InsaneJournal

Who: Peter Quill, Drax, Rocket, Groot
What: Rocket tracks down the other half of his crew.
When: Recently.
Rating/Notes: Green. Hover over the 'I am Groots' for translation.

Groot was following his dad down a quiet hallway in a strange building, on a strange planet. He didn't like having to freeze up and pretend he couldn't move when people stared at him. Someone said he was a cute statue. What a loser.

When his dad came to a stop in front of a door, Groot stopped behind him, his ever present game clutched in his wooden fingers, knobby thumbs pressing the buttons. He supposed he should be more worried than he was about why they were there, but if dad had an agenda, Groot was going to follow him just like the predecessor he sprouted from once did.

Inside the apartment the Guardians were living in, Drax the Destroyer was watching Cooking Channel, and enjoying Terran snack products. He discovered Cheez-its, the 'hot and spicy' variety. His head was tipped back as he dumped the neon orange cheese dust at the bottom of the container into his wide open mouth. Next on his agenda? Corn Nuts and more Pringles, while trying to figure out what a Couch Potato was...since he was told he was becoming one.

Rocket had bones to pick. Many bones. Big bones. All the bones. It was one thing for him to leave somebody else behind in space but quite another for him and Groot to be left with their asses hanging out in the middle of deep space. It wasn’t cool, certainly was not funny, and he was pissed.

He was stalking as angrily and intimidatingly as he could which was actually quite intimidating even though here on Terra he was known as an adorable woodland sometimes trash stealing creature until he and Groot came to a stop outside of the door that housed the idiots formally known as Guardians of the Galaxy.

The polite thing to do was to knock but Rocket had never been accused of being polite and right now he was angry so any and all concept he had of manners had gone right out the window right along any chance of tempering his more impulsive nature. He paused at the door, tipped his head and narrowed his eyes, eyeing it up and pinpointing the exact points that would need to be hit to get it off its hinges.

Ha, shoddy Terran craftsmanship, gotta love it.

A few seconds later and sure enough the door was kicked right off its hinges and sent flying towards the occupants of the room before Rocket was stepping over it and gesturing to Drax who was stuffing his face. “Hey, assface! What’s the big idea leaving me and Groot out in space, huh?”

Even Groot lobbed a dirty look at the Destroyer, before the ever present beep bloop bloop started up again.

Having a door kicked in was usually an occasion to grab a knife and start stabbing, but Terra was known as a 'safe space'. So a very sedate Drax stared at Rocket and Groot with a face dusted in neon orange cheese powder, which only accentuated the bring smile on his face a few seconds later.

"My friends," he said, standing up to greet them. "I was monitoring and then Mantis attempted to seduce me. I believe this caused an accident. It is good to see that you were not left to die miserably, alone and subsisting on your own waste products while trying to live in the dark reaches of space."

"I am Groot," Groot mumbled.

Peter had been out doing a donut run and was on the ground floor when he heard a bang from upstairs. Deciding the elevator would be the worst place to be in the event of a catastrophe (fires weren’t the only reason to avoid those death traps!), he took the stairs two by two, donut still in mouth, when he skittered into the hallway. Blaster out, he saw his door open and he ran in, ready to throw donut holes as a distraction.

Instead, he saw one angry raccoon, and one curious Groot. “Rocket! Groot!” He reached up and took the donut in hand. He stretched his arms out wide, and grinned. “You guys are here! This is amazing! The team is back together, and everything is right in the world again.”

“Don’t ya give me that,” Rocket countered angrily to Drax’s lame attempt at explaining what had happened. “Mantis ain’t got no feminine wiles. You probably fell asleep at the controls again like you do EVERYTIME we leave you watching our asses.”

And then Quill appeared.

Greeeeat.

“Not for lack of trying to kill us,” he pointed out as he turned his gaze, eyebrow arching when it became Quill was also stuffing his face. “Sure looks like you been missing us something fierce what with yous eating your body weight in food.” He passed a look down to Quill’s stomach. “Looks like yous could do with not eating so much.”

"I am...Groot?" Groot was looking at Quill's stomach as well. Maybe he was just thick trunked. Groot walked by Quill and gave the donut a stare, before looking forlornly at their sub-Captain's tummy. He planted himself down next to Drax on the couch, continuing to play his game.

Drax gave Groot a friendly pat on the back. It was almost fatherly, even if it was well known that such an honor went to Rocket.

"How dare you insinuate that I was resting my eyes," grumbled Drax, under his breath. And even lower and more grumbly still, "Maybe it was her mating season."

He gave an involuntary shudder at the thought, while looking disgusted.

With sugar covered fingers, Peter half lifted his shirt and pounded on his stomach. "Abs of steel, my friends. But you wouldn't know that since you don't have any abs!" He actually knew very little about raccoon biology but he felt it was a safe assumption. Besides, when was the last time you ever saw a ripped rodent? Never, right?

"And as much as it PAINS me to say it, none of this was Drax's fault. There's a magician with a fancy cape who told us that this universe is sucking people into it in an attempt to make this the greatest universe ever. There was a parallel Peter, but we don't talk about him because I'm better." He paused before adding almost reluctantly: "I'm glad to see you and Groot made the cut. I didn't want to have to retrain a newer Rocket to be my back up pilot."

Drax pointed at Rocket and started laughing. "That is what is known as an illness induced burning sensation!"

If Rocket didn’t have high blood pressure before he must definitely did when tweedle-dumb-as-fuck and tweedle-dumber-than-fuck both pitched in as to why his and Groot’s abandonment in space wasn’t Drax’s fault. Magician? Fancy cape? What had Quill been smoking?

“Yous two have any idea how dumb you sound?” He queried though his eyes did narrow and a finger lifted to hush Quill right there. “I ain’t nobody’s back up pilot. You’re mine.” And then he grinned, teeth firmly pressed together though he did look over at Groot a a moment.

“Any of this make sense to you?”

Groot rolled his eyes and shook his head, because there was no way this made sense to him. He gave Drax a dirty look and pointed his non-existence nose toward the handheld game.

Peter was so used to Rocket that he shrugged the creepy grin off, and walked into the kitchen. Placing the donuts down on the counter, he rummaged through the junk drawer until he found a screwdriver and then proceeded to the door. “Man, you can’t ever just knock, huh Rocket.” And he couldn’t just break the door in a way that could be fixed. No, it would need some parts, and he didn’t want to be the one to explain to their building manager that their genetically modified raccoon was a bad boy.

“And I don’t care if you think I’m dumb because we both know I’m incredibly intelligent. If you want to meet the guy with the fabulous cape, I guess we could arrange that, but then I bet he’d banish us to another universe where Drax is considered sexy, and lord knows we don’t need that.”

"There is no universe where I am not considered sexy," said Drax, as he tore into a fresh can of Pringles. Literally. Tore the top right off so he can methodically eat one chip at a time. One. Chip. At. A. Time.

Groot only glanced at Peter, twiggy fingers never once pausing while pressing game buttons. "I am Groot."

“Sounds like yous must’ve hit yer heads on the way here ‘cause there ain’t no universe where he-” pointed look at Drax “- is considered sexy and yous-” another direct unflinching look in Quill’s direction “-is anything more than a dumb hunk of meat on two legs.”

He was grumpy, alright? Really grumpy. Granted he was grumpy most of the time so it wasn’t really saying anything but he took umbrage at being deserted in space.

“Groot’s right,” Rocket shared as he huffed out a breath and swanned past Quill, swiping the screwdriver out of his hand. “Don’t touch it. You’d just make it worse.”

“Better,” Peter protested, glaring at Rocket and Drax, but Groot especially. “I would make it better, and you should know better.” He pointed a finger at the tree, knowing that the adolescent wasn’t even looking. With a glare, Peter leaned against the hallway across from the door and watched. “So, back to you thinking I’m the crazy one which is the only crazy idea out there right now. What’s YOUR theory then, idiot?”

“Idiot?” Rocket asked, fixing Quill with a thoroughly almost realistic perplexed expression. “I know yous can’t be referring to me ‘cause last I checked you needed a mirror to see the only idiot in the room.” He then smirked and heaved up the door and went about putting it back into position. Shit like this was easy, too easy, especially for Rocket who had a way with things and the smarts to go with it.

The door was soon fixed back into its original place and with a few short sharp turns of the screwdriver and the door was as firm could be.

There, see, much better.

Peter rolled his eyes with a very loud groan, as if his entire body was already bored with dealing with Rocket. Which it probably was. “Fine then, be that way. You’re just jealous that I have the inside scoop and you’re still freezing from space.” Turning back into the apartment, he headed straight for the donuts before plopping down on the couch next to Drax. The only other thing that Peter knew Rocket hated was being ignored. And Peter had all the time in the world.

Plus Chopped was on.

“Are you kidding me?” Peter motioned to the television. “How are they going to make dessert out of parsnips?!”

“I do not know what a parsnip is. That looks like a yaro root that has gone bad,” commented Drax, who was - naturally - not even aware of Peter’s ploy. He just really liked Terra’s cooking shows.

He grabbed two donuts and offered one to Groot, saying, “Trees need nourishment too. You should eat this Terran treat, known as a nut of dough.”

Groot didn’t look so sure about what he was being offered, until he took it and gave it a bite. His eyes lit up and the doughnut was gone, leaving crumbs and a few sticky twigs stuck on the couch.

Drax held the other doughnut out for Rocket.

“Friend,” said Drax, “you too should partake. Eat this treat, for tomorrow we might die as we try to defeat the Mad Titan. It will be a battle for the ages. After this poorly named treat, you should try Pringles. The flavor known as pizza is like your taste-buds are a concubine being embraced by a conquering warlord.”

Rocket mimicked Quill’s voice and managed to make him sound like a whiny girl before his attention turned to making sure the door was firmly fixed. Shouldn’t make the doors so flimsy here on Terra, meant they didn’t blow off so easy.

“Where’s Gamora?” He asked as he wandered over to sniff the doughnut warily before he took it in his hands. It was sticky and he wasn’t sure how he felt about it until he stuffed it into his mouth then all bets was off.

Terran food was good, actually good.

“Work,” Peter responded, his eyes glued to the screen. Parsnip ice cream looked oddly appealing. “She works for this rich billionaire guy who is basically a vigilante for justice.” Peter could respect that. Reaching forward for some Pringles, he took a handful and chewed loudly. “He has rockets in his hands and feet, which is way better than you. You’re actually NAMED Rocket, and you have no original rocket-ness.” He shook his head. “Lame.”

Looking up from his game, Groot appeared to consider what the captain-in-training was talking about. "I am Groot?"

"That is true. You have no rockets, Rocket," said Drax, offering their furry comrade the entire container. "Regardless, you are still my short, cranky friend and you can now help fix the ship I did not break. I am glad to have you here with us, in this beautiful Terran city which reeks of urine. Perhaps, together, we might all add to this stench."

Ah, friendship. It is truly a golden thing.