A/N: I do not own this movie, Marvel does thank god or this could have been a disaster, these characters or anything you recognize.
Groot was not in a good mood.
He could still feel his roots implanted deeply into the soil Rocket continued to provide for him, and until he was strong enough to pull those roots out himself he was stuck here. Plus, he needed some water, badly, and he didn't think the Ravagers were going to give him that what with being shoved in a closet.
He was not particularly worried about Peter himself, after all if Peter said that Yondu wasn't trying to hurt him intentionally then Groot believed him. However he was not looking forward to the others coming back and finding out Yondu had been on the ship. There was also the fact that, just because Yondu might not mean Peter harm, did not mean he wouldn't do something else equally as bad.
Rocket's reaction in particular was not something he was looking forward to. He was always so much more violent when there was danger around. He could almost picture his reaction now. Thinking of things exploding seemed to have a physical reaction.
There was a loud slam indicating the door to the ship had been opened with great force, and loud, familiar voices.
"Yeah put her down over there, and go get my tool kit." He heard Rocket's voice say from up above deck.
"I am Groot" I called as loud as I could, but it did not seem that I was heard as a loud banging noise resounded at the same time. Curse my still growing form.
"Yeesh man, don't break my stuff. Do you know how expensive some of this is!" Rocket growled, and the well accustomed noise of Rocket tearing through his tool kit could be heard. I began to grow seriously concerned as one, they had yet to come down and decide to check on there friend and, two, I had yet to hear Gamora speak up. Had something happened to her?
"No my friend I am afraid I do not. How is she?" Drax's heavy voice floated all the way down the stairs, along with the concern it held. Something was definitely wrong.
"She'll live." Rocket grumbled, almost to low for me to have heard. Thankfully these walls were incredibly thin. "Would you go check on Groot and Peter, can't believe they haven't made a peep down there yet."
The sound of the Destroyer's thick boots making there way down the stairs finally gave me reason to begin shouting again "I am Groot!"
The boot's paused and then Drax's voice could be heard more then clearly "Rocket, come downstairs quickly!"
There was a loud crash from up above, and the click of Rocket's nails skidding across the floor and then the stairs was quickly silenced as he laid eyes on what ever had spooked Drax. "Oh for the love of Asgard where, of frag! Peter, Groot!"
"I am Groot!" I called again, and finally seemed to have been heard as Rocket's paws once again made scraping noises in his hurry to a location.
The door swung open, and Rocket had snagged up my pot clutching it tightly to his chest. "Groot! Your alright! Where the hell is Quill?"
"I am Groot."
Rocket's arms tensed around me, I could feel all of the fur on him standing on end,"The Ravagers? Frag, well where did they go?
"I am Groot"
He finally pulled me away from his chest to give me the stank eye. "I know you were in a closet, considering I'm now standing in it to, but did you see anything, did they say where they were going?"
"I am Groot"
Rocket groaned, "Of course they wouldn't have told you, I was just asking if you heard!"
"I am Groot"
"No of course they wouldn't. What help are you anyway?" He demanded, while clutching my pot back to his chest as he began walking out and into Peter's room.
"I am Groot"
"S'alright Groot, not your fault." He murmured, heading back towards the stairs.
"Rocket, what has become of our friend Quill?" Drax demanded, stepping so close Rocket seemed in danger of being trampled.
"Groot doesn't know, but were about to find out." Rocket hissed, climbing the stairs and coming back out on the main deck.
"I am Groot!" I proclaimed, stunned to see Gamora sprawled across a chair, seemingly dead.
"What? Oh she's fine, just needs to be rebooted or something." Rocket said, putting my pot down right next to her chair, and sounding way more concerned then he was trying to hide. "Drax, go back and get our little prisoner, even if she doesn't know, we can still turn her over. Get at least one problem out of the way."
"I am Groot"
"I'll explain later buddy, right now I've got a dead Centurion to track down." Rocket snapped while heading back down the stairs, to do what I didn't know, which frustrated me more then I could say.
Drax seemed to be doing as Rocket had requested as he quickly made his way out of the ship, and came back moments later with Nebula thrown over his shoulder, seemingly as dead as her sister.
"I am Groot" I sighed in frustration, reaching out a branch to brush Gamora's cheek in concern, what had happened out there?
Drax made his way downstairs with his prisoner cuffed and thrown over his shoulder, just as Rocket was coming back up with Peter's locating device in one hand, and a device I didn't recognize in the other. "Through her in the kitchen and lock the door, don't think she can break to much in there if she happens to wake up."
"I am Groot" I demanded.
"Alright buddy, I'll explain, just give me one second..." he muttered, placing the locator down and fidgeting with the other device. There was a sudden flash of light, the sound of electricity warming up, and Gamora suddenly sat up with a wild swing, knocking my pot to the ground.
The hard impact of my mini home breaking apart and my roots no longer connected to soil was quite shocking in itself, the noise above me made it far worse.
"-could have killed him!" He blinked several times, looking about and rather confused that everything was suddenly gray.
"I did warn you Rocket, and I apologize for knocking his pot over." Gamora's voice finally, calm, cool, and collected as always.
"Don't apologize to me apologize to him!" and suddenly the gray fur was no longer there and I was being thrust into Gamora's green face.
"I apologize Groot." Gamora said, meeting me dead in the eye.
"I am Groot" I told her pleasantly, waving my legs around with glee, it felt good to be free of the confines, though I could already feel myself shrinking slightly from the lack of water and soil. Nothing a quick sun tan wouldn't fix.
"He forgives you," Rocket grumbled, placing me down gently and keeping an almost paternal eye on me as I began to walk towards the door "and we've got a problem, Quill's missing."
"What!" for the first time Groot watched Gamora lose her cool as she lunged to her feet, hands reaching for her weapons. "What do you mean missing?"
"I mean, he ain't on the ship. Groot said Yondu came around and shoved him in a closet." Rocket replied, now setting down the thing that had awoken Gamora and picking up Peter's location device.
"We must find them at once, where is Drax?" she paused, then glared about the room and continued "and what became of Nebula?"
"Your plan worked almost flawlessly, believe it or not. I do take responsibility for that bomb by the way so don't even start. Drax is hogtying up our little prisoner, and" Rocket smacked the device hard into his palm, and the blue light came to life, "our dear Star-Lord is right this way."
GOTG
Being able to walk again of my own free will was so invigorating, the sun shining being able to feel the earth once again, it was almost enough to help me forget why we were out here. Almost.
The others were all tense and, disturbingly for Rocket, silent.
I waited only long enough for our ship to fade into the distance to once again demand "I am Groot!"
Rocket sighed, keeping his eyes on his borrowed device before finally saying "Alright already, no need to get testy. We found Nebula at a bar, and Gamora came up with a complicatedly stupid plan worthy of our idiotic leader. The two of them have a bunch of cybernetics running through them, you know that."
"I am Groot"
"Right yeah, and so Gamora had me build something to turn them off. It's called an EMP, shuts down all electricity. So me Gamora, and her sister all got to take an involuntary dirt nap. Drax hogtied our next pay day, I woke up and shook it off. Gamora and Nebula needed a bit of a reboot to get started, and now your all caught up."
"I am Groot!"
"Well no, obviously we didn't see any of the Ravagers other wise we wouldn't have been so damned surprised to find out they'd been on our damn ship." Rocket grumbled, his fists clenching tightly enough on the controls that the image in front of them began to blur a bit. "Frag," he hissed, smacking it with his paw again to clear that up.
"I am Groot."
"Of course I don't blame myself, don't be daft! I blame those bloody thieves for taking our damned thief." Rocket gave the controls one more good smack and we were back on track again.
"How much farther Rocket?" Gamora called from the back of our group.
"Not long now," he called back "this thing says Quill's signature is right in this area, which means that-" Rocket stopped midway through both his speech and step, forcing him to falter and land on all fours, dropping the device, and bringing the rest of us up short.
We had just come through a bit of a clearing, and all current eyes had landed on one thing. Peter's jacket, laying atop what could only be a corpse beneath it.
GOTG
Peter awoke back on the Ravagers ship, something he had dreaded from the moment he'd escaped it. He had only lived by the skin of his teeth the last time he and Gamora had been here, now how was he supposed to get out with a bloody hole in his side?
He groaned, wanting to smack his head against something, but managed to avoid doing that and acknowledging that it would do more harm then good. Instead, he began to gently lift himself into a sitting position, and then gaped wide eyed at his actual location. He was not in one of the cells, or the many a torture chambers aboard this vessel. He just so happened to be in the one lonely, never used but for the most dire of circumstances med bay.
The only reason he was sure that he was on the Ravager home ship instead of having lost his mind was the smell. He liked to think his brain wouldn't have retained such an awful stank.
Managing to sit up all the way with only a few muffled groans, he looked around himself more properly. One, he was not tied down, nor it seemed in any way restrained. Two, his bandages were no longer on him, and a quick look at his torso showed that he had been more cleanly stitched then Gamora and her sowing kit ever could. Those were medical sutures. Plus, the heat that had been coming off of the funny colored scar was no longer present, the infection had been staved off.
Yondu had saved his life again. What on Earth was he going to owe his pseudo-dad this time.
The answer came in the form of a body bag.
The lead Ravager himself made his appearance by sauntering into this room as if he owned the place, which yeah he technically did. "Bout time you woke up, ya bum." Was his loving greeting.
"Hello your self," I grumbled back, "now where's my shirt."
"Oh well I am so sorry we didn't have the time to pack up your shit before bringing you over, ya little ingrate" Yondu grumbled, "I did however manage to snag your favorite toy."
He had that sickening look plastered on his face, that meant I was really not going to like what ever came next. He reached inside of his coat pocket and tossed it at my head to fast for me to catch a glimpse of what my reflexes were grabbing.
My thumb landed on the play button as I caught my Walkman in hand, and Cherry Bomb began playing loudly from the headphones that were still attached. I blinked spastically down at my prized possession for a moment, still unable to believe Rocket had fixed it up to brand new, then clutched it tightly to my chest giving Yondu the ugliest look I could muster.
My brain was finally catching up with the rest of the world, and something wasn't sitting right. "Where are my friends?"
"Those saps are just fine, boy" he said sounding rather unconcerned as he looked on with disinterest at his nails "you know a little appreciation wouldn't kill you. After all I was the one who got you help instead of going on a bounty hunt."
"Yeah, by kidnapping me" I grumbled, turning off my music and wrapping the headphones more securely around it before tucking it into my waistline.
"And why did my cut get infect Yondu? You would never be able to collect on my never ending debt if you killed me." I snapped, ignoring the fact that he was right. I knew all of my teammates had a thing against hospitals for there own reason, hell so did I.
"Oh you don't have to worry about that no more boy. I took care of that." I couldn't help but tense up at that. What if, somewhere in Yondu's twisted brain, he perceived the other Guardians lack of hospital care a problem and took care of them? Yondu had done stranger things like oh, helping to take on an invading army just so Peter would owe the Centurion for the rest of his life. "Just consider that infection a test."
Slowly, he began to ease himself off the table, careful of the hard tug he could feel on his bandaged side. "I'm leaving now Yondu, and I'm going to find my friends. If there hurt, or in any way-"
"Oh hush up will ya" Yondu cut me off, "I did you lot a favor. A thank you wold be nice." I ground my teeth together, Yondu had done something I really wasn't going to like.
I know you guys are all going to hate me and be extremely disappointed at the lack of Groot back-story, and I am sorry about that. I could come up with plenty of material for the others, some I even had to cut out, but I got nothing from Groot. It's kind of hard to accomplish a character back-story on three words. I'm really sorry for this, but I hope you at least kind of enjoyed.