"I'm an alligator, I'm a mama-papa coming for you."
As they had approached Knowhere for the very first time, the awe that Peter Quill had felt witnessing the severed head of an immeasurably ancient and powerful being used as a mining colony and hive of scum and villainy had been tinged with the sadness that never again would he get to hear 'Moonage Daydream' with such appropriately otherworldly visuals. That fact was rather being driven home now, as he strode down the tunnels of the asteroid warehouse, the uniform smooth bored rock a bland companion to the voice of David Bowie. Well, if you wanted to get technical about it, the voice of Ziggy Stardust.
"I'm the space invader, I'll be a rock 'n' rollin' bitch for you."
His eyes flicked down to the scanner in his hand. 100 metres to the gap in the floorplan.
"Keep your mouth shut, you're squawking like a pink monkey bird,
And I'm busting up my brains for the words"
Most people were dismissive of thievery. They viewed it, and those adept at it, with contempt. In some ways this was understandable, since no-one likes having their possessions taken from them, and certainly there were too many thieves who spent their time hitting the easy marks, a category that often overlapped with those who couldn't afford to lose what they had. However, if you took a step back and viewed the whole thing objectively, you could appreciate everything involved in the art of theft, the skill and the knowledge it took to perform. For example, the untrained eye would have looked at the drawn layout of this facility and ignored the patch of unused space on the central ring, 2nd floor. They would have assumed it was an area the designer had left unused for one reason or the other.
"Keep your 'lectric eye on me, babe.
Put your ray gun to my head.
Press your space face close to mine, love."
Rule 1 of not having your stuff stolen: don't leave it lying around in the open. Lock it up, the more securely, the better. What was the most secure place to store something? It was not, as he had answered when asked this by Yondu all those years ago when he had begun training him to become a Ravager, an electrified vault with a scorpion inside it (that had earned him a clip round the ear, though Peter suspected that was mostly because Yondu hadn't known what a scorpion was).
"Freak out in a moonage daydream, oh yeah!"
The most secure storage is where people don't even realise there's anything being stored. Like, say, a room that doesn't exist on any maps, three floors away from an ostentatiously large vault.
"Don't fake it baby, lay the real thing on me.
The church of man, love,
Is such a holy place to be."
Quill stopped in front of what the floorplan stubbornly insisted was dense solid rock. He passed the scanner over the area, grinning as the readings confirmed his suspicions: several inches of rock, then 2 feet of metal. He stuffed the device in his knapsack and began to feel about the wall, looking for the hidden lock.
"Make me baby, make me know you really care.
Make me jump into the air."
Bingo. His finger found a suitably sized nook (or was that a cranny? He never could figure the difference between the two.) and by feel depressed a trigger, the rock face sliding away seamlessly, revealing a vault door that typified the fine balancing required when designing something that needed to be as secure as possible while remaining practically invisible. It was top of the line, a true credit to those responsible for its creation... and the sort of thing he could crack in his sleep. Star-Lord strikes again he thought, with a great deal of satisfaction.
"Keep your 'lectric eye on me, babe.
Put your ray gun to my head.
Press your space face close to mine, love."
Quill knelt down, bringing himself eye-level with the primary mechanisms as he retrieved his tools. Settling himself in comfortably, he cracked his knuckles, then set to work.
"Freak out in a moonage daydream, oh yeah!"
As the song slipped into an interlude of guitar and some other instrument he'd never quite identified (some kind of messed up keyboard, perhaps?), the treacherous little voice in the back of his head that had been bugging him the last day or so piped up again. How are you going to explain this to your friends? He gave his head a little shake, as though trying to throw off some buzzing insect. It wasn't going to be that big a deal. There was plenty enough other stuff here that they could grab as well. Hell, there was enough weaponry here to give them a serious leg up on that whole killing Thanos thing that Drax had his heart set on. They'd understand.
"Keep your 'lectric eye on me, babe.
Put your ray gun to my head.
Press your space face close to mine, love."
The voice would not be dissuaded. If they're sure to understand, why not be honest with them in the first place? Because they would have insisted on something easier, or tell him his sources were wrong, or any number of other nitpicky little reasons.
"Freak out in a moonage daydream, oh..."
Why should he feel guilty? It wasn't like he'd lied, not really. They were hurting for units, and the work offers hadn't exactly been flooding in. He'd spent a long time formulating the plan, gathering as much information as he covertly could ever since he'd discovered what Aarzan had stashed away. Just because he hadn't told them what he personally was after...
"Keep your 'lectric eye on me, babe.
Put your ray gun... to my head.
Press your space face close to mine, love."
The voice offered its retort. What was it your mother always said about lying by omission? Oh that was low! Playing the mother card? What a bullshit move, even for himself.
"Freak out in a moonage daydream, oh yeah."
Quill was spared from having a full blown argument with his psyche when the lock opened with a reverberating clunk that vibrated up his arm. Smiling at a job well done, he put away his tools, standing once more and pulling the door open.
"Freak out."
Quill stepped inside the brightly lit room, only to be immediately perplexed. All that stood within were databanks, lights blinking as they filled the room with a faint air of buzzing static. This didn't make any sense. His sources had been impeccable!
"Far out."
His eyes darted about the room, but there was was no extra storage space, no hidden switches to throw to reveal the cornucopia he'd been led to expect. Just a whole lot of computers... and a holo-projector in the floor.
"In out."
With a deep sense of foreboding, Quill removed his headphones as the projector flickered to life...
There was something faintly absurd about the juxtaposition of the animals' soft lowing and the tension that otherwise filled the air, Gamora reflected, stilling herself to ensure she did not contribute anymore to the escalation of the situation than she already had by simply stating the obvious.
"We. Are. Not. Leaving. Them." Rocket glowered up at her, emphasising each word as his lips pulled back into a snarl that revealed far more sharp little teeth than she had ever wanted to see. Worse than the teeth were his eyes though, filled with the sort of manic intensity she'd only seen in those fuelled by their own sense of righteous anger. Ronan's, she realised; they're just like Ronan's. "The guns and the money can fricking burn for all I care, we're taking them."
"Rocket, this isn't about money. We don't have the space; not on The Milano, not on the cargo shuttle." Trying to use logic against someone driven by blind emotion was not a particularly great tactic, but the alternative did not seem any better given Rocket's nigh-on pathological dislike for sympathy. If this turned into a fight she couldn't guarantee she'd be able to win without at least severely injuring him, which would then almost certainly ensure a fight against Groot. That was an easier prospect physically, if just because he wasn't anywhere near as quick and nimble, but an even worse one emotionally.
And now I'm mentally evaluating how to assault my friends, she noted. Thank you so much for putting me in this situation, Peter.
"There's furniture and excess supplies and all kinds of useless crap we can toss." Rocket replied, dismissing facts with a frantic wave of a paw.
"We could strip both ships bare and there still wouldn't be enough room, and that's not even bringing up that the oxygen recyclers would burn out probably a little while before we all starved to death." Gamora sighed. She was telling him what he surely already knew given his aptitude for mechanics. He had simply reached the point where reality seemed completely malleable because he was just that damn angry. Which meant she was going to have to try the alternative argument...
"Look, Rocket, I understand that you want to help them. I understand that you're upset..."
His retort was just as rapid and delivered with just as much seething venom as she'd expected. "Oh you understand? Well that's just fricking perfect, isn't it? I guess I can just stop worrying about everything because you understand! Why don't you just go ahead and dazzle me with just how much understanding you have about me? Don't hold back; I could use a good laugh!"
"I hear you at night."
Silence took over in a heartbeat. Even the animals fell silent, moving away from them both, as though sensing that violence was imminent. Gamora could swear that Rocket was actually vibrating with anger. She tried as subtly as possible to shift her body to a position to receive an attack as he spoke, his voice quiet and almost eerie in its calmness.
"I don't know what you're talking about." He was offering her a way out of the conversation, and she wanted to take it, but she knew she had to press on.
"I don't sleep, Rocket; one of the... modifications Thanos had made to me. That's why I take the night watch in the cockpit. That's why I hear you in your sleep." She didn't elaborate; she didn't need to. The noise had confused her at first, the muffling of plating and bulkheads distorting sound even for her enhanced senses. She had followed it through the dark stillness of the night-cycled Milano to its source: Rocket's door. It was then she'd understood what she'd heard. He'd been screaming in his sleep. Not just screaming, in truth; there had been quieter noises, somehow worse; whimpering cries and pleas to stop. Pleas that were never answered.
She gestured to the milling herd "They're meant for whoever did this to you, aren't they?" There was a moment, then Rocket nodded, no longer looking at her, unable to meet her gaze. In the short time she'd known him, Gamora had never seen him look so small, all his fire extinguished. She found herself wishing she could find every single person involved in his creation and tear them apart with her bare hands.
"I am Groot?"
They both turned around to see Groot staring at them and the assembled animals with bewilderment, a crate larger than himself in his hands, two more being pulled behind him by vines growing from his back. His expression changed the instant he saw the look in Rocket's eyes. The tree dropped the crates and hurried over to his friend, attempting to envelop him in a hug. Gamora found herself somewhat relieved as Rocket immediately started squirming him way out of the grip, paws flailing to fend off the affection like he was allergic.
"Knock it off, will ya? I'm alright, you idiot." There was a loving tone to the admonishment.
"I am... Groot?" Groot gave Gamora an appraising look, eyes narrowing.
"It's not her fault, Groot. Found out all these guys are supposed to be shipped to those pricks on Halfworld." Gamora could feel the tension drain from both the air and her body. Rocket seemed to have calmed down, insofar as he could ever actually be called calm. The mention of Halfworld, conversely, caused Groot to give a splintery snarl, his bark spiking up somewhat.
"I am Groot!"
"Of course we're not going to let that happen! Just gotta figure out how to get them out of here..." Rocket began to cast his eyes about the expanse of the warehouse, as though expecting some large cargo transport to suddenly materialise into view. Gamora groaned inwardly, realising that Rocket was no nearer to realising the impossibility of his desires. She was about to vocalise this once again when a klaxon spring into loud, insistent life. Confused, she looked at Rocket.
"I rigged the facility proximity sensors into the central alarm system." He explained, concern crossing his face as the animals began to scatter in panic. "Looks like we're about to have company."
Quill's research had been thorough enough that he instantly recognised the holographic figure before him as that of Aarzan the Facilitator. Being Xandarian, he looked close enough to human to pass, especially if the humans in question were smug rich assholes.
"Hello Mr Quill; though I suppose given you're here on business I should call you Star-Lord." spoke the projection, its voice radiating polite condescension. "As you've by now no doubt realised, I'm afraid you have been misled as to the exact nature of my private archive. I apologise for the deception, but I did need to ensure that our meeting was at a place of my choosing. As we speak, a rather large group of armed men and myself are coming to collect you. If you would be so kind as to return to the central docking area to meet us, I'd be awfully grateful."
Pissed off, Quill gave the figure the finger "Yeah, because that's going to happen, motherfu..."
"Having given you the space for a colourful and doubtless obscene response," the recording continued, "I should point out that if you do not do so, we will destroy your vessel and kill anyone who has accompanied you on this venture. I look forward to meeting you in person shortly."
The projector shut down, leaving Quill to fume in private, his only accompaniment the smug sound of the voice in the back of his head. Told you so, dumbass.