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It was over. He was alive. His friends were alive. Rocket knew that but his subconscious didn’t, because when he went to bed the night it was finally over, curled up against Nebula, the nursery of tiny raccoon kits snuggled against their bodies, his dreams were full of horrors.And of His voice. The voice he had heard earlier for the first time since he himself was barely out of kithood, and that had previously lingered only in his nightmares.Rocket supposed it was no surprise that the memories he had been forced to relive as he laid dying would come back to haunt him in his sleep. But it wasn’t just them this time, his old friends, his littermates, the ones that had been dead for years, but his new friends as well. His new friends in twisted, mechanical form, helpless in cages just as his old friends had been.Quill with the body of a metal dog. Mantis with a beak like a bird’s soldered onto her mouth. Gamora’s hands became a churning mess of blades. These are the sort of bleak images his dreams conjured up. But Nebula was there. With Rocket in the cage, the rusted, metal cage carelessly filled with nuts, bolts and clutter. And she just looked . . . like herself. Except she still had that thing in her eye which he had taken out for her during the Snap.Because she was already like him. Altered. Partly mechanical.Rocket awoke from the nightmare, sitting up on the bed. Some of the kits began to softly whimper as his motion roused them. Feeling guilty, he stroked between their delicate ears, down their backs, gently shushing them.And when the runt of the nursery looked up at Rocket, with brown eyes wide with curiosity and blind, innocent trust, he came to the slow realization that there was a time he looked at the High Evolutionary the exact same way she was looking at Rocket right now.And a dam broke.A sob wrenched out of him. He had tried so hard to forget, he never talked about it, some things he even had forgotten, years on the edge of alcoholism would damage your long term memory like that and that was always the plan. But he had to see Him again- had to speak to Him again and now it was all rushing back.“Rocket?” Nebula bolted upright upon hearing him cry, probably on edge due to watching him almost die.“I’m sorry-“ he choked out, putting a hand over his eyes which flowed with tears, each time he blinked them away, more would instantly take their place.Nebula was careful to move the kits off of her and Rocket for the moment so she could move without worrying about any of them getting squished, placing them in the bunched up area of blanket at the foot of the bed. They tumbled around each other and squeaked. Then, she wrapped Rocket in her arms, and placed his head on her shoulder. He wished he had the strength and the sense to push her away, but he really didn’t want to.She stroked his ears gingerly, running her fingers through his fur.He openly began to cry against her chest and shoulder without inhibition.“I just want them to be happy, Nebs,” sobbed Rocket. “I don’t want them to ever feel the way I . . . I mean, fuck!”“You will be a good father, Rocket . . .” Nebula whispered to him. “Trust me.”“They-they died before they could even see the sky!” He poured out to her, clinging to her body, claws digging into her clothes.She nodded and held him tighter, as he shuddered.“H-He broke me. He took the only thing I had left to lose and then he tried to do it again!” Rocket exclaimed, in what was almost a wail, raw and dumbfounded.“He broke you . . . but you put yourself back together. Even though that wasn’t something you ever should have had to do.” Nebula told him.“No, I didn’t put myself back together . . . you guys did.” He admitted, hoarsely before pausing. “I didn’t mean to cry like this to you.”“I know. But you needed to. You didn’t cry once when it was happening. And I cried when you . . . when I found out you were alive.” Nebula said, her own black eyes beginning to glisten now.“I can’t go anywhere now,” he chuckled a bit through the tears. “I’ve got a crew to run and eight kits to raise.”“You’re going to do so well, Captain . . .” Nebula told him.“. . . With your help maybe I will.”For a moment there was silence, as Rocket laid against Nebula’s chest, and she held him tight with one hand, stroking his head with the other. The silence was punctuated by the two of them softly crying into each other’s bodies and the occasional chitter of a kit.“You know, your fur is actually . . . really soft.” Nebula mentioned, quietly.He laughed again. “Yeah . . . feel lucky, I don’t let a lot of people touch it.”“I have many reasons to feel lucky right now, Captain.”“You don’t have to call me that now, Nebs!” He assured her.“I know, but I’ve been waiting for the day I’d be able to for years, let me have this!”The two of them laughed and fell asleep once again in each other’s arms, surrounded by baby raccoons, Rocket’s sleep, becoming much more peaceful.~ The following morning, Rocket awoke to the sparse Knowhere sun shining down on his face, and to the sound of the nursery chittering, excitedly, as if to wake him up. The sky had that yellowish tint that it always seemed to in the head of the celestial, but it was still visible. The little runt of the litter was sitting on Rocket’s chest, looking down at him when suddenly a name for her came to him.“Good morning, Sky.” He murmured to the kit.“Are you ready for your first day as Captain?” Nebula’s voice interrupted, as she stood in the doorway, still just in the tank top and underwear she had slept in, holding a mug of what Rocket knew was Krylorian tea, as she despised coffee.Rocket grinned at her from his place on the bed.
I want to wake up like this every day of my life.
Is what he thought but of course he didn’t say that. All he said was, “Yeah, let me put on a good song to get ready to.”