Chapter Text
Galactic Federation transports were certainly more well-kept than Nova Corps ones, in a “gloomy, utilitarian heap of metal”-way.
At least, that was the impression Rocket got as they flew away from Koi-1. It certainly was a lot cleaner - most Nova Corps transports looked like soap hadn’t been within the same parsec since at least the start of the Kree War, while this one at least looked like someone had vacuumed it some time in the last year.
It was the sort of thing one focused on when their paws were locked together in indestructible cuffs, another thing that the Federation had on the Nova Corps.
Sighing, Rocket looked at them for the millionth time since being arrested. The design was frustratingly simple - no keypad, no biometric scan, not even the slightest bit of electronics to fry. Just…an ordinary key lock.
Sure, Rocket could probably have picked it with his footpaws, but that would have required a lockpick or a tiny rod or something. And, again, spotless floors.
Great. What a WONDERFUL turn of events. Stupid Flarkin’ backstabbin’ asshole just HAD to get greedy. I coulda been halfway to Kreplok by now if Orgon hadn’t decided phonin’ the Armada was a great idea.
At least he had also been arrested, small comfort as it was when he was currently reclining in a cell back on Koi while Rocket was busy jetting to…some Federation prison asteroid or another. I swear, when I get outta here, I’ll… I’ll…probably wind up fallin’ in with some other asshole that’ll hang me out to dry, won’t I?
That was how it always was - first the High Evolutionary, then countless others in a chain that now included Ogron of Plorgonar. Every single being he met had, continued to, and would continue to look at his back and go ‘hmm, why not stick a knife riiiight in there?’ Frankly, Rocket was starting to wonder if even Batch 89 would have -
Don’t be stupid. They weren’t like that. They weren’t…
Rocket felt a lump form in his throat. It had been…how many years? One? Five? Ten? And the fact that Lylla, Teefs, and Floor were just…gone…still hurt.
“Look,” one of the guards said, annoyed, “if you’re going to cry, prisoner, remember it’s your own fault you’re on this thing.”
“Shut up, ya overgrown lizard,” Rocket grumbled, mortified. Damn it, am I that much of an open book? “I’m just…tryin’ to get somethin’ outta my eye.” He gestured with his cuffed paws. “I can’t exactly scratch an itch while wearin’ a tube, you know.”
“Yeah, yeah, whatever.” The guard’s mask made it impossible to see their face, but their tone made their contempt clear. Rocket could hear them thinking: Ugh, why do I have to guard this little freak? I could have been sipping a martini on Snickmik V.
***
“Closing in on K-37 now, Captain,” Anno announced, although his shoulders remained remarkably tense. Nalani supposed it was only natural - he’d been with her on the Bachtune for only three weeks, and was still suffering from those ‘new crewmember’ nerves.
Which was a shame, because he’d never given Nalani any reason to doubt him, and certainly hadn’t during their last jump. Still, the pantherene captain supposed, she had felt the same during her first enlistment. “Understood, Ensign. Take us in slowly. First Officer, open a channel to K-37. Side screen.” Strictly speaking she probably could put it up on the main and Anno would be just fine, but the kid was running on fumes and she didn’t want to push him by removing the navigational chart. Not today, at least.
Moments later, the side screen resolved into a stern-faced Raptorsellus. “Bachtune, this is Prison Central Command. I take it your mission was successful?”
“Completely - we’re ready to offload whenever you are.”
“Acknoweldged, Bachtune. Although you may need to wait a few minutes.”
“Oh?” Nalani’s tail gave a flick of curiosity.
“You’re not the only delivery today.” The guard snickered. “If I didn’t know better, I would say someone at Armada HQ decided to send me some early birthday presents.”
“I’d hardly call convicts ‘birthday presents’, Command.”
“Fair enough.” The Raptorsellus coughed into his glove. “Apologies. We will be ready to receive you in half an hour, Bachtune.”
“Understood.” Nalani glanced over at Anno, who had winced at hearing the time. “We’ll endeavor to be in position to dock by then.”
“Excellent. K-37, out.”
“...Er, half an hour, ma’am?” Anno said in a tiny voice as soon as the communication ended.
“Half an hour.” She nodded. “I have faith in you - think of it like you’re back in the academy, running the Bershone Pass sim. If you can do that, you can do K-37, and unless your file’s lying to me you did Bershone…three times flawlessly?”
“Four, ma’am, it was four.” All the same, Anno sat up a little straighter in his chair.
Excellent. Nalani allowed herself a little smile before opening the Bachtune’s internal comms. “This is Captain Nalani. Prepare to dock at Prison Asteroid K-37 in thirty minutes.”
Nalani reclined in her chair, crossing her paws over her chest. I really hate these drop-offs. Complete waste of time. Still, their latest target was one they had been chasing up and down the Eridani system for a good week, so there would certainly be a little satisfaction in putting the period on that little escapade.
She was curious about the other transfer the guard had mentioned, though - from the looks of things they were already docked and offloading.
Nalani glanced around the bridge - Anno was leading them in steadily, as she expected, so she decided to hazard a bit of multitasking. Opening up her private communicator, she set it to a feed of K-37’s prisoner offload bay - a little trick her former chief engineer had taught her as a way to make sure that the procedures were being followed to the letter even after the dropoff. He had been by-the-book like that.
The feed kicked in right as the ship finished docking, and Nalani watched the ship’s ramp extend with a curious feeling of trepidation as four guards all trooped out and immediately turned to face back inwards. That’s a lot of guards for a ship that size. Why so many?
“Alright! Alright! I’m goin’! Jeez, don’t get your onesies all bunched up.” An incredibly cranky voice came from inside the ship, which Nalani soon saw belong to a…
Small, brown-furred mammalian in a standard mercenary suit. Okay, that’s…unexpected. Wonder what’s their story.
She kept watching as a fifth guard pushed the mammalian forwards with the tip of his plasma blaster, the mammalian complaining the entire way. A moment later, the prison’s warden made an appearance; all the guards save the one shepherding the mammalian saluted the Teuthian as he squelched forwards, and he returned the salute with a tentacle before looking at the mammalian.
“I’d salute too, but, well, you know.” The mammalian gestured with his cuffed arms. “Not that I normally salute my caviar, but -”
“Enough. I am Ixthl, warden of Prison Asteroid K-37.”
“The hell am I supposed to pronounce that?”
“The prisoner will show proper respect,” the shepherd guard said, jabbing his blaster into the mammalian’s back before Ixthl held up a tentacle.
“You will address me as sir. 89P13, you-”
“Rocket. My name’s Rocket.” There was an undercurrent of desperation in the insistence, Nalani noticed. Whatever ‘89P13’ refers to, the prisoner hates it.
“As I was saying, 89P13, you are being held on suspicion of theft, vandalism, and assaulting an officer. Your trial is set for three months from now, and until that time you will be detained here. I suggest you behave.”
“Yeah, yeah, I’ve heard the spiel before, sir.” Nalani found it rather funnier than she probably should have the way the mammalian - Rocket - made the word ‘sir’ sound like it meant ‘overblown dipshit’. “So let’s just skip to the part where we get movin’ okay? I’m sure you’ve got lots things you’d rather be doin’, I’ve got lots of things I’d rather be doin’ than talking to you, so win-win.”
Nalani decided she’d seen enough and closed the communicator, before opening it again. Petty criminals like that don’t warrant five guards, a transport all to themselves and a personal appearance from the warden.
She called the prison’s central command again. “K-37, this is Bachtune. I want all data on prisoner Rocket - or 89P13, whatever he’s in the files as - sent to this communicator.”
By her estimation, they were at least twenty minutes out from docking. Should be enough time for a skim, at least.
***
If nothing else, at least Rocket wasn't hanging upside-down like how everyone said the Federation held high-risk prisoners. Maybe tentacles doesn't think I'm a threat.
Well, regardless of what warden seafood thought, Rocket fully intended to be out in three days. Five, tops. He'd already mapped out the escape route from his cell to the flight deck - just shimmy to the ventilation system, follow it northwest and up three floors, and he was golden - and was halfway to figuring out how to get the cell door open after being in it for half an hour thanks to a helpfully-half-loose panel on the ceiling. All that he needed to do was figure out the guard rotations, and he would be good to go.
“YOU WON’T HOLD ME, YOU UNDERSTAND?” Rocket’s thinking was cut into by shouting from outside. Hopping off his bed he walked over to look, curious.
There was a trio of guards outside, flanked by two floating drones, escorting a giant, dark-red-skinned gangster Rocket was pretty sure went by the (completely stupid) name “Sweet-cheeks” Chester. Wanted for several counts of armed-robbery and spice smuggling, there had been a decent bounty attached to him. I shoulda taken that, Rocket thought, instead of lettin’ Ogron sucker me into his scheme. Least I can settle for watchin’ the guards prod him.
If anything, they were being even less gentle with Chester than they had been with him - while the guards had been content to occasionally poke Rocket forwards with their plasma guns, with Chester they had brought out actual stunsticks. And were using them fairly liberally. Not that Rocket blamed them, and they were having some effect on the big guy.
Just, not really enough.
“Damned STOOGES!” Chester’s hand lashed out and grabbed one of the security drones, before slamming it into the other one with enough force to knock it into the wall. As the second drone slid to the ground and shuttered off, the first began screaming a warning, and began frantically cycling its’ cannons around to try and fire. Chester then swung his impromptu bludgeon towards the nearest guard, just barely missing as his target leapt backwards. Growling in frustration, Chester threw the still-screaming drone at the guard before making a run for it.
“Security to Cell Block A!” The one of the two guards shouted into his mask’s comm as he ran after Chester, “All available units, we have an emergency in B! All available units, we have an emergency in Cell Block B!”
That got every guard running after them, and after a moment Rocket realized he was alone. Oh. Huh. Well, that’s convenient.
Half-baked plan or no, the fact that pretty much nobody would be watching meant that Rocket really was at the best opportunity to escape he would get any time soon. Okay, so if I want to get the door open, the circuitry is probably up there…
Rocket climbed up on the refresher in the cell’s corner and braced himself. Could do with more of a running start, honestly. Oh well. He leapt as far as he could, hoping he was right and the seams in the wall were wide enough that he could get his claws in, and grunted as he collided with the metal. For half a moment he felt himself slide downwards, but he managed to shove a claw in and, somehow, find enough purchase to hold himself. Okay, arm feels like it’s gonna pop out, but at least I didn’t faceplant onto the floor. Rocket grit his teeth and jammed his other paw into the crack and began the frustratingly slow climb up and over.
When he got to the loose panel he gave it an experimental jiggle, and was rewarded with a slight give. Okay, gotta two-paw this and hope I get lucky. Which, so far, has been a BIT of a mixed bag today. Taking a moment to breathe, Rocket leapt.
Again, he just barely managed to get enough purchase to hold onto, with the panel squeaking in protest before giving slightly more. Rocket scrabbled up as far as he could and scanned the wires. Right, how does the Federation do it again? Ummm…green means positive current, red means negative, they’re runnin’ that way for those four and the other way for those, which means the ones for the door are…aha! Rocket pulled a bit of metal out from his pocket that he’d managed to tear off the bedframe. Then, tearing off a piece of fabric, he wrapped it around his paw. This’ll work. Just gotta aim it right…
Federation prison doors worked off a simple system: a plain-old circuit activation. When one entered the right passcode or swiped their keycard, the central computer system was told ‘hey, redirect the positive current here to power the door’: otherwise the current just passed harmlessly overhead. Or ran the lights or something. So, if one could get a conductor in the right spot, such as, say, with a piece of bedframe, they could complete the circuit.
Rocket jabbed outwards with the metal, slotting it into the right spot on one end, before carefully grabbing the wire with his covered paw and jabbing it downwards. The effect was instant, hot, and very bright: the resulting sparks jolted Rocket back and he instinctively let go, dropping to the floor with a thud. Cursing, he stood up and tried to jolt some feeling back into his numb paw as he dove for the now-slightly-open cell door. Hah! Yes! Prison escape number four is in business!
He sprinted on all four paws for the ventilation grate as fast as he could, unhooking it and diving inside right as the alarms started up. Great. They already noticed? Right - I didn’t check for security cameras. Good going, dumbass.
Well, there was nothing for it now but to keep moving. Rocket started to climb in what he felt was the right direction, moving as fast as he could until he reached a junction about five minutes after entering the vents. One way was wide open, and the other was sealed shut. Rocket smirked and climbed into the open way, but after about five feet he stopped and frowned. Wait - they’ve had plenty of time to figure out I’m in here, so why ain’t this closed? It hit him: they wanted him to go this way.
Rocket turned around, the smirk returning. Think you’re so smart? I’ve got your number, guys!
***
“Air vent lock B-1 has been overridden,” one of the technicians called out, “Prisoner 89P13 is estimated to be two minutes from junction A-3.”
“Just as Nalani planned,” Ixthl nodded, “and what of Chester?”
“Still fighting,” another technician replied, “he’s hunkered himself down at the junction between blocks B and C..”
“Blast. Send the guard unit from C to reinforce B, and split half of A’s presence to go to the hangar bay.” Ixthl turned and looked at Nalani. “I’ll admit, I’m glad you’re still here. How did you know he’d take the closed door?”
“Simple: he’s smart.” Nalani looked at the map of the vents, tracing the line of travel Rocket was following with a finger. “That, and he thinks we’re idiots.” Which, to be fair, in the case of Ixthl…probably isn’t far off the mark. Leaving an open vent probably IS the sort of trap he would set, no matter how obvious it is.
In that case, it was definitely fortunate that she’d stuck around. She had wanted to talk with Rocket herself, after all, and a successful denial of escape would probably give her the opportunity to do so. It wasn’t ideal, and she doubted he’d be in much mood to listen, but it was better than nothing, she supposed.
“Target is estimated to have reached lock A-2,” the technician announced, “override is expected in ten seconds.”
“Good.” Nalani nodded and counted down in her head. Three…two…one…
The vent, as far as they could tell, remained locked. “Um…” Ixthl looked at her. “Captain? Thoughts?”
Nalani immediately realized. “Damn it. Now I’m the idiot. Of course doing the same thing twice would be too obvious.” She looked back as Ixthl. “If he approaches the hangar from A-3, how many vents are there he could pop out from?”
“Not sure. Map, zoom in and analyze.”
“Understood, sir.”
The vent map resolved to show the space around the hangar, with Rocket’s probable entry points marked. There were two, and they were far enough apart that covering them both was impractical. So we have to pick and choose, then.
“Send me the list of all the crafts we have in the hangar,” Nalani said. Then, without waiting for an answer, she turned and ran from the room.
***
Rocket snickered to himself as he climbed through the tunnels. Idiots. I’ll admit, it was smart at first - most guys’d see the open vent and think ‘hey, my lucky day’! Ya got me there, but doin’ it twice? Talk about obvious. He knew he’d be laughing about this for a while. He imagined they were probably still waiting for the vent to open, maybe guessing that he’d had some trouble with the door, when in fact he was almost at the hangar. Then, a quick hop into whatever skipper caught his fancy, and he’d be out faster than you could say ‘squid’. Child’s play. If anything, it was almost easier than any Nova Corps prison break had been.
Rocket reached a Y-shaped junction - both options, as far as he could tell, would take him to the hangar. Hmmm…what to do… He’d taken the time to notice what ships were present when they’d offloaded him, and from what he could remember there had been a few pursuit crafts on the western side. So from the left vent, then. Or should I go right and criss-cross? I’m definitely faster on four legs than they are on two. He thought for a moment. Nah. Best not to risk it. He climbed forwards, and before long he was at the vent.
Carefully, he peeked out - as expected there was a full complement of guards standing in the standard hangar sweep, covering all entrances and exits. Won’t be enough, guys. Mentally charting a path between the various crates, bins, and other objects lying around that would keep him out of sight, Rocket tensed himself to make a break for it as he gingerly unscrewed the vent grate.
Then, quietly, he dropped to the floor.
“Sorry about this…” a voice made Rocket’s ears shoot up. He whirled around -
Just in time to see a lithe, panther-like alien launch a net at him.
Although Rocket had enough time to be grudgingly impressed, it was nowhere near enough time to get out of the way.