I sniffed. Eggs? Fried bread with grated cassia bark? I perked my ears up and heard humming.
Quill wasn't supposed to be cooking this week, was he? It was my turn. I tried rolling out of the bunk, realizing it was far bigger than mine and I was pinned down. Tail swishing in overdrive, I wriggled and heard a 'mph'.
"Sorry, Gams," I mumbled, before adding, "waitasec, how the hell did I end up in your bed?" before pulling myself free and puffing up my fur in embarrassment. I must have gotten pretty drunk last night, or Gamora had another nightmare. I hope I didn't shred the cockpit seats again, because that was three weeks of my share of the overflow money I had to pay into the "you effed up" group jar. Drax was the worst offender, but his offenses mostly amounted to small dents in the metal, which he paid me directly to fix. I was the least likely to fuck something up on the ship, but the one who ended up actually having to pay out when I did. Because if I messed it up, you darn well know it's beyond my ability to repair, and going to be expensive.
"I didn't… uh, drink too much last night, did I?" I squeaked out, as I sat up, stretching. Something didn't quite feel right, but I couldn't put a claw on it.
"What? No, Rocket, not at all. I just wanted to make sure you didn't have any problems… I was going to bring you back to your bunk once you were in REM, but I must have fallen asleep myself," she said, a bit groggily. Gamora sat up, her hair cascading down in tangled curls.
I'm no expert on humanoid attractiveness, but I am pretty sure Quill would have killed me and desecrated the corpse to see Gamora first thing in the morning, looking like this.
"Problems?" I asked, before realizing what she meant.
I couldn't hear it. The whirring. The humming.
My cybernetics weren't there.
I froze up, and Gamora put her hand on me; probably meant to be on my shoulder, but with the difference in size, she engulfed most of my back, her hand patting down fur that I knew had long been burned away from repeated vivisection. The spot on the center back that I could neither see nor reach, but knew exactly what should be there.
My back still had a dull ache, a permanent chronic reminder.
"I'm supposed to- or any of us really, but Groot and Drax are too worried of breaking you and Quill gave you a hand last night- massage the ointment in. Lay prostrate and still; it may sting.
I heard the snap of medical gloves and instinctually turned to bolt, but Gamora's hand was a my chest and she slowly but firmly placed me down on the bed. I knew trying to fight against her strength was both stupid and futile, and forced myself to calm down as I heard- and smelled- the cold goo she was spreading over my back.
Faintly, I heard the sound of something shutting down, and the pain began to subside.
Shutting down.
Something wasn't right. A few somethings.
Quill was coking, his breakfasts were the best on the ship, but the flatbread he was making was my favorite recipe of Drax's.
I got to wake up next to Gamora, but she slept less than two hours a night on her augmentations… she'd never fall asleep next to me, or in the extremely rare chance she did, she would have been up long before my nose twitched.
And Groot massaged the pain shooting out of my back when I needed him too…
No, no, nononono…
I would never have my cybernetics removed. Sure, I hated them, hated what they did to me, but with them gone… I wouldn't be sentient anymore. I'd never have them taken back out. I had friends.
"Gamora, stop," I said, despite her gentle movements to rub the gel on my skin. "I, uh, I need the bathroom."
"Be careful not to drip too much," she chided. "I don't need to see Peter with a cracked rib from dancing and slipping on your detritus."
Nobody but Quill and I knew the real reason when he slipped on that patch of oil. Gamora and Drax were out getting Groot a new terra cotta vessel.
Yeah. I think I made the right choice.
On the way to the head, I picked up one of my guns, the small one that made a lot of noise, just in case I had been particularly stupid and wrong, and carried it into the bathroom with me.
"Hope I ain't misreadin' all this," I sighed as I pointed the barrel at my forehead, shakily undid the safety, and pulled the trigger.
Fuck.
Searing pain ripped though my backside, and a small needle and several IV drips receded as the pod hissed open, punting me onto a metal grated floor. A spray followed, and I touched the IV entry.
Slick plastic.
At least the crazy lotus-eater machine had the courtesy to give me spray-on bandages when it pulled itself out. I was totally naked, but clothing in my size was laid out at the base of the pod. I rolled the shirt over my head, feeling it snag on my back.
Cybernetics, present and accounted for.
Four other pods, sealed in the room, of course. It helped in my case that I was at least familiar with these things. A lot cheaper to be hooked up and trained in for being mining slaves (why else create intelligent small animals? I was basically built for extreme conditions in low lighting), than actually running a sim or sending too many to the shafts before they knew what they were doing.
I stretched out on all fours, then slid on the pants, shaking myself out. At least I recognized my dream as just that- then again, if the neural interface was trying to give us an ideal world and mine was the same as before, just with the best food from the best chef and curling up with Gamora, either I didn't really have a particularly active imagination, or I didn't have any nostalgia to relive. These things weren't infinite. They could only take the best moment of one's life and logically extend it out to the future. It wouldn't have the processing capability to say, put me in a teleholo I liked, or some head fantasy.
Too many variables to fill, and that would pull the dreamer out. Even the Milano was too hard for it to come up with improvements for me. And it couldn't draw from before then- what would it do? Make me a test subject? Make me a prisoner?
But the rest of my team, they've got lives before the Guardians. Before us.
Figuring out why we're here can wait. I need to get them to kill themselves first.