Monster, Chapter 1

His body was on fire. Well, it was more like nerve endings remembering the phantom pain that his synapses had been through from the nightmare he had, that encyclopedia they had fucking downloaded into his brain. Rocket woke up in a lather of sweat, the drone of the engines of the Milano reminding him again, that he was safe from Them.

Them. That was his name for the fucks that did this to him. Groot was still asleep, nearby. At least this time I managed to not cry out like a fucking child, he thought to himself. He wasn't sure which time was the most humiliating; the time that Gamora was there to reassure him, his body seized up in sleep paralysis, or the time DRAX of all people, was singing a lullaby to calm him in that rumble of a voice of his.

Actually, his pipes were pretty fucking good. He missed his calling, being a maniac. Or maybe Thanos missed it for him. What the fuck ever.

For Rocket, there were four kinds of nights. The first were the best and the fewest; the times he was either too drunk, or on a few rare occassions, too peaceful to be bothered. He forgot his dreams, and rarely woke up. Maybe, I don't have dreams like a headcase, he mused. Maybe, for a change, my dreams aren't utter shit.

The second were actually quite common, but on the whole, not bad nights. He would have one or two horrible dreams, but they wouldn't fuck with his senses too bad. The most that would happen is he'd look at his teammates with vague embarrassment, because those were often the noisy and the emotional ones. Once he was stilled, he could sleep.

The third he only considered bad because he knew he had to sleep. These were the nights where he'd stay awake, working out his latest invention, not out of obsession so much as a foreboding. He was waiting for the other shoe to drop. Some people tried to label it his version of OCD or paranoia, but he knew better. OCD is when you're fucking doing things because your brain is giving you neurotic fucking input that doesn't exist. It's not OCD or paranoia when the thing you're actively trying to avoid acutally HAPPENS. Groot had once made tea in order for Rocket to sleep. The raccoon considered that his floral friend meant well, (and worth mentioning, he never asked where Groot got the plants FOR the tea) but once Rocket did sleep, the fourth kind of night happened.

What made it so terrible wasn't the screaming in the middle of the night. It was the fact he couldn't scream. It was the idea when he woke up, he would be paralyzed, as if strapped to a table again. Sometimes he woke up, thinking this was a dream, that he was still contained in his white, windowless cell, wearing the scrubs they gave him when they managed to teach him shame, as if they were God in the Garden of Eden.

I shoulda never found Quill's collection of Terran books. Soon, I'll be on my knees, praying to some savior to deliver me from the shithole I'm in. 'Cept it doesn't work that way, does it? The God in the white beard only saves humies, and only good ones at that. I think I'm automatically damned, shitty little monster I am.

The dreams weren't the worst part, though. The worst part, always the worst part, was him being a mute observer as the scenes from Them (maybe this is a dream, being safe in the room with the only friends I know and love, dammit no no no, this can't be some escapist fantasy, fuck no) bled into the realm of the waking, invading Rocket's thoughts. And he watched as they replayed what created him, the patchwork animal version of Frankenstein's monster. Although Quill actually DID burn that book when he found out Rocket had been reading it and the nightmares had worsened, he remembered, the last coherent thought he had as it began.

Doctor [REDACTED]'s Log:

After sixty nine attempts with varying species (the Xandarian raven showed the most promise, but had to be put down), we have achieved sentience finally after increasing the genetic structure. Subject [REDACTED] was grown and modified out of an interesting species from a planetary backwater. Subject has cognitive ability of a three year old. We are trying to instill ethical behavior routines, but subject seems willful, particularly with metal or shiny objects. Subject also has an oral fixation. It is hopeful that Doctor [REDACTED]'s thumb and forefinger will get full function again after the surgery.

This is our greatest triumph. We will get to work on continued brainwashing and avoidance subroutines, and begin implantation immediately. Platoons of animals, marching in a row, able to assimilate with the wildlife, able to strike anywhere and anywhen. There will be no power that can stop us, and no power that can't afford to pay us.

Rocket's first thought as a sentient being was 'who am I?' Followed by the squeak he emitted when he realized he could speak.

They had a really dull answer for that one. There was something called Subject and a string of letters—Rocket knew letters, somehow—interspersed with numbers. Older Rocket would of said that he was named by the statistical gang bang of drawing letters out of a bag and an accountant's wet dream.

He didn't remember them now. He still remembered Them. After They realized they succeeded, They began implantation. Things to make him stronger and faster, and buoy up his skeletal frame. A cortical implant, mostly internal, that would serve as universal translator and data base all in one. It saved them time from teaching, it would intersperse the dreams of the raccoonoid with lessons. What things are, what they were. In that, they could give him information that would take years to learn.

There was some great stuff in there. His mechanical lessons were in there; but there were some texts that were obviously slipped in to amuse Rocket.

Maybe the person who programmed the cortical implant got away, Rocket thought. He certainly hoped so. He was part of Them, but not cruelly so. However, Him with the luminous eyes, glasses, as Rocket would learn later, were the worst of Them. None of the surgeries that were performed had any anesthetic; they needed to test the genetic pain modification. Also, to make sure he was able to receive a great amount of pain when being tortured.

And when they put the cybernetics in, it was a bit at a time, and to Rocket, what seemed to be the slowest, cruelest way possible. His transformation to living freak was often done at fourteen to sixteen hours at a time, interspersed only with four hour sleep breaks. They broke down his impressionable mind bit by bit, sliver by sliver. The glasses fuck enjoyed having an open debate over what to do with Rocket's sex organs. And open debate was fucking literal; Rocket was OPEN on the table while having the debate.

Leave them intact. That cold, amused voice said. With the genetic modifications, we can use him as a donor to create a resilient population once we can get the research to get a female. In fact, give him the hormone injections, he'll be useful if he has a better production and sex drive than a normal male of his species.

There's a reason why no one knows about that particular memory. Not even Groot, and that's not because of the jokes he'd get for having a greater than normal sex drive engineered into him.

It's because at Rocket's core, he worries that the scientists were right at his sessions. The sessions are what terrify him down deep the most.

You think we're cruel, Glasses said. The galaxy is cruel. We are your protectors against a greater population that will look at you and see a monster, a freak of nature that we made. We are your fathers. We will protect you, and all you must do is do what we need. You are a monster, poor boy, but you are a monster with purpose. Without us, you have none.

That's the problem, the reason Rocket had a hard time believing Quill when Quill wanted him to save the galaxy, to gain a purpose, a 'second chance'. He had destroyed his first one; and so since he had no purpose, he was going to spread that pain to others. He might as well do what he wanted, because what purpose did life have?

Rocket shuddered; this was the part he remembered most. After the cordial was removed, after the lessons on weaponry and bomb making, he had over heard Them speaking. Arguing; outside of his clean white cell.

The subject is showing too much independence, and possible aggression towards his minders. This wasn't Glasses; a man with a cold, detached voice. The Master is getting impatient.

Glasses spoke, and Rocket, a name he secretly named himself from a data chip that he had left them, and part of the database talking about exploration among the stars; listened to Glasses argue. It wasn't really arguing. It was more a discussion of a fact that was unlikely to change. He may be getting impatient, but we're making progress. Already, the firearms and the stratagem simulations both show him at 195% to potential. The brain stimulants are working DOUBLE. That 'independent subject', in his fields, is smarter than you or I. His mechanical aptitude testing is off the chart. And you want to destroy him?

He's picked out a name for himself. The subject is too individual. Again, that voice.

One week. Let us try to break what he has left in one week. Glasses said, bargaining. Let us gather the data from his body, get samples so maybe cloning can occur. I can only hope there's no degradation; the genetic modifications are more particular than his implants. (Both past and modern Rocket snorted at this. The amount of particular itching, scratching and pain in his back, real and imagined, proved to Rocket that his genetic toying was not as -particular- as the hardware they put in him.)

One week. Let's hope we're not making a mistake. Footprints. They were walking away.

Rocket proved he was ready for war. The damnable thing, and the reason why, if there is a Hell, he might go there: he killed at least half a dozen people in his escape when the bombs went off. He didn't kill them for money, or to save the galaxy, or even to stop their plans for him.

He killed them because he knew if he didn't, he wouldn't survived. They would of destroyed him.

It was child's play to get a gun and get to the shortest amount to the pod. All he can remembered was flashes, sometimes of dead faces. He managed to figure out the nav of an escape pod long enough to escape. All of him wishes he got as many of Them. He hates Them. They made him monster willing to kill a number of Them to live.

He made friends with that monster quickly. After all, before his friends, and in particular, Groot, who never judged him, never insulted him, and put up with the fact that he was pushing anyone away who was willing to get close, he had only the monster. The instinct that he had to get what he had to. Learning the concept of money wasn't hard. After breaking out of a science lab, destroying the names of himself and everyone who lived there, what was prison?

They taught him to shackle the monster, bit by bit; but he's still friends with it. Because one of these days someone will want to fuck with one of the others.

And they'll find that a monstrous freak meant to be a super soldier, now a super thug is more than ready for the task to protect the only things he has. Them. And that keeps him going, moderates the influences of shooting shit and blowing it up. (Although that has to be the best stuff of the knowledge he still has.)

This has passed quickly, sooner than he had hoped. Rocket begins to yawn, curled up into almost a fetal ball, and drifts into the realm of slumber.