Hey there! This is my first one shot so emm... yeah. I am having insomnia for the second day in a row and I'm frustrated so I decided to write to pass the time and came up with this.

English is not my first language so excuse me for any errors.

Disclaimer: I own no character in this story, just the story itself.

Falling slowly

The fall was unstoppable, no time for him to react as he felt his body moving through the air down to his own doom. He wanted to press his boots to try and stop the fall from even happening, but the debris over him was already pushing him downwards and nothing could stop it.

He acknowledged he was in deep trouble as soon as he landed. Pain exploded deep within his body as his legs collided with something. His body tensed as it was pushed backwards exposing every vital organ to the falling objects, his arms wide open as his head collided with the solid ground beneath and everything went black.

It was supposed to be a nice relaxing day. Five friends sharing an alcoholic beverage – or a nonalcoholic one if they preferred – in an old and rusty place Rocket knew was supposed to be awesome, but their attention was taken from their drinks when an overwhelming scream of panic reachesdtheir ears and of course, who else would run as fast as their feet could go if not the Guardians of the Galaxy?

They had arrived at the site easily enough as an entire crowd had gathered uselessly around it. They were screaming for help, but none of them dared to move a muscle twardso the collapsing building.

It seemed that the structure was meant to be blown away by some sort of powerful rich creature, but the tears in a mother's eyes told Peter that they had forgotten to explain it to the tenants, like they always did.

They had almost 20 minutes to get everyone out of the building. The walls already breaking from the first explosion, making it hard to see from the particles in the air, but Peter's mask allowed him to enter easily and find at least 6 different aliens stuck between fear and panic. He was almost out with the last one when he had heard someone call. It was almost a whisper, nothing to actually get anyone's attention, but Star-Lord was not anyone, so he turned to the blackness and allowed his gut to guide him to the last victim: the mother's child.

He quickly grabbed her, but there was no time to get out. He knew he had to do something in the lines of stupidity as time was ticking and the bombs would explode with no disregard for the lives inside. He swallowed hard before smiling wildly at the child, making sure she knew that somehow, everything was going to be alright.

Time stretched for his own luck as he shared a look with Gamora, who was at the opening, before she knew what he intended to do. Fear crossed her eyes, but he had already decided this was the way to go. He pushed the little girl from his chest, threw her towards Gamora and before they could even move an explosion had happened a few meters from Peter and down he had gone to his own secluded death.

The world flared red around him when consciousness came back with a kick. The air was dusty and it was hard to breathe, but it only took him a second or two to replay the last moments before he realized he was in deep shit.

Maintaining some sort of composure was hard when you are stuck in the collapsed structure of a building, but Peter managed to do so, because how on Earth was he ever going to get the hell out of there if it wasn't by his own two hands? His friends were not stupid enough to get themselves into any danger to save his own sorry ass, so he had to remain calm if only for his own selfish sake.

First thing first: assessment. He could breathe easily enough, which meant his chest was not compressed by any sort of object, which was good for most of his vital organs were logged there. Moving his right arm was easily enough, but his left was trapped. The pain of the stress and weight making it impossible to rotate or move even an inch, but he was not worried about a dead limb, because the searing agony he experienced each time he tried to pull it out was enough to make him understand his nerves were intact and on fire.

Okay, nothing broken yet, that's good enough.

He tried breathing again, tried to hear anything but the tingling noise in his head. Probably a concussion of some sort to add to his assessment. He closed his eyes for a second, his heartbeat almost controlled by pure willpower. He was not going to panic, Star-Lord never panics.

He opened his eyes again and realized there was just a bit of light around. He could see a ray of light making its way from upstairs and he followed it to a very grim view. His right leg was literally impaled by a big rusty metallic pole, but he could at least move his foot, which was sort of nice.

He swallowed hard as he tried to push his body into a better position but the pain in his leg and arm made it impossible for him to do anything but lift his chest a bit from the ground. He could feel his muscles tensing, his blood pouring from the hole, only contained by the damn pole that had made the hole in the first place and his bones trying to maintain everything where it should be.

He pushed the vile out of his throat as it tried to rise, because there is nothing worse than the smell of mixed blood and vile to add to his precarious situation.

How the hell was he supposed to get out of this one? He asked himself that same question a bunch of times before his own mind yelled at him for being so reckless and get into this situation in the first place.

He was tired, he really was. His eyelashes dropping without his own command as he tried to make a plan, because that's what he did: make plans in the spur of the moment. He was good at it when he was inside the Milano, in a comfortable place with no pain whatsoever, but he was also good at them when they were in the middle of battle and lives depended on him, so he should be able to do it when he was in the middle of a life threatening situation himself, right?

Okay… so… he swallowed hard as he tried to push his body again. His energy was dropping scarily quickly, but his mind pulled that thought away as he focused on a more important task. He bit his lip as blue eyes stared at the pole stuck in his leg. It had entered at his thigh from left to right. Blood had already coagulated around it, so it was even more stuck than Peter had suspected. Fuck. It was only a few centimeters he needed to push to get his leg free but the thought of bleeding out due to having cut an artery made him wonder if it was the right thing to do.

But what else could he actually do? His intercom was broken, so there was no way to communicate with the others and even if he did, what was he supposed to do? Beg them to get his sorry ass out of this jam? No, he was getting out of here without having Rocket reminding him of it for the rest of his life, thank you very much.

He gritted his teeth and placed his right hand as good as he could over his right thigh and for a second he believed he could do it, but as soon as he pulled his willpower crushed from the pain exploding through his body. He heard himself scream in such a manner that bounced on the walls and back to him almost instantly and it lasted longer than he would have imagined it to.

There was no way of getting out of here on his own. He needed his team and even though he trusted them, he also feared for their safety. Trying to save a captain was not something he had ever read on his midnight stories with his mother. It was rather the other way around: a captain never left a man behind. They would go to the extreme to aid their fellow companion, but how could he when he was barely able to lift his own leg?

– "If you are up there, now is the time to move, guys…"– he whispered and realized how tired his voice sounded. He wasn't getting enough oxygen in this rotten hellhole and he feared it would soon be his last.

He watched the dust danced in front of him as it was lighted up by the ray of light. He smiled at the beauty of it: there is always beauty, even in the worst scenarios. He smiled, if only to himself, and tried to relax. He was not going to allow his body any real rest, for it would mean crossing the line from this world to the other, but he could stop moving for a couple of seconds while his mind worked out another useless plan.

Suddenly, there was a scream. A vague idea of a scream if he was honest about it, but it seemed to be real, not a sick joke from his own desire to be rescued. He swallowed hard and counted to three before opening his tired eyes. There was a shadow on the top of the debris and he smiled.

– "Took you long enough…" – he tried to reply, but his voice was weak and it barely came out as a whisper.

– "Peter are you there?" – the yell was filled with concern and Peter really wished he could yell back at her that he was fine, that he was glad they had come back to rescue him and that everything would be alright. But he couldn't.

His chest contracted painfully as he realized that being safe was a long way from this moment, but at least, if the worst happened, he was not going to die alone.

–"Pete, we are coming down!" – he heard the continuing screams telling him he was fine, but the warm blood on his cold fingers told him otherwise.

No, he was not going to die. He wanted to survive this and have another scar on his already marked body so he could tell the story to another bimbo or friend, whoever decided to listen. He wanted to survive because, fuck, who the hell wants to die anyway? So he nodded, in the dark dusty clouded place he nodded, because he was not going to surrender to the grief and tiredness, because Star-Lord was not going to die due to a damn pole.

It took them some time to get down there. Rocket being the first to arrive, for he was the one that weight less and could move easily around the small area Peter found himself in. After the small mammal had placed foot on the ground he had stopped babbling about how stupid Peter was and had swallowed hard.

Fuck, maybe this was as serious as he had thought.

– "Hey…" – Peter smiled as best as he could, but a groan escaped his lips before he had a chance to detain it.

Rocket sighed and pushed a hand over Peter's lips to shut him up. He needed to think and fast because if he didn't, then Peter was as good as dead.

–"Only you can be stupid enough to get yourself in this sort of mess. What were you thinking?!" – he yelled as he jumped to assess Peter's trapped arm.

–"Wasn't…" – he replied – "You know me, act first, think later…. or something like that." – he closed his eyes as another wave of dizziness shook his body.

– "Yeah well…" – but as he turned horror crossed his eyes – "Wow there Pete! No sleepin' time. You ain't leaving me in this shit hole by myself!" – he rushed to his injured friend's face and placed both paws on his cheeks. They were cold and he seemed whiter than usual. Cold sweat was already forming in his brows, which meant they barely had time to act.

– "Ye…ah… not… asleep, dude… restin" – came the slurred answer, but it was an answer none the less.

– You better not be, or I'll kick your ass." – he responded before whispering something to an intercom.

Peter smiled again as he knew he was going to be fine. Screw his leg, screw his arm, he was alive and before he knew it, he was going to be out of there and back to his beloved Milano, because if he was sure of something. it was that his team was there and he was finally safe.

THE END

I thought of making it a two-shot with the aftermath, but I don't know. I guess it depends on you readers.

Thanks for taking your time to read this and I'll see you soon.