Chapter Text
The next morning (he was using morning lightly, since there was no day or night in space; there was only the ship's simulated day/night cycle), Grace woke as he usually did. Rocky was still dutifully lying with him, and once Grace was awake enough to stand, the eridian skittered off to his side of the xenonite barrier so he could both recharge his EVA suit and get out of it for a bit.
Rocky was wearing it a lot more than he usually did, due to the pressing threat of another human, and Grace couldn't imagine it was all that comfortable. Once Rocky was safely on his side, Grace headed out of the sleeping quarters and demanded his morning coffee and portion of breakfast from Mary. He asked for a second portion too, and set about finding Simon like he promised he would. The ship was fairly small, about the size of an apartment, and Rocky's side took up half of it, so it wasn't hard to find him.
Rocky said that Simon had explored the ship while Grace had slept, going into each room and inspecting everything curiously and carefully (he had kept an ever-watchful eye on him, in a way that a being without eyes and insanely good hearing could). At some point, he’d glanced into the sleeping quarters as well, but Rocky had hissed and Simon quickly turned his attention elsewhere.
Currently, the man was by the view port. A dome shaped window that allowed them to see the endless space around them. The view was a little distorted, since they were traveling at the speed of light. But there were definitely plenty of visible stars if you squinted enough. Simon was curled up on the floor beside the window, his one remaining arm wrapped around his knees as he gazed out at the stars. He was still only wearing a medical gown and a fresh pair of underwear, since Grace hadn’t yet provided him with clothes. He’d make sure to do that after they got through breakfast.
“Hey,” Grace greeted from a good few feet away, not wanting to be within punching range if he startled the man. He’d even made sure his footsteps were heavy so that Simon knew he was around. “You hungry? I've brought breakfast, as promised.”
Simon slowly turned to him, and there was a strange look on his face. It was a cross between devastation, disbelief, and a terribly relieved awe. His eyes were wet with unshed tears, and Grace realised that his left one strangely reflected red in the light. He would have to investigate that later. He wondered how well the man was able to see through that eye.
“Grace…” Simon said, his voice breaking a bit. “How are there so many stars? I-I thought…”
Grace stared at him for a moment, not understanding the issue. “Uh, did you miss the part where I said we're in space? There's kind of a lot of stars to see out here.”
“No,” Simon shook his head. “You don't understand. Where I'm from, all we see are the few remaining lights of dead stars. Every day, more and more of them disappear from sight.”
Grace's mouth moved uselessly for a second as he attempted to speak, but his brain was bluescreening. He had no idea what Simon was even saying. It made no sense. There weren’t any stars? What in the world was he rambling about?
“What I’m seeing right now… it just… it’s not possible,” Simon went on, lifting his hand and pressing it firmly against the window. “Is… is this real? Is this window a screen, or– or is it fake?”
“Fake?” Grace was baffled, completely confused by what he was saying. “Why would I… what purpose would I have for a fake window here? We have a whole… screen room for that. The Don’t Go Crazy Room, you know?”
“Are you trying to trick me?” Simon turned to glare at him. “You said we were going to a planet. That… that isn’t even possible.”
“Why…” Grace swallowed thickly. “Why would I trick you? What would I even gain?”
“I don’t fucking know,” Simon snapped. “You tell me.”
“Well…” Grace shrugged. He didn’t know how to make Simon believe him. They could always wait a year, and they’d have proof once they actually arrived. “We’re… going to Erid. I swear. I can even show you our map route in the cockpit, if you want. And– and we arrive in about a year. So, if I were lying, which I’m not, you’d definitely know by then. I’m not sure how the heck I’d fake my way through something like that.”
Simon stared at him, face going through several emotions Grace couldn’t identify before he furrowed his brows.
“You’re… telling the truth,” Simon observed. “You really believe we’re going to a planet.”
“I do,” Grace nodded nervously. “Because we are.”
“And you have… indisputable proof…” Simon paused, choosing his next words carefully. “That there are planets and stars out there in space.”
Grace stared at him like he was crazy before forcing himself to snap out of it and nod.
“Um… pretty sure, last time I checked, yeah,” Grace cleared his throat awkwardly. “The stars and planets are… all where they should be. I’d say we could use the telescope, but ah… we’re kinda traveling at the speed of light right now, and stopping now could push back our arrival time by quite a lot, so… you’re gonna have to wait a year before I can give you the proof you need.”
It was so strange, how this man was doubting him. He might be able to understand if it was just… him not believing they were heading to an alien planet. That, he could understand. It would make more sense if they were heading to Earth. But for Simon to think there were no stars or planets to go to at all? That was crazy, and made absolutely zero sense.
“If what you’re saying is true, then I-I don't think I'm from here…” Simon said, turning to stare back outside at the stars. “In my world… all the stars and planets… they're gone. They were taken in The Quiet Rapture. One day there, and in the next… gone. As if they never existed. The only people who survived were the ones living on space stations. So, you’re either so sheltered you somehow missed the news of The Quiet Rapture… or I’m not even from this world.”
“Hold– hold on,” Grace stammered, his pouch of coffee slipping from his fingers and hitting the ground. He was lucky he hadn't opened the cap yet. He had the other coffee pouch and the food tucked under his arm. “Are you saying… you think you're from an alternate reality?”
Simon nodded slowly.
The rest of the food fell to the ground as Grace raised his hands and grasped at his hair. “What.”
There was a crash behind them and a distressed chirp from Rocky before the eridian was scrambling down the hallway towards them on his side of the barrier. He crashed into the xenonite wall, singing several discordant tunes that were too fast for Grace to understand, despite his current claim to be fluent in his language. The translator couldn’t even pick up on it.
“What the fuck?” Simon jumped, tensing as he turned to Rocky. “What is it doing?”
Rocky continued to chirp and trill and whistle so fast that Grace's already fried brain was starting to hurt in his attempt to understand.
“Rocky! Slow down!” Grace begged. “I-I can't understand you!”
“GRACE! GRACE!” Rocky slowed down just enough for Grace and the translator to hear him properly. “New human come through wormhole! Is only explanation if from other world!”
“What?!” Grace practically screeched. “But that– t-they're– Rocky, you can't be serious! Wormholes are totally theoretical! I mean– you just– are you even hearing yourself?!”
“Yes yes yes!” Rocky waved his arms around frantically. “Simon appear in burst of sound and light! Unexplainable! Is wormhole! Only way Simon appear!”
“Wormhole?” Simon hummed to himself, and Grace and Rocky both froze as they snapped their gazes towards him (or in Rocky's case, tapped his claw on the ground to hear him better). “Maybe that has something to do with the light in the blood ocean…”
“What?! What light?! What are you talking about?!” Grace's mouth was spitting out questions faster than his brain could filter them. “You think you saw an actual wormhole? H-hold on– let's back up a little. What the heck is all this talk of a blood ocean?!”
“When The Quiet Rapture happened…” Simon told them. “Three moons appeared. All three were covered in oceans of blood. And some mysterous fuckin’ shit was happening on one of them. We called it AT-5. That’s where I was, before… before I was here…”
“T-the blood… that you were covered in,” Grace said gravely, struggling to process it all. “I tested it. It was human blood, but it didn't match your DNA. It was a lot of DNA crammed together. M-multiple people… more than the machine could count.”
Simon nodded slowly. “We think that's where all the people who died in The Quiet Rapture went.”
Grace felt dizzy, so he braced his hand against the wall to steady himself. “Holy fucking shit.”
It wasn't often that Grace cursed, but he felt like it was appropriate this time. It had been appropriate a lot lately, with everything that had been going on.
If what Simon was saying was the truth, that meant that alternate realities existed. And that it was possible to travel between them via wormholes inside of blood oceans. And the world he came from? It was straight up post-apocalyptic. All the planets and stars disappearing, with only a handful of people still left alive. Moons covered in human blood oceans with mysterious lights inside of them that were probably wormholes.
All of it was crazy.
Simon sighed, letting his head thunk back against the frame of the window. Then, with reluctance, he began to spin a tale of all the hardships he went through inside the blood ocean before appearing suddenly aboard The Hail Mary. Grace and Rocky were dead silent through the explanation, and Grace had to sit down on the floor with his back against the xenonite barrier just so he could touch base with reality.
When Simon was done, they were silent for several long minutes as everything processed.
“So, basically,” Grace felt a little hysterical as he said it. “You got sent down in a submarine to explore the blood ocean on AT-5 in search of philosophical answers to why The Quiet Rapture happened, and not only did you encounter a terrifying eldritch blood eel monster, but also found a supposed ‘light’ that another sub claimed to hold all the answers. And during your attempt to deliver your black box to the COI, which had downloaded the information the other sub had on the ‘light,’ the blood eel attacked, and next thing you know, you're here?”
Simon shrugged. “That about sums it up, yeah.”
“What the fuck.” Grace said.
“Grace break new record for amount of expletives in one day.” Rocky teased, but there was a slight existential tone to his voice that Grace could hear from his real voice under the translator. He was more teasing in an attempt to bring normalcy back into the fray, but it was clear he was just as affected by this information as Grace was.
“I'm gonna need, like… a few business days to process all of this.” Grace laughed nervously.
“I… don't blame you,” Simon said, acting remarkably calm despite the insanity he just described. But to be fair… Simon's universe sounded very different from theirs. Dealing with blood eels and crud like that sounded pretty par for the course. “Your universe is so… beautiful. So many stars. It was hard for humanity when they disappeared in my world. It’s probably… unthinkable to you guys.”
Grace didn't even know what to say.
“So… what's that?” Simon asked, gesturing to the food that Grace had dropped.
“Oh!” Grace cringed at himself before scrambling forward on the ground to pick it all up. He scooted closer to Simon, still keeping his distance a bit but close enough to pass his portion over. Maybe the subject change was good. He wasn’t sure how much more information his brain could process right now. “It's, ah… coffee and breakfast. You haven't eaten since you've been here. I'm not sure how well your stomach can handle solid foods though, so go slow.”
Simon unwrapped the breakfast burrito first. It had eggs, cheese, and sausage in it, freshly reheated from the deep freeze storage on the ship. He didn't eat it at first, simply staring at it with a perplexed expression.
“What food is this?” Simon asked. “I’ve never seen anything like it…”
Grace had already dug into his own, and his mouth was half full. He swallowed hard, almost choking in his attempt to answer Simon’s question quickly. “It's a breakfast burrito! I'd say you don't have to eat it if you don't like it, but we're kind of limited on resources. Lunch is gonna have to be a helping of Taumoeba, and dinner is gonna be good old coma slurry. So this is the best meal of the day, unfortunately.”
Before, he could have had two real meals a day, and substituted only one with Taumoeba or slurry a day. But with an extra person, they would have to eat a little less real food. They were lucky that the Taumoeba was an infinite resource if they kept breeding it right, and that the slurry was in abundance. He was also extremely lucky that the strand of Taumoeba he bred to be edible had some good nutrients, proteins, and carbs in it. The slurry was even better, with all the vitamins and necessary things to keep a human body healthy.
They might just survive the trip without withering away.
Grace still had some concerns. Like what if the trip took longer than expected? What if the deep freeze malfunctioned? What if the Taumoeba mutated and became toxic to them? What if the slurry went bad? He didn't see an expiration date on it, but he was still overly worried about all of it. It was a tough situation, especially with a new person added to the situation. They just… had to make sure to be careful.
Simon hesitantly took a bite of the burrito before his eyes suddenly widened and he started to scarf the meal down ravenously. Grace gaped at the man as he watched him finish the burrito in under a minute, almost choking himself to death in the process. He ate it like a feral animal, even licking the leftover grease from his fingers as if it was better than anything he'd ever eaten before. The scar on his cheek split open so he could shove more of it into his mouth at once, and Grace trembled at the sight. He very nearly lost his own appetite, but he was hungry enough to power through it.
Rocky shivered. “Disgust disgust disgust. New human more disgust than Grace.”
Grace… couldn't even disagree with him this time. He'd never seen someone eat like that before. He also wondered if the cheek-mouth was normal for people in his world, or if that was something new and unique to Simon.
“So… you liked it?” Grace asked, trying not to think too much about his inhuman features.
“Grace,” Simon said. “That was the best thing I've ever eaten.”
“Yikes, what did you eat in your world?” Grace asked with a nervous laugh. “Breakfast burritos are good, but I’ve had a lot better.”
Simon shrugged, fidgeting uncertainly with the cap on his coffee pouch. “We only had ration bars.”
Grace thought about it for a moment. In a world with no planets or sunlight, resources would be scarce and hard to produce. He wondered what the ration bars were made of, and he was too scared to ask. He wasn’t sure if their space stations had animals, and if they didn’t… that left only humans. So, either they cannibalized their dead, or… they had fully plant-based diets. If there were any plants for them to eat, anyway. Grace really… really… did not want to know the answer.
“They were stale and didn't taste like much,” Simon explained a little more, placing the pouch between his knees for leverage so he could open the cap with his only hand. “Eating was never pleasurable. Only necessary. Though I did hear that there were so many different foods in the world before The Quiet Rapture.”
“True,” Grace said, watching Simon take a sip of his coffee. “I couldn't even name all the foods that exist on Earth. Man, do I miss burgers.”
Simon chugged the rest of the coffee after the first sip, seeming to enjoy the beverage just as much as the food. When he was done, he turned to stare at Grace again. “What is this one? It's delicious.”
“Coffee,” Grace said, slowly sipping on his own coffee. He liked to savor his. “It's got caffeine in it. Helps you wake up in the morning. Kinda addictive, though.”
Simon paused, brows furrowing. “Addictive?”
Grace's eyes widened. “Oh! Not like in a super bad way. I just get a bit of a headache sometimes when I don't drink in the morning. It's not that hard to wean off of.”
“Grace lie,” Rocky called him out. “Grace grumpy grumpy grumpy before morning stimulant.”
Grace flushed a little. “Hey!”
“I'll make sure to limit my intake.” Simon mumbled, his hand lightly picking at the edge of the bandage wrapped around the stump of his missing arm.
Grace cleared his throat a little awkwardly. “Are, ah… the bandages itching? You might be due for a change. And… and you need some actual clothes. I have some to spare.”
They soon found themselves back in the medical wing, and Grace nervously wrung his hands together as Simon paused at the entrance. He was carrying a set of clothes Grace had given him under his good arm, which he would be changing into once his bandages were changed. Grace had dug around for some of the stuff that was more baggy on him. Simon was shorter than him by a couple of inches, but he certainly made up for it with the wide set of his shoulders, and the large muscles he had that could only have come from years of hard labor.
Grace was sure that even his baggier clothes would be a little tight on him, but it was better than Simon having to wear a medical gown for the rest of the trip.
“Armando should be able to help you out,” Grace told him, gesturing at the robot. Its arm waved in response. “You just gotta sit down on the bed and he'll work around you. If you're in pain, too, I'm sure he can administer painkillers. Sometimes he's a little stingy about it, but after seeing all your injuries… I doubt he'll deny you.”
Simon narrowed his eyes at the robot, not moving away from the doorway. “Can't you do it?”
“Me?” Grace blinked in surprise. “You said– you want me to change your bandages?” He pointed at himself, disbelief clear in his expression. “Me?”
Simon nodded, a pleading look in his eyes. “Yeah, I… I'd prefer a person to work on me.”
“Armando is a revolutionary, state-of-the-art, medical nannybot,” Grace barely held back a nervous laugh. “He's what kept you alive these last few days! All I did was drag you to him, and Armando did the rest. I might be a doctor, but I am definitely not a medical one!”
“It's just changing bandages, isn't it?” Simon frowned. “Can't be that hard, Doctor Grace.”
“Don't– you don't have to– please, just call me Grace.” Grace stammered, shooting a glance over at Armando before looking at Simon again.
The man was curled in on himself a bit, shoulders hunched with his hand grasping what remained of his left arm. He seemed to even be keeping his head down, as if trying to appear less threatening.
Grace felt his heart pound faster at the thought of getting close enough to touch the man. He swallowed hard, feeling the ache of the bruises around his neck. The pulse of his swollen, healing nose. The sting of the gash across the bridge of it. When he knocked his glasses loose, they must have cut through his skin.
“I won't touch you,” Simon assured him after a moment. “You made that one of your rules. I'll follow it.”
“R-right,” Grace said, gesturing Simon towards the bed. He could do this, he could do this. It wasn’t that big of a deal. “Armando, ready the supplies I'll need to change Simon's bandages.”
Armando's arm started to move as it pulled the supplies out of a compartment and started to prepare it for use. Simon made his way towards the bed, shooting a wary glance at Armando, before sitting down. He set his fresh change of clothes beside him and turned his attention to Grace.
“Okay, so… I'm gonna start removing the previous bandages.” Grace announced. He helped Simon remove the medical gown before he started to unravel the bandages slowly and methodically, trying his best not to hurt him.
“I-I'm… really sorry,” Simon said suddenly, being very still so he wouldn't spook Grace. He was staring at his face, eyes tracing the injuries that were still healing there. He looked a little further down, wincing at the finger-shaped bruises on his throat. “I'm sorry I hurt you.”
“It's fine.” Grace brushed it off, trying to stay focused.
“It's not,” Simon said. “You're scared of me.”
Grace pursed his lips for a moment. “Yeah, but… correct me if I'm totally wrong, but you were scared of me, too. You did that because you were scared.”
“I did,” Simon nodded. “I was scared of what you were planning to do with me. I thought you were only healing me so you could send me back down there. That's the only reason I could imagine the COI actually giving me a doctor and wasting medical supplies on me.”
The last of the bandages on Simon's arm– well, his stump– fell away, and Grace froze. He had been bracing for a familiar but gruesome sight. He expected angry, red wounds, still healing and gnarly with stitches in them. And there were stitches, but… the scars were a shiny, healed pink. Entirely closed and bearing stitches they didn't need. Last he saw of the injury, barely days ago… was of hanging, torn apart flesh that could only have resulted in his arm being literally ripped from his body.
Grace didn’t know the details, and he wouldn’t dare ask. But the type of wound he had… there was no way it had been cut or severed. It had been pulled, ripped, torn from him violently. There was no clean, quick slash. It must have been brutal, painful, and slow.
How… how in the world did it look so clean right now? The limb was still missing, of course. There were scars from where he’d been stitched back together. But they looked so much older than they were supposed to. As if they’d been there for years. It was so strange.
“Huh…” Grace stared, squinting his eyes. Maybe he just wasn't seeing right without his glasses? He almost hoped that was the case. Because the wound being healed up like this conflicted with his sense of reality (as had everything else lately).
“What?” Simon asked.
“So… I could be wrong,” Grace prefaced. “Because I can't see that well without my glasses. But, um… you look… healed?”
Simon glanced down at his stump. He stared at it and didn't move. He even seemed to hold his breath.
“Is that… normal for you?” Grace asked, trying to keep his nervous hysteria at bay. He really did not need to panic right now.
“No,” Simon shook his head sharply. “No, definitely fucking not.”
“Right…” Grace nodded before turning to Armando's computer screen. His hands shook as he accessed the medical log. It would show every action Armando had completed, every action it planned to complete after assessing a patient, and even why. Grace scrolled through, seeing lists of what medicines were administered for what ailments and what actions were taken for Simon's wounds.
Grace squinted hard as he read it, struggling without his glasses. He read through the last couple of days. It seemed like Simon's wounds had been healing at an absurdly fast rate, and Armando's computer system didn't seem to know how to react to that. There was a recommended amount of days/times that Armando was supposed to re-bandage and clean the wounds before the injured areas were healed enough to go without, and though the computer was confused about why he was healing literally weeks ahead of what was predicted, it had still decided to go with the usual recommended amount just in case their sensors were picking things up wrong.
Grace turned to squint at Simon next, really looking at him. He hadn't been able to tell much since everything was blurry as crap, but as he focused on the wounds that were supposed to be on Simon's face, he realized… they looked a million times better than they had when Simon first arrived. The boils and blisters were either gone or so much smaller they were almost gone. The skin on the damaged side of his face was still discolored with scars, but it no longer seemed to be sagging off his skeleton. He looked… healthier. Like he wasn’t on the edge of his deathbed.
Grace rubbed his eyes, feeling a headache coming on after several long moments of squinting. “You are healing ridiculously flippin’ fast, dude. I-I don't even think you need bandages anymore. We can even remove the stitches.”
“How long was I asleep?” Simon asked.
“Like… three or four days,” Grace scratched at his beard. “Your injuries… they were… so much worse than this. They would have taken months to heal under normal circumstances. Heck, in these logs, Armando was recommending at least four weeks of bed rest, and it thought there would be a few weeks more of recovery after that. But, now that I think about it, you're walking around the ship shockingly well for someone with your injuries!”
“That's… insane.” Simon said.
Grace rubbed his eyes again, turning away from the screen. He took a deep breath before turning to look at Simon with his hands on his hips.
“Your… mutations,” Grace cringed a bit at himself. “I, ah… I noticed…. Your cheek…” He pointed at his own cheek with a trembling hand. “It opens… sometimes… along with the rest of your actual mouth? Is– is that not normal, either? Are none of your mutations supposed to be normal for you?”
Simon quickly raised his hands up to his cheek, shakily prodding at the strange teeth protruding from it. “W-where does it open?”
“U-um… between the teeth?” Grace's voice was strained.
Simon's hand was shaking as he felt around the teeth, not at all getting close to the faint line of scar tissue. “S-show me?”
Grace glanced around, as if there were anyone else on the ship who could do it. Rocky wasn't even in the room; he was giving them space while Grace checked his injuries. And he likely wouldn’t touch Simon with a ten foot pole. He was the only one Simon could be asking, but he still did a doubtful doubletake.
“You– you want me to touch you?” Grace asked. “R-right now? On your cheek-mouth?”
“That– that would be helpful, yes.” Simon said, his own voice a little strangled. There was a terrified glint in his eyes.
Grace rubbed his sweaty hands on his pants before slowly reaching for Simon's face. The man held his breath as his eyes tracked Grace's fingers. His heart was pounding hard, and his anxiety was shooting through the roof (or, technically, the hull of the ship). His fingers lightly brushed the faint scar where he knew the skin had split on a few occasions. It was between the mess of jagged, misaligned teeth.
“Right here,” Grace told him, swallowing hard. “There's a line connected to the corner of your lips, and– and I've seen it split open.”
Simon reached his hand up and touched right next to Grace's fingers, feeling the scar. Then the skin split apart under their touch and Grace jerked his hand away and stumbled into the medical table behind him. Simon was breathing a bit hard as his cheek-mouth opened more, and he traced it with his fingers with a mix of terror and curiosity.
“W-what the fuck is wrong with me?” Simon asked, eyes wide with fear as he pulled his hand away. The skin started to slowly seal back together, totally seamless. “What am I, Grace? What… what is wrong with me?”
Grace's hands were braced on the table behind him, and he shook his head. “I-I don't know. I… did a DNA test. You came back human. I can… I’ll do more experiments, alright?”
“Ex-experiments?” Simon stammered. “You… you’re going to do that?”
“Yeah,” Grace nodded quickly. “I’ll run some experiments. Figure out what’s going on with you. We’ll… I can figure it out, okay?”
“I-I'm a monster,” Simon said, wrapping his arm around his stomach and hunching forward as his breathing started to sound more like a wheeze. “You– you should have thrown me out the airlock. I-I'll go if you want me to. I-I don't want to hurt you. You're already scared of me, and I hurt you. I-I don't know what this means for me. I don't know what I'll do…”
“What?” Grace lurched forward, hand hovering over Simon worriedly. “Simon! No, no, there's no way I'm sending you out the airlock!”
“You should,” Simon said, eyes growing wet as tears formed. “I-I'd… deserve it.”
Grace's chest felt tight. He anxiously hovered around Simon, unsure what to do as tears slowly started to slip down the man’s face. Oh, gosh, he didn’t know how to make him feel better. His human social skills were so rusty! How was he supposed to help him?
“I'm not a good man, Grace,” Simon said shakily. “I… killed people. A lot of people, in my world. They died… by my hands. I deserve to die, too.”
“Simon,” Grace shakily let his hand fall to Simon's shoulder. The man instantly melted, his forehead touching Grace's stomach as a soft sob left the man's throat. “S-Simon, I don't want you to die. I am… scared of you. I won't lie about that. But I don't see you as a monster. And I'm sure, in a world like you described, you had a reason… for why you killed people.”
Simon trembled against him, and Grace sighed before moving his hand down from his shoulder and to his back so he could hug him. Simon's arm flew up instantly, wrapping around Grace's lower back like a man starved of positive touch. Grace shivered, feeling both sick to his stomach at the touch and so, so relieved to have it. He wrapped both of his arms around him, cradling Simon's head and gently running his hand through his long hair.
“At the end of the day, I-I'm actually… glad you're here,” Grace blinked rapidly as tears formed in his own eyes. It was so overwhelming and confusing to be this emotional over a total stranger. But maybe they both needed this. “I-I haven't seen another human in years, and I thought I never would again. I’ll run some tests, and we’ll figure out what’s going on with you. It’ll be alright.”
“I'm s-so sorry, Grace,” Simon whispered to him as he tightened his hold, hugging Grace like his life depended on it. “I'm so sorry. You told me not to touch you.”
“It's fine,” Grace assured him quickly, still gently twisting his hand through Simon's hair. “I touched you first. I-I guess we can… edit that rule? Y-you… can touch me, if you want. But ask first, or– or just warn me.”
Grace could handle it that way. If he was prepared, it wouldn't startle him. And he didn't think Simon was planning on hurting him again anytime soon.
“Okay,” Simon nodded into his stomach, voice breaking a bit. “Okay, t-thank you. Thank you, Grace.”
“There's no need to thank me for that.” Grace said.
It would be better for both of them, if touch was on the table. Grace craved real touch. Cuddling with Rocky at night helped a bit, but there was nothing like real skin-on-skin contact. He might have a weird, horrible nausea response to touching Simon right now. But that was because he had only felt pain from real touch for so long. But that didn't change the fact that touch was something he needed. Something he was distraught to live without.
Maybe, if Simon asked again to touch or hug, Grace could learn to not be so afraid of it anymore. He could find true comfort in it.
As Simon sniffled into Grace's shirt, his hold around the man tightened just a little more.