“Take care when choosing a place to root yourself. You will be there long, many a Flora Colossus has withered away trying to uproot themselves after they changed their mind. Granted it can be done, but only with great care. When you choose a place to put down your roots, make sure it is a place that you would never want to leave because it is best not to do so.” Why would anyone want to root themselves down anywhere? Groot is always wondering. The galaxy is filled with so many beautiful, interesting places! So many different people to meet and things to do. Groot loves his homeworld dearly, he misses the omnipotent presence of the other Groots. He longs to connect his roots to the others once again and grow, grow, grow in the flourishing forests of Planet X. Forests that are no more. But it is not all bad of course, he has Rocket. He has his other friends, Star-Lord, Gamora, Drax. They fly around the galaxy helping those they can and hurting those who would cause harm to other people. It is a good life, it is fun and there is never a dull moment. Groot loves his companions, he loved them enough to sacrifice himself for them. It was not what he had planned, but he remembered the love of all the other Groots connected to one another and the ever-glowing spores and he was at peace. Then he was regrown. It took a long time for him to re-learn, to re-connect and to remember. There are still things that he doesn’t remember. But Rocket did a pretty good job of explaining everything.
Life aboard the Milano gallivanting around the galaxy is all Groot hopes it would be. Then they get to earth, something about the Avengers. Thanos comes after them and they must join with their new friends to fight him. Groot is happy to do this, he is proud. There are good forests on Terra and trees that speak to him in ways only he can understand, through the roots. He fights against Thanos with all the might in his bark but it is difficult. That is when it happens. Groot does not even see it at first. He feels it. The familiar weight of Rocket on his shoulders is there one moment, made slightly heavier by the gun he is toting, and then the weight is lifted and Groot is confused. He looks down and sees not but concrete. He turns around and only then does he see. Rocket lies uncommonly still, his blue and brown jumpsuit is torn. Groot can see the plates in his friend’s back, the cybernetics. They are sparking and Rocket makes a wounded noise, he is on all fours, trying to get up. Electricity dances across the metal implants and Groot can sense the hot flashing agony. He bends down, grateful that Thanos’s goons have moved on to the others.
“I am Groot?” He asks, looming over Rocket. There is sap coming out of his friend in hot metallic drops. Groot takes his friend in his arms. He is so light without his guns. He looks around for safety and carries Rocket despite his protests, to a small green strip on the side of the now demolished road. “I am Groot?” He looks at Rocket who is cursing and holding his chest. His friend’s brown-red eyes look glossy. Groot begins to grow out his branches, creating a cocoon around the two of them. He hears the frantic footsteps of the others.
“Rocket!” It is Peter, he pushes the button by his ear and his helmet recedes. Gamora looks worried too, she is silent but Groot can sense her dread. Rocket’s breathing is not normal. His sides move rapidly and he gags on more sap.
“I am Groot?”
“He is bleeding,” Drax says. “We must get help,” Groot watch Rocket shaking his head, his eyes are clamped shut in pain.
“It’s not…that…it’s my…cyber…cybernetics…” Rocket’s entire body shivers and he looks up at Groot.
“We gotta do something for him!” Peter shouts, “do we have any water? Something to clean the wound?”
“No, but I have this,” Gamora removes one of her arm bands and begins to tie it around Rocket’s chest. His friend hisses and more red-metallic sap seeps from his wound. The cybernetics snap and Rocket screams, Gamora jerks away on instinct. Groot pulls his friend closer to his chest, his branches are growing all around them now. Just like before the Dark Aster, but this time Groot does not think he can help. Rocket is hurt and he cannot help. This pains him, he winds his vines around his friend, feeling him shake. Drax mutters something but Groot does not hear. He watches his best friend look at Peter.
“Look, Quill, I ain’t….I’m a realist…so…” Groot feels Rocket’s small hand-like paw grip Groot’s vines. He reaches out one hand to Peter who takes it, and the human’s eyes begin to fill with clear sap. Groot knows what they are. Groot has seen tears only once before in Rocket’s eyes when he was about to sacrifice himself. “Take care of Groot okay?”
“Rocket what are you saying?” Rocket twists in Groot’s embrace. Peter is clutching the creature’s hand so hard that Rocket winces in pain and his cybernetics shock him again. Groot can only grow leaves over his friend’s chest to try and stop the sap. Rocket goes rigid when the electric mechanisms in his body spasms again.
“Jus…” he chokes out, “just promise me you’ll take care of Groot. Got it?” Peter nods. He nods. He accepts. Groot grows another vine and strokes Rocket’s cheek. His friend turns, looking at him. “Also…I may have promised a Razzak kingpin that you would marry his daughter in exchange for a lead on a bounty I had a few months ago…” Peter blinked, mouth agape.
“Wh…what?”
“Don’t worry agghhh, about..i..it.” Rocket cringes and Groot caresses his fur until he feels him relax a y bit.
“I am Groot,” Rocket blinks slowly and Groot feels his best friend pull himself up with as much strength as he can muster. He knows not to stop him. Rocket grips Groot’s wooden chest tight, leaning against him. His friend looks up at him with those wide eyes.
They are brown and red like a forest fire. Burning, feverish and penetrating. Rocket nods, tears coming from his eyes now. “I am Groot…” Rocket nods more, vigorously, doubling over and holding on to Groot even tighter as another wave of shock goes through him.
“S’okay, don’t worry about me you d’ast idiot.” Rocket wheezes, closing his eyes and trying to open them again. Rocket’s arms shake and the pitter-patter of the red sap hit against Groot’s vines. He looks at Gamora, Drax and Peter who all seem frozen. He looks back at his friend who now puts his head against Groot’s chest, trying to burrow into it. Groot cradles his friend, not unlike a mother does for her scared child.
“I am Groot,” if he could only say one thing to his best friend, no soul mate. It is that.
“Yeah. Yes,” Rocket opens his eyes and lifts his head to look straight at Groot. His perfect shining orbs are less shiny, they are shallow and glossy but he smiles. His eyes are full of fear and love, gratitude and other things that Groot cannot name. “And yes, you….are…Groot..” Rocket’s voice is thin and small, his sides move in shallow rising and falling rushes. His head falls against Groot’s chest and he nuzzles against him, making a strange sound that is both a whimper and a sound of contentment. Groot feels it when the life slips from Rocket a few moments later. What transpires between Rocket’s last words to him and the time he is gone is something Groot does not have words for. He feels that life go away like a breeze. He sees his friend’s tail go limp and little body slump. He holds Rocket closer and puts his head down to his friend’s. He stays like that for a long time. He hears Peter sniffle and can smell the shock on Gamora and Drax. Groot did not feel any pain when the surface of Xandar shattered him, but he feels pain now. Pain he didn’t think possible like the very deepest of his roots are being split. He holds Rocket to him until the battle is over. It is an eternity.
“Groot, we gotta bury him…” Peter says painfully. He tries to gently pry Rocket from the blanket of vines and sticks. Groot shakes his head, he holds on tighter. Peter tries all manner of coaxing but eventually, Gamora and Drax have to use all their strength to hold him back as Peter takes Rocket from him. Groot bellows, keens, a deep sound from inside himself that has no words.
“I am Groot!” He calls frantically, Peter turns around and Groot lets his arm lengthen, reaching for Rocket’s tail.
“Groot,” Peter groans, “we…we have to…” but Groot only plucks a hair from Rocket’s tail and takes it in the palm of his hand.
“I have sought revenge for my wife and daughter,” Drax grumbles, he is staring at the ground, fists clenched. “Now I will dedicate my life to taking revenge for Rocket’s death as well. I will not rest until I have found the thing that shot him and have killed it in a most gruesome matter.” Groot knows that Drax means this out of love, and so he nods. But revenge will do nothing. Drax puts a large warm hand on Groot’s arm. It is comforting.
“I am Groot,” Drax nods as if he has understood. Groot looks at the strands of fur and watches them intently. He does not know how much time passed between that white space and the time he remembers opening his eyes to Rocket’s beaming face. He hopes it is not long, but he will wait however long he must.
“Oh Groot,” Gamora says and he knows by her tone that he does not want to hear the rest of what she has to say. “It doesn’t work like that. He won’t regrow like you can.” Groot feels another snap within him. Shattering anguish deep in his roots.
Peter digs what they call a grave in a small patch of green lawn outside the main destruction of the battle. It is a small space but it is nice. Groot watches them place Rocket down. He looks like he could be asleep. They place his guns beside him. They take turns saying nice things, kind things. Gamora does not speak, she kneels down and leans over where Rocket lies. Slowly she reaches out and touches his cheek thoughtfully. Groot can see the sadness behind those stern eyes. She bends down and kisses Rocket between his brows. A small light kiss farewell. Peter’s mouth opens a little, then his eyes narrow and Groot cannot help a smile; whatever elaborate mating courtship ritual he and Gamora had been carrying on, it evidently had not yet resulted in such affections. Gamora straightens and they stand silently. The debris from the battle roll by them, all is dust and ash and there is so little that is green and growing. Peter steps up, he has tears in his eyes as he looks down at Rocket. Groot watches him breathe through his emotions.
“Rocket was…he…” Peter pinches his nose with one hand as if to stifle more tears. “Damn it Rocket!” He turns, head shaking and instead fiddles with his musical device. In a matter of moments, Groot hears the oddly pleasant melancholy melody. Even Drax is moved to speak after the song, He steps up beside the edge of the grave they dug.
“Small wood land beast. You were most noble in battle. It…has been an honor to fight beside you….” Groot watches the warrior struggle to find the words. It is often hard to find words. “I will see that you are avenged…you have the word of Drax the Destroyer.” He steps back and Groot looks down at where Rocket lies. He waits for a tail to twitch, for Rocket to leap up and curse them all out for acting like sentimental wusses and thinking he was dead. He waits, and waits, and waits and suddenly knows what he must do. Rocket had taken care of him when he was just a sapling, he tended him and watched out for him in his own gruff way and now it is his turn. Groot moves to stand over Rocket by his head and that is when he begins to grow his roots down, deep into the soil, spreading out underground. His roots envelop Rocket in a hug around his body and Groot stretches out his arms, growing, growing into branches. His branches grow green leaves, vibrant and lush. Drax, Peter and Gamroa watch in wonder, Gamora’s somber smile plain on her face. When Groot is done he shakes his branches experimentally and is satisfied. He nods to Peter who somehow just knows and begins to cover Rocket. Groot does not mind, he holds Rocket in his roots. Peter works slowly, eventually, Drax lends a hand and lastly Gamora. They stay, silent and in their own thoughts until Peter speaks.
“We should go,” he whispers. Without a word, Drax places a hand over the small mound that covers their friend and says something in another language. Then he stands and departs. Gamora takes Peter’s hand and they too begin to walk away. “C’mon Groot…. we can come back and visit,” Peter mumbles, beckoning him. Groot shakes his head,
“I am Groot.”
“I know you don’t want to leave Rocket…” he says painfully, “neither do I, or any of us…but we have to go before Thanos’s goons come again.” Groot does not care about this, about any battle. He has found a place from which he will not want to leave, not for the foreseeable future. He has put down his roots to stay as he was told by the other Groots so long ago.
“I am Groot,”
“You’re going to stay here?” Peter asks the tone of sadness does not go unnoticed. Groot loves his friends, he truly does but he cannot will not, just leave Rocket. He promised never to leave him again when he woke from that strange white in-between place. Groot keeps his promises.
“I am Groot,” he explains, hoping that Rocket taught Peter enough for him to grasp some understanding of what he is saying. “I am Groot,” he gestures to the small dome of the ground. “I am Groot,” he puts a hand to his heart and taps gently. Peter nods and Groot smiles sadly.
“A…alright buddy,” Peter looks up at him and without a second thought wraps his arms around Groot’s trunk. “We’ll come back alright? Take care of yourself.” Groot nods. He will try. He bids them good bye and he feels something snap inside of him, though not completely. Peter also keeps his promises, they will visit. He grows a flower for each one of them. An orange tiger lily for Peter, a violet iris for Gamora, a red amaryllis for Drax. They go one by one and he watches the Milano take off through the sky. Then he is left alone, alone with Rocket who has still not moved, who is no longer warm. Groot stands silent and from his leaves he sprouts pink petals. Pink being Rocket’s favorite color, and the subject of many jokes when the rest of them found out. The subject of many death-threats of said jokes thereafter. The flowers grow plentifully and when the breeze comes Groot watches the petals drift away, some of them scattering across Rocket’s grave. They are ephemeral and fleeting, fragile and precious like the lives of other beings who cannot regrow. In time Groot decides to go dormant. He does not fancy being aware and awake in a world where Rocket is not there. Where Rocket is not running a sarcastic, profanity fueled commentary of all they do and see. He wakes from his dormancy only when the rest of the Guardian’s visit and they do visit every once and awhile. They seem to be getting along well without him but they always ask if he wants to return. That they miss him. Perhaps one day he will, but not right now. They do not understand this but they accept it and for that he is grateful. When they leave, Groot goes dormant once more, unseeing, unspeaking, unfeeling. He secretly wonders if one day, in his dormancy he will find Rocket. In that strange place between un-waking and waking.
If you are ever on Terra and happen to see a sprawling tree with pink petals, and if under that tree there is a small mound all painted in silken fallen flowers then you may consider sitting beneath that tree. You may or may not see the kind outlines of a face, unmoving but there. You may choose to sit for awhile in the comfort of that tree. For if Groot has learned anything it is the importance of friendship and serenity, of peace of mind and love. You may sit under that tree and think of those you love and those you’ve lost. You may sit for a long time before a small flower gently falls and lands on your head, or shoulder or into your lap. When it does, if it does, you may take that flower with you whenever you decide to continue on your way. Groot will not mind, he will be glad to spread his thoughts and wishes in the form of petals and flowers. He knows that Rocket would scoff and laugh but Groot does not mind this either because there is such strength in tenderness and such sorrow in love. Because souls are like all growing things, changing, constantly shaping, sometimes growing in unorthodox ways but growing nonetheless. Sometimes, like Rocket, it takes a long time for someone’s soul to flourish, if it ever does at all. But Groot knows that this is alright, the bud of a flower is equally as beautiful as one that has already bloomed.