that I think about it,” Trixie began. “You did seem a little sensitive.” After shooting a glare at her, he winced towards Gamora. “Sorry if it looked like I was flirting with the high priestess by the way. I wasn't like, at all. Just chatting with weird vibes in the mix.” “Who said I cared?” Gamora said before disappearing into the ship’s storage room. “Ouch.” Trixie grinned. “Shutup. And it looked like you did care! So that's why I was saying sorry just now!” Quill called after his green lady friend and tried not to look rebuffed. “Just in case you did.” “Gamora is not the woman for you, Quill.” Quill and Trixie flinched at seeing Drax suddenly next to them, completely still like a statue. The unicorn bristled in slight annoyance and surprise. “Wha--?! How long have you been standing there?!” “I've been practicing being invisible. It's a work in progress.” Drax explained and looked at Quill again. “While you both are strange and downright repulsive at times, I feel that you two are not meant for one another.” “Well, thanks for your opinion, Mr. Lovecritic,” The human rolled his eyes. “Ever heard of the phrase, Opposites attract?” “Yes, and it is a horrible phrase.” Drax crossed his arms and leaned against the nearest wall he could. He appeared to think of something to add to his clearly profound words. “Hmm...There are two types of beings in the universe--” “I used to think that before now.” Trixie offered. “--The Dancers, and the Non-Dancers….or as I like to call them: The ones who do not dance whatsoever.  I know, it's a wonderful moniker.” The alien brute nodded as a fond memory played behind his eyes and he explained it. “It reminds of the time I first met my beloved wife at a war rally.” “Oh, God.” “It was a glorious, deafening night of bright lights and loud music. Everyone in the village flailed and jerked about like brain-dead bilgesnipe, dancing...Except for one woman. My glorious Ovette.” He continued fondly. “ I knew immediately she was the one for me--My one who does not dance. The most melodic song in the world could be blasting around her...She wouldn’t even tap her foot. Wouldn’t move a single muscle, “ Drax raised his non-existent eyebrows. “ One might assume she was dead.” A very fed up Quill strained to hold his smile. “Man, that does sound sexy.” He nudged Trixie with his ankle. “ Doesn't that sound hot, Trix?” She nodded, wearing a bigger faux grin. “I hope I'm as lucky as you, Drax.” “You’d be wise to hope for it. The thought would make my nether regions engorge.” Starlord wisely cut that conversation off. “Okay! I get it. I'm a dancer. Gamora isn’t.” “It’s perfectly fine, Quill. You just need to find someone who is pathetic...like you.” “Right. Great advice.” Quill deadpanned. “Do you need a hug?” “No. Don’t touch me.” As Quill entered a high stakes battle to keep Drax from hugging him, Nebula cast her stone cold stare down to Maud. Maud returned it with an odd look as if trying to stare inside of Nebula as opposed to the outside. The cybernetic woman snarled at the mare. “What are you looking at, Beast?” Maud tilted her head. “Your face, I guess.” Hmmph. A lot of sarcasm for such a strange beast. Nebula would have snapped its vulnerable neck if her hands were free. Instead,d she settled for jutting her nose at an object, not from them. “I am hungry, Beast. Hand me some of that Yaro root.” “Don’t. It's not ripe.” Gamora returned with the lock in hand, hardened eyes focused solely on her. “And I hate you.” Before Maud could so much as blink, Nebula snarled at her with an electronic whir narrowing her cybernetic eyelids. “You hate me? I took you for many things, but never a hypocrite. You abandoned me on that planet and stole that stone for yourself. You killed your way to victory and had no trouble fighting me to do it.  And yet here you stand...a hero. “ Nebula stepped close despite the locked shackles, body itching to leap forward and strangle her. “...I will be free of these putrid shackles soon enough, and then I will snap your spine in half and tear off your head. I swear it.” “No…” Gamora, a bold smirk on her face, leaned in close. “ You’re going rot...and rust the rest of your days in a prison on Xandar… wishing you could. “ With that, the green woman brushed past her pony friend and sat to sharpen her sword. A half minute into the task, she heard a set of hooves trot up to her and stop. “So...That’s your sister.” “Yes.” Gamora huffed through her nose. “Sisters don’t normally act that way with each other. “ Maud continued, glancing back at Nebula with the slightest expression of concern. “Or at least, my sister and I don’t. We’ve had our differences, but we got over it.” She made a noisy scrape with the sharpener. “Good for you.” Maud sat down, ignoring the obvious attempt to ignore her. “I’m just saying, maybe you shouldn't be like this. I know it can be tough sometimes.” Gamora scraped to a halt and stared at the mare incredulously as if she’d said something particularly stupid. “Tough? Nebula is not tough. She’s murderous and conniving. Is your sister murderous and conniving?” “That doesn’t matter--” “Oh, I think it does.” “It doesn’t. She’s still your family, isn’t she?” When the question wasn’t immediately answered, Maud followed that up with: “If I were you, I would try to right...whatever happened between you two. It could be good for you both.” “Good idea! She’s only tried to kill me multiple times, so what the hell, right?” “She said you did some things too. There’s room for room for correction on both sides but--” “Listen, Maud. Normally I would shove you aside, threaten you or both. But, I just so happen to like you the slightest, so I’ll warn you instead.” The green woman gestured with the hilt of her sword to her, all signs of sarcasm her features. “Drop this, right now. I know you want to help, but I don’t care and neither will she. There’s nothing to fix between us, so don’t start trying.” As usual, Maud´s face didn´t betray any signs of emotion. In fact, it seemed to be even more stoic and unreadable than before. “ There is. And I will.” Gamora would have narrowed her eyes--would have come up with a threat of some sort to keep her out of things she had no business in. She would have if it wasn’t for an electronic beeping noise. Both Maud and Gamora turned to stare at the head of the ship, where Derpy sat in Rocket’s chair and watched the monitor with childish interest. “Wow, this game is pretty difficult. I don’t know how to work the controls on this thing.” “That’s not a game, stupid,” Rocket rolled his eyes and shuffled over to his seat with his hand's busy tinkering with a small sphere. “That’s the motion sensors I installed for the back of the ship. Like eyes at the the back of yer head.” “Oh.” Derpy turned back to the monitor and squinted at it curiously. “Then why do we have a bunch of orange dots behind us?” “Orange Dots?” Quill marched up to the monitor in swift strides to join her staring contest with the screen. Everyone else joined and sure enough, the sensors displayed several objects approaching them in a giant herd, like a school of fish led by a while. Starlord raised an eyebrow at this confusing news. “Odd. Those are Sovereign ships.” Trixie shared a greater look of confusion. “That is odd. Are they chasing us? What for?” Drax grinned broadly. “Perhaps they forgot another reward and are trying to give it to us!” Derpy turned around in the seat and shook her head, tsking. “Nah, Drax. They would have one ship for that. We might have offended them somehow, you know? Maybe they’re mad at Rocket for stealing their batteries?” The pegasus slapped a hoof over her mouth, and the eyes of the whole ship shifted slowly over to the raccoon. Said raccoon snarled at her under his breath. “Dude! Are you serious?” “Sorry! I meant to say that I have no idea why they’re chasing us!” The pony nervously tapped her hooves together and gave her signature shrug. “What an mystery this is, am I right? Or am I right? Totally not Rocket’s fault whatsoever.” Derpy Winked. Rocket facepawed. The ship lurched sideways as something bombarded the side. The guardians immediately lept into action, each one of them sitting in separate seats at the front of the ship. Starlord shared a particularly unhappy look with Rocket as he hopped into place in the captain's seat. "You're crazy, Rocket. You know that right?" "I came. I saw. I took." The raccoon shrugged. Gamora rolled her shoulders back, popping joints in her body engaging the targeting systems for the side weapons. The three passengers behind her popped up in her thoughts, and she sighed aloud. As much as she would like them to stay out of this for once...She turned the seat around 180° and raised an eyebrow skeptically. "Well? Are you three going to stand there, or are you going to help?" The three mares exchanged separate glances but nodded in unison.