Rocket dreamed again.
He remembered when he had still been nothing more than a raccoon, crammed into a rusty iron cage with dozens of his own kind. One day, the cage door opened, and a large, dark hand reached in. Every other raccoon shrank back into the corner. Only he stayed where he was, frozen by fear, and because of that, he was chosen as the test subject.
What came next was the operating table, restraints, brutal modification. His body was cut apart and pieced back together. Bloody and broken, he was thrown into a cage for experimental subjects.
That was where he met his three friends, where he spent the brightest days in the middle of his pain, and where he eventually watched them die.
He had dreamed this dream many times before, like a strip of film playing on a loop. But this time, at a certain point, it suddenly broke.
Something new appeared in the dream.
The memory still began with the crowded iron cage, but after that, Rocket and the other raccoons were placed in a climate-controlled glass habitat. There was plenty of food and water, a proper day-and-night cycle, and even soil, artificial rock formations, and trees. The carefree little raccoons quickly adapted to their new home. Every day they ate, drank, buried food for later, stole things when the mood struck, scrubbed their faces, groomed their fur, fought with the other raccoons, and made friends.
The people managing the enclosure were always energetic and conscientious. They regularly sent robots in to clean the habitat, checked on the animals' health, took the injured and sick away for treatment, and quickly sent any unfortunate deaths to the incinerator.
Even in the dream, Rocket was confused by all of it, but he still sank into the simple happiness of being an animal.
That quiet life was broken by the arrival of a golden mask.
The High Evolutionary came into the enclosure built for the raccoons, and the tiny, timid creatures all fled into rock dens and hollow trees. Only one little raccoon remained in the open, staring up at him in a daze.
The man in the golden mask extended a hand. It was pale and slender, every vein visible, the knuckles sharply defined. But instead of roughly grabbing the raccoon the way he expected, the hand simply stopped in front of him in a calm, almost inviting gesture.
The little raccoon climbed onto the hand with great caution.
The High Evolutionary gently stroked his back from head to tail. The warmth of that hand made him tremble slightly.
"There, there. Don't be scared. From now on, you're 89P13."
Test subject 89P13 was placed on an operating table. OrgoCorp staff administered anesthesia, and then the High Evolutionary picked up a scalpel.
Beneath the bright surgical lights, 89P13's skull was cut open. The High Evolutionary altered his cerebral cortex, granting him the capacity for language and elevating him from an ignorant animal into the ranks of intelligent life.
When the surgery was over, the High Evolutionary instructed his staff to send the subject to a hospital room for observation.
89P13's room had four beds. Besides his own, there was an otter in one, a rabbit in another, and a walrus in the last.
As the anesthesia wore off, 89P13 shook in pain. The otter in the next bed pressed the call button for him. An OrgoCorp employee in a white coat came in and gave 89P13 another dose of sedative, letting him fall into a peaceful sleep.
When he woke up, he felt much better. At some point while he had been asleep, the three animals had gathered around his bedside and were watching him with warm, friendly eyes.
The modifications on the otter, rabbit, and walrus all ran deeper than his own. The otter's arms had been replaced with a pair of flexible metal prosthetics that could freely reshape themselves. According to her, they could turn into tens of thousands of different tools. The soft white rabbit had four spider-like mechanical legs attached to her body, and a pair of antennae protruding from the top of her head, which gave her a degree of psychic ability. The walrus's tusks gleamed with the cold shine of metal. He had shown off what they could do, and whatever strange alloy they were made from made them nearly indestructible.
"Hey there, friend," the otter greeted him warmly.
89P13 stared at them in bewilderment, but over the next few days, as they talked, they gradually became friends.
The daily life of the four innocent little animals was very simple. Aside from physical checkups, they attended classes and had knowledge poured into them.
They copied the way the OrgoCorp staff spoke and addressed the High Evolutionary as "sir," a childish attempt to win his favor. Outside their lessons, they had plenty of time for fun. There was not much to play with in the hospital room, but even roughhousing with each other was enough to fill a day happily. They never seemed to get tired of hide-and-seek or freeze tag.
89P13 was the quickest learner of all the test subjects, so the High Evolutionary began tutoring him separately. Losing some of his playtime with his friends bothered the little raccoon, but spending time with sir was not bad either. His intelligence also showed itself in his eye for detail and his ability to read emotions. Even the OrgoCorp employees who had followed the High Evolutionary for years could not guess what their creator was feeling through that cold golden mask. He always seemed equally calm and equally alone.
But 89P13 could sense his joy, anger, sadness, and everything in between.
Before long, that ability carried him from his chair at the little desk straight into his creator's lap, where he received gentle strokes and scratches. 89P13 refused to get down. After several rounds of modification, the raccoon was now about two feet tall, no longer the tiny thing he had once been, the kind you could tuck into a pocket. So the High Evolutionary indulged him by sitting cross-legged on the floor and placing a small blackboard in front of them while he taught.
Their classroom was on the top deck of the ship. Through the window, they could see the blue sky and the landscape below. Every day, OrgoCorp cargo ships flew in and out of the atmosphere, and one day 89P13 pointed at the blazing exhaust trails behind them and gave himself a name.
Rocket.
The High Evolutionary asked him what the name meant. Rocket shyly clutched at his wizard's robe, his furry little face full of anticipation, and said that someday he wanted to fly out into space and see the universe, taking all his friends with him, and sir too.
It was the first time his creator had ever laughed that happily. The employees of OrgoCorp looked at one another in shock at the sound.
"What? Did I say something wrong?" Rocket asked, crestfallen.
"No," his creator said, gently stroking the raccoon's head. "I'm just moved. You and I share the same fate, a destiny of wandering far and wide."
That day, when he returned to the hospital room, Rocket's friends learned that he had given himself a name, and all of them eagerly wanted names too.
The otter thought for a moment and said, "I want to be called Lylla."
"Lylla!" the rabbit exclaimed in delight. The walrus mumbled the name to himself twice, then broke into a goofy laugh. Rocket repeated it over and over, as if trying to carve it into himself like a tattoo.
The rabbit spun excitedly in circles on her spider legs like a white whirlwind. Suddenly she tripped, fell flat on the ground, then burst into a silly giggle.
"I know!" she said. "I want to be called Floor. Because right now I'm lying on the floor."
That name made everyone laugh.
When it was the walrus's turn, he did not hesitate at all. He named himself Teefs. The reason was obvious, he was very proud of his tusks.
The four little animals repeated one another's names over and over, almost like patients comparing symptoms.
"Lylla."
"Floor."
"Rocket."
"Teefs."
Every time they said one, they laughed again, and they kept at it until the sky outside had gone dark.
Lying in bed, Lylla sighed and said, "We'll get to stay together forever, right? Once sir finishes his work, he'll send us to the new world to live."
"Of course," Rocket answered without hesitation. "We'll definitely stay together."
Floor's red rabbit eyes gazed out the window. "When we get to the new world, what do you all want to do? I want to be a painter."
Teefs patted his round belly, making it thump like a ripe watermelon, and said with simple sincerity, "I want to be an acrobat."
Lylla narrowed her eyes thoughtfully. "I think I want to get a normal job first, work for five or six years, save up some money, and then travel everywhere."
The others praised her for being smart. Even her dream was clearer than everyone else's.
Then it was Rocket's turn.
He hesitated for a long time before saying, "I don't know. But I do have a short-term goal. I want to learn every last thing sir knows, and then have him tell me himself that I'm amazing."
"Go, Rocket!" his friends cheered and applauded his grand ambition.
Over the following year, life did not change very much, but Rocket's extraordinary intelligence fully revealed itself through constant study. By now, there was no scientist in OrgoCorp who could surpass the raccoon in sheer knowledge. He had squeezed the last drop of scientific expertise out of sir.
The little raccoon strutted proudly back and forth in front of the High Evolutionary, waiting for sir to write some brand-new formula or theorem on the blackboard so he could solve it again and be praised.
The creator stayed silent for quite a while.
Rocket grinned, ready to accept his compliment.
Then the High Evolutionary picked up the chalk once more and wrote:
Magic for Beginners.
Rocket stared at the blackboard, dumbfounded by this entirely new system of theory.
His creator rubbed his head.
Hmph. Trying to show off in front of me? You're still way too green for that.
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