st_arkintern | [Closed to Quill] The physics is theoretical, but the fun is real.

[Closed to Quill] The physics is theoretical, but the fun is real.

Peter Parker is sitting in the cafe, a textbook sprawled out on one side of the table, a graphing notebook filled with complicated-looking equations and the corresponding math on the other. Today's self-chosen subject of study? Lagrangian mechanics.

Peter idly taps his pencil near the bottom of the page and lets his chin sink into the palm of his free hand. If he keeps looking at this, he thinks he's going to lose his mind. He's been trying to figure out this answer for fifteen minutes now, and he's pretty sure that he's made a mistake somewhere, but he can't find where.

Peter folds his arms against the table then lays his forehead against them with an audible groan. Truly, it is a groan of despair.

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Whether or not Peter had meant to impress a girl, Quill thought it was still a great way to get chicks.

"That's important," he agreed, "there's a lot of stuff to factor in with being a superhero. Sometimes you miss dinner dates or you got to cut out of the movie you're currently making out of. And the laundry. I mean, wow right?"

"Yeah," Peter says, leaning forward. He doesn't really have to worry about the whole laundry thing because he knows what weeks it's his job to do the laundry, so he gets it done, but the stuff about missing dinner dates and movies?

"I had to ditch my date at Homecoming because her dad was going to hijack Mr. Stark's cargo plane with all these high-tech weapons and tech that night," he says. "I didn't know who the Vulture was until he was driving us to the dance and I realized right afterwards what he was doing, and I couldn't explain to Liz why I was leaving."

Peter quickly adds: "It's another Liz. Not the same Liz." He just keeps liking girls with the same name.

"Wait, wait. Hold up." Quill said, raising his hand. "First of all, The Vulture? Cool bad guy name."

And Stark definitely seems like the kind of guy to almost lose his weapons.

"But you're dating a girl named Liz here, and you dated one back home?" Qull asked rhetorically. "Dude That deserves a high five."

He leaned over the table, leaving a hand up for Peter to slap.

Peter grins and high-fives Quill. One date probably wasn't dating, but he's not going to argue that. Mostly because Quill is probably one of the Top Five Coolest People alive and Peter really wants him to think that he's not a cool and not just a nerd who plays with LEGOs and dresses up in a leotard.

"Yeah," he says. "The Vulture name really worked out because he was scavenging for parts left over from Avengers battles." Even if anyone else didn't think the name was cool, Peter thought it was appropriate. "Things with Liz really work out, though. She was upset about me ditching her at Homecoming, then after I brought her dad in, she ended up moving to Oregon."

That kind of put a damper on Peter's chances of taking her on a second date.

"Wait, your other Liz's dad was the bad guy?" Quill said as he leaned in a little. "Talk about plot twist. That's rough."

He shook his head. At least I went in knowing who Gamora's 'dad' was.

"Maybe you should start vetting your girlfriends." He joked. "Like a superhero background check."

Peter actually takes the suggestion seriously.

"I think Liz is okay," he says. "This-Liz. We call Liz back home other-Liz." That reduced the confusion when talking about the many Lizes in Peter Parker's life. "It probably helps that she doesn't have anybody back home here to go super villain."

He does briefly wonder if Max would have a bone to pick with him if he ever showed up here.

"You're the only person to ever know me-me to show up here," he says, "and I've been here almost 10 months now. It's great that you and Rocket showed up at the same time."

Peter dampens his lips. He should probably clarify. "Some of the people here have met or know of other Peter Parkers. Other Spider-Mans. They're not me, though."

"Other yous?" Quill repeated as he tried to wrap his head around that statement. "Like in Flash of Two Worlds?"

He inhaled excitedly and asked, "Do you think they know other versions of me and Rocket?"

I'm clearly the best version, but it'd be nice to know what my other selves are like

"I'm guessing none of your other versions have showed up, huh?" He continued thoughtfully. "How weird would that be?"

"Yeah, something like that," Peter says nodding vigorously. It's hard for him to reign in the excitement. Minus Quill's questionable taste in films, the two of them seem to be (mostly) on the same wavelength. It's a little like meeting a cooler, older version of himself that actually likes Footloose.

"I mean, it's possible they might," he says. "You can ask around?"

Peter's quiet for a second when he asks about the other-Peters.

"No, they haven't," Peter says, and he's kind of thankful for that. "The ones I've heard about are older than me and a little different from me." He laughs lightly. "I'm actually kinda relieved they're not here, because I'd just end up comparing myself to them."

"Dude, you can't go comparing yourself to someone else." Quill said, disregarding any irony in this proclamation. "You're you, right? And from what I see, you're pretty bad-ass. I mean, you dated a chick whose had was bad enough to have a name. Only supervillans have names. You fought a supervillan."

Quill's expression was serious. He believed what he was saying.

"So what if there are other Spider-Mans out there in alternate realities." He continued. "You know what they don't have, that you do? For starters, none of them are probably friends with the leader of the Guardians of the Galaxy. Even other mes would be super choosey about that kind of thing. And none of them are in this cool Inn right now with a cute girl friend and fireworks from scratch and conquering math."

Peter just looks at Quill as he says all this. It's strange because usually he processes things faster than other people because of all his enhanced senses, but right now, everything Quill says feels like it's hitting him a half-second after he says it.

When Quill finally finishes, Peter's still stunned; it takes him a moment to react, just like it took him a moment to really understanding what Quill was saying. Peter dampens his lips and smiles goofily, then looks down at his notebook, embarrassed at precisely how happy he is right now, and then tries to hide it.

He isn't successful.

He needs to say something before things get weird, so he says the first thing that comes to mind.

"Thanks." For what? his mind urges. "People don't -- you know, people don't usually tell me that kind of stuff."

Quill grinned at Peter's response. I wish Gamora were here to see this. I can do nice things! He is also glad Rocket was not around at that moment.

"That's because most people suck," he said, still smiling. "Listen, I don't let just anyone be apprentice, on-probation Guardians."

"On-probation Guardian?"

This time, Peter makes no attempt to hide how happy he is.

"What do I have to do to get off-probation?" he asks. "Besides get Rocket to like me?" Obviously, that was one of the requirements.

Uhh...

"That's sort of an as-we-go thing," he said confidently. "Some things I'll tell you off the bat, but others is sort of an observation thing, you know? Like, we're Guardians all the time, even when we're not kicking butt."

"Okay," Peter says, nodding. What traits should he be demonstrating? He's not really sure, but it's not exactly a test if you ask for all the answers.

"I should really get back to my homework," Peter says, though it's not really homework when it's work he assigned himself. Maybe demonstrating responsibility was one of those traits that he was going to be graded on and showing that he was responsible enough to get his work done would be another notch in his favor.

"Would it be okay if you told me more about the Guardians later? And about Celestials." He'd met a lot of different people here, but none of them could claim to be Celestials. "And your powers." One of his favorite things to talk about.

"Yeah, of course. You can come find me any time, dude." He said with a grin. "It's nice to have someone from home, even if you haven't actually met me yet."

Quill also liked talking about himself. This was win-win.

He stood up and turned the chair back around so he could tuck it into the table.

"See you around, Spider-Man." Quill said with a wink and a small salute.

Then Quill walked away to try and defeat his video game nemesis.

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[Closed to Quill] The physics is theoretical, but the fun is real.

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