Chapter 239

"Give it to me," said the green-skinned woman, pointing her sword at Monica.

"I'm afraid that's not going to happen," Monica said, smiling at the woman.

The green-skinned woman frowned before lunging at Monica with her sword ready to strike.

Her foot stomped the ground in one direction to feint before quickly slashing with her sword.

Monica smiled before suddenly placing the orb in the path of the woman's sword.

The woman immediately halted her strike before sidestepping and glaring at Monica.

She hesitated to strike the orb since she was clear on what was inside.

Suddenly, from behind Monica, Peter leaped from the upper floor with his hand extended towards the orb. At the last moment, Monica moved it aside, causing him to miss and fall to the ground.

As he fell, he quickly rolled before drawing his weapon and firing several times at Monica.

Monica agilely moved her body in place, dodging the energy projectiles.

Peter looked astonished at Monica as she evaded his shots.

Monica just gave him a playful smile before looking behind Peter where the raccoon was aiming a weapon at him.

When the raccoon fired, a small blue ball hit Peter, electrocuting him, his screams echoing throughout the square as he trembled.

Monica quickly looked at the green-skinned woman who made another attempt by rushing towards her.

Before she could get close, several beams of light headed towards the five, lifting them into the air and restraining their movements.

Monica frowned feeling the restraint; she could free herself by sending a powerful magical pulse around her, but she decided not to.

She found the whole situation a bit interesting; she wondered what a space prison would be like. Plus, she was curious about what the orb was and who was interested in it.

Monica gave one last look at the orb before leaving a potent magical mark on it, ensuring she wouldn't have to go through the hassle of finding it again.

The five were thrown from the air into a containment cell before being scanned one by one.

That's when Monica learned the names of everyone; the green-skinned woman was Gamora, and she seemed to be the daughter of Thanos, a well-known figure.

The raccoon was named Rocket, and the tree was Groot.

As for Peter, although she already knew his name, she was surprised to learn he was from Terra, the name Xandarians use to refer to Earth.

Regarding herself, they didn't gather any information, but they still sent her to prison.

There were some shoves or glances that she really didn't like, almost making her want to just destroy everything and go home, but after taking a deep breath, she managed to calm down.

It was her first outing in years, and she really didn't want everything to end so quickly. At least she had a few stories to tell her cute little sisters.

In that situation, she couldn't help but think of Natasha, and how difficult it must have been to go on missions where sometimes you have to endure too much.

They were quickly handcuffed and put into a ship before being taken to Kyln, a maximum-security prison on Xandar.

A massive fortress located in the middle of an asteroid field.

To her annoyance, they were roughly pushed down again as they were led through a long hallway.

"Most of the Nova Corps want to enforce the law, but these are corrupt and cruel," Rocket said, glaring at their captors.

"But, hey! It's not my problem; I won't stay long. I've escaped from 22 prisons; this won't be any different," Rocket said, mocking the guards.

Monica just rolled her eyes, finding it stupid that he said it in front of them.

"You got lucky, or you'd be in Yondu's hands right now, and I'd have my 40 thousand credits," Rocket said, glancing at Peter.

"Many have tried to kill me, but none have succeeded. I won't fall into the hands of a chatty raccoon," Peter said sarcastically.

"What's a raccoon?" Rocket asked, confused.

Monica looked at them curiously from behind, wondering if there were also raccoons in space, just with a different name.

"It's what you are," Peter said exasperatedly.

"By the way, what's the orb?" Peter asked, changing the subject before Rocket could respond, and looking at Gamora, who was at the front of the line.

"I'm interested in knowing too," Monica said, smiling.

"If you don't know what it is, why did you try to steal it?" Peter asked, annoyed, turning to look at Monica.

"It was a job," Monica shrugged.

The group continued to move forward when Peter suddenly stopped.

"Hey! Blue idiot, that goes in the box, take them off," Peter suddenly shouted before going through a closing gate.

The whole group stopped, watching Peter almost hysterically shouting.

"Take them off!" Peter said furiously as he was handcuffed.

The guard looked at Peter with confusion before taking his electric rod and pressing it against Peter.

"Well, that must hurt," Monica said along with the rest of the group watching Peter convulse on the ground.

Two guards quickly approached and took Peter before dragging him away while urging the others to keep walking.

A quick change of clothes, and Monica was walking in a yellow inmate suit as they entered the center of the prison.

Looking up, she saw that the whole place seemed to be a massive tower hundreds of meters tall with cells everywhere.

"Wow, it's huge," Monica said, looking curiously.

"What's wrong? Is this your first time out of the house?" Rocket mocked.

"Actually, it is. I've never been to prison before," Monica said casually.

"Murderer!" a sudden shout interrupted their thoughts.

Many prisoners seemed to be yelling at Gamora as they threw things at her.

"You seem to be quite popular," Monica said, looking at Gamora, who seemed exasperated.

"You're trash!" the prisoners continued to yell.

"Many here have lost their families because of Ronan and his henchmen. You'll live a day at most," Rocket said.

"And the guards?" Peter asked, looking at Rocket in confusion.

"They just prevent you from getting out," Rocket mocked.

At that moment, Peter came face to face with a tall blue-skinned guy. Monica idly wondered if he was a Kree.

She would have gotten more involved, but she saw Gamora slipping away, so she decided to follow her.

Peter didn't seem to know what the orb was, so Gamora was a better option.

The prisoners quickly began to harass and threaten her until she quickly entered her cell and started to close the door.

Monica slipped in before it closed.

"What do you want?" Gamora asked, frowning.

"Let's share a cell," Monica said, smiling before looking around.

"But this place is horrible, there isn't even a mattress," Monica said, approaching what she assumed was the bed.

Gamora frowned; Monica really gave off vibes of a spoiled girl who had gone out to see the world.

Monica quickly used her magic circle to clean up the bed before transmuting it into a clean and comfortable mattress.

"So... this is all just a game to you, isn't it?" Gamora said, seeing Monica's display of power.

"If you mean the fact that I can leave whenever I want, then yes, my father tasked me with returning the orb to him. But I'm just a bit curious about what it is, plus I don't want to go back so soon," Monica said, sitting on the bed.

"And? Are you going to tell me what's inside the orb?" Monica asked, looking at her.

"Inside the orb is one of the Infinity Stones," Gamora said, speaking with uncertainty.

"Hm, I suspected as much," Monica nodded.

"Anyway, Rocket boasts about his ability to escape from prison, so I'm curious about how he'll escape," Monica said, lying down on her bed and closing her eyes.

Gamora just sighed before lying down on her bed; she envied a bit how free Monica seemed to be.

Several hours passed, and suddenly in the middle of the night, Gamora was abruptly awakened as someone covered her mouth and put a dagger to her neck.

"Take her to the showers, I don't want blood in the cells," a guard said, looking at the prisoners.

Two prisoners quickly took her away before another prisoner approached Monica.

"And her?" the prisoner asked, looking at Monica with lecherous eyes.

"As I said, as long as there's no blood in the cells, you can do whatever you want," the guard said before leaving.

The prisoner immediately reached out for Monica, taking her chin to get a better look at her; the lights were off, so it was difficult to see.

Monica immediately frowned at feeling something touch her before casually slapping it away as she sat up and rubbed her eyes.

The sound of a muffled groan immediately sounded in the cell as the prisoner held his forearm in pain.

His wrist hung weakly, clearly broken.

"Hm? What are you doing here?" Monica asked, frowning; her red eyes glowed in the darkness as she looked at the guy.

"Raping you?" the prisoner said unconsciously upon seeing those glowing red eyes.

"Hm," Monica said, at a loss for words.

Monica finally sighed before walking past him while waving her hand.

The prisoner suddenly burst into flames before turning into ashes in a couple of seconds.

Monica quickly used her senses to locate Gamora until she reached the bathroom; to her surprise, Peter and Rocket were at the entrance stealthily watching what was happening.

Monica didn't pay them any attention and walked past them into the showers, then she saw Gamora being pressed by the neck by a rather muscular guy with grayish-green skin.

Without thinking too much, she quickly kicked the man's side, sending him flying aside.

"Hey, wait, wait," Peter quickly said, trying to calm Monica.

"He's not our enemy," Peter said.

"She's not your enemy either," Peter said again, this time looking at Drax, who had quickly stood up.

"She's now Ronan's enemy. If you kill her, you'd just be doing his job for him. How about you stay with us until Ronan shows up? That way, you can take care of him," Peter tried to use his eloquence to avoid unnecessary conflict.

In his opinion, Drax was stronger than everyone there; he considered that Monica could knock down Drax only because she attacked him from behind, so it was better to win over Drax.

His wit and ease of speech were what had kept him alive until that day.

Drax remained silent as his hand rubbed the place where he was kicked.

"Alright, I hope you keep your word," Drax said, giving Peter a glance before looking at Monica and leaving.

That kick really hurt; it made her realize that this woman wasn't easy to mess with.

"Looks like you enjoy getting into trouble," Monica teased Gamora.

Gamora just rolled her eyes, ignoring her as she rubbed her neck.

"How about now that I saved you, we talk about your buyer for my orb?" Peter said, looking at her.

"You plan on selling it from prison?" Gamora mocked.

"Here, my friend Rocket assures us he can get us out," Peter said.

"Yeah, and then I'll take you to Yondu to get my 40 thousand credits," Rocket showed his fangs.

"I'm sure the orb is worth much more than that, right?" Peter looked at Gamora.

"I know where to sell it for 2 billion units," Gamora said.

Peter and Rocket breathed heavily upon hearing the terrifying figure; Rocket completely forgot about the 40 thousand credits.

"Hey! Are you forgetting that the orb is in my hands? I don't plan on selling it," Monica frowned.

Everyone immediately fell silent.

"Well, for now, let's escape from this prison, and then we'll figure out what to do with the orb, okay?" Gamora said, seeing that the situation was getting a bit tense.

Everyone nodded before returning to their own cells.

The next day.

The group of five sat down to breakfast.

"Can this be considered food?" Monica asked, poking at the food with her fork.

"What did you expect? At least they give something," Rocket shrugged.

"Alright, let's talk about how we'll escape," Peter said, not wanting to digress.

"Okay, see that guard over there? I need the control on his arm," Rocket said.

"Leave it to me," Gamora said, nodding.

"There's a black panel in the central tower behind me, it has a yellow light."

"Inside is a quarnyx battery; I need it," Rocket said.

"Are you kidding? It's over 7 meters high, not to mention it's the most heavily guarded area," Peter frowned.

"We need it to escape," Rocket said decisively.

"Now... this is important, the battery must be removed only after getting the prison controller from the guards," Rocket said seriously.

"Hey, your tree didn't seem to hear that part," Monica said, seeing Groot walking toward the battery.

"What?" Rocket said before turning to look at Groot.

"Hey, Groot, come here," Rocket quickly said as he saw Groot reaching out to take the battery.

"I am Groot," Groot said in a confused tone.

"No, come here now," Rocket said anxiously.

"I am Groot," Groot said in an annoyed tone.

"Let's do it tonight; I watched the guards yesterday, and I saw them patrol from outside the cells. We'll ambush them, take out the battery, and run to the control tower," Rocket said.

"Also, it's very likely they'll try to kill you again tonight; yesterday's guard is a good target," Monica said, looking at Gamora.

"Alright, then we're clear," Peter said, nodding.

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