Chapter Text
By the end of the first day, Yondu’s determined that Terrans are good for precisely three things – getting into trouble, somehow getting out of trouble, and pumping daft beats into their ears so that they can’t hear you while you’re explaining that the engine room ain’t for brats to go pokin’ their noses in, you listenin’ to me, boy? You’ll send us wheelin’ straight into an asteroid belt and then where will you be? Fucking frozen solid with your eyeballs poppin’ out, that’s where. Now look at me when I’m talkin’ to you, boy, or I’ll rip those headphones off and eject ‘em out an airlock.
By the end of the first week, Yondu has added two more skills to the boy’s meagre list. The first is (to his disgust) crying. Crying that no matter of threats will annul. And Yondu’s got a lot of threats: ranging from the banal – the boys have been gettin’ hungry again, so you’ll hush it if you don’t wanna be next on the menu – to the inventive – if you don’t shut yer yap I’ll slather you in syrup and leave you in scoutin’ distance of a spacewasp comb. Holding upside down and shaking, his usual preferred tactic, has been conclusively proven to make matters worse.
Okay, so perhaps it’s not all that surprising. Yondu doesn’t know much about Terrans. But they seem a fairly sentimental species – one look at the amount of lovey dovey drivel on the kid’s darn mixtape could have told him that much. And anyway, he ain’t heartless. Being abducted by aliens not an hour after your carrier’s death would merit a tear or two even by his standards.
But honestly. It’s been seven solars. And this is getting ridiculous.
If mama Quill’s meant to be looking down on her little Star Lord from where she sits sipping macchiatos, or whatever it is she’s supposed to be doing when she’s partying with The Spirit In The Sky (this being the extent of what Yondu’s bothered to learn about Terran religion; and this through no will of his own, but rather because the kid’s been blasting that soundtrack on repeat since he arrived)… Well, she ain’t gonna want to see his face all scrunched up and covered in snot. Yondu sure as hell don’t.
However, Terran tears seem as impervious to reason as they are to threats, bribes, bargains, and every other damn trick in Yondu’s book. In fact, kid’s so damn leaky Yondu’s starting to wonder if he’s defective, and prays that his daddy won’t demand a refund.
Thank the star systems that he and his usual bedmate aren’t reproductively compatible.
So, life goes on. The kid keeps crying through the down-cycle. And amping his music to maximum and glaring at his dorm mates when they, leery from lack of sleep, stomp over to inform him that if he doesn’t cut the yowling, they’ll make him. It’s noisy. It’s irritating. It’s disgustingly sentimental, and it certainly ain’t endearing him to Yondu, no more than it is to the crew.
All this pales though, in comparison to the fifth of the Terran’s talents.
Because it turns out the kid is a galactic-class, thrice-damned genius of a cockblocker.