Fuzzystatic

Status: Complete
Published: 19 June 2025
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,050
Rating: General Audiences
Tags: Mantis/Nebula (Marvel), Mantis (Marvel), Nebula (Marvel), consider: mantis gets a haircut, nebula is easily flustered and mantis likes to tease her

AO3 Mirror

Opening Notes

Original AO3 Note: had this half finished since my last haircut and figured. yeah i can finish this up and post it why not

Nebula doesn’t process Mantis’s haircut right away. Her gaze flicks briefly over Mantis and slides right past—only to snap back with newfound intensity when she registers what she’s seen.

Mantis’s hair is short—really short. It’s the shortest Nebula’s ever seen on her, cropped close enough to her scalp Nebula thinks she might have use clippers to get it so short, at least on the back, but she still has curls long enough to frame her face.

Nebula realizes with a start she’s been caught. Mantis had noticed her staring, and is now watching with slowly growing amusement, the corners of her mouth pulling into a smile. She raises her brows expectantly as Nebula clears her throat awkwardly.

“That’s a new look.”

“I wanted to try something new. Do you like it?”

“It’s…different,” Nebula says dumbly.

Mantis tips her head to one side, considering. “Good different or bad different?”

“No! Good different,” Nebula exclaims, a little too quickly. “It looks good on you.” Mantis’s smile broadens, and it makes Nebula look away, feeling embarrassed.

“Well, aren’t you sweet,” Mantis says, a teasing lilt to her voice. She steps closer, half-circling so she can look Nebula in the face again. Mantis studies her for a moment, then lets out a quiet laugh. “You’re blushing.”

“I’m not,” Nebula says, her face hot.

“Uh-huh,” Mantis says, in a way that makes it clear she doesn’t believe her, and takes another step closer.

Nebula wants to protest, but finds that she can’t. Mantis is leaning into her now, and Nebula’s head is full of static.

She tries to step back, maintain the distance between them, but instead she backs into the edge of the workbench behind her. It makes her jolt in surprise and she immediately grips the edge of the workbench, bracing herself. Something on its surface clatters away, jostled by her hand.

Mantis closes the tiny distance left between them and Nebula can only lean so far away. The workbench’s edge digs into her spine. Mantis’s hands settle on the workbench on either side of Nebula, trapping her, and Nebula’s grip on its edge tightens.

Mantis leans in until they’re nearly nose to nose.

Mantis is watching her expectantly, waiting for an answer. She smiles pleasantly up at Nebula. Mantis looks so disarmingly sweet, but there’s a playfulness to her expression, to the brightness of her eyes—a mischievous shine that she always gets when she’s messing with Nebula.

While Nebula feels frozen, stiff and awkward, Mantis seems to be having a grand old time. She doesn’t look like she’s planning to move anytime soon, still waiting on a reaction from Nebula.

Nebula clears her throat again. “You look good,” she finally manages, brows hooding low over her eyes. She turns her head away just enough so that their noses aren’t practically touching anymore.

“Yeah?” Mantis’s grin widens, something Nebula is acutely aware of despite her closed eyes. Even her antenna seem to perk up a bit, the ends wriggling a little bit.

It isn’t just her face feeling hot now. The heat has spread all throughout Nebula’s body now, and it makes her antsy—squirmy with a discomfort Mantis picks up on immediately.

It doesn’t make her any more sympathetic towards Nebula’s plight. If anything, she seems to grow more amused.

Nebula swallows. “Is this necessary?”

Mantis hums thoughtfully, pretending to think about it, and Nebula finally looks at her again, tries to glare at her. Her face is still flushed with heat, and she looks so grumbly and flustered that Mantis finally breaks, giggling. It wasn’t exactly the intended effect, which does nothing to improve Nebula’s mood.

“I can’t help it. You make it too easy to mess with you.”

Nebula makes an indignant noise at this, which draws a delighted laugh from Mantis. Still giggling, Mantis finally steps back, and Nebula feels like she can breathe again.

Nebula lets out a breath and with it, the tension in her body. She takes a moment to let her heart rate settle before letting go of her grip on the workbench and straightening up.

“Don’t do that again,” Nebula warns, but there’s no bite to it, and despite her best efforts she still can’t manage a proper glare either. 

“You could have pushed me away any time,” Mantis points out, and Nebula just grunts in response, frowning. Mantis lifts a hand to run her fingers through her hair. “You really like it?”

Nebula slits her eyes and hunches her shoulders, as if weighing her options, before grumbling, “Yes. You look…cute. Or pretty, or—whichever you prefer.” Mantis smiles at this, and Nebula can already imagine what sort of teasing jabs this might elicit, so she hastens, “Don’t you like it?”

“It’s just…different.” She shrugs. “My head feels much lighter. I didn’t realize how heavy hair could be.”

She runs her hand through her hair again, toying with the short curls while Nebula watches. “I think I like it.” After a few seconds of this, her hand drifts to the back of her head, where her hair is even shorter. “It feels fuzzy back here.”

Nebula has the sudden and horrifying urge to run her own hand through Mantis’s hair. The urge is gone in an instant but Nebula’s fleeting distress must have been visible because Mantis offers, “Do you want to feel?”

Nebula snaps back to attention, expecting to see mischief on Mantis’s face, and she’s already bristling, preparing to snarl in response to her ceaseless teasing, but she’s wrong. Mantis’s smile is genuine, almost shy now, and it takes all the wind from Nebula’s sails.

Nebula doesn’t know how to respond, so she doesn’t, but she gives a slight nod, curious now that it’s been offered, and Mantis tilts her head towards her. They’re still close enough that Nebula doesn’t have far to reach when she lifts her hand, and soon she’s running careful fingers through Mantis’s hair.

Mantis’s eyes shutter close under Nebula’s touch, surprised at how nice it feels.

Nebula’s fingers reach the back of Mantis’s head, where the hair is short and soft and all she can think is fuzzy. She can see why Mantis won’t stop fiddling with her hair.

“I think,” Mantis says, cracking an eye open, “I really like it.”

Ending Notes

N/A