video; @star.lord

[nostalgiabomb]

[ INT. Shared Housing, Floor 13, Room 4 – Very Late Night.

We open on a shot of the living space in one of the many shared housing units. It's dark in the messy room, with a couple of red jackets tossed onto the backs of chairs. Nearby, soft snores are audible.

In frame is a small, wooden creature, his giant eyes squinting with concentration as he stares at the screen. An old, beat-up mp3 player and a Sony Walkman sit beside him on the coffee table. The little creature mumbles a tiny, irritated— ]

I am Groot?

[ —in the same tone of voice someone else might use to ask, “How the hell do you work this thing?” He pokes at the screen fruitlessly for a while, but soon enough, his eyes light up as he shoves his hand forward one last time.

Suddenly, “Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap” by the illustrious AC/DC shrieks over stereo speakers.

DONE. DIRT. CHEAP.

Sorry about your beauty sleep, Floor 13. And probably Floors 12 and 14.

The sapling yelps, scrambling and panicking to figure out how to stop this crazy thing, just as a sleep-tousled Star-Lord stumbles into frame, flicking on a light. Barely audible over the music, ]

Groot, what are you—?

[ Busted.

Peter picks up the device, sees that it’s recording, and he grimaces. ]

Oh, son of a—

[ Which is when the feed and the music both cut out. ]

Comments

[tetherer]

You can call me anything.

[This is said in complete earnest. They've been giving a lot of thought to their name recently, after Cassian and Finn both suggested finding one more suited to being a Real First Name.]

You could even call me Teth, I suppose. I'm trying it out. Until I find a real name.

[nostalgiabomb]

[ He pauses, blinking to fill in the quiet. (Actually, blinking makes no noise, so really, he’s not filling in anything.) ]

... You seriously don’t have a name? [ He sounds more confused than incredulous, at least. ]

[tetherer]

Correct. It would be blasphemous to call me anything but my title, after all.

[Said not without a hint of irony.]

Here, though, I'm finding it harder not to have one.

[nostalgiabomb]

[ Yeah, he hears that sarcasm, and he offers a quick, almost barely there sympathetic frown. ]

Teth’s cool for me if it’s cool for you. Until you decide on something more permanent, anyway.

[tetherer]

It's cool for me.

[They'll just... have to figure out the permanent part of this.]

I'm open to more suggestions, in the meantime.

[nostalgiabomb]

[ god please don’t ask the man who willingly calls himself Star-Lord for ideas ]

What you could try doing is watch a bunch of movies, and, like, if you really like a character, you could steal their name?

Like, you could start with Alien or Aliens.

[ is he suggesting the Tetherer call themselves “Ripley”?

... yes. That’s totally what he’s suggesting. Because Ripley is badass. ]

[tetherer]

Hang on.

[They navigate on their phone to a notetaking app.]

Alien and Aliens. What other films should I watch?

[They are taking this advice very seriously, okay.]

[nostalgiabomb]

[ Peter is similarly taking this way too seriously. ]

Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, maybe. [ There were a bunch of cool names in that, if he remembers right. ] Footloose might be a good one, too.

[tetherer]

Ferris is a really good name already.

[Type type type. Taking notes.]

Is "Foot Loose" one word or two?

[nostalgiabomb]

One word.

[ before he went to bed did he think he'd be making movie reccs to someone claiming to be a god?

He sure did not, yet here they are, anyway. ]

Start with that one. It's one of my favorites.

[tetherer]

[They smile, taking note of the single word. F-O-O-T-L-O-O-S-E.]

Okay. I will absolutely do that.