Disclaimer: I don't own Star Wars or Guardians of the Galaxy or Marvel.

This story is inspired by Dr Matthattan's Lord of the Rings/Avengers crossover. As this is a work in progress, I will be happy to take any opinions or ideas for my story into consideration. Wanted to post this after I put more thought into it, but with Guardians 2 on the way, I just decided I couldn't wait any longer.

But anyway, here it is...Guardians of a Galaxy Far Far Away...

Chapter One - A Relic of Mystery

Peter Jason Quill kept his helmet on as he searched the wrecked ship he was currently treading through for anything that could be salvaged, using the thermal vision in the eyes to help him see in the dark. While just looking for something to do in the edges of the galaxy, which was known as the Outskirts, he and his crew stumbled upon this city-sized arrowhead-shaped ship and, after not receiving any reply when they tried to make contact with it, decided to see if there was anything they could sell to the black market.

Quill didn't bother putting on his headphones to hear his tunes. He wanted this time alone to brood on recent events. What had happened a month ago was one of the two craziest moments in his entire life. The first was when his life on Earth, or Terra as everyone else in the galaxy called it, came to an abrupt end. His mother died from cancer and only a few minutes after that he was abducted from his home by Yondu Odonta, the leader of a band of interplanetary mercenaries known as the Ravagers. Quill was bred since then to be a Ravager himself and spent the twenty-six years since then looting and scavenging.

That life came to an end a year ago when he got caught up in a war between the Nova Empire and the Kree radical Ronan the Accuser. In fact, Quill became the center of the war when he stumbled across a relic that Ronan wanted, which turned out to be an Infinity Stone, one of the most powerful items in the entire universe. But Quill, along with a group of outlaws, managed to save Xandar, the capital planet of the Nova Empire, by destroying Ronan. After that, Quill left the Ravagers and he and the other outlaws were pardoned by the Nova Empire for their crimes and became a group known as "The Guardians of the Galaxy".

Quill also learned that day that he was only half-human. His father was some sort of ancient unknown species, which explained what his mother meant when she often said he was an angel. This revelation dug up an old yearning he had as a child, which he had spent twenty-five years burying. He only had his mother when he was young and never knew his father. Despite the praise she often gave him, he couldn't help but feel resentment towards the man who didn't even bother to show up on her deathbed. At one point in his life, he stopped caring about who the man was, but now couldn't help be feel curiosity over...

His thoughts were interrupted when he stopped at a large door made out of some sort of thick metal. Clearly this had to be some sort of vault and had to contain something extremely valuable. He dug into his pocket for his blowtorch and after igniting it, slowly began to cut around the handle. After what felt like maybe hours, he finally cut all the way through and the door slowly began to open.

To his disappointment, there was only one item inside and it was small enough to fit in his hand. He had to press a button over his right ear, causing his helmet to shrink into an earpiece, in order to examine this item properly. It was shaped like a pyramid with metal framework covering what looked like dark red crystal. The sides had intricate patterns etched to them and the base of each side had some sort of strange writing.

Quill just shrugged and picked it up before putting it in his knapsack. But as he turned around, he saw just how long he had been cutting through that door.

Long enough for a group of hideous aliens with dark green skin, pointed ears, and chins with several vertical folds in the skin below their mouths to surround him and point their guns at him, showing their sharp teeth as they grinned and looked at him with their red eyes.

Skrulls, Quill grumbled to himself as he put his hands over his head. I hate these guys.

The biggest of them lowered his gun as he strutted towards Quill.

"Well looky what we have here, boys," he said in a deep voice to his subordinates. "It's our old friend Space King. Haven't seen you since Darbia."

"First of all," Quill sighed in annoyance, "it's Star-Lord." Then he responded in mock cheerfulness. "And second, glad to see that you got your nose fixed after I broke it, Scrub."

"It's Skragg!" the lead Skrull snarled. He then locked his eyes on the former Ravager as he paced back and forth, almost like a tiger at a zoo examining onlookers. "I'm glad I got a chance to see you. I not only get to pay you back for our last meeting, but to avenge the Skrulls for their current predicament."

Quill did his best not to smile as he looked past the Skrulls to see movement in the dark. He couldn't see the appearances, but he could make out the shapes of two sets of thick tendrils slowly lowering two tall figures as a smaller figure scurried downwards.

"If that maniac Ronan had succeeded in destroying Xandar," Skragg continued rambling, "Nova and the Kree would have that stupid peace treaty null and went back to war, allowing us to catch them off guard. But since you stopped Ronan, they've been able to put full focus on us. So the way I see it, 'Star-Lord', you're responsible for the war we're in."

Quill just smirked. "Well, I appreciate all the praise, but I can't take all the credit."

At that, the sound of rapid gun fire and the unsheathing of swords was heard behind the Skrulls, whose attention was now drawn to Quill's fellow Guardians who came to their leader's rescue.

The green-skinned beauty Gamora swung her sword fluidly and managed to kick nearby Skrulls and dodge incoming shots with incredible grace that came from enhancements she received from the villain known as Thanos, who captured her when she was a child and bred her to be an assassin, only to have her betray him later.

Drax was able to endure the shots that hit his bare chest as he yelled a loud battle cry while cutting down his foes using a pair of twin daggers. Drax, whose family was murdered driving him towards revenge, showed that he was deserving of his nickname "The Destroyer" with his brute strength, quick reflexes, and his ability to take as much hits thrown at him.

Firing a rapid-fire gun and laughing like a maniac was Rocket, a raccoon genetically modified to walk and speak like a human and had a vast knowledge of technology, especially weapons.

One Skrull who was wounded from Drax saw that he had a shot at the raccoon's back and decided to take advantage of it. But before he could, a loud thud was heard behind him, causing him to look back and see that the cause of it was a huge creature that looked like tree with arms and legs and a flat face that currently had an angry look.

"I am Groot!" the creature roared before slapping the Skrull away with his massive hand.

Quill was not idle as his friends fought. Once Skragg's attention was off him, Quill immediately took out his own gun and fired at the leader before shooting at nearby Skrulls and had the pleasure of taking out the last one.

"Nice job, guys," Quill said to his teammates, who all stood and looked at him, waiting to hear what else he had to say. "Well. Let's get back to work and see what else this place has that's..."

A cough was suddenly heard behind him. They all looked to see Skragg force himself up and press a button on his wristband, causing a beeping sound to be heard from it. Then suddenly the same beeping sound came from the wristband of a dead Skrull, and another, and another as the hall began to echo with beeps. It didn't take the Guardians long to figure out what that meant.

"I vote we run like hell," Rocket opted before he made a mad dash away from the bodies.

"I second it," Quill agreed as he followed the raccoon.

"Third," Gamora replied.

"I am Groot."

"Agreed," said Drax.

With that, the five of them dashed down the hall, then ran through the labyrinth that probably would've taken them days to get out of if not for Rocket's keen sense of smell. Soon they came to the airlock that they came out of earlier and began to climb onto their ship, the Milano, just as they heard a boom sound coming from behind them. The bombs had been charged enough to explode and the explosion began engulfing the large ship.

"Rocket, we need to get out of here!" Quill called out as he, after everyone was aboard the Milano, closed the hatch.

"Oh really? Ya think?" Rocket snapped at Quill pointing out the obvious as he climbed into the cockpit and began working on the computer. In seconds, the Milano unlatched itself from the larger ship and quickly flew away. Just as they caught their breath, they all looked through the windshield of the cockpit, to see where the large ship used to be as a bright fireball expelling tiny bits of debris in all directions.

"Well," Quill sighed as he leaned back in his chair. "Another day, another bang."

After a half-an-hour of recovering from the excitement, the group gathered in the cargo hold to examine everything they had looted.

Groot at first smiled with pride in himself as he showed the contents of his satchel, but that smile dropped into a look of confusion as he saw the skeptical looks everyone else gave him.

"We've been down there for hours and all you collected was nuts, bolts, scrap metal, and dust?" Rocket queried in exasperation. After rolling his eyes, he started examining the guns and other gizmos he picked up from the wreckage.

Drax meanwhile had just torn the lid off a steel crate, then looked at amazement at the contents. He took out two glass bottles and examined them.

"Alcoholic beverages," he said with awe. "Looks like some sort of ale." He then shouted like he just won a game he enjoyed playing. "I say we drink to our victory!"
"Right there with ya, buddy!" Quill responded as he helped himself to one of the two bottles in Drax's hands, which Drax was too wrapped up in his excitement to object. After the two removed the tops, they began chugging down the contents of the bottles.

"You know," Rocket spoke up as he examined the guns. "Judging by the rust on these things, I'd say no one's touched that ship for thousands of years."

Upon hearing that, the ale that Quill had chugged so far suddenly erupted like a geyser from his lips and covered the floor in front of him.

"I'm not mopping that," Gamora informed them, not taking her eyes off the tome she was looking through.

After a minute of coughing and gagging, Quill looked at the cover of the tome and saw it only had a symbol engraved on it, which looked like a hexagon with a smaller black hexagon in the center that had arrows protruding from the corners, pointing at the corners of the larger hexagon.

"What's it say?" he asked Gamora.

"No idea. Never seen this kind of writing before."

Quill stood up and walked over and peered over her shoulder. Instead of letters, there were strange hieroglyphics that made absolutely no sense, yet they did seem kind of familiar. It took him a moment to realize why and he quickly reached into his knapsack and pulled out the relic he found.

"This thing here has those very same markings," he said to her, causing her to look in his direction and look at the pyramid in interest. In fact, the other three looked in their direction and gazed with curiosity at it.

"Wow," Rocket said as he took a look at it. "Wonder how much the Broker would pay for something like that."

Groot slowly reached for it, but then suddenly shouted and stumbled back. Everyone else looked at him in worry as the giant tree creature was suddenly shaking in fear.

"I...am...Groot," he whimpered before walking away.

"I am Groot" was all he was able to say, but apparently the way he said it was his language. And only Rocket was able to understand it.

Which was why Gamora looked at him and asked, "What did he say?"

Rocket looked with utmost concern for his best friend and partner in crime as he responded, "He just said he's got a bad feeling."

An hour passed. Gamora found Quill alone in the cockpit with the Earth song entitled "I'm Not In Love" played on a volume only high enough for just those in the cockpit could hear. That and his neutral expression as he stared off into space were enough to tell her what he was thinking.

"You know, Quill," she said softly as she sat on the seat next to him. "You're free from Yondu. You have a ship that can take you anywhere in the galaxy. Why not go to your home?"

Quill didn't turn his eyes as he responded. "And do what? I didn't finish school. No education, no experience. Can't exactly get a job on my world without any of those. Not a good one at least. At best, maybe work on a farm. Why would I trade fighting bad guys and hopping from planet to planet for that?"

"Personally I would," she responded, which drew his attention away from space to her. "Nothing but a lifetime of violence and death. Years of pain from my body being forged into a weapon made for killing, and my only life was to hunt and erase those whom Thanos and Ronan wanted dead. I yearn for a peaceful life."

"So why not go look for a farming planet and do just that?" Quill asked. "You're now free of Ronan and Thanos. Nova's pardoned you for your crimes. You don't need to stick around with us." He quickly added as she gave him a hawklike stare that made any man tremble. "Not that I don't like having you around. You are a pivotal member and we'd all be dead without you. I'm just saying you have no..." he struggled to find the right word to say, but it was just too much strain trying to think.

Gamora found the word first. "Obligation."

"OBLIGATION!" Quill repeated. "That's exactly what I was gonna say. You have no obligation to stay with us is what I'm saying."

Gamora just rolled her eyes at Quill's attempts to be a confident smooth-talker before leaning back into the chair.

"Nova may have cleared all my crimes, but my conscience hasn't. I have too much to atone for."

Quill just stared at her in sympathy. Thanos took over her homeworld and forced her to watch as he killed her family. Peter had seen his own mother die and it tore him apart, and still did. But his mother died from an illness. He couldn't image what Gamora must have felt watching her family being murdered.

Before he could say anything...

"Hey, lovebirds!" Rocket called out. "Pow wow. Got something to tell ya!"

Gamora was now livid. "Call us lovebirds one more time, rodent, and I'll sell your pelt!"

"Hey!" Quill yelled while holding an index finger in warning. "No one is killing anyone on my ship, got it!" But then he lowered his voice to a whisper, showing he wasn't happy with Rocket's comment either. "Just shave his fur off if he says that again."

Gamora gave crooked smile as she nodded. "Fair enough."

Everyone sat in a circle as Rocket held on to the relic they found, which Groot still looked uncomfortably at.

The raccoon was the first to speak. "Well, I thought I'd see what I can dig up on this thing. So I took a peek at Tivan's records and found..."

"Wait a minute," Quill interrupted while looking at the raccoon as though he just committed an unforgivable crime. "You hacked into Taneleer Tivan's records?"

"I didn't hack!" Rocket retorted. "I just used our computer to look into his without his permission."

"I am Groot?" Groot asked looking confused.

"No it's not the same thing," Rocket retorted. Then he continued, "So I had the thing scanned to see if his books had anything similar."

"So what does the Collector say about it?" Drax asked.

"That's just it," Rocket answered, as if he thought he found the solution but instead a dead end. "He's got nothing on it."

"But that can't be," Gamora argued. "Tivan collects nothing but the rarest of species and artifacts in the galaxy. He'd have information on all sorts of things so he'd know what's common and what's rare."

"There's one possible explanation," Drax said as a thought came to him. "It may not have come from our galaxy."

"Took the words right out of my mouth, big guy," Rocket concurred.

Drax frowned at the Raccoon hybrid. "I would not put my hand anywhere near your filthy mouth."

Quill and Gamora exchanged glances as they rolled their eyes over Drax's inability to understand metaphors. But all thoughts and further discussion about the artifact were suddenly interrupted by Milano shaking, causing everyone to thrown to the floor, except for Rocket, who was thrown to a nearby computer.

As everyone got back on their feet, Quill took a moment to figure out what happened. "Someone's shooting at us."

With that, he dashed over to the cockpit, with the other Guardians behind him. But as they left, the artifact, that now rested alone on top of the computer Rocket was on, began to glow.

There was no mistaking that colossal pistol shaped space ship that the Guardians saw as they looked out the cockpit window. Peter had spent more than half of his life on it and it was well known to most of the galaxy as the Eclector, the Ravager's mainship.

Before any of the Guardians could comment, there was a buzzing sound coming from the ship's communicator. As Groot pressed a button on it, the face of a blue-skinned man with a red fin on his head appeared. Yondu showed all of his gold teeth as he grinned.

"Hello, Quill. Good to see ya, my boy."

"Yondu," Quill responded with a frown on his face as his eyes narrowed at the sight of his abductor and slaver. "How'd you find us?"

"I never lost ya, Quill. That M-ship ya call the Milano used ta be mine, remember? I keep tabs on all my property." He suddenly held up a protesting hand as if he expected Quill to say something. "Babababa. I don't want it back. Think of it as a going-away present."

"Okay, Yondu," Quill began to explain, "if this is about..."

"This is not about not giving me the Stone, boy," Yondu interrupted. "I trained ya ta be a perfect Ravager, and I can't help but be proud of how well I taught ya. Besides," he grinned as he held up the tiny plastic troll doll that he found in the orb instead of the stone, "I like it. This is about a little bounty that Tanaleer Tivan posted. Apparently ya'll just got something that's very rare and he wants to add to his collection."

Upon hearing this, Rocket cringed as he felt his fellow Guardians glare at him. He chuckled nervously. "He caught us quicker than I thought he would."

"We'll deal with you later," Quill warned him before looking back at the Ravager. "So why didn't Tivan contact us and ask us for it?"

Yondu just shrugged. "Probably still mad because of what ya did to his collection."

"In our defense, that wasn't our fault," Quill protested.

There was suddenly activity on the computer nearest Rocket, which caught the Raccoon's eye and he looked at the screen in alarm.

"Uh...Quill..."

"Not now, Rocket," Quill snapped. "Okay, Yondu. If you want it that bad, just give me a moment to get this thing giftwrapped for you..."

"Not taking any chances, Quill," Yondu declared. "I'm gonna make absolutely sure that I get that thing."

"Quill, I've got something to tell ya," Rocket spoke up.

"You don't get to speak!" Drax shouted at the Raccoon.

"Okay, that was just repeating what Gamora and I said to you."

"He's right," Gamora added. "You don't get a say."

"Besides," Yondu continued. "Need ta show my crew what happens when ya cross me."

"You said you were okay with that," Quill protested.

"Quill, you really need to see this," Rocket was now getting testy.

"I am okay with that," Yondu informed him. "But the fact remains that ya cheated me. I just let that slide then the rest of my boys start slacking and thinkin' they can walk over me. Nothin' personal, Quill. Just business. Me being a nice guy, I'll give ya'll a minute to say your goodbyes and hear what that rat has to say before I blow you up. Nice knowin' ya, Quill."

With that the image faded.

"Okay, Rocket," Quill sighed as he looked at the Raccoon, hoping that what he had to say was going to help them in their situation. "What?"

"Something just hacked our navigation systems. AND YES! THIS IS HACKING!"

The ship suddenly vibrated before they felt it being slingshot into the furthest reaches of the galaxy...

...and beyond it.