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Neptunian Fever.
Rocket had assumed he was immune. Humans can’t visit Neptune without the vaccine, but Rocket figured he wouldn’t catch it for obvious reasons. The illness isn’t fatal, it isn’t even particularly dangerous to anyone between the ages of five and 60, but it is definitely annoying.
In retrospect, Rocket wishes he’d sprung for the shot. Needles aren’t his favorite, but it’s better than this damn fever.
“Why’s it even called a fever?” he groans, shimmying deeper into the small round pet bed Groot had purchased for him. Fever is only a small part of the illness. It comes with shakes, strange hallucinations, intense vomiting, and an almost constant flow of liquid from both the nose and the eyes. Rocket had amassed a monolith of used tissues beside his bed, piled in a nest of old blankets they took from various clotheslines.
Groot shrugs and lifts the small bed to place a warm pillow beneath it. Rocket had been complaining he was cold only a few minutes before and had sent Groot to steal an electric heated pillow. It had taken him a while to figure out what that was and find one but he had it now and is feeling pretty proud of himself.
"I am Groot," he assures the raccoon with a smile.
“You’re just saying that,” Rocket curls up around the pillow gratefully. “Those meatbags can stay sick for weeks and they have bigger immune systems.”
The illness started as a little tickle four days ago. Rocket started to feel a little tired and worn out, but he figured it was just fatigue and let Groot carry him more often than usual. He fell asleep in the boughs of his partner more than once, rocked to sleep by his slow swaying gait. It wasn’t like him to just fall asleep out in the open on unknown planets, but he just chocked it up to working himself too hard.
By the second day, he felt sweaty all the time and dizzy when Groot lifted him up into his arms. He was constantly stuffing his paws down his trousers to scratch his thighs where the fur was matted down uncomfortably from sweat. He didn’t sweat like a human exactly, but neither did he sweat like a raccoon. The juncture of his thighs to his hips sweated like crazy, as well as beneath his arms and the sides of his neck, but mostly he sweats from his palms and feet. He was constantly opening his jacket to fluff the fur of his chest and try to air out the uncomfortable itch. Jupiter was a fairly chilly planet too, so it didn’t make sense.
Day three brought the nausea. It was mild at first, he could handle it. He must have looked a little queasy because Groot was constantly asking him if he was okay. But he kept it together for the tree’s sake. They were visiting Jupiter because it had the largest manmade forest in the galaxy. They’d saved up to spend an entire week on the planet, and vacations for them came few and far between. He wasn’t going to ruin Groot’s commune with nature over a little bit of nausea. He thought it might make it better if he let the tree carry him, but he was sorely mistaken. Less than five minutes of swaying in his branches, and he vomited all over his partner’s chest. Thankfully, Groot has no sense of smell or concept of disgust, and simply washed off in a stream.
Today came the worst of it. A fever spiked sometime in the middle of the night and he woke up soaked with sweat and shivering. He’d rolled over and thrown up over the edge of his cot, and the pitiful sobbing brought Groot instantly to his side.
The pet bed was purchased after his cot proved to be grossly uncomfortable on his achy body. He gave up on the concept of clothes after only a couple hours, they only pressed his fur down and made him constantly itchy. He wraps his tail around his thighs and shivers against the warm pillow, groping for the seventh tissue box he’d worked his way through and jamming the soft paper into his eyes to soak up the dribble of mucus that kept crusting his long eyelashes shut.
“I want soup,” Rocket grunts, hacking up a mess of fur and snot into his tissue. The fever has caused his grooming instinct to go a little haywire, and he finds himself unconsciously licking and nibbling at his sweaty fur to try and get rid of the matted knots. The result of which has only made him sicker because he has to keep choking up these disgusting tangled messes of black and silver fur. He scrapes his tongue over his front teeth and spits the rest of the fur on the floor. “Do you think you can handle microwaving a can of soup?”
"I am Groot?" Groot asks, nodding enthusiastically. The truth is he has never worked a microwave before. Or made soup. Or even eaten soup. But he's seen Rocket do it before, at least the microwave part, and he knows most cans come with instructions.
He doesn't read very well. Not most languages any way. And the task is a little daunting. But for Rocket he'll do it. He'll make the best canned soup his partner has ever had.
“Yes we got soup,” Rocket hiccups miserably and scratches his thighs to chase away the persistent itch. “I think there’s a can in the cupboard with the hocked car batteries.” He pulls his knees up to his chest and blows his dry, raw nose into a tissue.
Groot smiles and gives Rocket a pat on the head before getting up to go get the soup. It takes longer to find a bowl that's clean and hasn't been used for target practice. Eventually he gives up and knits together twigs to create a water tight bowl out of his own wood.
Reading takes a while. The directions don't make much sense but he follows them anyway and puts the can in the microwave. Two minutes don't seem long enough to get the soup warm so he puts it in for five instead, knowing then it will be nice and hot just the way Rocket likes it. But the can starts to warp after a couple minutes and it makes him nervous, so he opens the microwave and squeezes the metal until the top pops open and puts it back in.
The wait seems way too long but when he takes the soup out it's steaming hot. In fact, it's so warm even the can is steaming a little.
Proud of himself, he pours the soup into his bowl and bends his way back through the small ship. They’d originally meant to put up in a hotel room, but the instant the owners of the hotel caught on that Rocket had the fever, they refused the pair service. People are vaccinated apparently only for the airborne virus, but direct germ contact is still incredibly contagious. They were forced to go back to their ship, which was too small for Groot at the best of times, never mind carrying hot soup.
Rocket perks up eagerly when he smells the off-brand chicken soup being carried nearer. He rolls over onto his back and stretches out on the soft bed belly-up, letting his paws and feet hang over the edges.
“You were gone a while, I was afraid you fell in the microwave,” Rocket sniffles loudly and wipes his nose on his forearm.
"I am Groo - !" Groot starts to say. He doesn't get to finish because he trips. His legs have always been too big and too heavy and it's not the first time he's tripped over something because he didn't lift his foot high enough.
Unfortunately the soup goes flying as he throws his arms up to keep from landing on Rocket. He watches it fly through the air, up and up before arcing and falling, its contents landing all over Rocket.
The raccoon shoots almost vertically out of bed. It’s like being shocked by a cattle prod, and he launches out of the bed like lightning. He clutches the rafter a few feet over his bed with all four sets of claws, his fur dripping with steaming-hot broth. Noodles slide down from his ears and carrots mush between his toes. His whole body is shaking, his teeth chattering, and his eyes watering from the pain.
His claws slip. He doesn’t have far to fall before he lands in Groot’s outstretched hands. Wide-eyed and teeth clenched, Rocket arches in his grip and lets out a high-pitched whine. His whole body is burning and the overload of sensation on his skin leaves him feeling dizzy and overwrought.
“Groot,” he growls, too exhausted and in too much pain to put the force behind his words. “You- you- Groot.”
"I am Groot I am Groot I am Groot." Groot repeats again and again, panicked. He didn't mean to hurt Rocket. He would never hurt Rocket. And he was already sick and now he's in pain and it's all Groot's fault. Dumb clumsy Groot. Rocket would be better off without him.
"I am Groot," He says sorrowfully.
Rocket relaxes a little in the tree’s hold. He shivers and lifts his soggy tail to wring it out. “I’m not gonna make you leave,” he groans, convulsing a little when the dull nausea that had taken a back seat to the intense burning settles back hotly in his belly. “But I am gonna make you give me a bath.”
Groot relaxes a little, the few leaves that had started to turn brown and fall come back greener than ever.
"I am Groot," He says happily.
“You don’t have a choice,” Rocket grunts. “And you gotta buy me a new bed.”
Groot carries his partner to the tiny washroom on the ship. They don’t have a bath, only a single-stall shower that Rocket can’t even operate alone because the controls are too high up. So Groot fills the sink with water and stops up the drain with a cork make of his own wood. Rocket tests the water this time to make sure it won’t burn him before Groot settles him down in the water.
The sink is too small for Rocket to really settle down in, so he hooks his knees and elbows over the edges with a groan. Groot starts to comb his long twiggy fingers through his fur, and Rocket sags into the touch.
“Shoulda known you couldn’t handle soup,” he mutters, turning his head to pick a noodle out of his ear.
"I am Groot," Groot says again, frowning deeply.
He pulls noodles and bits of chicken out of Rocket's fur, already thinking about how he's going to show his partner how sorry he is. Maybe he'll buy him a really nice new bed. A big one. With lots of padding and a built in heater. He'll like that. Of course he might never be able to get Rocket out of it again.
“Quit apologizing,” Rocket says bitterly, scrubbing the back of his hand over his eyes as he tries his best to ignore the nausea creeping up his throat. He’d hoped that he could trick his own body into not being nauseous if he completely ignored it and ate soup instead. He forgot his queasiness in the drama of being scalded alive by boiling liquid, but it’s returning full force. And what’s worse, he knows that without at least a few spoonfuls of soup in his stomach, all that’s left to throw up is acid.
"I am Groot," Groot offers with a hopeful smile, wanting so badly to make his partner happy. He will get better soup, he thinks to himself. Better soup that he will not drop this time and Rocket will feel all better after he eats it and won't be mad at Groot anymore.
“You don’t have a bed, dumbass, you don’t sleep,” Rocket groans, throwing an arm over his eyes.
“I am Groot.”
“Frankly I don’t want more soup after this,” Rocket flicks a bit of carrot at the tree. It sticks directly between his eyes.
Groot whimpers. He wants to make things better for Rocket but if he doesn't let him get him more soup he doesn't know what else he can do.
"I am Groot," Groot whines, shifting from foot to foot nervously.
Rocket lifts his paw to peek up at his partner. The carrot is still stuck to his face. He can’t help but smile a little. “Where are you gonna get crackers? You just gonna walk into a grocery store? Pretty sure most places don’t service trees.”
"I am Groot." Groot counters, frowning.
He really means it too. He would rob a hundred grocery stores and steal every cracker on the planet if it would help Rocket.
Rocket turns over on his side in the sink and pulls his legs into the warm water, pillowing his head on his forearm. He tries and fails not to smile. “Don’t stick up any markets for me. I can’t fly us outta here if you get in trouble in this state.”
"I am Groot," Groot promises instead. Maybe one of those climbing things cats like too. Rocket won't admit it but Groot knows he likes them.
“Forget a bed right now, I want a towel,” Rocket sniffles, hooking his chin over the edge of the sink in search of a towel. He yelps when Groot starts to lift him out of the sink, and the colossus drops him back in with a splash, startled and afraid he’d hurt his partner.
“I am Groot?”
“I want a towel to use as a blanket in the bath,” Rocket splutters, curling over the edge of the sink with a moan. The sudden plummet aggravated his already flipping stomach, and he chokes down the sticky, sweltering feeling of impending gagging.
"I… I am Groot," Groot says, understanding now.
He hurries off to find the fluffiest towel he can. Since he can't feel it's hard to judge exactly which towel that is but he finds the one that is the thickest and looks softest and hopes it will do.
Rocket bundles up in the towel in the hot water and forces down a whimper. He hates being sick. He’s only been sick a few times in his life. He hates being so vulnerable and needy. He supposes it’s a little bit better this time; this is the first time he’s ever been sick with someone to take care of him. Groot is clumsy and dorky, but well-meaning. And he rubs Rocket’s belly when he’s queasy.
All too suddenly, the water feels too hot and the towel is stifling. His fever must have spiked, and he feels like he’s being boiled alive. He cries out and scrambles out of the sink, tangled up in the towel, and drops heavily to the smooth floor with a loud, wet plop.
Alarmed, Groot jumps back, out of Rocket's way. He has no idea what's going on but Rocket clearly needs help. Maybe he's having a fit? Or he's lost his mind and doesn't know what's happening? Or maybe the water suddenly got very cold?
Whatever the problem is it doesn't matter. He has to help the raccoon he loves. With this in mind he swoops down and lifts Rocket up into his arms, releasing glowing spores and bursting into sweet smelling flowers to help soothe the agitated mammal.
"I am Groot," he assures his partner.
“Let go of me you talkin’ pine!” Rocket tries to wriggle out of Groot’s arms before it’s too late, but the nausea grips him and he hurdles over the edge of self control and heaves. His throat burns, his nose burns, and he chokes on the vile acid that surges up through his mouth and splashes onto Groot’s feet. Rocket gurgles and moans, choking and sagging in Groot’s arms. He feels a little bit better now, if completely exhausted and dripping, the towel still wound around his hips and legs.
Groot doesn't even seem to notice the puke. He just holds Rocket and smiles, glad to see that he's finally relaxed. He shifts him in his arms enough that he can hold him in one hand and lifts him out over the sink to drink from the faucet to clear his mouth.
Rocket doesn’t drink as much as he gargles sideways and lets the water dribble back out of his mouth. He doesn’t fight the physical manipulation at all, allowing Groot to manhandle him however he likes. He hiccups miserably and droops limply in the tree’s arms, shivering. He tries to drag the towel back up around him to keep out the chill, but he’s too weak right now and it’s wrapped up too tightly.
He doesn’t fuss when he’s turned this way and that to get the wet towel free, allowing his body to flop whichever way Groot sends it. He’s almost lulled to sleep by the constant motion as Groot picks out the second-fluffiest towel and starts to rub him dry.
Groot gets Rocket fully dry and fluffy and brings him to the heating pillow, replacing the pet bed temporarily with a blanket, to sit on while he brushes his fur, hoping he can soothe him back to sleep.
"I am Groot," he says when he's finally done and can allow Rocket to curl up on the warm blanket, his fur soft and free of tangles.
Rocket squints up at Groot with a pained, tired smile. He’s sticky and sweaty and slightly damp and a little queasy, dizzy and feverish and he’s been seeing white spots for hours now, but Groot has this way of making everything better.
“I love you too,” he mutters, carding his fingers through the soft fur on his tail. “You big dope.”