Sometimes - in the little free time he's allowed, waiting in a cage for the next day to start, for the next order - he wonders.
He wonders about what happened and what could've been; did his parents give him up for their safety, or was it just for gold? Was it their only option? Did they cry at night over their decision, over their lost son, or was it just one less mouth to feed, hands cold as they traded him over in exchange for a little money.
Did they care?
And if the Kree hadn't come, would they've stayed happy? Would he have grown up with hugs and warm affection instead of whips and cold cruel apathy? He liked to imagine that his mother would play with him and that his father would teach him about the world, trying to imagine what they look like as his hazy memory only recalls a blue skin just like his and big, bright red fins.
Would they love him?
He wonders about who he is and who he would be; he doesn't know if he ever really even had a name, anything to be called besides the numbers he was given - that they call him, indifferent, as if he was just another one. Not a child nor a person, just a weapon with an order to follow. Did his parents pick him a name - did they fight over the options, staying up at night wondering what would best fit their unborn child? Was it the name of a warrior, or of a dear relative? Was it a name they loved?
Or did they sell him without even naming him first, as to not get attached.
If he had stayed, what would it be like? Would he grow up to be a warrior, a hunter, or would he be a farmer? Would he one day have a family of his own? Someone to trust and love by his side, and a child that would never know suffering like this?
Who would he be then?
He doesn't know anything about where he came from and the people there - his people. He knows his family was religious, he remembers them praying, but he can't remember how or to who. Was it common, would he be like that too?
It's hard for him to imagine ever believing in something bigger - in someone bigger, - while chained and having his soul tortured out of him. He knows there's no one there, that no one gives a shit. But he tries anyway. He picks up a few pieces of the other slaves' stories and cultures, tries to place it together with faded memories and imagine a future that never came to be. Of a different life altogether.
It's hard to imagine being loved, too, but that thought he buries deep inside of him as he drowns himself in what-ifs.
But it never works, does it? The reality always too harsh to leave him alone.
He doesn't even remember his own language besides a few sounds now foreign to him in a far away memory that he's not even sure is real - soft, mournful clicks echo on his mind together with a broken cry - so how could he expect anything else. Everything he has was given to him by his masters, by the Kree, from the words on his mouth to the ration and dirty rags.
All he remembers - all he has - is pain.
He's nobody.
He's nothing.
With no family or home, no culture to call his own, nothing but the longing to belong and to be loved.
As he grows up longing turns into bitterness as he learns that it doesn't matter. Damn sentiments don't matter. His parents never cared and never would, and he hopes they died for what they've done to him. Not accepting that hard truth has only ever made him weak. The moment they decided their son was worth nothing more than a few coins to them was the moment they condemned him. The moment they erased his identity and turned him into cargo.
But he won't let that be his fate forever.
The Kree master he was assigned to tells him about his next battle, not looking at him at any point as they do nor bothering telling him who he's going against, and throws him the weapon he's supposed to use. The usual speech is given with an emotionless voice, telling him exactly what would happen if he disobeyed or lost, information already carved into his brain so deeply that his every step is given with it in mind. The orders clear.
They tell him to fight.
And so he does.
He fights and fights and fights. Wounds and battles and victims getting lost in number, their importance watered down by the need to survive. He fights for it, fights for the chance of one day being free, for the chance of getting revenge.
And that day is coming, he can feel it in his bones.
So he fights.