Ego Planet

Once upon a time, there was a planet that was also a person.

Its name was Ego. And it was, on the surface, the most beautiful place that most of the Guardians of the Galaxy had ever seen.

Rolling hills of gold, as though the whole world had been poured from sunlight. Flowers of brilliant blue, nodding softly in a warm and scented wind. A sky the color of a deep dream. The ground hummed very faintly — a welcoming hum, like a house full of warmth. At the center of this world stood a man, tall and silver-haired, smiling with every part of his face.

"Peter," he said. "My son."

Peter Quill stood very still. He had grown up without a father, carrying a cassette tape of his mother's favorite songs and a photograph worn soft at the corners. And now here was a man saying he was Peter's father — a Celestial, an ancient being of such power that he had shaped himself into an entire living planet.

It seemed, for one breathless moment, like it could be the most wonderful thing.

It was not.

Ego had a plan he called the Expansion. For thousands and thousands of years, he had traveled the universe and left pieces of his living matter buried on distant worlds. His plan was to wake all those seeds at once, flood every world with his own consciousness, and make the entire galaxy into a version of himself. He wanted Peter to help him power it. The Celestial spark in Peter's blood was the key.

When the Guardians understood what was happening, the beautiful planet changed.

The golden hills rippled, like the surface of water when something stirs beneath it. Tendrils pushed through the soil — long, reaching things that moved with purpose. The blue flowers were not flowers at all. They were nodes of Ego's growing mind, pressing toward everything.

And Nebula arrived at exactly this moment.

She had been held captive on the Ravager vessel Eclector — a rough and noisy ship. She had spent the journey watching and calculating and waiting, and when the chaos from Ego's revelation created an opening, she took it. She found a ship. She found coordinates. She landed on the living planet in the middle of everything.

Another person might have stood still in confusion.

Nebula moved.

Her cybernetic eye swept the terrain — BZZT, processing, mapping — identifying the people in danger and the paths still clear. She found Mantis near the Milano: an empath with long antennae and large dark eyes wide with alarm.

"Up," Nebula said. "With me."

It was not the gentlest invitation. But Mantis came.

They moved together through the shifting landscape, pulling the injured clear, directing people toward ships. Nebula did not make speeches. She pointed, she cleared, she checked, she moved. Every step was calculated.

Underground, the Guardians were running toward Ego's core — a blazing light at the center of his living mind. Rocket had built a device from the Milano's power source, quick and brilliant and just barely stable, and the plan was to place it at the heart of the planet and run very fast.

Nebula counted heads. She ran the math. She identified the last two evacuation routes as the tendrils thickened and Ego's surface heaved.

"Move," she said to the last cluster of people. "Now."

They moved. Rocket's device reached the core. The countdown ended.

KRAKOOM!

The planet Ego shook. And broke. And came apart in rings of golden light that expanded outward into the dark — beautiful and final, like the last breath of something that had lived too long and chosen all the wrong things.

The Milano shot free of the destruction, engines burning hard, everyone aboard, no one left behind.

Nebula stood at the rear viewport.

She watched the rings of light spread and thin and finally disappear into the darkness.

She thought about Ego, who had believed he deserved to be everything.

She thought about Thanos, who had believed the same.

She thought about the difference between being very large and being worth something.

Large was easy enough. Any planet could be large. Any tyrant could gather power and reach and authority.

Worth something — that was harder. That took choices. Small ones, every day. Helping when no one was watching. Staying when it was easier to go.

Groot was standing nearby. He had a flower in his hand — a small pale thing, newly grown. He held it out to her without ceremony, without expectation.

She looked at the flower. She looked at him.

She took it.

"Thank you," she said.

"I am Groot," he said, very softly.

She was almost certain, by now, that she knew exactly what that meant.