Secret Wars

Last Days Pt. III

You knew that years of therapy and talking about everything you'd been through up to this point in your life would never help you get over dying.

You'd been dead, and now here you were standing in front of the man who had lost you.

Peter looked broken, and from the little bits and pieces you could remember from your last moments, they were all haunted by his howls and cries for you not to leave him.

You felt guilty for what you'd done - leaving Peter - but you didn't feel guilty for sacrificing yourself for everyone. It was what your dad had done, so why not you?

Maybe that was the problem though, right? You'd thought sacrificing yourselfhad been the right thing to do - a normal thing to do - and that wasn'tsomething a twenty-two year old woman with her life ahead of her should be thinking.

Regardless, you were happy you were back ... for Peter.

But for every other purpose and every other part of you ... you weren't sure you deserved to be back. The concept struck you with a wild and shrill ache through your chest, because you weren't sure exactly what this meant for you and your emotional state.

But you pushed all that aside, pushed it deep down as far as it could go and as far back into your mind as possible, because though you'd been through the unimaginable, Peter had had to live past the unimaginable, and you could tell it was going to also haunt him for the rest of his life.

You'd only been gone for around a day and a half in real life time, but to Peter it had felt like a never-ending spiral that shook him to his core like a sharp icicle trailing down his spine.

"I'm never leaving you again," you whispered, "Okay, angel? I promise. And this is a promise I'm going to keep."

Peter looked into your eyes now, seeing the sincerity as he nodded. He leaned in and rested his forehead against yours. He kept reaching for you as if you check that your body was warm again. Were you really breathing? Was your heart really beating? Your heartbeat was thundering through his bloodstream just as it always had but now Peter couldn't stop it. He couldn't tune it out.

Well, he could if he really wanted to. But he was afraid that if he stopped listening then it would go away again.

You closed your eyes with a sigh, content to be back in Peter's arms again as he held you close. His arms now felt sturdier than the last time you'd been lying in them considering how much he'd been shaking. But now in this moment, in this one little moment, things were okay.

"I love you so much," he sniffled, pulling away and running his fingers through your hair. "Oh God. I missed you. I couldn't ..."

Peter was struggling to speak and you could tell that he had really, reallybeen suffering these past hours. You tugged at his curls on the back of his head, pushing his face softly into your neck as he wrapped himself around you and you held him close, allowing him to sob into your skin.

"I know," you nodded, "But I'm here."

"Y/N ..."

"I know."

Peter didn't leave your side. As everyone started packing up, you had multiple reunions with people who you could tell your death had impacted them more than they cared to admit. Nebula actually gave you a hug and called you 'sister.'

Even Drax seemed joyous by your return.

Ana was pulled from the tent she'd been jailed in, and you felt a bit of satisfaction seeing her shocked face when you were standing next to Peter holding his hand.