Two Person Job: Rocket and Quill's day.

Altair four turned out to be a surprisingly nice m class whose slow, lazy rotation, extreme permanent tilt at the polls and nearby red giant bathed of the planetary capitol in rose-coloured light for two weeks at a time, broken up with week long nights. Gamora had heard the term "dormitory settlement" applied to commuter towns on the outskirts of cites that practically emptied during the working day as people commuted into the city to work, and filled up again in the evening when people finished work, but the Altairians seemed to have perfected the idea. A glittering band of outlying settlements across the darker side of the planet, were people commuted each day, before returning to the near permanent day of the capitol to work. She checked her final approach vectors, and begun to bring the Milano in, keeping her face neutral as Quill, an appalling backseat driver, stood down the steps from the cockpit and shouted helpful advice.

"So are you sure you don't need me to come up there and program in a landing approach?"

"Peter, I may not fly these things in combat, but I've been making routine and stealth landings since I was fourteen. It's a universal interface, it's common to every ship made or maintained in the Nova Empire for the last forty years. I have this." She said, adjusting the seat back and engaging the landing program. The planetary capitol glittered on the shores of a shallow polar sea that would heat up in the long days and keep the temperature from dropping too low in the week long nights. Even so, the temperature range would be somewhat extreme.

"We'll be arriving at sunset, which takes the equivalent of a full day." She called down as she got up and begun to walk down the steps. " Temperature should be somewhere in the mid to high twenties Universal, but even with the warm costal air it'll drop to below freezing every night, as low as minus fifteen or twenty, depending on the weather."

Quill screwed up his face. "Isn't it kind of spooky that pretty much everyone in the galaxy picked the same temperature scale?"

"No: almost all species are Carbon based and evolved on planets with liquid water, if you count in base ten, you're going to develop a temperature scale that goes from freezing to boiling of water in ten's or hundreds at whatever your atmospheric pressure is. It's an M class, of course it uses the universal scale. Doesn't earth?"

"Earth, yes. America? Hell no. We don't like anything metric. Hell, other than out currency we don't even have anything decimal."

"Why, just… why?"

Quill shrugged. "We kind off figured we had a system that worked, sorta, so we kept it. It's not like we're completely insane, I think the Brits use the same system."

Rocket, who was sitting at the bottom of the stairs fiddling with bomb parts snorted at that as Gamora came down and passed him.

"Yeah, because if two of your crappy little non-planet-spanning countries decide on it, it must be great."

"Well now you mention it, they do use the same names for units as us, but define about half of them differently."

Rocket and Gamora stared. "I'm sorry." Said Gamora "but Peter, is there anyone on your planet who isn't insane to some worrying degree?"

"I dunno. Bigbird, maybe, he seems to have it pretty much worked out. Just does his own thing. The Fonz… President Regan. There are probably others." Said Quill, managing to grab a railing with his hand despite the cast and limp along to the kitchen. "So you gonna pack beachwear or winter clothing?" he asked. Gamora glared at the mention of beachwear, but pushed past him head held high and said, lightly.

"Neither. I'm supposed to be posing as a member of a diplomatic trade delegation." She said, her voice getting increasingly muffled as she descended the steps from the common area to the med-may she used as her quarters "I thought something suitably conservative and formal would be fitting."

"Well, you'd hope at least one of you has clothes that are 'fitting' on some level." Yelled Quill from the top of the stairs, as the sounds of rustling cloth than indicated dressing and undressing were occurring rang up. "You should see what Drax fondly imagines suitable bodyguard garb to look like." Said Quill, standing on tip-toes and trying to sneak a peek down the stairs. Rocket walked past on his way to the fridge and casually shoved Quill in the small of the back without looking up from his bomb, leaving Quill panicking and windmilling his rigidly cast arm to try and keep his balance for a full minute of terrified silence: because if anything would hurt more than falling face first down the steps with three limbs already in casts, it would be Gamora finding out he'd tried to sneak a peek. When he finally steadied himself, he turned and limped over to Rocket, pissed off and mouthing the word Dude?

Rocket glanced up for a second, his face seeming to spell out the phrase So? What are You gonna do about it? And Quill considered this, shrugged to concede the point and slumped back down at the table as Rocket continued to…. Rocket. You know, Quill wasn't sure what it was Rocket was building, but he was gonna go with a guess and say Thermobaric device, because it had been a couple of days since the last one, and he usually made those before lunch. That or a really ugly clock.

"Don't touch that." Said Rocket, without looking up.

"Touch what? Asked Quill, innocently."

"That detonator you're playing with. Put it back because that isn't a toy."

"Technically, anything is a toy if you play with it." Countered Quill, tapping the detonator against the wall mounted holo monitor. Rocket sighed.

"If you drop that this close to the main charge it might go off. And if that goes down your cast, I'm not helping you dig it out. As a general rule, Toys shouldn't be designed to kill you horribly."

"Prrrfff. Shows what you know man. Two words: Lawn. Darts. Aka the pointy skull piercers of death himself. You weren't worth shit unless you had lawn-darts back home. Or a slip and slide. Or moonboots: if it wasn't made of brightly coloured plastic and about to critically endanger your life, it wasn't a toy."

"Herself."

"What?"

"In Xandarian death is female." Said Rocket, adjusting a wire.

"Really? You're not kidding me?"

"Female."

"Huh. Not that I don't believe you Rocket but Hey Gamora!"

*rustle rustle rustle* "Yeah?"

"Is death female?"

There was a long pause.

"Yes."

"You sure?" called Quill.

"Definitely."

"Okay" said Quill, handing back Rocket his detonator. "Just checking." He said, half turning in his seat as he heard Gamora start up the stairs "that's funny because in English…Guh?"

Quill stared.

Gamora was wearing a charcoal-grey double-breasted suit-jacket of the sort favoured by high-ranking female Nova officers, displaying the ribbons of the fictional trade delegation in place of the rank bars, and cut so incredibly severely just being in the same room as it probably violated some laws somewhere. This was combined with a matching charcoal miniskirt, her hair up in an iron-hard bun and a pair of glasses that had clearly been stolen from the sort of librarian or schoolteacher to just lived to sternly yell 'silence' at unsuspecting people, and she'd fitted the combo so well to her waist the ensemble had just reduced quite an important chunk of Quill's brain to pre-pubescent ooze.

Gamora caught Quill's expression and, completely miss-reading it, adjusted her clothing in a way that gave Quill a reason he'd find it difficult to rise from his chair other than three limbs in plaster, and said "You look shocked, you don't think this is too assertive, do you?"

"Gah… No, no. Powerdressing, we have that back home. I think the shoulder-pad look for women was due to come back in 'round about now anyhow. It… it looks good."

Rocket, however, snorted. "Yeah, because when you're in infamous daughter of the mad Titan Thanos absolutely no one will recognise you if you're wearing glasses."

"Quit ruining this for me." Said Quill. "Besides, they may not even notice." He said, with complete honesty.

Rocket snorted. "There is that. Covering the exposed bionics with foundation should fool the casual observer. The concealed dagger as a hairpin is a nice touch." He said, looking over Gamora's clothing rather more phlegmatically. He sniffed, twice. "Ceramic, neurotoxin coated, lacquered sheath, very classy." She smiled.

"That you Rocket, I thought you'd like that. I've gone for a monomolecular garrotte in the left sleeve and a hidden recording device in the glasses as well, just in case."

"Yeah, well, that's a good look for anyone. I'd have a gun or two, but that's just me." Said Rocket.

"Wait, you're wearing a hair pin?" said Quill. Rocket glared at him, disgusted.

"How are you even still alive?"

"Trust me, if you're not feeling he same way about this I am, then I postulate that you're the one who's not truly living old chap."

Rocket snorted. "Frick'in terrans… hey, Quill quit messing with the table! This is delicate work! Ya wanna get blown up?"

Quill tore his eyes away. "What? What did I do?"

"You lifted you side of the table, like, six inches." Rocket complained.

"I don't know what you're talking about!" he said, hurriedly crossing his legs, or at least trying to with them in casts before he caught the look Gamora and Rocket were sharing and realised they were fucking with him again.

"I'm injured! Be nice to me!" he grumbled, tapping the monitor trying to get the intercom up. "You shouldn't gang up on your captain like that. It's probably mutiny or insubordination or one of those other long naval words I couldn't be bothered to learn or some such. Hey Drax? Gamora's good to go, you ready to rock and Roll yet?"

"No. Why? Are the ships lateral stabilizers once more malfunctioning? Could not they be fixed to prevent rolling motions? Probably with some sort of system of Baffles?"

"What? Oh Jeez no, we don't need any more stuff on this ship that's just plain baffling. Just…. Just get ready to leave the ship, okay? Touch-down time in t-minus…. Touchdown t-minus like five minutes. ish. Three to eight. Ten at the most." He said, hanging up.

Quill noticed Gamora looking. "Hey, at least I remembered that I don't need to say time before t-minus."

Gamora shook her head. "It's not that. I'm just a little worried about this mission."

"Why? Nova said it's gonna be a cakewalk. Just putting the frighteners on some stuffed suites." Said Rocket. "It should be like taking switchblades from a baby."

Quill and Gamora started. "Candy." Said Quill after a moment.

"Huh?"

"Candy from a baby. 'Like taking Candy from a baby.'"

"What, really?" asked Rocket, looking up from the bomb. "Seriously?"

Both Quill and Gamora nodded. Rocket frowned and scratched himself with his screwdriver, and then shrugged.

"Huh, I guess you grew up in a different sort of neighbourhood from me. Wait, what? Who's gonna give Candy to a baby? It's a choking risk and they're gonna get fat. No wonder there's so much diabetes about. That's just unsafe."

Quill tuned back to Gamora. "What's your worry?" Gamora shrugged.

"It's like Drax said to Dey: we're no private investigators. Rocket is a good hacker, and I've worked undercover before, but we're that last people an origination like Nova should be sending on an intelligence job like this."

"Okay, granted I'll admit that the last thing anyone could accuse me of is intelligence." started Quill, before Gamora cut him off.

"And it's like Rocket said: I've got a reputation, and I am not proud of it, but I earnt it and it is out there. This planet has a Nova naval station in orbit, Ronan was not happy that the people here let them build it. It was before I was involved with him, but he hit this planet pretty hard, if anyone recognises me they'll know for sure this isn't a trade delegation they've been invited to join."

"Maybe that's the point." Countered Quill. "Nova said we're trying to make these guys panic so they do something stupid Rocket's computer hack can trace. If I was going to scare people, I'd send in a known associate of the guy who attacked their planet. We're supposed to provoke a reaction: shake the tree and see what falls out." Said Quill. He heard an affronted sigh, and glanced sideways. "No offence Groot.

"I am Groot!"

"Yeah but Quill, ya wanna shake the tree, you don't use a wrenching ball." Said Rocket. "The guys at this company might be messing around with intel derived from experimenting on infinity stones. If it's the Sandhurst Files, then it's the same intel that directly got Drax's family killed, and they send us in knowing that he's gonna be involved? On a planet were Gamora might get made on sight and isn't likely to be the flavour of the week? You have to wonder, do they want us to scare them to get the Intel, or are they secretly hoping we start some sort of ruckus so those navy-brats in orbit have an excuse to go in all guns blazing?"

Gamora and Quill considered this. "I doubt it's that bad Rocket." Said Gamora. "I was more concerned that Nova are trying to send some message we're not privy to."

"Like what?" asked Quill.

"Like, 'we have known assassin Gamora and mass murdered Drax the destroyer working for us, and we know where you live'." She said "Is that what we formed this team to be? A naked threat?"

"I'm fine with the naked bit." Said Quill, but he stroked his chin thoughtfully. "But I see your point; it is a little heavy handed. If we are going to act as Nova's attack dog, we ought to be told that's what we're doing."

Gamora sighed. "I know, and if this is a veiled death treat it just seems a little distasteful to be doing this for a measly 20 grand."

Rocket snorted. "Hell, 20 g to tell someone we're psychos and we know where you live? I'd deliver that message for a hot breakfast. But I get your point, we should screw Nova for the last subunit."

"Actually Rocket I'm not sure that was her point-"

"Whatever. But yeah, there's something here we're not being told." He said, tapping the Bomb he was building. "So if you need to get out in a hurry Gamora, just signal me over the coms or stick this into any electrical outlet." He said, handing her what looked like an ordinary Nova empire plug, with no appliance attached. Before Quill could ask what it was, Gamora frowned and said "A Bug?"

"Nope. It was a bug, takes sound, encodes and uses a powerful resistor in the plug to alter the power output of the building to send the info to anyone monitoring it's power usage." He said, looking to Quill before he could bug them with questions. "So you can eavesdrop without having anything that transmits on wireless frequencies 'cause those are too easy to detect. I modified it to send out a distress signal. Even if they block coms, and stop me hacking their internal sensors, you plug that baby in and I can locate your position to within five meters and drop by with the Milano and pick you up."

Gamora turned the device over in her hand "Okay, if you disguise it as a coms or infoglass charger I could probably get it through security. But what if I'm somewhere deep inside the building? You can't fly the Milano through walls."

Rocket grinned, and held up his bomb "Walls? What walls?"

Gamora looked disgusted, but still kept the charger, waving it at Rocket. "Okay, but as a last ditch, got it?"

"Last ditch sounds good to me." Said Quill. "This is still supposed to be an easy job, no point in getting all paranoid and blowing the place up on the off chance there is something odd going on we ain't seen yet."

"Yeah well hummie, just 'caus you're paranoid don't mean there not out to get you. I note that Dey still hasn't answered our request for info on known side effects of infinity stones. Probably trying to buy enough time to build some sorta lab so they can study us in and see if we're gonna grow balls out or ears or some shit. " said Rocket, picking up his containment-sphere ball and turning it from side to side in his hand, scowling.

"I am Groot."

"I am not projecting!"

"Well given no-one really knows what infinity stones do outside of disintegrate people I wouldn't hold out too much hope for intel there anyways." Said Quill, as the sound of Drax stomping up the stairs from the observation area pulled them away from that conversation.

"So did Drax go for that suit I picked for him?" asked Gamora. "The low profile armour in the jacket could come in handy."

"Sort of." Said Quill.

"Sort of?" asked Gamora. "He's either in the suit or he's not I don't see how-" Gamora paused. "Don't tell me-"

"Do not tell you what? What information is this Gamora must not know?" asked Drax, walking up to the top of the stairs wearing the pants and shoes form the suit but, predictably, not the shirt or jacket. Rather than concealing his knifes he was wearing both openly.

Gamora pinched the bridge of her nose. "Never mind Drax. Low profile armour is overrated anyway." The proximity alarm begun to sound. She turned to Quill. "We're coming in to land now at their private pad. Take the opportunity to scout the facility from that air, take as many scanner readings as you can and compare them to the schematics that Nova gave us on the EIR headquarters, then move off to the main starport and wait there. You'll have good cover and an open approach back to EIR if you need to."

"Good luck." Said Quill. Gamora smiled briefly and wished him luck too, before turning to Rocket.

"You have their computer fixed?"

"They can't do a thing without me being over it like Quill on free food. We're good."

"Good. Don't let him drink on his meds."

"Wait, was that me or Rocket you were talking to?" asked Quill, offended. "We're responsible adults, when no other option presents itself."

"I was talking to Groot. Don't let him drink either Groot." She said, before turning back top Quill and raising an eyebrow. "Didn't you learn anything the last time I left you alone with Rocket and Alcohol?"

"Yep: Rocket's dick can't point down." said Quill, cheerfully. He noticed the shocked look he got from everyone. "What, it can't. He's got like a little sheath thing, he can't even use a urinal normally."

Gamora pinched the bridge of her nose, and Rocket turned to Quill and responded, deadpan. "I hate you. So much."

"What, oh come on that was funny. Yeah, I know what you meant Gamora and it's not like we'll end up invading another giant severed head: we already have one thanks to my masterful strategical planning and- owww! Owww OWWW! What?! Stop hitting me with your ball Rascal racoon! No fair!"

"Just try to do something constructive while we're out." She said, taking an info glass and adjusting her clothing in the reflection to make sure she looks sufficiently solemn and serious. "Cleaning would not go amiss." She said, walking out.

"Miss you too!" called Quill, starting the sensor sweep from a wall panel as Rocket scampered up to the cockpit to handle the final stage of the landing, there was the gentlest of bumps as the Milano touched down, and Rocket clambered back down the stairs to open the pressure seals for the lower airlock.

Quill and Rocket watched as Drax and Gamora walked down to the lower airlock for their exit. After a moment they both turned to each other, and regarded their situation.

"Beer?"

"You read my mind Quill."

"I am Groot."

"What? He says Gamora removed all the booze from the fridge."

"Huh. So out of interest, those food caches you have all over the ship-"

Rocket turned back to the cockpit to take The Milano in and park her and wait for Gamora and Drax to finish. As he did, he punched the wall next to him. The panel flopped open to reveal a six pack and chemical crush-to-activate cold compress.

Quill nodded, seriously. "Constructive. Sure. How hard could that be?"

One hour later.

"Bored. Bored bored bored bored boooooorrrrred!" sung Quill, angling the sling so that he could change channels on the holo with his one limb that wasn't in a cast.

Rocket was curled up on his workbench: his fractured ribs wouldn't allow him to climb to his hammock as usual and he'd responded by stealing all the towels on the Milano and building a nest considerably closer to the ground (He'd put glass fibre in Quill's cast for daring to suggest he get a cardboard box), and was currently staring at the wall and making mental lists of all the places on the ship he could hide the body of an idiotic 30 something man-child. He'd got into high double figures.

I mean it's easy; you'd just need to get him in small enough lumps.

On the basis that at least one of them needed to be able to fly the ship if Gamora needed a quick getaway, and on the basis that Quill could do many things one-handed but operate the helm wasn't one of them, Rocket had given Quill all of the beer, in the vain hope it would shut him up. The practical upshot of which was that he now had a noisy and obnoxious drunken terran on his hands, or at least a nosier and more obnoxious terran, who clearly wasn't mentally prepared for the enforced inactivity that came with having two broken legs. Also, he was having difficulty sleeping as Groot's growth spurts were making him more active than usual, and given he formed the headrest of Rocket's temporary bunk his fidgeting was less than conducive to a good night's rest.

Good sundown's rest on this dirt ball I guess. Like I need my frickin' circadian rhythm to be any more fucked up. He thought, trying to ignore the way he could feel bone start to grow over and around the traceries of polymer and titanium that held his ribs in shape.

"Bored bored bored bored boooooorrrrred!"

"Oh will you just shuuuuuuuut up!" yelled Rocket, sitting up fast and instantly regretting it as his ribs flared into agony. "You've been back on the ship one day and you are already the most annoying thing in the universe! I've had ear-mites that were less irritating! I swear by Groot Quill, if you don't shut your frickin' hole I'll put a new one in ya!" he yelled, inaccurately throwing his ball, his aim a little off due to his injuries. Quill saw the throw and flinched, nearly falling off his seat due to his casts.

"Woah! Sorry dude, I didn't know you were sleeping, just thought you were ignoring me. Sorry it's just being injured sucks. Like, really, really badly."

Rocket muttered and grumbled and bitched to himself as he scrubbed at his face with his paws, before walking over to Quill scratching at his itchy cheat-wound with one paw as he walked.

"Well, you're not frickin' wrong there Quill. I can't climb, I can't lift my gun without it hurting' real bad. Can't lie on my side, my front, my back. Hurts when I breathe, hurts when I take a crap and that frickin' arrow wound of Yondu's won't stop itchin'." He said, grabbing a cup of hot caffeine from the dispenser and sitting down opposite from Quill.

"Oh, you have the itchy do you Cheeseburglar eyes? Some bastard stuffed glass fibre down my casts and I've got like, two stylus, a few chopsticks and a wad of gum stuck down there already. My legs hurt all the time, I can't sleep on my side because there's like, this bolt that holds the 3D printed cast in place and it pokes me in the thigh if I turn on my side, I can't walk properly, and I have to shit with the door open because I can't unbend my legs enough to fit in the cubical! My shoulder still really, really hurts and makes a weird clicking noise when I try to lift it. Not to mention it takes, like, ten years to undo my fly like this. I have one of these beers, I need to start planning my trip to the head before I pop the ring pull!"

"Plus you're starting to smell worse than usual. You do realise that you can get the 3D casts wet, right? You're allowed to shower."

"I am showering! I just can't bend my arms enough to apply deodorant normally, and when I tried to do it at an arm's length I sprayed my eye, dropped the can and gave up. I'm just saying, you think you have it bad? Try falling four times your height onto concrete and then having a fridge dropped on you."

"Yeah well, try having some fat, stupid terran dropped on you when you're trying to help him."

"I am not fat." Grumbled Quill, a schoolboy error, because if Rocket had any talents besides machinery, theft and violence, it was zeroing in on people's weaknesses just like that.

"You weigh a frickin' ton. You're a space-wale."

"Hey, I worked very hard to get in shape!"

"'Tuber' isn't a body shape, butterbutt. Worked hard? So you used to be fat? I bet you used to be fat. All the crap you eat, you smell like you ought to be fat."

"Hey!" said Quill, looking angry. "Okay so I'll concede that I might have had a little puppy fat when I was younger, but I realised that wasn't the way I wanted to be and I worked through it."

"Bet you only lost the weight 'cause people laughed at you."

"Okay, well so there was that time at the beach, people did comment on my swimsuit, but I made a decision based on the fact that I was getting chased by the cops a lot and needed to outrun them without panting or falling over all the time."

"Bet you cheated. Lipo? You're too lazy to work out."

"Hey, I lot the weight the usual way: I cried off like 40 pounds and the rest of it was just jogging and feeling really hungry all of the time."

"Yeah, whatever fatty."

"Be nice to me, I'm injured." Muttered Quill, pulling a deathstick carton out from under the table and lighting up with a shaking hand. Rocket watched him for a long time until Quill noticed.

"What?"

"I thought Gamora made you get rid of all of those after Fairport?"

"Did she?" asked Quill innocently.

"Let me re-phrase. I have an eidetic memory. Gamora made you get rid of all of those after Fairport. On pain of pain."

"Yeah well, it's just the one carton I held onto, not even sure why and I just felt like one. One. It's not like this is going to become a thing. They don't cause cancer and the risk of suddenly getting narcolepsy or Priapism or sudden unexplained organ failure is ridiculously low, like, one in five or something. I just… just." Quill noticed Rocket watching his cast arm bouncing up and down off the table top. He wasn't telling it to do that. He hid it underneath the table.

"I just felt like I needed to take the edge of man! I'm going stir crazy. I dunno what it is. I think, I think that being stuck here and so helpless while Gamora and Drax are out there makes me feel so awful. I can't sleep, I'm irritable, I feel like someone replaced the back of my eyeballs with carpeting and it just sucks Rocket and I don't what it is!"

"Uh Hu? And, yanno, the fact you've just spent a week in a military hospital hooked up to a goddam Morphine drip and have suddenly gone cold Lizard hasn't got anything to do with it?"

Quill looked panicked. "No. Why, do you think that's it?"

"Geeze Starlord I don't know. You got wrecked by Yondu and we plugged you full of smart morphine and the day you come off you happen to start smoking? Quill, look at the empty beer cans. You're pretty much one of those incredibly annoying social drinkers who occasionally goes overboard and gives alcohol a bad name that gets blamed on committed antisocial drinkers like me, but it's mid-morning and you've blazed thought that six pack like it wasn't there and you've got the shakes. Yeah, Quill, I'd say it's that."

"Awww fuck. I can't be a junky: I can't let you guys down, Gamora would kill me, and I could never afford that sort of lavish dying-in-an-alleyway crackhouse lifestyle.

"Yeah, I mean we'd have to get the ship way cleaner for a start." Said Rocket. "You'll be fine: all the meds are under lock and kea, and we only have smart Morphine on ship: you inject that and you're not hurt, it won't detach from the nanites and you'll piss it right back out. You'd have to break a bone first if you tried to shoot up."

"It'd save time: if anyone caught me doing something that dumb when I'm meant to be their captain then they've a right to break my spine." Said Quill, looking about as low as Rocket had ever seen him look. "Fuck I hope this passes, I don't need this shit on top of everything else."

He looked at Quill without much visible sympathy, but then said, a little more gruffly than needs be. "Well don't worry: I've seen enough Mercs' get through being wounded and coming off Morphine before: I'll look after you."

"Thanks Rocket I really appreciate that-"

"By which I mean if you get the diarrhoea and vomiting that tends to kick in at around the twenty- four to thirty-six hour point, I'm welding you in the head until it's all out of your system and filming it in case I ever need to blackmail you. But I like you, so I'll cut some holes in the door for your legs and sell you toilet paper at a thousand units a roll."

"You're a true friend Rocket, you know that?" said Quill in tones of leaden sarcasm.

"Tell me it's not what you'd do if the situation was reversed, and if you make it so believe you I might cut the price to nine-fifty."

"Meh, I make no promises. Besides, I think the Nova Corp. were pretty good and weaning me off it in the hospital ship: they disabled the morphine button my by bed on, like, day two. "

"Okay. So you won't be wanting these then?" said Rocket, producing a carton of two hundred death sticks and laying it on the table.

Quill stared. "Where did you-"

"Same bar you did, remember? Yours's for only eight hundred."

"What? Dude that's four units a stick, forget it." Said Quill, sucking on smoke angrily.

"Suit yourself. If you don't buy by the time you finish that smoke, it doubles. And doubles again tomorrow." Rocket watched Quill face for a long moment "How many have you got left in that c-"

"Four. Counting the one I'm smoking now. I'm not buying it. That's basically theft."

"Meh, actually it's more a sort of extortion."

"You'll just tell Gamora and she'll bin them." Said Quill, suspiciously.

"Quill, on my honour as a thief, I will not tell Gamora." He put a furry little paw over the mid-section of his body glove, possibly somewhere in the zip-code of a heart. "You have my word."

Quill regarded the 200 sticks for a long time.

"Seven fifty."

"A thousand."

"Done." Said Quill, handing over his credit slip with indecent haste.

"You have been." Said Rocket, pressing a thumb to it to complete the transfer.

"Groot!" yelled Rocket.

"I am Groot?"

"Quill's smoking deathsticks! If Gamora left you any instructions about that, now's the time!"

"Oh you little ring-tailed bastard! I- no Groot no get off…. Ahhhhh! Vines don't go there Evil-dead! Listen Groot we can cut a deal just… No!" Quill wailed, as Groot wrenched the carton out of his one good hand and ran off to the head, followed a few seconds later by the sound of very expensive flushing. Quill turned back and glared.

Rocket leaned back and placed his paws behind his head. "Hey, I didn't tell Gamora." He eyed Quill lazily.

"You think you were the only one here bored out of his mind? I gotta find something fun to do."

Quill glared. "Gamora said we were supposed to find something constructive."

"Hey, I'm open to idea's if you have any."

Many Hours Later.

"Got any fours?" asked Quill, glaring at his hand.

"Go fish."

"Dangit. I only just taught you this and you keep winning." Said Quill drawing a card. A seven. That made three in his hand.

"Got any sevens?" asked Rocket. Quill swore.

"I know you're cheating Rocket. I just don't know how you're cheating."

"I handed you the deck and you shuffled where I could see them, knowing full well what my memory is like. That and scent marking the cards and the fact that this game requires the other player to be honest when asked if he has certain cards in his hand… Four sevens, that makes seven out of thirteen books to me. I win."

"Double or Quits?" asked Quill.

"What? You're gonna bet me two-trillion units and four kidneys?"

"I'm good for it. Put it on the ship maintenance tab." Rocket frowned, but begun to shuffle.

Quill watched his eyes, and very casually said. "You shuffle well. You practice much?"

"Cards? No. Nimble paws. Little practice with sleight of hand. Wallets mostly."

"Oh. No, wondered if you played a lot, is all. You know, when you were younger."

"What, before this incredibly tedious afternoon started? No."

Quill felt more than heard the hostility creak into place when he tried to hint at Rockets past, so he just went full in and said.

"Well I guess you probably didn't have much time for games when you were younger."

Rocket spat. "Games? Sure. Mazes, puzzles, that thing where you have to get the tower of rings from one peg to the next in the minimum number of moves, anything that built up hand eye coordination or tested logic or memory. I got good. I got real good. You tend to if there's someone watching whose entire job is to hurt you if you don't. Fuck games."

Quill sat back, a little shocked both by another horrible glimpse into Rockets past, but more by the fact he had actually managed to get him to talk about it, even a little.

"Wow, or sorry dude I didn't know-"

"That's 'cause I don't like to talk about it. And you owe me a set of kidneys. We playing cards or what?"

"Where exactly did they-"

"Go fish, Quill.

"Come on I'm just trying to-"

Rocket stood up and walked away, pouring his cards out of his hand as he did.

"Go fucking fish."

As he walked away from Quill, the ship's com begun to ping, on the secure channel.

Quill and Rocket shared a look, and they were both professional enough to forget what had just happened and instantly get their asses into gear. Rocket ran to a computer terminal to run a check on the call and got the ship powered up in case it was something major, and Quill answered it on the holo-screen.

It was Dey, looking a little flustered.

"Hey, Starlord. Our guys in orbit over you just picked up a massive energy spike from the EIR facility. Was that you guys?"

"No, I don't think so. Rocket?"

"Sure as hell wasn't us. Holy fuckballs that's huge. Their power output just skyrocketed. Hey, … that building is wired for three-phase! That's not on the schematics we were given!"

"So?" asked Dey and Quill together, not engineers.

"So, domestic power is two phase. The place is registered as an office and warehouse only, standard corporate HQ cubical farm with some delivery space. You only use three phase if you're welding or need to spin something at really high speeds, give it an extra lick of rotary power per phase."

Dey cottoned on. "Centrifuges?"

"Yeah, I'd guess. Too small a space for an enrichment one, I'd guess a big bank of medical centrifuges… some fucker in there has built a fucking lab, and it just went into overdrive."

"What!? You sure?" asked Quill, mortified. Rocket glanced up.

"Am I sure? Yeah. Trust me."

Quill looked to Dey, angry. "Okay bigshot, what about this job weren't we being told!"

"Nothing, the job was exactly as we discussed, go in, and try and rattle them a bit!"

"Oh yeah, then why the hell use us, we ain't no detectives!" snarled Rocket.

"This is a neutral planet here! We've got no authority, but we thought that reminding them that we have a known association with someone like Gamora would scare them into playing ball! We didn't even really need to find out what they were doing that urgently, we just, shoot, just wanted to remind them that we know where they live!"

Rocket and Quill shared a glance. "Hot breakfast?" asked Quill, sarcastically. Rocket snorted.

"Huh?" asked Dey.

"What he means is our price just doubled." Said Rocket, frantically scanning the screen, trying to find out what on Halfworld was going on.

"More if anyone is hurt!" snarled Quill, practically hopping with impotent rage.

Dey nodded, looking increasingly stressed. "Done, Nova prime wants to know if what's happening is related to you guys, and if it's a threat to the Nova naval base ASAP. Find out what's going on and we'll triple the cash, no questions asked. Can you call your team? Ask them for intel, or at the very least just warn them?"

Quill nodded, and fumbled for his com.

"I tried that." Said Rocket. "Gamora is still there, but I can't get a good fix on where, exactly. They must have a signal jammer, or something from that lab is naturally interfering. No signal to speak of, can't place a call. Calling Drax, but he's not answering. Trying to get a trace… no. that can't be right!"

"What can't?" asked Quill. Rocket complained.

"It doesn't make any sense. According to the cell network, we're right on top of him!"

Both Quill and Rocket jumped when the lower airlock slammed open (although Quill was at least 12% sure that the girly shriek wasn't from him) and Drax pulled himself up the steps from it, staggered, and fell down heavily. He was bleeding, in a bad shape, and very much alone.

Rocket ran to him (Quill hobbled) and began to bombard him with Questions of the "Drax buddy, are you okay?" Type as he checked his wounds, and Quill turned angrily and shouted at the scree.

"A nice safe job! That was the pitch! What the hell weren't you telling us? I swear Dey if something's happed to Gamora, then this is on you and I'm gonna fly this ship back to Xandar and I'm gonna shove that Infinity Stone so far up Nova Prime's ass she'll-" he felt an hand on his wrist.

"Drax? Drax buddy?" he said. "What did those idiots get you mixed up with?"

Drax slowly focused his eye on the man whose wrist he was holding, and, painfully, shook his head.

"Peter Quill. I… I believe you are blaming Denarian Dey for no just reason. This… this is my fault."

Awesome Mix Tape Vol2: One (is the loneliest number) Three Dog Night.

Coming soon: Two person Job; Drax's day.