#every rocket

mcu rocket

FALLING: rocket can see from day one that you’re attractive. he ain’t a frickin’ moron. you’ve got the kind of eyes that would make ‘most anybody melt. not to mention the way you smell like something fresh and warm: sugar and sunlight and a little salt, all at once. a summer sunset over an ocean beach, maybe — on one of those fancy resort-planets he’s never actually been to.  yeah. he ain’t stupid. which is why he also doesn’t let himself dwell on it. if he does, he might start thinking about other things. like how he bets you’d feel perfect under his palms. like how you’d sound if he explored every dimpled inch of you.  unfortunately for everyone involved, this rocket is probably the most resistant to acknowledging soft feelings — either yours or his. in short: you’ve got your work cut out for you, babe. if you’re feeling brave, you can go ahead and try to flirt a little. there’s an eighty percent chance that this particular rocket won’t recognize what you’re doing — and on the twenty that he does, he’ll be convinced you’re making fun of him. once you can finally persuade him that you’re genuine, he’ll assume you just wanna knock jet-boots a few times, ‘till you get the weird temporary fetish for exotic scumbags out of your system.  it’s up to you to be clever, now. and cautious. and kind. a little sly, and a whole-lot patient. Just keep finding your way into his bunk, each time bringing a bouquet of a dozen reassurances that you can both just have fun together, and it doesn’t need to be anything serious.  whisper the words into his fur enough, and maybe you’ll both believe them.

ROCK-BOTTOM, BABY: remember that whole “time + trust” thing? this rocket is going to require all your grace, even when knocking jet-boots turns into can’t sleep without you. maybe especially then.  because while it might feel like this rocket doesn’t trust you, the truth is, he doesn’t trust himself. believing in the high evolutionary did a number on him, and while rocket might be able to build a semi-reliable spacecraft out of a match, some string, and a soda can, he’s not sure he can recognize a person who intends to do harm. which is why he treats everyone like they intend to do harm. it’s a sorta preemptive strike, or whatever. best defense is a good frickin’ offense. blah blah blah, insert some other weird humie idiom he learned from pete here.  so when he realizes he misses you while you’re separated on different missions — well, there’s gonna be some explosions. or implosions. or a little self-sabotage. at first he’ll growl and snarl and try to convince himself that he only misses you for your warm humie body and the sounds you make when he’s wringing orgasms from it: for your blunt teeth and your sea-salt and summer-sugar scent — for your lips, so much fuller and plumper than his. for the novel view of your ass, unobstructed by clothing or tail. he ignores the sickening hollow in his gut that suspects he’s a dirty frickin’ liar, till it cramps so bad that he has to admit he misses you for more than all that. he misses the way you sing along — badly — to quill’s music, and the way your eyes sparkle when you smile, and how your fingers curl and claw through his fur. he misses the way you talk to groot, and your terrible sense of humor, and your awkwardness when you get embarrassed. he misses your presence, and the quiet way you listen to him, your consistency and your patience, and the way you seek out his thoughts like each one is worth more than an anulax battery. hell, he even misses the way you get cranky and scowly and grumpy when he says stupid shit, or when he keeps you up too late in the sleepshift.  which means that by the time you get back, he’s spoiling for a fight. buckle in, babe. this rocket’s  bound to be an a-hole — more than once, probably. but whether your response is to cry, or argue back, or give him the coldest shoulder this side of the galaxy — well. these fights are just gonna make him miss you more than he already did. plus, seeing you hurt because of his insecurities has a way of chewing him up way worse than any punishment you could possibly mete out.  he’s gonna make it up to you, he tells himself. and not with some stupid, grandiose gesture, either — no matter what pete says. you won’t be getting twenty spartaxian roses from this rocket (and if he gives you a fancy new gun, it ain’t in lieu of an apology — it’s just because he wants to make sure you’re safe). he’s not suddenly trying to sweep you off your feet, or shower you in a bunch of sappy nonsense. nah. he’s gonna do the frickin’ work, and fix his own shit. so you don’t have to.

eidos rocket

FALLING: babe, i’m so sorry to say that this rocket barely clocks you at first. it’s not your fault. you’re just another flarkin’ biological on his ship, causing problems and taking up oxygen. he’s too focused on building bombs to be bothered with you — other than to tell you to keep your fingers to yourself if you wanna keep ‘em at all. plus, when it comes to — er, romance — his eye tends to be drawn to flashier lifeforms: dancers in cheap dazzling sequins, babes with a lot of skin or scales or feathers showing. come-hither smiles that can beckon from all the way across a crowded dirty dive-bar in the coldest reaches of the universe. your comparatively-timid attempts at flirtation will likely be returned with eyerolls — if rocket notices them at all.  try not to be too disheartened. this guy gets hit on in every gambling den and darkened alley he comes across. he’s going out on dates every time the milano docks on some greasy space station for more than a rotation or two. he’s disappearing for sleepshifts and coming back midway through breakfast with a sway in his lush plush tail and a smirk painting his mouth. you never had a chance, babe. at least not that way. not yet. look, it might sound cliché, but you’ve gotta just be yourself. at some point, he’ll start glancing at you with more speculation than cynicism in his eyes. And it won’t be because of anything you’ve done, either — not directly. it’s just that groot talks about you. incessantly. and rocket’s used to the flora colossus being overly-affectionate with every d’ast biological he comes across, but he’s not used to the sharp, focused intensity of groot’s fascination when it comes to you. the big guy’s always telling stories: from the time you were struggling to learn how to aim the laser cannon because you weren’t used to adjusting for thermal bloom, to some song you were singing while you helped him prune some of the excess growth on his head, right down to  yesterday when you knocked over the salt at dinner and made fun of yourself.  it’s exposure, rocket tells himself when he finds his eyes following you through the cockpit — when the snarky comments that always seem to slide off your shoulders like silk skew instead into dirty, flirty little remarks. yeah. it’s exposure, and forced proximity. he’s been hearing about you too much, so of course it’s got him curious, and remembering all the times you might’ve said something cute to him back in the early days. he suspects the novelty of your presence will wear off once he gets used to you.  spoiler — it doesn’t.  probably because groot isn’t wrong — you really are so flarkin’ sweet with the big guy. chattering at the flora colossus, listening even when you can’t understand him. holding his hand. watching his back. protecting him in a fight, or standing up for him when quill hatches some stupid plan that would put him at risk.  look, rocket tries to keep an eye on groot, but he can’t be there all the time — and he’s sorta grudgingly grateful that somebody else is looking out for the flora colossus too, because nobody’s as gentle and kind and softhearted as groot is. though maybe you’re pulling up in a close second.

ROCK-BOTTOM, BABY: in the end, what will win this rocket over — well, the rest of the way — isn’t anything you could have prepared or planned for. see, this rocket dreams, even more than any of the others: about the sensory deprivation tanks, about the spinal control units. about rote memory exercises that unspool like an endless purgatory while he sleeps, and the people he loves sacrificing themselves again and again.  the nightmares are nothing new. the universe is a cold flarkin’ place, and — in spite of the abundance of one- and two-night-stands — this poor rocket has gotten used to dealing with it on his own. he’s never really considered any other option. not since tella. and he’s certainly never considered what it might be like to stumble out of his bunk, broad-shouldered and ash-mouthed, shirtless and combing absently through his beard with shaky claws like he’s trying to rake his nightmares out of his fur — not while you’re on board. he’ll be busy being preoccupied with his leftover hell — grateful he wasn’t off-ship in somebody else’s bed when it woke him. he’ll swagger slowly through the corridors of a sleepy milano and into the central bay, forcing himself to focus on fantasies of building a new kind of grenade. he’s prob’ly gonna sit up all night, distracting himself with its creation. at this rate, he’ll have it done before the first wakeshift even hits— —which is about when he stumbles right into you, draped in stars and shadows and insomnia, prettier than any sequined dancer. you, round-eyed and startled, with concern carved into your moonlit brow. your head will tilt. your eyes will squint. your lips will purse, thoughtful and worried, and he’ll know that you’re seeing right through him. he’ll stare back, slack-jawed and horrified, and hoping against hope that you won’t needle him for more information than he’s ready to share. but you won’t. hey, you’ll say instead — the word slow and measured as it filters into the long lingering silence. your bare humie-toes, rounded and clawless, will twitch as you curl yourself onto the couch, making space for him in the shadows — adjusting the blanket so there’s room for him at the other end, if he wants. yeah, sure, there’s a whole cold universe all around you both — but here you are, offering him a little bit of your warmth, with no demand for him to give back anything at all.  wanna sit with me?

cartoon rocket

FALLING: so many rockets have a praise kink, but this guy’s right at the tippy-top of the list, with no krutackin’ shame (and good for him!).  the first time you arch an eyebrow and tell him how impressed you are by his technical brilliance or his latest gun or his cool idea, he gets a weird little flutter behind his mutated breastbone. look, he’d like to say that he knows he’s a d’ast genius, but the truth is, this rocket always feels like he’s playing catch-up to a ship that keeps hurtling through the cosmos, just a little faster than anything he can make. even though he thinks his weapons are powerful, unique works of art, he can’t help but wonder if anyone notices but him.  once he realizes that you notice too, he’s going to try to keep you in hearing-range all the time. with a flimsy sort of nonchalance that you can see right through, he’ll offer up every bit of tech and each new invention for your praise and admiration. and while the number of fresh firearms and bombs will never seem to diminish, strange new attempts will be littered in like confetti — things you’d mentioned once or twice, wistfully, without any intention at all. a lava lamp. a waffle-iron. an icecream-maker.  something like a vcr, after you find that bundle of old terran vhs tapes on that junker planet. (he‘ll later sob through the entire duration of the secret of nimh, but he’ll think the heartache is worth it if you let him curl up against your warm flank and wrap a soothing arm around his shoulders, scritching gently at his ears).  is he falling in love? sure. is he bothered by it? not at all. unlike most rockets, he’s too blissed-out to be properly perturbed.

ROCK-BOTTOM, BABY: picture this (because afterward, rocket often will): you’re caught in some catastrophe or another. a battle, either planetside or in the stars. a leak in the O2-generator, or loss of hull-integrity. something that renders drax’s brawn and gamora’s battle-strategy useless — and flark knows what quill’s rambling about. rocket’s voice has gone shrill as he frantically tries to piece together a solution. after all, he’s the only krutackin’ brain outta the original group. he’s supposed to know how to come in out of the blue with a solution when the rest of these suckers can’t figure it out. but then you speak up: cool. calm. collected. you ask a few questions and rocket can see the shape of your plan forming in his head even as your voice ripples through the air.  it all hinges on him, you say. him and a little bit of his brilliance, his ability to create. in no time, he’s hurling out orders, getting the rest of the idiots in position to make your genius-scheme work, then executing his own role with an exuberant cackle — pleased to play such a major part. the day is saved, because of your quick thinking, your calm, cool clarity — and your ability to see what he is capable of. later that night, when you get the others to toast his genius with stolen bottles of fizzy solberry-juice, all he’ll be able to do is stare at you with big, worshipful eyes. move over, ja kyee lrurt. rocket will always admire her, but there’s only room in his heart for one beautiful, brilliant baldbody at a time.  and ja kyee never called him a genius while scritching his ears.

universe-killer rocket

FALLING: look, my friend. i hate to break it to you, but universe-killer rocket doesn’t fall. oh, he’s fascinated by you. it doesn’t take long for him to get there at all. hell, there’s almost no build-up whatsoever. the first time he watches you persist in the face of cruelty — perhaps at the hands of the universe, or some stranger, or his own hellspawn-crew — he finds a bitterly bemused smirk twisting up one side of his mouth. just what else can you survive? it only takes the two of you crossing paths once or twice before he decides he should just keep you — for however long you can last, anyway. maybe you’re lucky, and you have some tangible skill or advantageous information that could be useful to him. at least that way, you might serve in a role that his hellspawn will treat with some respect. but if you’re just the soft, pretty baldbody who the universe-killer keeps collared for his own amusement—? well, then life will be a lot harder. for a lot longer.  either way, the longer this rocket keeps you — the longer you survive — the more he craves your presence. that resilience of yours — it glistens like gunmetal. like the hull of a silver ship, protecting your fragile human heart from the cold sucking wound of space. maybe you’re the type to become as sharp-edged as he is (you could never be as sharp-edged as he is); maybe you bite back when he’s vicious. maybe survival has made you grim and distant, or soft and pliant. maybe you’ve decided to try and create some kindness in a deeply-unkind cosmos. it doesn’t matter. as long as you keep being somehow, relentlessly you, he’ll want to keep you for his entertainment.  at some point, you’ll come to understand. this rocket is so fascinated by you because there isn’t anything left of him at all. not because of his prosthetics, of course. no — like theseus’ ship, he has replaced every whisper of his naive, gentle youth with a faster and stronger bite, with longer and sharper claws, with bigger and bleaker canons. there isn’t anything of his softer self left, and most days, he takes a sort of fucked-up pleasure in that. but here you are — unbelievably, perplexingly, amusingly whole — and sometimes when he’s high on wundagorish everbloom, he thinks he can stare right into that flawless star-bright core of yours.  you fucking burn him.  but then, this rocket has learned long ago to crave what hurts him — to demand more of it. and more of it. and more.  and when it comes to you, he does. want. more.

ROCK-BOTTOM, BABY: i don’t think this rocket realizes how much he wants more of you, though — not until something happens to threaten his ownership. some idiot crew of sakaaran smugglers and slavers, perhaps — crossing paths with him on a random planet he’s slated for demolition. thinking they can raid his ship without realizing who he is. it’s rare for his crew to be confronted by other spacefarers at all — but for the transgressors to survive long enough to leave? unheard of.  but this time, one of the lucky — or perhaps unlucky — jackasses manages to snatch you as a hostage.  rocket holds up one mechanical claw to his crew, signaling them to fall back as the sakaarans toss you around like a ragdoll. he watches through silent, narrowed eyes while you fight them. but you’re no match for a dedicated crew of slavers, and rocket stares with a faint curl to his lip when they hold you steady and use a hyperlaser to cut off your collar. apparently, sakaarans are smart enough to recognize that there’s probably a tracker embedded in it, but not smart enough to realize that nicking your flawless neck has earned them far worse than a death sentence. when you wince and hiss and a thread of thin smoke rises from the burn, this rocket just smiles with the same deadly amusement as he had when the collar had first closed around your perfect throat. his singular prosthetic eye glows reality-stone-red when the smugglers take off: as bloody and bright as a wartime promise. it doesn’t take long for the hellspawn-crew to get you back. the sakaaran vessel is left a smoldering, collapsing husk of ruin: a smudge against the skies, one of the many ghost-ships that this rocket has left scattered throughout the universe like confetti and shrapnel. any future scavengers will flee the wreckage before they’ve even truly glanced inside — overwhelmed by a lingering dread too thick and heavy for even the most hardened ravager to stomach. when rocket gets you back under his cybernetically-enhanced hands, he doesn’t bother to take you back to the captains’ quarters. he pulls you onto the lowered ledge built into the captain’s seat: a little addition made specially for you, so he can keep you wedged between his thighs when he wants. he tilts your head this way and that: studying the burn on your neck, patting your disheveled hair or tear-salted cheek with a smirk. you shift against the metal plating of his armored prosthetics, inexplicably glad to be back in his reach. he’ll snap his clawed fingers at warpig, who’ll stride forward silently with a delicate laser scalpel-sealer in one hand and jar of oral anesthetic in the other. the captain’s arm will reach around you and pull your spine squarely against his belly; one fist will close with shocking, mocking gentleness on your jaw, forcing your mouth into an embarrassing slippery-wide pout in front of his entire crew. the fingers of his other hand will dip into warpig’s jar of anesthetic and then slide between your lips, stroking over tongue and teeth till he’s coated every soft wet surface. then rocket will nod to his chief medic, and she’ll step forward with the tiny scarlet laser, as glowing-red as rocket’s augmented eye. you’ll flinch, of course — look up over your shoulder to the universe-killer, hoping he’ll give you pity or answers. he never gives you pity.

this time the tracker goes inside you, rocket will explain with a smirk, while your gums grow numb and spit glosses the corner of your mouth, shining silkenly along your chin.  open up, pretty thing, he’ll coo, and his grip on your chin will force your lips wider. the surgery will be quick — painful despite warpig’s surprising delicacy, and the generous overuse of anesthetic cream — but you’re strong, and frankly, you’re just glad to be back home. rocket’s heavy metal claw will weigh down the juncture of your throat and shoulder, stroking soothingly along your skin as warpig finishes up and you rest your tired body and tear-swollen face against cold metal and fur, uncaring of your audience. there now, this rocket will croon indulgently. only one last step, sweetheart. the shallow attempt at consolation will harden into a brittle grin. beg me to bite you. you blink up at him, eyes owlish and bruised. w-what? wanna give you a permanent collar to go with that permanent tracker, he’ll tell you reasonably. wanna make sure everybody in the fuckin’ universe knows you’re mine.  the grin — bright as a diamond-edged sawblade — will grow sharper, and you’ll suddenly feel the purpose beneath the cool metal hand weighing down your throat. and i want you to beg for it, he’ll add, thumb stroking along your carotid as he smiles at you. the hellspawn will watch on, silent, with perhaps a little more deference than they’ve shown you in the past. hazily, you‘ll feel yourself tilt your head, baring throat and shoulder to his teeth as your swollen, spit-glossed lips part to beg for your bite. no, universe-killer rocket doesn’t fall. he drags you down deep, to wherever he’s at.

marvel rivals rocket

FALLING: unlike the other rockets, this guy’s got no qualms with hitting on you from day one. you’re it, babe — for this cycle, anyway. he sees you, he wants you, and he’s gonna keep up with the outrageous come-ons till you’re charmed enough to let him in your bunk.  it’s all drawled snarky flirtations, tipped hats and sly grins, a hundred come-hither winks beneath taunting tosses of hair. he loves how you respond: cheeks warm and nervous at first, but he can tell you’re into it. and he’s absolutely lustdrunk when you get more comfortable and start paying back each and every slightly-smarmy compliment with an eyeroll or a smartass wink — right before flicking his shiny earring in a way that manages to make him want to sputter like a moon-eyed virgin.  this rocket doesn’t really think about it as anything deeper. not at first. he just likes the way you look, the way you smell. the sound of your grumpy g’morning first thing in the rotation, when your voice is all hushed and crushed and sleepy before you pour yourself that first cup of hot caffeine.  eventually — once he wins you over — he’ll be infatuated by the feel of you under his hands, too:  the uniqueness of your fat-to-muscle ratio, the way your humie-lips are so much fuller and more plumped-up than his, the bluntness of your bite. the way — blindfolded — he can run his fingers over tiny patches of your skin and know exactly which part of you it belongs to. that’s that ticklish inner elbow, he’ll say with a leer and his candy-red eyes closed tight. the right one.  he loves games, after all — and sure, he usually cheats at ’em, but he doesn’t need to with this one.  that’s the inside of your left knee. the arch of your right foot. middle of your back, just to the left of your spine, sorta under your shoulderblade. that’s the skin riiiiight under that bouncy left ass-cheek. and that’s your tummy, at the tippy-top of your belly-button.  i keep tellin’ you, sugar, each spot on you feels different.  and i got you memorized. 

ROCK-BOTTOM, BABY: one cycle of no-strings sexual gratification turns into two. three. five. eleven. thirty-two. he expects to get bored but you’re always up to try something new, aren’t you? and not just in the bunk, either. they get a call to a weird new planet, and you’re eager to go. some new heroic oddballs show up, ready to join the fight — and you’re happy to play along, meet new people, figure out ways to complement their skills with your own. he decides he’s gotta go on a hunt across the universe to find out what happened to lylla, and you’re asking how quickly the two of you can head out. sometimes you get all nervy and skittish, but you’re always open to a new adventure, and you’ve always got his six.  which is why he’s gonna make sure that he’s always got yours. 

comics rocket (ewing, rosenberg, et al)

FALLING: like his eidos-counterpart, this rocket probably doesn’t even look at you twice. at first.  you see, he’s also got a type, and it’s got nothing to do with skin color or body size or number of limbs. rocket prefers one-night-stands in general, but if he’s gonna start a relationship, it’s probably gonna be with a hottie who low-key loathes him. not necessarily in a step-on-me sort of way — not that he’s always opposed to that, either — but just in the way where he can vaguely pick up on a little condescension, a little contempt. the likelihood of an eventual betrayal. it sort of automatically puts an expiration date on things, and there’s some security in that. and besides, it’s not like he holds himself in all that high of regard anyway. so when you enter the scene — a fellow crew member who he’ll have to live with for who-knows-how-long, with barely a breath of true derision in your whole body — some part of rocket’s brain just turns off and doesn’t even acknowledge your presence.  quiet persistence is key here. personally, i’m always a fan of bringing this rocket late-night cups of coffee in the cockpit. it’s a lot harder for him to ignore you when you’re the only other person in the room and the rest of the guardians are all asleep in their bunks, and the ship feels dark and dreamy and hallowed. eventually, your one-sided conversations will lull him into a place where he misses your company on the sleepshifts when you don’t show up. flying alone is great and all, but nothing compares to having you rambling quietly about nothing, or snoozing in the copilot’s seat, glossed up in starlight and haloed by galaxies. rocket’s been lucky enough to have a few good friends in his life, and even more lovers. but at some point — when you’re laughingly telling him some story, or listening to him attentively with moons reflected in your eyes, or muffling little yawns and snuffling snores into the duvet you‘ve started hauling into the cockpit with you, rumpled in sleepiness and wearing fuzzy flarkin’ slippers on your hopeless humie feet — at some point, he’ll start to wonder if he can let himself have someone who’s both.

ROCK-BOTTOM, BABY: there’s no lightning-strike moment here. this rocket feels himself losing it one sappy flarkin’ brain cell at a time: whenever you ask him a clever question, or when your lashes fan over your cheeks while you doze, or when one slipper dangles off your frail bare foot. and then — late  one sleepshift — he looks over at you, all vulnerable and trusting and freckled by flakes of starlight. he closes his eyes, and sighs, and pinches the space between his brows. shakes his head, and stares out the viewport, and takes a sip of the coffee you’d made him. yup, he thinks, with a stoic flattening of his brow, and resignation twitching downward in the corner of his mouth. yup, there goes the last little bit of his self-preservation. he’s a fuckin’  goner.

comics rocket (skottie young)

FALLING: looook, babe. real talk: this rocket thought you were cute from the beginning, and he totally wouldn’t mind boning you if it weren’t for his whole self-imposed  “don’t fuck your co-workers” rule (a rule which, he’s noticed, neither pete nor gamora seem similarly hindered by). being cute doesn’t really set you apart though — rocket’s had more bedpartners than he can count, and frankly — in their favor — almost all of ‘em had more money he could steal on his way out.  so he doesn’t imagine you’re gonna be that much of a temptation.  then the crew ends up  on nivlent during their annual wrestling tournament, and groot’s sorta a local legend when it comes to nivlentine wrestling. usually the rest of the crew leave him and his buddy alone when they’re mission-free and planetside. let ‘em do their own thing — which is mostly causing fights, fixing fights, gambling on fights, and making a scene. but you insist on joining them — maybe a little naively, rocket thinks — ‘cause you wanna “support groot in his wrestling matches.” look, rocket’s taken a lot of dates to wrestling shows — the louder and wilder, the better — and they never seem into it. he’s already positively grumpy at the thought of having his enjoyment dimmed by some wet-blanket babe who can’t appreciate a good adrenaline rush and who he’s not even gonna get to rail afterward. but not two seconds into the first match, you’re up on your feet before he is, jumping and whooping, a grin on your face and glitter in your eyes while you cheer for your boy in the ring. it makes rocket’s jaw drop at first. then he scrambles up on his chair next to you and joins his yells with yours, pressing himself shoulder to shoulder with you as you’re squeezed together by the crowd on either side. yeah. you’re by far the rowdiest supporter in the stands, and by the end of the night, rocket can barely see the stage thanks to the hearts blossoming up in his eyes. that’s when he starts paying more attention to you: watching the way you handle your blasters, keeping an eye on you in missions. flirting with purposefully over-the-top outrageousness and a wide shit-eating grin that makes you roll your eyes and laugh: certain that he’s just making fun of you, and taking it all in a stride.  by the time you start attending dungeons-and-dragons nights, he’s basically lost it. not only can you hold your own in a crowd of overzealous nivlentine wrestling fans during a planetwide championship, but you’ve got almost as good an imagination as he does? and you keep putting tony in his place when the bastard deliberately tries to derail rocket’s campaign plans — which is not only hot as hell but also gives rocket an unfamiliar flutter behind his breastbone. for flark’s sake, he doesn’t even mind you teasing him about always being the gm when you keep saying “game master” in that throaty tone of voice.  in spite of the whole “no fucking coworkers” thing, he can’t keep himself from wondering if you’d be interested in trying some other roleplaying games back in his bunk.

ROCK-BOTTOM, BABY: which is all to say that rocket’s already lost in the sauce during a mission that skews sideways. and by “mission” i mean: this guy probably got himself into some kind of trouble — caught by an angry space princess he ran out on, or someone he stole a fuckton of money from, or both. maybe his big mouth started a brawl at a local dive bar just by saying a bunch of glarnack he shouldn’t have. things are looking pretty dire — not that he’d ever lose a fight, but he’s starting to get sort of banged up — when you swoop in out of nowhere and save the day with a well-aimed stunner-blast.  forget hearts. he stares up at you with whole galaxies in his eyes.  “i didn’t expect you to come rushing in to save my tail,” he teases later, with an ice-cold can of blubber ale pressed to one aching swollen eye. you’re using a warm wet cloth to soften and rinse away the blood crusting in his fur, and for as wild as he’s used to things getting in bed, this feels so suddenly intimate that he has to audibly swallow. you snort. “i’ll always come rushing in to save you, tail or not,” you tell him, so simply that for the first time in his entire frutackin’ life, he has no smartass response at all.  look, this rocket has saved a lot of people (usually for the reward money), but he’s always been partial to the rare individual who turns the tables and saves him. gives him more of a buzz than fuel fumes, and more butterflies than asgard’s entire stock of firefly-wine. it’s not even just a kink (it’s a little bit of a kink). it’s just that this rocket is so deeply entrenched in his own perceived aloneness that when such a sweet honey shows up and has his back in a conflict — one that is arguably his own fault — it chips away at his sense of isolation. sure, he’s the only one of his kind, but maybe what he really wants and needs isn’t another person like him after all. maybe it’s a person like you.

references to: Rocket Raccoon & Groot (2016), Vol 2 Issue 4 | Rocket Raccoon: A Chasing Tale Vol 1 Issue 1 | Rocket Raccoon: Storytailer, Issue 7

mcu rocket

CLINGER: it’s too bad that you’re smitten with rocket from the moment you meet him, because of course, this guy’s too full of self-loathing to realize it. unfortunately, like a duckling, you imprint on him right away. something about his crankiness makes you trust him immediately, as if it’s an indicator of his authenticity. and being in the far reaches of outer space is fucking scary for a freshfaced terran like you, unused to being out in the stars. so you pretend nonchalance while you wander into the cockpit when he’s there, and the commons bay when he’s there, and the engine room when he’s there… it’s equally too bad that rocket’s not a frickin’ idiot. he notices right away — how you flicker at  the edges of his presence like a moonmoth to a bowlight— and it’s fuckin’ annoying. early on, in a fitful moment of defensiveness, he sneers at you with all sorts of poison in his voice. clingy much? it's pretty much the only thing he's said to you since you've showed up. humiliation heats your cheeks, but it doesn’t make you stop. for fuck’s sake — why are you always watching him like that? d’you think he’s gonna steal something? (spoiler alert. he is gonna steal something. or at least, he’s gonna try. but having your eyes on him around the clock has stopped him from swiping a number of little treasures over the last few cycles, and his resentment grows each time.) with each passing rotation, his tension ratchets higher and higher, and he hates how certain he is that your big, manipulative eyes are picking apart everything about him: his flinches, his scars, his aches. his criminal intentions.  eventually — as per frickin’ usual — he cracks under the strain. furious, venomous words ricochet from his lungs and spit out his mouth, like bullets and ion blasts.  get the fuck away from me, he seethes, you nosy fuckin’ parasite. and you do. rocket feels bad about it later: ears flat, tail tucked, moping and sulking even though he knows he’s got no right to be so miserable about his own frickin’s behavior. he feels even worse when gamora scolds him for it — reminding him that you’ve got no-one out here.  lots of people got no-one, he snaps back, as if it doesn’t make his already-crumpled-up heart shrivel and pinch further in his chest. at least the rest of us manage to keep from being so damn annoying about it. rocket, gamora deadpans, that sweet kid is probably the only person on this ship who doesn’t think you’re annoying.  she shakes her head, like he’s the idiot.  they just want to be around you. he freezes at that. scoffs. gamora’s usually a decent judge of character, but in this case, she’s gotta be wrong. rocket’s pretty sure that the only person who’s wanted to be around him since halfworld is groot senior. everyone else is just there due to obligation or familiarity, as far as he can tell. and you’ve got no obligation, and even less familiarity.

CLINGEE: still, though—he starts watching you. really watching you, trying to tamp down on his preconceived notions. you’re — well. you’re a little clingy with everyone, aren’t you? like a lost little puppy. worried every time they leave; eager to see them back. trying to discreetly check them over for injuries, always looking uncertain of your own welcome. you’re so concerned, so caring. it’s still annoying, of course — on principle — but it’s increasingly hard for him to dredge up any hostility about it.  he tells himself that you need to toughen up. that nobody out here is gonna be as stable and dependable as you apparently need. that you gotta get some calluses to survive in space. but he can’t bring himself to say as much. not out loud. he figures he’s done enough damage to your soft, fragile feelings. and besides, it’s not like he doesn’t notice that you never follow any of the others the way you used to follow him.  only now, the memory of you chasing him around doesn’t feel like such a sour, suspicious thing. now, he wishes he’d enjoyed it more. because the truth is, you’re kind of cute about it. a little self-conscious. a little needy. in retrospect, it could’ve been nice — someone wanting him around that much. someone worrying and fretting over his absences, hoping to be consoled with kisses when he returns. it gets harder and harder to sneer at you every rotation, and even the gruffness in his voice starts to feel more like velvet than sawblades.  it’s not till he’s waiting in the cockpit, tracking your ship as you go on your first-ever solo mission — plucking a bald spot into his tail and planning regular transmission check-ins every rotation — that he realizes what’s happened. And it’s all stupidly thanks to pete: strolling in, all nonchalant — like you aren’t a few hundred lightyears away, all by your lonesome, and not due back on the benatar  for another five-and-a-half-rotations. rocket’s already promised himself that when you get back, he’ll be nice. so nice. hell, he might even frickin’ apologize for being such a dickhead. he’ll let you hang around as much as you want: camp out with him in the cockpit, hand him tools in the mechanical room.  sleep in his frickin’ bunk. if you want. fuck. it’ll be fine, pete says, interrupting rocket’s thoughts with a roll of his eyes. he tells rocket how smart you are, how clever, how resourceful — as if rocket didn’t know all that.  there’s nothing to worry about, dude— i just want ‘em home, rocket snaps.  another handful of fur floats to the cockpit floor, and pete rolls his eyes again, smirking. geez, rocket.  clingy much?

eidos rocket

CLINGER: he’s not sure how the flark you won him over. ever since he’d made the mistake of telling you he thought he was gonna die — just a little hazing for the newbie, nothing serious; not till you'd started bawling your d’ast eyes out, looking like he’d broken your soft little humie heart — he’s found it hard to take his eyes off you. you’re cute. like, real cute. and even if he’s a scummy son-of-a-chog who really should leave you alone, he can’t help but wanna keep you close.  and apparently the feeling’s flarkin’ mutual, because you seem to be around all the time these days. he’d bet a hundred-k credits that you’d follow him right into his bunk if he let you, never mind the fact that he figures you’re just a little too innocent for most of the games he likes to play there.  it’s the first time he goes on a solo mission that he realizes just how attached you’ve gotten. your brow’s all pinched and twisted, and you look a little waxy, skin damp like you’ve got a fever or chills or both. just not feeling my best today, you tell groot when he asks, then mumble something about headaches and nausea. you’re scrubbing your knuckles over your sternum like you’ve got heartburn. his ears twitch. every once in a while your heart does a double-beat, hiccuping like the false start in a sprint, and your breathing gets reedy and shallow. what the fuck? you worried about me, sweet thing? he’d meant it to sound condescending and smug, but the words come out crackled with concern. he’s developed a begrudging sort of affection for you. maybe even a rather filthy fixation that he’d absolutely act on if he hadn’t sworn off biologicals. not to mention that watching pete and gamora fumble around like a pair of flarkwits is enough to put anyone off the idea of dating in-house.  you flinch when he asks, though. just… come back, you’d ordered through bloodless, pinched lips. normally he’d balk under someone thinkin’ they could tell him what to do, but it strikes something in him: what you’d said. the way you’d said it. he knows what it’s like to be afraid of losing people.  so instead of getting snippy, he just squints up at you with caramel-rum eyes and finds — for once in his d'ast life — some krutackin' patience. hey, i got some stuff in my bunk that needs to be kept watch over, rocket tells you slowly. the words are cautious, even if the impulse isn't. but then, he’s always been a creature of impulse. do me a favor, sweet thing — sleep in there while i’m gone? you can have the hammock. might be a tight squeeze, but— okay, you say quickly, like he’s just offered you way more than a substandard bed. his eyes narrow further. f’you hear any weird beeping, get quill, he instructs, knowing that you won’t hear anything of the sort. or, well, if you do, it won’t matter anyway, because half the sector’ll already be condensing into a manufactured black hole from that black-market gravity-bomb he’s been messing around with for the last quarter. no — needing you to keep an eye on his scut is just a pretty fiction for both of you. an excuse — to comfort you, of course.  and maybe to get you into his bed without him having to worry about flarking things up. 

CLINGEE: he imagines it a few times. that is, a few times for each and every rotation that he’s away. he kinda likes picturing you, climbing clumsily into his hanging bed. snuggling up to his pillow. waking in a loose sleepy tangle of limbs. maybe once or twice, he even indulges in the thought of you playing with yourself there, just 'cause you can’t help but miss him oh-so-very-much — even though he’s never once let himself touch you like that before. so far, anyway.  when rocket finally returns to the milano a cycle-and-a-half later, you’re waiting at the airlock before his pod even docks. your eyes look starved for him.  and it’s… gratifying.  flark. not even groot has ever looked so thrilled by his return. throughout the rest of the rotation, you stick so close to him that he can feel you brushing against his fur everytime you breathe. funny — a quarter or two ago, he woulda found it as annoying as flark.  now he leans in. maybe he should go more often, he thinks — if this is the sweet homecoming he gets when he returns. you, clinging to him like honey.  the sleepshift destroys that idea, though. he hadn’t thought about what it would be like to come home to a bed you’d slept in. never again, he thinks, fisting a handful of the blanket still drenched in your scent. he drags the fragrance into his lungs, practic’ly salivating while he grips his aching dick and strokes it along the curve. fuck morals and ethics and the stickiness of workplace-relationships. and fuck you, for getting your flarkin’ pheromones or whatever all over his d’ast hammock — never mind he’s the chog who told you to sleep there. he forces himself to let go of his cock and his quilt, fumbling himself back into his pants and raking an angry claw through his beard, tousling the fur on top of his head.  never again, he snarls on repeat under his breath, starting for the hatch of his bunk — heading toward you like the gravity-bomb’s been set off after all, and you’re the walking talking singularity. yeah, fuck you. he’s never letting you sleep in his bunk without him again. short term, the only solution is to drag you back here tonight. longterm? he’ll just have to take you with him. 

cartoon rocket

CLINGER: this rocket cannot, for the life of him, recognize what your separation anxiety for what it is. all he knows is that it’s a perfect compliment to his touch-starvation.  oh, he might pretend to feel smothered when he first meets you, but he’s besotted quickly enough. how could he not be, when you’re always cracking jokes at quill’s expense and showing off that big beautiful brain of yours in a hundred little ways you probably don’t even realize? besides, he reasons. everyone in the guardians has their quirks and flaws. better for all of them if you’re a little overeager for connection, rather than keeping everyone at arm’s length. enough of ‘em already do that — himself included.

CLINGEE: to be honest, rocket’s probably not the healthiest influence on you. he indulges himself by indulging you: perching on your back and peering over your shoulder, draping himself against your side whenever he gets a chance. he preens under your attentions, like the fact that you want his presence so bad is proof that he’s more than a runty, ratty little flark-up.  groot encourages it, too. the big guy’s sweet, but he doesn’t understand enmeshed attachment or codependency. he’s just happy to see that his friend has another friend — especially one like you, who the flora colossus likes so much.  maybe you should try to be a little more independent. the consistency of rocket’s presence in your life — entertaining you with snark while the two of you eat elbow-to-elbow; insisting that you’re always partnered with him and groot so he can keep a hand on you at all times; telling you stories while he tinkers with some tiny machine in your bunk till you fall asleep with your head on his thigh, dreaming of clinking metal and growly grumbles — well. you’re worried it will make things so much more distressing when you do have to separate for whatever reason.  but for better or worse, rocket has no intentions of letting that happen.

universe-killer rocket

CLINGER: it takes a minute for universe-killer rocket to figure out you’ve got a little separation anxiety — and the microsecond that he does, he pounces. how can he help himself? this rocket has learned to take every scrap he wants. he’s so darkly delighted to find that you have such an easily-exploitable weakness, and he’s thrilled to figure out how he can manipulate it to please himself. in this case, pleasing himself mostly means breaking you down into a cute, dependent little humie pet: willing to give him the information only you know, or complete the tasks only you can complete. and equally willing to beg for his collar around your throat or his bite on your skin. so he gets to work, with all the power of that intuitive genius that seems to come so easily to him. eventually he settles on a calculated cocktail of instability and stockholm syndrome, which seems to do the job nicely. in no time, you’re doing everything in your power to convince him to keep you by his side. once, you even going so far as to offer to let him leash you if he’ll take you with him.  he gives in that time. for his own entertainment.  and you are entertaining. for fuck’s sake, at some point, you start picking your cuticles raw every time he leaves you locked in his captain’s quarters for an hour or two, till he threatens to keep you electrocuffed to the bed if you don’t stop.  no-one spills your pretty red blood but me, he teases, his unholy prosthetic eye all aglow. not even you. later, when the hellspawn fleet has overtaken a new star system and knowhere is blotting out some poor planet’s sun, the universe-killer is called to descend to the world below on account of some disagreement between his crew. It’s a minor matter — one they should be able to figure out on their own — but they’re terrified enough to ask for his input, and he’s always pleased with the power that comes from giving it.  and when he returns to the skull, smug and satisfied — why, you’re practic'ly frickin' weepy. he loves that about you. loves how you look up at him with those big wet eyes and trembly-tear-glossed lips, the slightly-swollen tip of your nose from scrubbing at it while you’d sniffled in his absence. it’s fucking intoxicating, in a way he hasn’t been able to manufacture with chemical substances. what’s left of his biological nervous system crackles with static; the mech-engineered nerves feel like they’re sparking, hot little lances of pain. yeah, he loves it. loves you. whatever. loves the way that you hiccup when your eyes finally fall on him, the tension rippling out of your shoulders in relief only to come rolling back in when you remember that he’s a fuckin’ monster. loves the way you start warbling again, tripping over your words when you try to convince him that you’re so grateful for his return. it isn’t till the next time he’s called away that he figures it out. he’s amused, at first — like he always is — at the way you beg him not to leave, promising him you’ll be good, pleading with him to take you with him. amused, and pleased, and more turned on than he has time for right now. mockingly — not expecting a real answer — he asks what has you so needy for a universe-killer’s company.  you don’t want to tell him. universe-killer rocket has a laugh that curdles your insides: sarcastic, taunting, gleeful. you fully expect it to be wielded in your direction if you admit why you need him to stay, to keep you with him. it’s a laugh that slices through you, that always seems to show you in no uncertain terms jyst how vulnerable you really are, and you’ve no desire to have it turned toward you once more. but — you’ve also been under his thumb too long to disobey. so, hiccuping and hyperventilating around mouthfuls of tears —  you tell him anyway.

CLINGEE CAPTOR: it’s not that you want him around, he realizes slowly — and he’s a fuckin’ idiot for thinking that it was. it’s not even that you crave the illusion of stability that his presence provides, or — better still — that you’ve started craving him the same way he’s started craving you.  (unfortunately, all those things are true — he simply hasn’t forced those particular confessions from your lips yet.) no. the reason you can’t bear for him to leave is that — at some point, in some way — someone has convinced you that they’ll hurt you when he’s not around.  one of his hellspawn has dared to make his pet feel unsafe on knowhere.  maybe he should be glad about it. smug. whatever threats they’d levied had helped turn you into this: pliant for him — at least on some days — and so humble and grateful, begging him to keep you. but he doesn’t like it. he doesn’t like it at all. he tells himself it’s because you’re his to break. he tells himself it’s because they scared you without his permission.  he even almost believes it.  he seethes. he forgets leaving you. forgets the thing he was asked to come fix, too. his crew will figure it out themselves anyway — or they won’t like the consequences. instead, he holds your face in his enormous, metal mitt — the one that can turn into a fucking bazooka — and tilts your gaze up to his. and he drops one word — like a fucking bomb. who?  and later — when he finally leaves you sniffling and teary and lonely in his quarters — it’s only to make sure nobody thinks they can scare you like that again.

rivals rocket

CLINGER: the truth is, this rocket barely even clocks your anxiety at first. he’s been enjoying flirting with you for some time — opts into spending so much time with you that it hardly even registers that you’re a little clingy. when it does occur to him, he only finds himself a little disappointed that you wouldn’t take too well to a quick fuck or a fling. too bad. he’d love to have some fun with you if he wasn’t worried you’d want him to stay.  but even without mutual orgasms, or maybe some makeout-sessions, he enjoys his time with you. you’re arguably the most tolerable person around — other than groot, of course. and he doesn’t really think of your neediness other than with an occasional vague half-regret.  suddenly — out of nowhere, unexpectedly —  the first few chronoverses open up. and it’s chaos — messy, gritty, confusing chaos — but the two of you are together, at least. for the first handful of battles, you're together. and then the next time, you’re not.  he comes back to his real universe, high on a win.  a little freaked out, sure — but he always loves a chance to kill some guys. it takes a second for him to realize you’re not there waiting for him — that you went somewhere, too, and that he has no way of knowing when or where. before he can process the sudden ripple of unease under his fur, though — the abrupt certainty that he’s going to be the next bastard molding and destroying the space-time continuum like a handful of plastic explosive — you’re back: swirling into existence right as you crumple to your knees. tears silver your cheeks, leaving behind salt and rivers of glass. 

CLINGEE: he’ll never forget the way his heart drops, sickening and gutted and hollow, certain you’ve been traumatized or wounded — maybe even mortally. he all but lunges at you, gripping his prickling claws into your upper arms, hauling you upright so he can check you over. you look unharmed— for all that your breath is hitching and hiccupy. your fingers plunge into his fur and curl, anchoring yourself to him like you’re daring doom’s chronoverses to try and tear you away again. his nose flares, but he can’t pick up the scent of any blood; his ears prick, but your heart sounds mostly normal, if far too fast. he asks what’s wrong, what happened, if you’re okay; you try to respond — at least, he thinks you do — but all your words are a wreckage of broken gasps.  later, he’ll stay up for rotations on end. he’d previously been working on some better weapons — some tech that could maybe help stabilize some of the secondary chronoverses, too. but after today, he’ll redirect his time and energy into making something that can keep you two together. because what happens if you get pulled somewhere without him? and you panic like this, where there’s no-one good enough to take care of you? to protect you and look out for you? no. wherever you go — whenever you go — he goes too. that’s just how it’s gotta be.  but for now — in this moment — he has to deal with the gasping, wrenching, gutting agony of your anxiety attack. too bad he’s no good at it. injuries he can handle — but as much as he’d love to console you right now, he’s trash at this emotional stuff. so he tries to get up, to go find someone who might actually know how to be comforting.  but your fingers knot in his, big teary eyes begging wordlessly: stay.  he’s never really thought of himself as a pushover before, but here he is: wrapped around you, petting you, holding you tight. trying to help you slow your breathing. muttering into your skin: yeah, yeah. okay. i’m here, sweetheart.  i’ll stay. 

comics rocket (ewing, rosenberg, et al)

CLINGER: this rocket is the rocket that takes the healthiest approach to your separation anxiety. not because he’s got any emotional intelligence, mind you. just chalk it up to his .976 optimum intuitive grasp. or his infamous, innate skill for strategy. or something.  it’s a bumpy start, though. as a rule, rocket doesn’t bother trying to learn new crewmates’ names. the original guardians can barely stand to stick together for more than a quarter at a time — most of the new ones don’t last half that long. and stronger earthers than you — kitty, ben — have ended up tucking tail and going home to their backwater mudball far sooner than rocket would have liked. so combine that with his own reluctance to develop relationships — not to mention pete tryin’ to flarkin’ strongarm rocket into showing you around the ship — and he’s got a healthy dose of resentment already brewing by the time he realizes you’ve, like, bonded to him or something. …sucks to be you, he thinks. you’ve gone an developed some sort of attachment issue to the one grizmod on the ship who’d rather be alone. he manages to stoically ignore you at first. and to your credit, you don’t kick up a fuss about it. you simply find your own grizz to do, lingering in his periphery like an annoyingly-endearing shadow. you never seem to demand his attention — nothing more than a nod, a shy smile, the occasional offer of coffee.  it isn’t till the guardians undergo one of their annual krutackin’ break-ups that he realizes how much trouble you’re in.  the truth is that all the guardians — with the exception of you and groot — are prone to throwing temper tantrums when they don’t get their way. and yeah, that includes rocket himself — and he knows it, though he’ll never admit it out loud. In the middle of this particular fight, gamora storms off in the only working escape pod, and drax demands to be let off at the next spaceport, and frankly — rocket yells — pete better be plannin’ on hitching a ride there too, because rocket’s put in too many hours working on this gorgeous ship to give it up for a manipulative brat like flarkin’ star-lord. and nobody — not even groot — notices how hard you’re trying to bend over backward, to get them to talk, to try to make a little peace between them all.  later, rocket remembers it. your teary eyes, the way you’d practically started hyperventilating when gamora had left — you pupils dilating in panic. he remembers it. he thinks about it. he can’t stop turning it over in his head. halfway through the sleepshift he gives up on rest and makes his way back to the cockpit, intent on flying them that much closer to a place where they can split up — trying to figure out what the flark he’s gonna do with you. give you to pete, till the next time they get back together? it’s the smart decision, but it leaves a bad taste in his mouth. pete’s a little safer than rocket. less likely to take risks, maybe. less prickly, certainly. though k’ythri only knows what will happen if the grizmod gets it into his head to seduce you — which is another thought that puts rocket’s sharp incisors on edge. all these tangled thoughts are the reason why rocket’s so distracted that he doesn’t even notice you in the copilot’s seat until he’s almost sitting down next to you. it makes him jump, and he never flarkin’ jumps.  for sharra’s sake, he almost yelps. what the krutack are you doin’ here? you blink up at him with bleary eyes and salt on your cheeks. a divot’s carved between your eyes, and your lips tremble and purse. sorry, you croak, your voice all throaty and hoarse like you’ve been sobbing. something stupid wrenches in his chest. he scrubs at his manufactured sternum uselessly, so distracted — again — that he almost misses it when you tell him you’re leaving.

CLINGEE: wait, rocket says impulsively, as you begin shuffling yourself out of the seat. just — just flarkin’ hold on. he pinches the bridge of his nose. look. are you… all right? you stare at him blankly. you look like the saddest krutackin’ thing in the universe. yeah, you whisper after a moment. i’m fine. i just have a headache. you turn, and he finds himself calling out again. wait. uh — you know where the headache meds are? he ends up getting them for you. meds. a cup of water. he gruffly encourages you to sit. and he asks. what’s goin’ on? why are you so worked up? it’s nothing to freak out about, he tells you. splitting up is something the guardians do with more regularity than breaking the law or saving the galaxy. they all just need some time to cool off. they’ll be back. they always are.  your pretty eyes start leaking again as he talks, and he kinda wants to strangle himself. he’s even tempted to try it. but instead, he does what he does best. he strategizes. before you know it, he’s steadying you. distracting you. not well, but enough that your tears come slower. less often. and once he’s sure you’re asleep, he’s sending a transmission to gamora. i don’t care how pissed you are, he snaps into the holorecording. you don’t walk off again like that without talking to the new kid first. and you need to comm ‘em first thing in the wakeshift. every first wakeshift for as long as you’re gone. regular, steady contact. you understand?  a growl.  you owe me, gams. drax and pete wake up right as gamora happens to comm him back. rocket’s grateful you’re still sleeping — worn out, he assumes, by yesterday’s distress.  listen, he says. he has to grimace around the sour taste of his pride as he swallows it down. for you. listen. i still hate you all. lie. but i’ve hated you before, and we still managed to pull ourselves together to save the universe or whatever. this is — this is just as important. of course, everyone agrees. soon, they’ve got a whole scheme worked out. regular solo-missions for the foreseeable future, one at a time, starting out with contracts that will only require a few hours apart and gradually growing longer. plans for each guardian to talk with you about goodbye rituals and keeping in contact with you during their absences. increasing independence. it’s a flexible plan — responsive to your needs, while balancing the expectations of their good paying customers. flexible, but steady. reliable. stable.  probably more stable than anything they’ve ever tried to do before. which means, rocket thinks with a sigh, that they’re bound to flark it up. but for you, they’re willing to try. together. and so is he. 

comics rocket (skottie young)

CLINGER: skottie-young-rocket is no stranger to a clingy babe. when you save someone, they kinda tend to get attached. and when you give ‘em the tail, then they really don’t wanna leave.  he doesn’t mind. it’s one of the perks of bein’ a hero or whatever. and he’s always been good at escaping when he wants to.  which means he usually only sticks around long enough to get his rocks off, get his partner’s rocks off, and then hack into their accounts and clean out as much of their treasury as he can. to, uh, cover the costs of the rescue, of course.  but you — needy when he’s around, irritable whenever he’s gotta go — for some reason, he flarkin’ loves it. the grumpiness is cute: the way you go from being the sweetest, friendliest, funniest, hottest little number he knows to suddenly hissing like an angry flerken-kit, all cranky and annoyed, prickly as hell — just because you gotta go a few hours without him.

CLINGEE: yeah. rocket likes your clinginess. so sue him. he probably even teases you about it. until one sleepshift, right before he’s s’posed to take off for a couple cycles, when you turn on him with bared, blunt teeth and a tiny growl that’s probably the least intimidating thing he’s ever heard. how would you like it? you spit, all cutely-raised hackles and narrowed, flashing eyes. if i were leaving all the time, and you didn’t know when i was coming back? or if i was coming back? or if i was safe or okay? his smile drops like someone has turned the gravity up to five-hundred, brows suddenly slanting, stricken. because as erratic as this rocket is, he’s still deeply empathetic — he just needs someone to spell things out for him from time to time. and the fact is, he wouldn’t like that. not at all. after all, doesn’t he know what it’s like to be the loneliest guy in the universe?  he palms the back of his head and stammers out lopsided excuses and weak apologies, hating himself for all the times he hasn’t taken it seriously. he promises to comm you once every shift, just to let you know what’s goin’ on. and while he’s away, he works on a new little gadget. bespoke matching trackers, with expansive long-range signal. one for each of you. so you both always exactly know where each other are. 

mcu rocket

DOMS YOU: by doing whatever it takes to make you beg for him — to force you to convince him that you want him, that you need him. he’s a master of edging, and he wants desperately to leave marks on you as proof that he was there. it’s not a dealbreaker if you aren’t into spanking or biting or spanking or clamping or spanking or bruising, but he’d love to give you just a little bit of pain if you’re into it. also likes to degrade you a little too, but has a hard time bringing himself to be really mean when he likes you oh-so-much. oh — and the top-drop is real with this one, so make sure to provide good aftercare for your dom.

SUBS FOR YOU: the amount of trust it will take for this rocket to explicitly sub for you is immense (though it’s pretty clear early on that even if he likes to degrade you a little bit, you’re the one with all the power in the bedroom). he doesn’t like to be restrained by anything but his own willpower, which is admittedly flimsy. but for you, he’ll try: clenching his fists into the sheets of his bunk, gripping onto shelves and hatch-frames and anything else he can brace himself against to try to keep from touching you when you tell him to keep his hands to himself. he might even let you blindfold him, though he’s honest enough to admit that he can use his other senses to get a pretty clear idea of where you’re at and what you’re about to do. the truth is, this rocket really does want nothing more than to make you feel good — and if that means letting you take control, he’ll figure out a way to do it. after the first time — when you’ve given him so many orgasms he thinks he might’ve actually died and gone to a better afterlife than he deserves — he’s more willing to explore whatever options you want, just as long as you keep murmuring those sweet little reassurances that you’ll take care of him.

eidos rocket

DOMS YOU: most rockets have something of a gunplay-kink, but this guy takes it to the next level. he loves to both toss you around and boss you around, and lavish you with all sorts condescending praise — particularly when stretching you out on a cannon. plus, ever since that night you let him get you high on everbloom, he can’t stop thinking about how sweet and silly and eager-to-please you’d been while intoxicated. he won’t do anything without your explicit consent, but he can envision a whole galaxy of fun if you let him do that again.

SUBS FOR YOU: this rocket generally avoids situations where he’s vulnerable, so at first it seems like you’re unlikely to ever get the upper hand. secretly, he also worries about having flashbacks to the labs when restrained, or the sensory deprivation chambers when, well, sensory-deprived, so traditional bondage is a no-go. i don’t think he minds you taking the lead, though — just be prepared for him to be bit of a pillow princess when roles are reversed. that said, the truth is that between the cold contempt of the kree scientists, lylla’s sacrifice for his life, and tella’s betrayal, this rocket — while vain as hell in regards to his pretty fur and stunning physique — does worry that there’s something intrinsically inadequate about himself as a person. shower him with enough authentic praise, and he’ll do just about anything to keep it (and you) coming.

cartoon rocket

DOMS YOU: this rocket absolutely sees himself as a dom and is also absolutely not one. underneath it all, some part of him believes that he’s still the unloved runt of his family and the weird one on halfworld — and no matter how amazingly brilliant and capable he’s become, that perception of himself never fully goes away. except for when he’s with you, that is. look, he tries to boss you around a bit. but when you give him that sweet, indulgent little smile and massage the base of his ears, he’ll do whatever he can to please you. the closest this rocket gets to “calling the shots” is when he leaves fine red scratch marks somewhere visible on your skin — loving the way it looks like he’s claimed you (even if part of him would much rather be claimed).

SUBS FOR YOU: did you see the episode with ja kyee lrurt? sure, it’ll take a whole lot of trust-building to get there, but once he’s fallen for you, this rocket will worship the ground you walk on. he’ll trip over his own tail trying to make you happy, both in and out of bed. step on him, spit in his mouth, and call him a good boy, and he’ll be thankful.

universe-killer rocket

DOMS YOU: WARNING. DANGER. if this rocket decides to let you live in the first place, he’ll be wanting to keep you collared around the clock. imagine everything the other rockets do to dom you, but dial the intensity up to thirteen and make it at least six shades darker. loves to see you crawl.

SUBS FOR YOU: oh honey. you’re in the wrong place. at best — once he softens up to you — you’ll get a part-time service dom. maybe. it’s not even that he doesn’t want to submit to you (though he doesn’t). it’s mostly that he wouldn’t remember how if he tried.

marvel rivals rocket

DOMS YOU: i’m still getting to know this rocket but it’s clear he likes variety, based on his dramatically-different looks. i suspect he’s got a major size-kink to go along with that tendency, too. it doesn’t matter that he’s smaller than you in stature: this rocket has at least fifteen different prosthetic cocks and about ten of them are too big for you to take without substantial prep. don’t worry, though: while rocket is not patient in most things, he makes exceptions for this. he loves sinking into you nice and slow while you’re all teared up and dripping, grinning maniacally against your damp skin and purring, “easy, sweetheart; biiiiiig stretch”

SUBS FOR YOU: this rocket’s got super-soldier trauma too, but i think he’s also way better at being part of a team — which means he’s willing to take one for it, too. submitting to you is the equivalent of a trust-fall, and once you’ve had his back in battle, he’s willing to at least give it a shot. give him a playful flick to his earring and a smirk to let him know you’re in the mood to boss him around, and he’ll let you as long as it leads to multiple orgasms for both of you. as mentioned, he’s also a big fan of shaking things up, so feel free to try out all your new ideas, just as long as you’re communicating beforehand.

ewing/rosenberg/et al rocket

DOMS YOU: this rocket spent some time with a pretty little thing from the aceta system and learned all about traditional krylorian ropeplay. he loves tying you up with all sorts of deviously-positioned knots that tease your poor, delicious body every time you take a breath. then he just sits and drinks his angargal’s (neat) and watches you with a predatory grin and a few casual — if absolutely filthy — “compliments.” is it even edging if he’s not actually doing anything? he’s innocent, your honor! except that he might jerk off on you, just so he lasts longer when he finally gets inside you (plus there’s something about see you you helpless and dripping — with his fluids and yours — that makes him dangerously feral). he’s also a big fan of directing you on how to touch yourself — especially if he can make you edge or overstim your own body. it feels like the ultimate control to him.

SUBS FOR YOU: this rocket loves cuddles, physical affection, and quality time — though he’ll never admit it. it’s on account of him being the loneliest flarkin’ guy in the universe, of course. he hadn’t remembered his past for circs — just a big ol’ hollow void in his history that he’d filled with persistent dread, raw nerves, and more cons and grifts than even he can recall. had his heart broke once or twice, and generally perceives himself as too much of a d’ast grizmod to be worthy of another person’s genuine love. and then he’d gotten his memories back… only to find out he’d been an authentic dumb-ass hero in a past life, before his former enemy had married his girl. it had really sent the message home: that nobody’s just gonna give him nice things. well. nobody until you. so cuddle this rocket up tight in your arms, and treat him oh-so-lovingly — spend late nights with him in the cockpit and listen to his stories — then stroke his tail while you ask him so sweetly to jack himself off. he’ll find himself doing whatever you say before he even realizes it. or — if you want to give him a real treat — make him promise not to move while you cockwarm him for an hour or two. make sure he knows that there will be no orgasms for cranky gunsmiths who can’t stay still. he’ll stare at you like you’re absurd for suggesting it — why the flark would he agree to something like that? — but after two minutes of you holding him snuggled tight inside you, he’ll start getting teary-eyed from the sheer emotional intimacy of it all.

skottie young rocket

DOMS YOU: by tying you up and overstimming you — again and again and again and again — with his tail and a dozen new toys he made himself. today. look, he’s gotta try ‘em out somehow, and you’re both his lucky muse and his favorite lil test-subject. loves to make you cry — but only for fun reasons. would absolutely arrange for another sub to wreck you under his direction, but only if you told him you’d be into it. he’s one-thousand percent a showman of the highest caliber and he’s gotta make sure everything’s over the top so he doesn’t disappear without ever being loved, which means he also doesn’t mind a full-fledged audience.

SUBS FOR YOU: if you’re looking for vulnerability with this rocket, you’re more likely to find it in unguarded moments of sexual intimacy that are remarkably vanilla. why? mostly just because it’s proof that he doesn’t always have to be the most outrageous thing in the galaxy to keep your attention. these are the moments when he’s heartwrenchingly soft, when he might explain to you how isolated he feels, how he’s searched high and low for “his own people” and has always been reminded that he’s the only thing like him in the universe; that he’s tried to fill the void with an endless parade of gender-variable space-princesses only to find that no-one ever made him feel less-alone — until you. but if you’re looking for submission… well. this rocket is the switchiest switch to ever switch. he has no issue subbing for someone with whom he expects to have fun, mostly because he doesn’t have to trust you to play sub for you. he’ll let you do pretty much whatever you want in the name of brat-taming, but the joke’s on you if you think he’s not capable of wresting back control the moment he wants it. for flark’s sake, he can get out of those electrocuffs in less than two seconds if he wants to — and he’ll never be done being a brat.

ROCKET DOMS / SUBS FOR YOU.

an exploration of every rocket's kinks, specifically as they pertain to domming you or subbing for you. // NSFW.

ROCKET DRINKS / SMOKES.

every rocket's preference when it comes to substance use. // NSFW-lite.

ROCKET FALLS FOR YOU.

each rocket's journey into attraction and inevitable devotion. // req // NSFW-lite.

ROCKET WITH A CLINGY PARTNER. [NEW! MARCH 19]

each rocket reacts to a partner with separation anxiety. // req // NSFW-lite.

ROCKET TEAMS UP. [MAY-ISH]

each rocket's role in a team-up of rockets... including a team-up on a cute little reader. // req // NSFW.

ROCKET REACTS TO WATCHERS. [JUNE-ISH]

each rocket's response to someone he catches staring at you. // req // NSFW-lite.

mcu rocket

for the most part, mcu rocket simply uses a sonic-shower when he can. almost every ship he steals — and certainly every one he builds — has one. he loves a hot water-shower, but until he figures out how to make an H2O converter, it's just a waste of a limited resource in space. also, given the thickness of his pelt, he has to dry his fur unless he wants to be a soggy mess for the rest of the day — and that tends to dry out his skin, since he doesn't invest in nice fur-and-skin products. some of it's a self-punishment, but he's also a criminal who's basically constantly on the run, so he tends to live light. a couple-dozen collapsible guns, an extra jumpsuit, and groot. that's all he needs.

it gets rough when he doesn't have access to even a sonic-shower, though. sometimes he's reduced to grooming his fur with his tongue like an animal. and even though it leaves his coat feeling glossier and fuller than any other product he's ever used, he still feels dirty afterward — knowing how people would judge him if they knew.

once he puts down roots in the bony, calcium-rich soil of knowhere, things shift a little. he invests his time in building himself a working water-shower with a blast-dryer long before he ever thinks about a real bed. he keeps a little shelf with some nice fur-oil next to his fur-and-skin moisturizing shampoo, and his dental-pick and polish. still, it isn't till after volume three that he starts to allow himself to enjoy things. he finishes his new bathtub around the same time he — reluctantly, begrudgingly — invests in a mattress. and while he's always known how much he enjoys being submerged in water — he's even sometimes wondered if he might have been a swimmer if not for all the metal in his body that now makes him less-than-bouyant — he suddenly realizes there's nothing quite like a bath.

so while his morning and evening rituals remain largely pragmatic — brushing the lint and dust from his fur, keeping his sharp teeth bright and white and clean, taking a shower when he can and oiling his fur to keep it glossy and bright, moisturizing his skin underneath — bathing is one of his secret indulgences. it's the first thing he does once the bowie has docked and the systems have been checked and nebs has been debriefed, and he can slink off to his apartment.

after all — nothing is more relaxing than a good, hot bath after a day of fixing knowhere's internal engines, saving a distant planet from a despotic ruler, and trying to keep track of phylla (overzealous little genius) and adam (overzealous enormous himbo). his tail splashes the water and he rests his head against the edge of the tub. i like to imagine he wears one of those soft headbands with the big bow in front (in pink, of course) to keep his fur from dripping condensation in his eyes. bubbles are a bit of a pain to wash out of his fur — though he does secretly love them — but he has a growing collection of little glass bottles of muscle-soothing salts instead. he puts something chill on the zune — maybe lights a few candles he picked up on indigarr — and all his knotted limbs loosen in the encompassing warmth. the old aches and pains from his surgeries and prosthetics melt away, and his stress dissolves in the steam like a dream he can barely remember.

eidos rocket

most of the other rockets haven't had to rough it quite the same way that mcu rocket has, but eidos rocket in particular is at the other end of the spectrum when it comes to making up for lost time. he's by far the most vain of the rockets — always has been. even when he was still on halfworld, he cleaned his teeth and brushed his tail religiously before bed. looking good and grooming himself were ways that he could feel in-control and proud of himself, even when everything else was absolute shit.

once he's out in the greater universe — free — the physical comfort of good hygiene and self-care become more elaborate and more ritualistic. every night, he brushes out and oils his fur. a hundred strokes for his tail alone, just to make sure he gets every speck of dust and lint and shed strand of hair. he does the same with his beard and the fur on his head, though far fewer strokes are necessary. then he uses warm, wet towels to dampen both before massaging in his custom-made fur-and-skin tonic (based on a beard-oil he'd stolen from a spartaxian mark right after he got off halfworld). every morning, he cleans his teeth carefully, and brushes his fur till it shines again, and skillfully rebraids his silky beard, grinning as he makes sure each bead is perfectly positioned for maximum charm. The he settles his goggles atop his head, and cocks them to one side, and smirks at his reflection.

yeah. he knows he's hot.

once a cycle, he tries to do some deep-conditioning, too — assuming whatever the gardeners are doing allows for the time and attention, that is. cleans his fur thoroughly, then steams in the little sauna he'd initially built for drax and gamora after they've been training. washes with water and some special fur-glossing shampoo that he steals whenever he can and buys whenever he has to. oils up and wraps himself in towels, then rinses it all out and conditions with more expensive products. rocket knows expensive things aren't always high-quality things, but he likes both and he doesn't deny himself either.

plus, the whole event is like an aromatherapy session, and since he's currently not inclined toward talk-therapy, he figures this has to suffice for now.

rivals rocket

rivals rocket is almost as invested in his self-care as eidos rocket, though it shows up in different ways and for different reasons. while self-care for eidos rocket has been a way to maintain control and confidence when he was imprisoned, rivals rocket sees it as a way to remind himself and everyone else that he isn't some kind of stupid animal, and that he deserves better than to be tested on and ripped apart and experimented upon. so it's not only a way of maintaining his health and relaxing; it's also deeply connected to a defense of his identity. if he has to skip a day, he'll be fine, but he's also going to figure out a way to continue practicing self-care routines as often as possible, even when the environment is rough and he has to be creative.

but when all is well, rivals rocket starts every morning with a quick, brisk shower — a luxury not afforded to him in his previous life — and a rigorous dental-cleaning, since his pearly-white canines are a source of pride. he likes to intimidate people by flashing a wide, sharp, shit-eating smirk, and he doesn't want anything to detract from how clean and dangerous his bite would be. he picks and polishes, and probably uses two different kinds of mouthwash: one for killing bacteria, and another for strengthening enamel — and he never-ever forgets to floss. in fact, this guy probably even carries a travel-pick and some dental-gel in one of those pouches he keeps on his person at all times. he loves the feeling of his mouth being cold and clean, which was another rarity before he gained his freedom.

rivals rocket also focuses as much on the thick crop of fur atop his head as he does on his tail, hitting both with a glossing-spray after he shakes off as much water as he can (unlike mcu-rocket, this guy uses only a hand-dryer on a cool-setting to get rid of any excess dampness on his body). he likes to run his fingers through the fur that droops into his eyes: massaging his own scalp, tugging at the roots, then pulling gently on the luxurious strands. it's almost as grounding as the mint in his mouth.

then, in possibly the most-critical part of his waking-up routine, rivals rocket slants himself a wink in the mirror, flashes his sharp canines, and gives himself finger-guns before heading out the hatch.

skottie young rocket

now, skottie young's rocket has no ritual at all — mostly because he is bad at consistency in any form. this guy's the one who just brushes his teeth in the shower whenever he wakes up. why waste water on an extra task, you know? and it's easier for him to remember everything if he does it all at once. sometimes he remembers to clean his teeth before bed, too, but his sleep-habits leave something to be desired anyway. he's as likely to fall asleep in the engine room as he is in the cockpit, and twice as likely to fall asleep in either of those places versus actually making it down to his bunk. to compensate, he always pops a dental-hygiene tab after every meal, trusting that it’ll do its job in breaking down any left-behind matter and bad bacteria. to be honest, this actually probably means he has the best dental hygiene of all the rockets, even if it is basically on-accident.

that said — when he remembers — this rocket does use a special silk-lined wrap that he stole from fron. the fur-covered fronnish locals would sleep in warmth-generating flannels and fleeces, but a lot of their clothing had satiny linings to protect their fur from pulling or breaking while they slept. rocket keeps the one he stole specifically for his tail (and as a souvenir), and he uses it whenever he remembers to.

after all, the babes LOVE the tail, you know?

ewing, rosenberg, et al rocket

finally — the ewing, rosenberg, et al rocket. (as he would say, we've saved the best for last this time.) this guy has always enjoyed the finer things in life. he uses good-quality, scentless shampoos and conditioners, and he cleans his claws and teeth meticulously. he'll even do a deep conditioning for his fur when he thinks of it. but unlike the other rockets, the most important element to his self-care routine is anything that supports his sleep. he uses an eyemask to block out excess light — especially since his eyeshine tends to pick up so much of it. no earplugs or headphones, though — it's important to him that his sharp ears can pick up any change in the ship's systems, even while he sleeps. and though he wouldn't say he has a collection, he does like to indulge himself in comfy pajamas on occasion. pete once brought him some from earth that had a rocket-ship on the shirt, and they're some of his favorites. this rocket always tries to wind down with some quiet hours behind the flight controls before bed, making sure to kick everyone else out of the cockpit so that it's just him, the sky, the ship, and the stars.

well. he kicks out everyone — except you, i think. i like to imagine that, even though it took a while for this rocket to warm up to you, you're now probably his favorite person on board, on par with groot. after all, you were the one to introduce him to sleepytime teas: chamomiles and lavenders, lemonbalms and peppermints. you've taken to brewing you both a cup every night, maybe adding a little vanilla syrup or some honey, too. you bring both mugs into the cockpit, steam wafting up around you into the cool blue shadows, and rocket leans back so he can swivel the copilot's seat toward you, taking his cup with claws that clink against the ceramic.

i love to think that this is a new ritual, shared between the two of you as you relax before bed, together:

shared tea, and a sea of the stars, and the sweetest of sweet dreams on their way.

here are the fan-art links i promised you, too!

rocket's bathtime rituals

rocket in pajamas (baby and full-grown rockets pictured here)

rocket sleeps with a stuffie

rocket just enjoying some flowers

rocket is comfy in his crocs

mcu rocket.

DRINKS: booze is actually this rocket’s drug-of-choice. almost every planet has some kind of fermented liquid intoxicant and since he’s willing to drink absolute swill, he can usually get it for cheap — not that he’s not perfectly willing to steal his alcohol. sometimes he wants something fancy that’s out of his price-range, and other times the barkeep’s being an asshole. either one is a perfectly reasonable excuse for some sleight-of-hand (or interfacing the cashiering program and looting the whole pub). if you were to ask rocket the purpose behind his drinking, he’d sneer at you and say it was a weird frickin’ question and that he drinks for fun. this is a lie. once he gets to know you a little more — trusts you with his old bruises and scars a little more — he might admit that he drinks to forget. this is also a lie. though to be fair, he probably doesn’t know it. like almost everything else he does, this rocket drinks to punish himself. he knows he ain’t lucky enough to forget jackshit, and frankly, he doesn’t deserve to. he knows he just sinks deeper into his memories the more intoxicated he gets. he knows he’s more likely to get mean and reckless and shoot somebody or blow up a bar — or worse, blow up a friendship. if rocket eventually starts drinking less around you, it might be because he doesn’t feel the quite the same need to be cruel to himself. look, we’re not at forgiveness yet, but this is a step in the right direction.

DRUGS: relatedly, this rocket doesn’t often use drugs to take the edge off his chronic pain. some part of him wants to feel it. it reminds him of how he failed his family, of how fucked-up the galaxy is, of how fucked-up he is. but he will occasionally use for other reasons, and not all of them are joyless. he’s not opposed to a buzz that sharpens his focus or helps him sleep or decreases his anxiety or makes certain things feel extra-good during 18+ activities, if you know what i’m saying (dude’s tried the synthetic version of the virgin’s calabash more than once, and honestly, it’s a good fuckin time). but if we’re talking about regular use…. well. sometimes he sits in the cockpit with his feet propped up on the flight controls with a wreath of smoke around his head. they say world tree root's good for seeing the dead,*1 and when he sips that cinnamon-peppermint haze, it burns and freezes all his thermoreceptors. two lungfuls is all it takes, and the constellations suddenly all look like lylla and teefs and floor and groot. and others, too ~ people who weren't even his fault, but seemed like they were probably decent enough before the universe snuffed 'em out. tibius lark, for instance. and garthan saal — even though rocket doesn't generally hold with cops. and yondu, who'd understood him better than anyone else before him. and that pink chick, too — the krylorian who'd worked for the collector. they all swim in the stars, happy and free and completely unaware of him, watching them like the galaxy's most miserable voyeur. he doesn't sleep those nights, no matter how heavy his eyes get — just stares at them and breathes in the ashes of yggdrasill, until his eyes blur and sting and all he can see are prisms and rainbows and splintered, watery light.

I IMAGINE as the two of you grow closer, he might share his smokes with you: seemingly reluctant, but so relieved to no longer have to go through this little ritual alone. it'll be rough the first few times. you don't always see what he sees — not till he shows you, like he's pointing out shapes in the clouds — and when you do, it'll make your vagus nerve clench and ache for him and the wistful twitch of his whiskers and ears, like he wishes he could join them. but over time — with your quiet presence — the vibe changes. the cockpit becomes a chrysalis and eventually, smoking no longer seems like a sentence that rocket carries out with a hollow gutted heart, but something the two of you share: quietly, in peace, in honor of and in communion with those who've returned to the stardust.

eidos rocket.

DRINKS: if this rocket is in the position to drink something straight from the bottle, he's definitely going for angargal's. it's classy scut, you know? but he's not above drinking whatever's local — not as long as it can peel the ceramic plating off a ship and give him a buzz without costing more than he wants to spend in the moment (the fact that he’s so good at stealing shit helps). he’ll toss back a fancier drink when he can — mostly ‘cause it's a way to spit in the eye of the rich chogs who look down on people like him — but asgardian mead and sovereign rum just don’t pack the kind of punch he needs to take the edge off.

DRUGS: speaking of taking the edge off — this rocket loves to smoke every now and then. he doesn’t smoke every day, but catch him perusing fresh blends whenever you stop for a lazy rotation on some new satellite or space-station. he's tried dried leafy concoctions made from everbloom varietals and world tree root, leaves from kymellian antigen-trees and embers of genesis — and countless cotati cultivars and asgardian herbs (including that one that made you all subby and sweet that first time he'd smoked with you). what can he say? he's always been partial to things that ignite. unfortunately, some drugs just don't come in the form of fire, and it’s worth noting that while asgardian booze may be weaker than the paint-thinner this rocket tends to prefer, asgardian elixirs are another story entirely. a drop on the tongue can have you seeing the secrets in-between the stars, or communing with the atoms in every texture your fingertips touch. rocket doesn’t like to admit it, but that last one works particularly well on a guy with such sensitive hands. he usually takes a drop or two right before he intends to pick up some sweet thing to bring home to his bunk on the milano — but he’ll just as often end up with his date waiting at mantlo’s, completely forgotten, while you find him crooning over the flight controls instead, or dismantling and reassembling all his favorite bombs and blasters, or purring and petting whatever tech he can reach when he’s shoulder-deep in the engine. either way, he figures, it’s a win. of course, he also keeps a vial more discretely tucked away in a little pocket on the underside of his hammock: an antidote for sleep-shifts when he dreams he’s stuck in the sensory deprivation chambers. those nights, when he wakes up certain that he’s not real, having an extra-enhanced sense of touch helps ground him. if he trusts you enough to let you into his bunk, you might notice that little pocket — and if you get close enough, you’ll find two other vials there as well: elixirs for recovery and renewal. those are for when the pain gets bad — or when he wakes up, sweating, certain he’s still in a spinal control unit: every nerve screeching and stuttering with the memory of bone-rattling, brain-melting electric shock.

I IMAGINE there are two other asgardian treats this rocket likes to keep on hand — specifically for bedroom shenanigans. as untrusting as this rocket tends to be in relationships, he does enjoy a good one-night stand — even the occasional “longterm arrangement” with interested parties. i don’t think he hesitates to bring in anything that he thinks will enhance pleasure, for either himself or his partner(s). so be prepared for him to offer you a lofn-kiss, purchased from one of his most-trusted dealers on knowhere. it’s a little hard-candy that tastes like sugared roses with a honey-flavored elixir inside, and oh, it’ll make you come harder and longer and more often and more frantically than you ever have in your life — for as long as it’s in your system. the other little thing he keeps in his cooler is a couple tiny bottles of his favored vintage of asgardian firefly-wine. it’s got a negligible amount of booze in it (enough to get you buzzed, though it doesn’t do anything for him). the real selling point for rocket is that it makes you glow all cutely when you’re about to come — and frankly, he just finds it gratifying to be able to see what a good flarkin’ job he’s doing. *2

cartoon rocket.

DRINKS: cartoon rocket consumes energy drinks by the gallon. he’ll drink coffee too — black and plain, or sludgy with sugar — but no cream. he wants nothing between him and that sweet sweet caffeine (plus whatever other panic-inducing poison the galaxy adds to its stimulants). he doesn’t drink alcohol all that much — though the energy drinks he prefers are banned in most systems and are often served under-the-table at intergalactic dive-bars as uppers — but when he does, it’s usually some kind of boilermaker: preferably with a dark beer, and a good half-shot or more of cream-liquor, just to make it extra-exciting.

DRUGS: this rocket thrives off caffeine pills and various space-amphetamines. he’s been known to occasionally break open the little capsules and add them to his coffee (which has usually already been… uh, enhanced by two bottles of whatever five-hour-energy equivalent he’s managed to pick up at the last space station). he hoards those little bottles like duct tape, friends.

I IMAGINE look, there are plenty of other stimulants, and this rocket likes ‘em all. i don’t take this incarnation for much of a chemical engineer himself, but i’m sure he’s got the hook-up to a self-proclaimed "pharmacist" who keeps him stocked in everything he needs to treat that undiagnosed ADHD (kids, don’t try this at home). the hyper-focus also distracts him from his depression and makes him feel so productive that he can convince himself he ain’t a worthless weirdo-runt, the only flarkin' one of his kind. unfortunately, this particular cocktail isn’t doing shit for his anxiety, and our little guy’s lucky that the unique process halfworld used to create him also strengthened his heart, ‘cause it would’ve certainly given up by now. every time you hug this rocket, you feel that vital blood-pumping muscle rattle in his chest like a goddamn drumroll on a snare. of course, that can only partly be blamed on the drugs and the coffee —at least when you’ve got him snuggled so damn tightly in your arms.

universe-killer rocket.

DRINKS: he'll drink whatever the fuck he wants — but to be honest, he's not that interested in alcohol. typical fermented beverages don't do anything for him anymore — not even the highest proofs in the multiverse. it's probably one of the reasons he's so damn cranky, actually. the poor guy hasn't had a satisfying buzz in more circs than he can remember. truthfully, he probably only drinks anything rarely. not all that gear he’s carrying around is made up of prosthetics and firepower, after all. i bet he's got a saline drip going, somewhere in there.

DRUGS: along with the saline, universe-killer rocket is on a steady dose of painkillers, chemically-engineered by himself and injected right into his bloodstream, thank you very fuckin' much. little crystal-armor vials — hidden in a cooled compartment somewhere in all that metal — slick his veins with juuust enough to take the scalpel-sharp edge off his constant twinges and aches without numbing him completely. this rocket runs a little hot, too — which he doesn't care about on his own; it's a negligible discomfort compared to everything else his poor body’s gone through. but once or twice, a bunch of vital life-support systems nearly overheated, and he couldn't let that happen again — not when he's still got so much to do. so there are some coolants, too — drugs of necessity rather than drugs of joy (or whatever passes for joy in this rocket's world). in terms of "recreational" use — if you want to call blowing up people and planets "recreational" — he's also got a little button somewhere in there that he can press for a particular stimulant. PRN, of course. gets all hyper-focused and his already-heightened senses heighten even further. bump that intuition up from .024 points of optimum grasp to .00035. when he's on this drug — his own brand of wundagorish everbloom, stolen from the high evolutionary's labs and synthesized to suit his needs, for once — it's like he can see the paths of all the planets and star systems and galaxies, glistening across the void of space like spidersilk in the moonlight: not where they've been but where they're going; not only their revolutions but right into the redshift. he can see the fuckin' future and he knows every move you're gonna make before you make it. *3 what more could a universe-killing cyborg want?

I IMAGINE the come-down is rough, man. losing access to all that practically-prescient perception leaves this rocket feeling vulnerable, and if you think other rockets hate feeling that way — well. buckle up, buttercup. if he's out in space or wreaking havoc on people he doesn't care much about, then their day is about to get infinitely worse, even if he does suddenly seem way more... well, sloppy. but if he's alone with his crew — and he does have a crew, though you wouldn't recognize most of them — he'll try to hide away and minimize fall-out. snarling and pacing in his quarters, his hair-trigger temper is already half-pulled. if you're lucky, maybe he's made you his coerced terran-consultant; if you're unlucky, you might be his collared humie pet — either way, it's not a good idea for you to stumble across him when he's like this. hopefully, he catches himself before he blows your brains out. if he does, keep your eyes down and back away slowly. don't make eye contact. hell, you might even want to bare your vulnerable belly or show him your pretty throat, just to be on the safe(r) side. that said, whatever you do: DON'T. RUN.

marvel rivals rocket.

DRINKS: there’s a dangerous drinking game at some of the underground clubs and raves this rocket likes to attend. order up “a full set of infinity stones” to get seated at a rotating tabletop — set with six brilliantly-colored shots per person, each one more reality-warping than the last. the goal isn’t just to slam your own six, though — nah, that’d be too easy. if you wanna play to win, you gotta shoot and steal as many drinks from everyone else in the game as you can, too. shooting and stealing ~ is it any wonder that this is one of rocket's favorite pasttimes? the winner is whoever finishes the round with the most infinity stones in their belly and hasn’t been laid out by them. it's a bit of a challenge, since most players will be swearing they can see time before they even get to the third glass. (spoiler: they can't see time. maybe if they could, they'd know rocket was gonna kick their ass ~ and then steal all their shit.) usually, wagers are made before the table is spun, and rocket makes sure to needle and bully his competitors into raising the stakes — again and again and again. then, thanks to his speed, sleight of hand, bonkers constitution, and willingness to cheat, he always wins. the only thing more interesting than his unbroken record is the fact that the intergalactic rumor mill claims he’s the one who invented the damn game. you’d think these morons would stop trying to win against him, but everyone wants a chance to beat the reigning champion. that's fine with rocket. it gives him a chance to do his other favorite flarkin' thing: gloat.

DRUGS: like i said in the previous post, i’m still figuring this rocket out. i suspect he’s the type to claim he’ll try anything once, though it’s only sort of true. he’s got a limited circle of people he trusts — mainly those who’ve been on his side in a fight — and he’s not about to take the newest synth drug on the market unless he knows he’s got a clearheaded ally watching his six — preferably one who can do some major damage. uh, the ally should probably also be able to hold rocket himself back, too. just in case. not that anyone can really hold rocket back. that said, i suspect rocket sees himself as that clearheaded ally for you. if you wanna try something new, he’ll grin and wink and flop his fur out of his eyes, and probably goad you into it if you're on the fence. i'll take care of you, sweetheart. don't you trust me? don't you remember how i had your back on klyntar? the minute he thinks anyone is even looking at you sideways, he’s already got the photon reaction chaingun out and is mowing them down. look at that cutie. he's so adorably vengeful when it comes to his friends. and you ~ well, you can decide for yourself whether or not that’s the kind of back-up you want when you’re high.

I IMAGINE unlike other rockets, who have probably all been banned in a laundry-list of dive bars across the galaxy (excluding universe-killer rocket, who goes wherever he wants and razes everything down), i suspect this rocket manages to charm his way into complimentary bottle service everywhere he goes. a flash of fang and earring, a smirky thanks sweetheart; you’re a doll to the server; a toss of the mane or a tip of the hat and a wink — well, anticipate getting the most attentive service you've ever seen plus free drinks every time he lures you into some shady club on digriz or conjunction. he’s always had these skills, of course — but recently, he’s decided to use them to impress you. so come on, sweetheart — join him on the mezzanine? watch the king kick these sorry losers’ asses at a round or twelve of infinity stones, while you sip that cute little low-proof drink you like so much. by the end of the night, he’ll probably win enough units to buy you a new ship of your very own — not that you’d wanna go off alone when you could stay with him though, right? that's what it means to be a team.

ewing/rosenberg/et al rocket.

DRINKS: a gargleblaster with angargal’s, neat. or maybe five. *4 like mcu rocket, this guy prefers to drink his intoxicants; unlike mcu rocket, he prefers to indulge himself when he does. it’s important to note that the gargleblaster is an established style of cocktail à la the hitchhiker’s guide to the galaxy, wherein drinking one is described as “having your brains smashed out by a slice of lemon wrapped round a large gold brick.” yeah, that sounds right up this smooth fucker’s alley: bludgeoning himself to death in the most luxe way he can think of. what can he say? the guy just likes nice things, which explains the angargal’s too. that glarnack is smooth. not that this rocket won’t drink moonshine made in an unoxxian’s containment sock if it's the only thing on tap — he just prefers not to, unlike some of his counterparts. look, he might be a real dirtbag, but he enjoys the nicer, sweeter little luxuries in life when he’s got the chance, you know? rich coffee, good booze, well-tailored suits — and you. unfortunately, alcohol is a real depressant, which means that at the end of a booze-soaked night, this rocket’s always going to remember that he’s not particularly nice or sweet. which may be why he dislikes himself so damn much.

DRUGS: this rocket dips into recreational and practical usage now and then. certain sensory-enhancers, when his partner(s) are into it. a social cigar when he’s working a mark and the situation calls for it. maybe some low-grade stimulants when he’s the only one on the ship and trying to make it to the next rendezvous in good time. most often, though? this rocket indulges in the occasional cigarette when he’s sitting out on the flightdeck, all alone late in the sleep-shift. the brand he favors is a pretty clean-burning kind of indigarran tobacco — far less likely to put malignant growths in his lungs — and mentholated, too. of course, inhaling smoke is never without its risks, but the way the synthotine sands down all the sharp edges of his mood is worth it sometimes.

I IMAGINE it’s your first clue that he likes you, actually ~ though of course, you're a clueless little thing. air filtration systems on all rocket's ships are flarkin’ impeccable, and he doesn’t have to worry about lingering secondhand smoke for more than two minutes at any given time — but he also doesn’t rush to stamp out his cigarette if quill or gamora or drax happen to wander into the cockpit late in the rotation. it’s generally understood that after a certain hour, the flightdeck is his domain, and his alone — and anyone else intruding can deal with the d’ast consequences. but that first night you come wandering up to the copilot’s chair because you can’t sleep — adorably rumpled in your sleeping clothes, wearing cute little slippers, for flark’s sake — rocket’s choking on smoke like it’s his first time, lunging forward in his cocked-back seat to try and stub out his cancer-stick, flailing dark claws at the poisoned air to clear a fresh space for you to breathe. it takes you more than a few times to understand his reaction — at first you just assume he’s embarrassed, to be caught smoking late at night. never mind that you’d seen him at it once — off the ship on an abandoned planet, from a little ways away — and admired the way his dark hands had tenderly sheltered the cherry while he’d lit it. the embered tip had glowed as prettily as his eyes when he’d inhaled, head bowed and fingers cradled. it isn’t till much later in your, ah, friendship — palming his neck and muttering, using irritation as a screen to hide any softness — that he explains why he always rushes to put it out when you come on deck. it doesn’t matter how mild and barely-toxic these cigarettes are, he tells you vehemently. earthers got weak lungs. rocket’s sure he heard that somewhere. and why would he want you coughing up a storm when you could be snoozing so sweetly in the seat next to him all night? or worse, what if the smoke sickened your helplessly-unaugmented respiratory system? so take that in, and shower him with soft little thankyous and a light touch to his shoulder or the crown of his head. and for god’s sake — don’t remind him that he’s never seemed to care much about pete’s lungs.

skottie young rocket

DRINKS: acanti blubber ale, baby!*5 mostly because it's banned in an ever-increasing number of systems. if he's honest, it smells and tastes like shit (burnt rubber that slides down his throat the way hot grease slides down a kitchen sink) and when he thinks about the fact that it's made from the fat-reserves of a sentient, peaceful spacefaring whale — each one as naive and curious as a dumb little kid — he does feel vaguely guilty (he's even been known to get mopey if he thinks about it while he's drunk on it). but hey, he doesn't drink it very often! and he steals it anyway, so it's not like he's supporting the market with his hard-earned units! and besides, he makes it a point to blow the junk off every acanti poacher he comes across! which is — a surprisingly large number, now that he thinks about it. he always seems to attract the poachers.

DRUGS: if you ask this rocket, he'll tell you the best drug in the whole flarkin' universe is m'kraan. it's not really shaved off the shi'ar's mystical m'kraan crystal, but it might as well be, as far as he's concerned. fine and glittery as fairydust and sold (or stolen) in skinny paper tubes like the universe's most expensive set of pixy-stix, it comes colored and flavored and sugary-sweet — inducing even sweeter visions. everything has a halo when you're on m'kraan. you can feel the seams of the universe under your fingers. silk is more silky, sugar is more sugary. the stars are starrier and even pain feels like a lovesong. so yeah, this rocket will sing the praises of m'kraan, then probably wiggle his eyebrows and try to get you to take some too — just to see what happens.

I IMAGINE look, he's not a liar. at least not about this. he really does think that m'kraan is his favorite drug of choice (other than you, of course). there's just one thing this rocket has forgotten to factor in, and it's that he's huffing fucking engine fumes all goddamn day. this dude is gone on benzenes all the goddamn time. and when he isn't ears-deep in an engine — tail puffed up to thrice its natural size with pure euphoria — he's constantly canoodling with various explosives, and detonating bullets as big as your head: sucking in lungfuls of amyl acetate so strong that it leaves the sweet scent of bananas in his fur. it's just as well. this way you can cuddle him up for your own little candied contact-high.

SILLY NOTES 'cause i like to (loosely) base my silly shit on canonical silly shit

*1 the roots of yggsdrasill connect the realms of the living and dead.

*2 asgardian elixirs of recovery and renewal are mentioned in the comics, as is the elixir of lofn, which is a sort of asgardian love potion, if memory serves. and asgardian firefly-wine typically only makes moon elves glow i think, but we’ll call this is a special vintage.

*3 wundagore everbloom is technically native to earth, i think ~ but since the high evolutionary built wundagore ii in the stars, i feel confident that he experimented with lab-grown space-varietals. the flower allows people to see the future, but only after it has been "consumed twice", or, as i would phrase it, filtered through an intermediary. in this case, we'll imagine that the high evolutionary himself was likely force-fed the blossoms en masse, and after he was killed, rocket distilled and manufactured his synthetic everbloom “booster” from the contents of wyndham's stomach. ew. universe-killer rocket doesn't. fucking. play.

*4 gargleblasters with angargal's (neat) ~ Rocket: The Blue River Score (2017). Ewing, Gotham, et al.

*5 acanti blubber ale ~ Guardians Team-Up Vol 1, Issue 5 (2015). Lanning, Schmidt, & Duarte. acanti are sentient singing space-whales ~ one of the oldest and most-peaceful races in the universe.