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If you asked Grace what had started it all, he’d say three things.
- The trip was long. Which, of course, was a given, and not at all special to that day in particular, but it still hung in the air like a sour note. The trip before had been long, and the one ahead would be even longer.
- He had slept weird the night before. Even deep in the vacuum of space, amongst unexplored stars and unknown phenomena, he still had to deal with the smallest yet most annoyingly persistent parts of being human. And that little pinch at the base of his neck that liked to take a bite out of his concentration every time it came to life just didn't seem to want to go away. No matter how many times he kneaded at it.
- ...it was just too much that day.
Existentialism aside, the truth was simple.
It was just too much that day. There had been many days for it all to have been too much, and there had been plenty of days when it had been just a little too much, all of it. All of the vastness surrounding them, all of the knowledge dragging behind Grace like a weighted cape, all the lightyears he’d know and all the lightyears he would know, all of it.
But not Rocky. Never Rocky.
In fact, Rocky had been just that little bit that was never too much, never part of the ‘it’ that was too much. He was mostly that one ‘it’ that would make it balance out, just teeter the line of too much but never quite tip over.
To speak further on it, Rocky seemed to have this innate sense of understanding when the vacuous space around them was just a bit too much. When the metal walls of the Hail Mary had decided to shrink in on Grace and leave him to the whims of his own flickering mind, that’s when Rocky’s songs would pitch down in octave and volume, as though he were worried his voice would also be far too much. It could never, but it is a detail appreciated nonetheless.
But it has been a year since they left Tau Ceti on their way to Erid, and food was still in fair supply, and all the little menial tasks that they’d had to work on and then recompleted for redundancy’s sake have been retired. The Hail Mary is well on its course, and there is nothing -absolutely frustratingly nothing- on the ship that needs doing. At least, that which Grace can do. So he turns to the only other thing on this ship worth paying attention to, which would always have his attention regardless, but it’s nice to place that mental worth on him.
Rocky and Grace banter. They throw loving words disguised as insults back and forth as though they were playing ping pong, and Grace revels in it. When the science on the ship has long bored his mind, it is able to run marathons in the mental loops of finding something else to jab at Rocky. It’s all in good fun. It’s always all in good fun.
“Grace leak all over floor when walk, its gross.” After a while, the layout of the Hail Mary became ingrained into Grace’s corneas, burned in like it had always been a part of him, and it drove him up the dang wall. So he’d decided to redecorate. There wasn’t much in the way of things he could move around, all of it having been designed most meticulously to ensure optimal storage for long-term space travel, but there were a few things here and there. A cabinet that sticks magnetically to the wall that could afford to move to a different wall and so on. It just turned out that the things that can be moved just so happened to also weigh a million pounds. But isolation does weirdly determine things to the human mind, so. He’d done it anyway. And in doing so, had worked up a consistent sweat. Hence the uncalled-for jab.
Rocky had, of course, not helped. Not that Grace had wanted him to help, he’s not even sure he could have helped, given the bulbous and less-than-graceful gait of his hamster ball, but it is worth noting that Rocky hadn’t even risen to his claws in words of encouragement. He had instead watched Grace struggle and trip many times, safely from his perch on the ground, two arms claw-deep into the electronics of some broken doodad Grace couldn’t even begin to try and make out the purpose of. He’d watched from his xenonite throne, safe behind his ivory xenonite walls, and had made the jab all the same when he’d seen Grace struggling, had known just how difficult this was, and Grace was not going to leave it unreturned. Having taught middle schoolers has left him knowing better.
“It’s a normal bodily function bud, I can’t help it.” He huffed, squatting to lower the particularly heavy and very expensive equipment in his hands. His back was tweaking with every bend, and he’s lucky enough Rocky doesn’t know about lift with your legs, not your back. He thinks Rocky having that knowledge would only end in constant reminders and lectures on “proper lifting techniques”, which he had less than enough patience for. Not to mention Rocky was literally all legs so there’s a certain level of unfairness to lend to the argument.
He’d ruminate on it more but it ran the risk of Rocky noticing his silence and demanding to be let in on whatever mental rollercoaster he was currently strapped to, and that was the last thing he needed.
He wheezed where he squatted, bent over the piece of machinery in less than proper form. He’d think of something more creative to throw back once he could take a proper deep breath. Rocky, unfortunately, beat him to it.
“Can help not leak on floor, eughhh.” He hadn’t even looked up from his tinkering project, how was he supposed to know that? Grace grunted as he drew in a ragged breath, letting the steady burn in his chest ebb slightly before he could allocate blood to his brain and respond.
"Just like you can’t help leaving your little xenonite bits all over the place either?”
“Is helpful!” Rocky stamps, using his back leg to emphasize. “Local emergency repair scraps, is important.” He still doesn’t look up from his project. “Unlike emergency repair Grace clothes all over place.”
Oh he’s in a mood today. Farbeit from Grace to have understood the personalities of intelligent extraterrestrial life when he was still a teacher, but nowhere in his faintest memories or limited imagination would he have thought they’d have such attitudes. Here we go. “Mary here doesn’t have a clothes dryer, so they need to dry somewhere. That doesn’t even bother you, it’s all on my side, why do you care?”
“Is affront to Rocky eyes. Is ugly.”
“You don’t have eyes.”
“Is human expression. Grace has been in space too long, can’t remember human expressions. Joy joy joy. I am free.”
“Don’t you start you.” Grace sinks to sit crisscross in front of Rocky, who still won't look up from his tinkering project. OK. “I remember plenty.”
“Grace so young, mind can’t remember anything. Is sad actually.”
“I am not the one here with perfect memory.”
“Is very clear.”
Ok. So that’s how it is. Grace steadies himself as something pops to mind. He can see the reaction now. “You want to talk about mess? It’d be a lot easier to maintain if somebody could walk in their ball better.” Here we go. Rocky pauses in his tinkering, then slowly tilts his carapace up in the closest Eridian estimate of a slow judging turn he could manage. Then he pounces.
“Rocky is Eridian genius for ball, ball had never been conceived of on Erid, Grace should be bowing.”
“Hate to break it to you bud, but on Earth, that isn’t anything new. Hamsters have had those for ages.”
“Don’t know word.”
“Tiny rodent.”
Rocky jumps up, affronted, pushing his project to the side so he can have more space to stamp at. “Am not tiny rodent!”
“Didn’t say you were. I’m just saying, you’re kind of behind them at this point.”
“Am not far behind tiny rodent!” Rocky scoffs with a near-imperceptible rush of air that Grace knows it means he’s gotten under his skin. Carapace. Whatever. “Am far superior to tiny rodent. Would crush tiny rodent under Rocky greatness.”
“Woahhh there!” Grace leans back dramatically, hands raising. “Taking out the competition, now that’s dirty.”
“Is not dirty, is truth! What is dirty is Grace clothing all over.” He trills after, which Grace has come to recognize as some form of Eridian curse word he has no care to try and translate. Rocky is stamping now, poking a claw in his direction.
“What’s dirty is that you would take to murdering poor defenseless hamsters for having an ‘Eridian Original’ idea first. For shame Rocky. For shame, man.” Flawless deflection.
“Rocky will not take shame. Rocky is not shame. What is shame is Grace.”
“I didn’t claim the invention of somebody else.” It’s a funny thing, the icicle that seems to form in his chest somewhere. It’s a small dripping entity, hardly worth a note. But when Rocky brings his name into the argument, it forms, and it takes no time to pronounce itself. He nibbles at the inside of his lip as Rocky formulates his response.
“No, but did claim captain spot for himself. No training for captain. Is fake captain.’
There it is again. Ice, chilled and consuming, spreading from that drip somewhere inside of him. Like ink blotted into wet paper. His breath comes out just a bit tighter, a bit colder, and he immediately mentally recoils. Where did that come from? All in good fun. All in good fun with his friend.
“Not my fault I’m the only one who can hold the yoke. Maybe you’d be above hamsters if your ball had arms but.” He rebuts, trying to regain the ease of normality. To show this is fun, to prove it to himself, he clears his throat and braces himself on his hands. “You can’t. So I’m the captain. Too bad.” The designation settles over him like an ill-fitted jacket, tight in too many places and not quite right. Like it doesn’t belong to him.
”Grace try give Rocky more ideas for genius Eridian inventions. Is like trying to make Rocky more of an Eridian genius. Is useless. Rocky already had idea.”
“I’m sure you have.”
“Already had idea, like good captain.”
“Are you trying to usurp me bud? Ouch.” What he doesn’t speak aloud is the genuine chill that seems to run through his body at the comment, how his shoulders hunch in slightly, how he kind of doesn't want to do this anymore.
“Is good idea to have qualified genius in captain spot, not leaky space blob that leaves mess everywhere.” He chortles. “Unqualified.” Rocky is typically very in-tune with Grace’s body language, and redirects when he notices change. It seems, this time, he’s too far into their banter to notice the other side pulling away. Or perhaps his annoyance at being bothered while at work is muffling that typical instinct. Regardless, he seems particularly ruthless in his comments today, and even though Grace knows it’s all in good fun, it’s not really feeling like much fun at the moment.
Rocky doesn’t mean it. That is a fact well-established over a year in their camaraderie, that Rocky says things when annoyed but never quite means them in the way they come out. In large part, the limited communication and simplification of his language to accommodate the computer is to blame. In a smaller yet far more painful part, the fault lies in Grace’s ability to take the most insignificant phrase and assign it far more meaning than it had meant to hold. It is that, in combination with Rocky’s next jab, right as he’s about to say something, that seems to do Grace in.
“Why Grace so not right, question?”
And. Well, if that isn’t the crux of it all. Grace doesn’t bother to try and draw in a breath to respond. He can’t even think to respond, not with the way his throat seems to clamp shut.
Not right. Grace has found himself growing some tough skin over time. It’s a necessity when he teaches middle school. It’s especially a necessity when he had taken on the reputation of the cool teacher, which in student standards often meant they could say whatever they wanted to him without consequence. Which was, of course, not true, but they did it anyway and he had built up a pretty strong skin to untoward and uncalled for insults.
It seems 6 years have long since weathered away at that skin.
The words are old, having hung in the air for minutes now, but. They hang, and they seem to be doing a good job at wriggling their way under his peeling skin, poking holes in his chilled chest to let more air sweep in and chill him further. He couldn’t dare to try and speak now. In fact, he can’t seem to be able to bring himself to sit in this icy dome he’s made and self-isolated in for much longer. Funny isn’t it, how he’s managed to bury himself into a hamster ball of his own.
Fake. A fraud. Of course he is.
He’s so far into his own little ball that he almost doesn't notice that his response has taken too long. But he does. It’s a muffled thing, as though he were underwater and taking notice of the waves just above him.
He also notices that Rocky, or at least the burred shape of Rocky, has gone abruptly very still. He trills a single cord, curt and definite. Grace doesn’t have a lot left in him, the chill in his chest seemingly draining his energy like a mosquito, but it is just enough to recognize his name. The computer takes over for what his mind suddenly seems unable to make out.
“Grace.” Rocky stamps, his claw twitching. “Is your turn.”
Your turn. Like it's a game. Which, in retrospect makes sense; they never treated these banters as anything more than a friendly heated exchange with loving nuances behind it. They often went nearly completely forgotten after a day. Just some good fun between friends.
It usually was just good fun between friends.
Rocky waits, an expectant air about him. When there is no response, he shifts slightly, his carapace pressing in closer to the xenonite wall. “Grace?” Grace is just barely aware that his shoulders are trembling. Oh my god, how pathetic. Of course he isn’t qualified.
What kind of astronaut trembles?
I put the not in astronaut.
Rocky is trilling his name over and over now. “Is joke, Grace. Is joke. Rocky not mean. Grace. Grace. Is Grace ok, question?”
Grace does not respond, is unable to respond, and that makes it all worse. Rocky does not like it when Grace doesn’t respond, he’s told him as much. Reminds Rocky of bad time, he’d said. Grace knows that. And yet here he is, not responding. Letting the trills that Rocky had so lovingly bestowed on him waver and dissipate in the air without a word to validate them. What kind of captain lets his team down like that?
“Grace. Grace shaking. Grace!” Rocky’s trills have risen in octave, and he can hear them like he heard them that night. Panicked. Helpless. And without a response to calm them down.
There are lights blaring red inside of him, and much like that night, he can do nothing.
He needs to say something. He needs to assure him that everything is fine. He needs-
He needs to get out of here.
“M’fine…” He speaks through a mouth full of sand, raising his head from where it had found purchase on his knees. Light fills his world, and it is too bright. Too much. Rocky bangs on the xenonite wall just in front of him, and it is loud.
“Grace respond, Grace respond! Grace ok, question?”
“Mmhmm.” He slurs. There is a somnolent weight that has found itself clinging to his head, muffling his words and his thoughts. He needs to get out of there. With slow careful movements, he folds his legs underneath himself and rises to his feet. They are numb and boneless under his weight, and he stumbles where he stands. Rocky’s carapace follows him. When he speaks next, it’s two octaves lower.
“Grace don’t sound ok. Statement.”
He doesn’t respond. He’s pathetic enough already, might as well continue in that trajectory. He blinks blearily down at the Rocky-shaped shadow, then turns and trudges off. He nearly wipes out on the machine he’d put down, his foot catching on the edge and his head colliding with the wall as he stumbles. Pain blooms from his forehead as he reels back, groaning at the stars that take over his vision. Oh god that is loud. Rocky calls his name again, an octave up this time, and Grace really needs to get away. So he does what he does best.
He flees.
Except there is only so much you can flee, stuck on a ship in the middle of space and all. The hallways aren’t long enough, and the rooms aren’t big enough, and soon Grace finds himself having fled as much as he can. And now he is stuck. As before. As he will always find himself.
It so happens, perhaps by design or perhaps by subconscious, that Grace finds himself in the dormitory. It is the farthest from the laboratory that isn’t packed with machinery he doesn't understand or screens he doesn’t know how to operate. Blank walls let his mind settle, and the plush comfort of a mattress he hadn’t known he’d crawled onto lets the ice swirling in his chest settle into a slow melt that drip drip drips acid.
Man. What a loser.
There is comfort, thin and shallow and hardly enough to melt this tension he finds himself simmering in, but there is comfort in having nothing but wall meet his back as he slides against the edge. Mercifully, he’d woken to the bed in the corner, and had thus maintained that as his home base. In part because occupying the spaces that had once held the corpses of his former team feels all kinds of wrong. Mostly because the corner means security and consistency. The corner meant safety.
So there he found himself, hunched in the corner, his knees drawn up to this chest and head cradled in his hands as he tried and failed to level his breathing. Funny how all the breathing exercises he once preached like law to his kids he can no longer recall. They bounce around in his head like a flickering light, here and gone in a flash, a note here, a rhyme there, but hardly enough to leave any effect. The Hail Mary is on a straight direct course, and yet Ryland Grace is spiraling.
He will not lie to himself and say this is a foreign concept. Far from it. His memory may be an old weathered thing with holes in the fabric but he remembers every detail from the moment he awoke in the Hail Mary over a year ago. The fear, yes. The glow when he’d found himself in a friendly pattern with Rocky. And, most vibrantly, the utter liquid fire of horror when he’d finally recalled the circumstances that led to him being on the ship.
He’d spiraled then, and he’d spiraled many more times. And he’d lied. His tongue filthy with guilt and sand, he’d told Rocky it was a side-effect -nothing more than a cold sterile medically-induced symptom- of the long-term coma. And Rocky had believed him. Of course he had. He’d had no reason not to. As far as he could tell, Rocky had been nothing but absolutely truthful with him, so of course he’d think the same of Grace.
Taking advantage of his naivety. How horrid.
Oh god. Thinking of Rocky as naive. He just can’t stop, can he?
Grace feels safe in the corner, but the walls of the corner are cold. All the walls on the Hail Mary are cold, metallic, and utterly lifeless in every sense. The mattress can only do so much. His head pounds.
“Damn it.” Grace doesn’t curse, but he allows himself this one. After all, who’s going to admonish him for it? Not his kids, who he left behind to suffer on a freezing planet. Not Carl, who’d be proud of him for branching out of his kindergarten vocabulary. Certainly not Stratt, who never gave a damn in the first place.
Not Rocky, who doesn’t even know what that means.
…he thinks that, even if Rocky knew that word, with all its contexts and meanings, he wouldn’t care anyways. Grace is no dolt, he knows those words that Rocky refuses to translate are some form of “dirty language.” He can hear it in the way the octave stays strong when he belts the notes, how they snap quickly like a scorpion, and how he moves on to another song without lingering on it. Curse word. That’s become just as clear as the fact that Grace doesn’t care much for said “dirty language.” But he never called Rocky out for it.
…fudge. Rocky. He really fudged that one up, didn’t he.
Guilt is a heavy sticky thing that chokes. Like sand, it builds up on his tongue and grates at his throat. The more you poke at it, the denser it becomes, and the less washes away with every breath. And right now, there is a fortress of densely-packed sand standing guard on his tongue, strong and consuming and gritty against his vocal chords. He chokes on it, and it stands taller.
Why couldn’t he have just taken it? It’s a sore subject sure, but Rocky doesn’t know that. Rocky doesn’t know anything. Grace had painted a false picture, and Rocky had taken it as truth and poked at it just as he had poked at the rest of his gallery. He just hadn’t known how wet it was, how easily it smeared to reveal the lie mixed into the paint. How, if he poked hard enough, eventually the real truth would start to peek through, dry and chipped at the edges.
And now Rocky thinks he has poked something wrong, and will likely never poke again.
And the worst part of it all? Rocky had poked at something wrong, something raw and vulnerable and thin enough to tear. And while a lot of it had been kept from him, there was a small part that he’d known about. And poked anyways.
Grace’s insecurity at his own ability to complete what he needs to, from the most menial tasks to the most monumental experiments, was no secret. There was no poorly-painted excuse hiding those. There had been, for a little bit, but Rocky had torn those down almost as quickly as he’d come to face them. And Rocky had this way of reassurance that Grace couldn’t deny, an exploration of the most unemotional logical facts that he refused to back down from until Grace himself could take them as truth.
So Rocky knew. And he’d jabbed at them before. It never bothered Grace before. Why didn’t it bother him before?
“Grace?”
Why did it bother him now?
And that’s the thing about corners. They’re safe, until somebody else finds them. Then they’re just that. A corner. With nowhere to go and no choice but face the front. A knee in your back and hand turning your head to face inevitability without a say in anything. The wall is cold, like a needle in his neck.
Rocky stands at the entrance of the dorm. To be clear, he is barely inside, the majority of his hamster ball paused outside the room. He shifts from leg to leg, carapace dipping awkwardly when he hears Grace look at him.
“Grace ok, question?”
…he should say yes, probably. Allay the worries that seem to be making his friend itch. Pack more sand.
“…no bud. I’m not.”
“…” Rocky seems to want to step forward, thinks better of it, then shrinks away at the admission, the ball wobbling as he takes a step back. “Why Grace not ok, question? Grace need help, question?”
Grace swallows the lump in his throat. It doesn’t go away.
“Rocky make Grace not ok, question?” Rocky says again, trills small and lower in octave.
“No! No bud, it’s not you. Not completely, no.” If there is one thing that can break Grace out of this sand trap he finds himself in, it is the worry of somebody else falling into it. He forces himself to unfurl slightly, lowering one leg out in front of him and bringing his arms down to hug at his chest.
“Rocky say joke. Grace upset after joke. But Grace not upset at joke, question? I don’t understand.” Rocky stamps a claw down, two others twitching in the air. “Rocky want to fix, but does not know how to fix.”
This isn’t fair to either of them. Grace feels young, being admonished by a teacher for not using his words. His own lessons mirror back to him.
Not using your words not only hurts others, but it hurts you as well.
It is a far cry from preaching and practicing what he sows in front of the students, and outside of the classroom. Outside of the solar system.
His students cannot see him now. He can no longer call himself a teacher. But the urge to teach never seems to leave him completely. He feels the need to set an example anyways. So when they look up at the stars, if they cannot see him, they will at least see the trail he left. No matter how far away it leads.
“C’mere Rock. We need to talk.” He pats the other end of his mattress, lifting his leg to make room. Rocky hesitates slightly in the doorway, then makes his way across the room with a methodical slowness so as not to make too much noise with the thumps of his ball against the floor. It seems that no matter how many polygons he adds to the thing, it remains forever lopsided.
When they are not in the lab, they are typically found in the dorm, sharing stories and otherworldly knowledge. It had started out with Grace on his bed and Rocky in his tunnel overlooking him, but Rocky had grown frustrated at the rigid wall. So it became Grace on his bed and Rocky in his ball, looking up at him. But Grace felt bad looking down at him, so it became Grace on the floor and Rocky in his ball. But Grace’s back did not take a liking to sitting on the hard floor for hours, and Rocky took notice of his restless fidgeting and shifting of positions, no matter how many times he insisted he was fine.
So it became Grace on the bed, and Rocky, in his ball, with a little help of a xenonite ramp, also on Grace’s bed. This arrangement had worked out just fine for the both of then.
Rocky hardly gives a thought to the ramp now as he scurries up its length and settles on the bed. On the far edge of the bed. Grace takes stark notice of the berth and feels cold. His fingers pluck absentmindedly at the sideseams of his shirt.
Rocky beats him to speaking. “Grace upset. At Rocky, question?”
“No pal. Not upset at you.”
“So Grace upset at something else.”
“Yeah. Something else.”
“Grace get upset after I said words. Grace upset at Rocky words, question?”
Grace doesn’t respond right away, letting the question sink in. Rocky doesn’t push, for which he can only thank tirelessly. He can’t let himself relish in the final moments he will ever hold Rocky’s respect, not when they are so tinged with tension. He clears his throat.
“Let me tell you a story, ok? I think it might help.”
“Puppet show?”
This earns a soft low chuckle, the kind that is barely a hum out of his nose. But it is a chuckle regardless, and Rocky seems to leans forward slightly with it.
“No bud. No puppet show for this one.” He swallows thickly. The sand coats his tongue. He clears his throat again. “Once upon a time, a school teacher lived on a planet, and his sun was dying. So he left his small classroom to go teach in a much bigger one. In doing so, he left the kids who he’d been teaching all year behind. But he didn’t really have a choice not to anyway. He doesn’t think he would have chosen differently if he did have a choice. Regardless, his classroom went from pre-teens to the bravest and most brilliant minds his planet had to offer.
“Like Grace!” Rocky butts in, then pauses and hunches back down. “Apologies. No more interrupt.”
“…like Grace, this teacher was thrown into a job with minds who were much smarter and much more noble than he. And he felt out of his league. Like an outsider. At times, he wanted nothing more than to go back and teach his kids again. But this job was going to save those kids, so he left them behind. Then he became important at that job, and it took over his life.”
“This job took a few years, and everything went well. This job was going to send the bravest and smartest minds with a coma-resistent gene into the sky in hopes to save the teacher’s planet. Everything was going well. Everything was going to be well. That is, until an accident three days before the final launch took the lives of the entire science team for the mission. Which meant they were now one person short.”
Rocky’s carapace rocks gently up and down, as though nodding. “Understand. This is why school teacher is in space.” The sentence is a kick to Grace’s throat, in its reminiscence to the early days in he and Rocky’s companionship, and the bile that churns at knowing that “no, not entirely.”
“Grace replace science team.” Rocky clicks, the vents on his back rising and falling like pieces falling into place. “Grace upset at comments about qualification because Grace was not original science team. And Rocky…” He wails then, a high pained noise that has him rising to the tips of his legs and leaning back. “And Rocky poke fun at Grace for it. No no no, bad. No no no.. Did not mean. Is joke, promise! Did not mean at all. Rocky should not have brought up. Sorry sorry sorry.” His rambling morphs into chitters that Grace cannot translate, and neither it seems can the computer, but it seems to upset Rocky further. He has to lean forward and grasp the ball with both hands to keep it from tilting backwards off the bed. Not much good he could have done anyways, the ball and occupant inside weighing far more than he could ever hope to carry, but it seems to grab his attention. Rocky jerks lightly at the touch, his carapace facing him with such a terrifying stillness that he could have been paralyzed were it not for the insistent tapping of his leg against the bottom of the ball.
A few months ago, Grace could never have dreamed of seeing such an emotional side of Rocky. Crazy, how time changes perception.
“Rocky. Listen to me.” Grace says, leaning close enough to feel the warmth radiating from the xenonite. He shifts in bed so his back is against the wall next to Rocky rather than facing. “Let me finish. Please.” He stares intently until Rocky stops chittering to himself and seems to calm down enough to face Grace, and signal for him to continue. Grace’s hands retreat from their grasp on the ball, and find themselves atop his knees. In a way, he’s somewhat grateful for the pause in the story. Gave him a little time to prepare for what comes next.
“The accident, right. It was just that, an accident. A mismeasurement of Astrophage. Just a mistake.” He clears his throat. “That mistake led the teacher’s boss to decide to send somebody else in their place.” His voice breaks, and he clears his throat again. The memories push hard against his skull, doing nothing to quell the forming headache, and his eyes burn now. “That somebody was the teacher.” Out of the corner of his eyes, he can see Rocky freeze. “And why not, it made perfect sense. Out of everybody, he was the most qualified. He had been through all the trainings, and knew everything about the mission. It was the most logical conclusion.”
“And I didn’t want to.” He’s too tired, frankly, to try and keep the tears springing at the edges of his eyes from falling. Rocky spares him any comment about leaking. “I knew that going would save my kids, would save the world, and I didn’t want to. The teacher, no longer a teacher, asked if he could think about it. He was given three hours. ”
”It wasn’t enough, and when the coward came back, he still said no. He couldn’t do it. There are more qualified people to do the mission, he said knowing he was the most qualified. You’ll find someone else, he said knowing there was no time. I can’t do it, I said knowing it would sentence my kids to die if I didn’t. Still, I didn’t.” He trails off, the tears falling down his cheeks packing the sand in tighter. Cowardly, even still, to have to stop talking and keep the truth from the one who deserved it the most.
Rocky hears him cry for a bit, refusing to sing a note until the tears seem to lessen. “But Grace is here. Statement.” He chortles, the notes low in octave and wobbling in cadence. There is an emotion there, in the notes, that he cannot recognize. Grace ignores the emotionless computer and hears this terrifying calm in the way the notes are forced out that tells him Rocky is actively realizing. He is there with him. And he shudders with a ferocity that has Grace talking before any conclusions can be drawn.
”I ran. I didn’t want to go, and they wanted me to go, and they took away my right to say “no”. So I ran. Scared. But this job not only had the bravest and most brilliant minds, but they had the strongest and most powerful bodies to back it up. And I was never the bravest and most brilliant, nor the strongest and most powerful. I was just...” He huffs a wet laugh, if only to keep his next breath a breath and not a sob. “A coward amongst the best.” The laugh fails, and indeed his next breath chokes. “So I ran, and they got to me and made me go anyway. A needle to the neck and access to the world’s most powerful drugs made it easy for them.” His glasses slide from his nose and into his lap, and he cannot bring himself to care whether they stay intact or not as he hunches into himself with a sob. “I never had much of a choice when it came to this job, did I? I didn’t have a choice when they came to get me and I didn’t really have a choice when they came to end me.” His voice is wet now, wobbling with every silent cry that rips its way through him. He can barely speak the next sentences without gasping for every word.
“And you know the rest. Woke up without a memory. Why is a schoolteacher in space? I didn’t know then, but I know now. Let me give you a new answer.” He’s in loose hysterics now, tears flowing freely and gasps taking over his breathing. “Because he is a coward and he never really had a choice anyways. So.” He’s fading, losing himself to the sobs that pound against the sand in his throat. God Rocky deserves better than this wreck of an explanation. And Grace can’t really give that to him.
Rocky is silent for a long time. Which, for Rocky, is a feat upon itself. He is silent, but Grace can feel his focus starkly on him as he sobs into his knees. And Grace can say no more. Like a coward.
Rocky only moves once Grace’s cries migrate into silent heaves of the chest. He shifts slightly, palm pawing at his cheek to try and clear some of the tears, when he hears the ball clattering besides him. He peers up to see Rocky grasping at the inside of the ball and jerking it this way and that, trying to rotate it beneath him. It’s an awkward process to lay witness to, especially when he feels hollowed out and scraped clean on the inside, but he just sits there and watches it happen. Finally, Rocky seems satisfied, and then there’s something on Grace’s pant leg. A claw. Rocky’s claw, poking through the flexible mesh panel and pressing into the fabric of his jumpsuit as far as he can get it through the material. Once it’s able to find purchase in the fabric, he grips it and turns his carapace to face Grace. And then, with a terrifying levelness to his chirps, he says,
“Grace is never going back to Earth.”
“Huh?” He heaves, the shock of the words seeming to reset his breathing into something more manageable.
“Grace is never going back to Earth. Statement.” There is a sheer lack of musicality in the notes that grabs at his ribs and shakes him into focus.
“Yeah well… I don’t really have much of a choice there.” He murmurs through sniffles.
“No matter. Even if Grace had the choice, is never going back, never never never.” He stamps his leg for emphasis. “Rocky will not let.”
“…what are you getting at here?”
“Grace leave his job to save Earth. Grace do important work to save Earth. Grace sacrifice so much to save Earth. And Earth repays Grace by killing Grace. So no, Grace is not going back to Earth. Grace is dead to Earth.”
Grace should feel something at the sheer emphasis, but his brain can grasp at nothing but the numb meaning of “I think you’re missing the point here. I ran.”
“No no no.” Stamp stamp stamp. “Earth wanted to kill Grace. Grace did not want to be killed, so Grace ran. Is not cowardly, is logical.” Stamp.
“Everybody was going to die, and I said no.”
“Everybody was going to die, and you did much much work to keep them alive. And they repay by trying to kill you anyways. So Earth does not deserve Grace. Grace sent Taumeoba to Earth, and Earth gets no more of Grace. Rocky gets to keep Grace.”
Funny how the mere motion of wanting to be kept rather than sent away does a strange hallowing thing to Grace’s chest, turning his breathing into cathartic heaves rather than a mindless necessity. To be wanted not for his mind, but despite it is a notion that sits unfamiliar in his throat, an ebbing tide that laps away at the sand.
Grace’s head, which had fallen between his legs, rises and turns to look at Rocky, resting atop his knees. He feels torn, ripped into shreds and crumpled up, a ball of wet stained paper begging to fall apart at the seams. There’s a claw on his leg, however, that keeps him from crumpling further. “You should be disgusted.” He says feebly.
“No.” Stamp.
“You should be mad. I lied.”
“No.” Stamp,
“You should hate me.”
“No.” Stamp. “Never never never.” Stamp stamp stamp.
And with that, this rock -this intelligent alien who has only known him for little over a year- has understood more about him than anybody he knew for longer back on Earth. He manages a smile, a small one that tugs at his lips and doesn’t quite reach his eyes, but it is a smile regardless. Rocky trills, notes he recognizes as a sound of care and affection, and rolls as close to him as he can. Grace, in turn, having worn himself out thoroughly, tilts to the side until he is leaning fully against the ball and the wall. Rocky raises himself to meet him, and the warmth coming from him melts the icicle in his chest.
He was wrong. There are some walls on the Hail Mary that are every bit as warm and alive as the being who lives within them. They did not belong to the ship before. But now, they are every part of the ship as the hull itself, and he could not imagine his life without them.
Funny how the purest form of humanity does not require a body of flesh and bone to exist. Funny how it finds him even now, so unfathomly far from Earth that the very meaning of the word bends and curves at the edges but still feels so indisputably like home.
“…m’sorry. For getting upset earlier.”
“No sorries. Rocky understand now. Rocky joke was insensitive. Should not have made joke at Grace expense. Will not do again, statement.”
“No, Rock. You didn’t know. There’s no way you could have known. That’s not your fault.” He bites at his lips. “Though, maybe let’s wait a little bit before joking about me being a captain and inadequate and all of that touchy stuff. Just a little. It’s all still a bit fresh.”
“Rocky promise. Rocky sorry.”
“You’ve been forgiven since the day we met.”
“You too.” He pauses. “And you have been everything to me since the day you came back.”
Grace is too strewn out to cry. He manages to anyways, here on his bed, pressed up against the warmth of the only other living intelligent creature for lightyears, one whom he loves so dearly he cannot even begin to speak it aloud. By the way Rocky sings a low hum that makes itself at home in his chest, he thinks his heartbeat has given him away. He should respond.
But how? How can he even begin to try and articulate affection so deep it has woven itself into his very DNA, into every breath he takes and every decision he makes? How does one express the reason for the existence of their love into the limits of 26 restricting letters? To do so feels like a disservice to the hazy limitless bounds his brain reaches for to try and make sense of it all. It is a foggy incorporeal idea to its core, irrepressible and inextinguishable, that slips through the cracks of grasping fingers desperate to understand. A formless shape trying to mold to the confines of discovered language. It is simply intelligible. And to try and say it aloud would be such an injustice to the cavernous sentiments that it would lead to the destruction of Grace’s ability to speak.
But he cannot let silence be his answer. So he will speak, and it will pale in comparison to what he is really trying to convey, but he will try anyway.
“And you have meant the world to me since the day your ship appeared on my radar. No, far beyond the world. The universe.” It is far from comprehending the insurmountable levels of adoration running rampant in his mind, but given the way Rocky melts where he stands and purrs, it is good for now.
“Rocky ship detect Grace ship first. Rocky love Grace first and harder.”
“Mmm I don’t know about that.” Grace laughs warmly against the xenonite, letting the last of his stuttering breathes dissipate into the chuckles as he hugs at the ball with every ounce of strength he has and trying his hardest to ignore the drops trailing down the panels. “I think I love you more.”
“No. Is lie. Grace love a lot, but Rocky love more.” He knocks his carapace against the xenonite where Grace’s head lays in emphasis.
“Oh, what’s that? I can’t hear you over the sound of my love.” Eloquence long having vacated his mind, Grace stretches out, whomping over the ball and nuzzling it like a cat. God he’s a teacher in his mid-30s and he couldn’t bring himself to care.
“Rocky was wrong. Grace lie about one thing. Grace lie about loving Rocky more. Is not true. Rocky love Grace more more more. Rocky keep Grace forever.”
“Mmm no. I’m done lying. No more lies coming from me. I love youuuu the most.” He is far too tired to try and maintain any modicum of “acting like his age”, so he lets the exhausted haze in his mind take over. That haze is, evidently, making him act like a toddler.
And nobody is there to watch the two smartest minds this side of the universe lug the mushiest most loving sayings at each other and try to out-love the other. And if they were there to watch it, those two smartest minds couldn’t have cared at all to do it any other way.
Later finds them both still on the bed, Grace draped over Rocky’s ball. They’ve both slipped into a blissful silence of just enjoying each other’s company. Not sleeping, not quite yet, though Grace can feel weight starting to accumulate on his eyelids. Rocky has settled down against the side of the ball, his legs folding under him. He’d been humming soft songs for the better part of their time together. It’s when said song pauses that Grace knows he’s about to speak again.
“I feel…” He does not continue, his chords making way for unintelligible notes that cut themselves short. A rush of air leaves his vents that sounds suspiciously like a chuff. Grace gives him the minute to collect himself.
“What? What do you feel?”
“🎶”
”I don’t think I know what you mean.”
“Human word angry is not enough. Need better word.”
“Better as in nicer?”
“Better as in… more angry. Eridian word is 🎶”
”…” Grace does not respond. “Why are you angry?”
“Am not. Am more than angry.”
“Ok. Why are you more than angry?”
Rocky paws at the bottom of his ball for a moment, shifting side to side as the words dissipate into the silence. His vents huff. “Grace is best friend. Closest being to Rocky.”
“Ok. Love you too, but I’m still not understanding.”
Rocky chuffs more loudly and rises to his legs, stomping. “Rocky don’t understand how Grace so ok with this.”
“I’m not.” Grace rises from his lounge, turning to look at him better. “I just lost my mind because of it, did you not hear that?”
“That is because Rocky insensitive. Grace sent to die. How is Grace not angry too, question?”
Grace swallows. This is not a part of that conversation he exactly wants to explain. Mental health is a long winding road and he has too much carsickness for it now. “After a while, the human mind gets tired of being angry and sad. You make peace with it.”
“Grace said you did not mean. That is just something Grace say.”
“Ok bad example.” He flaps his hand lazily in the vague direction of the metaphorical past. “That was a while ago. Since then, I’ve been given the chance not to die so.” Grace sniffles, letting his head fall back. “I’m happy.”
“Don’t understand.” Rocky says desperately, his tones shaky.
“That’s okay.” Grace says, taking on his placating teacher voice. “You don’t have to. You’re allowed to be angry.”
“I just…” Rocky, seemingly frustrated with his enclosed space, spins in place. He stomps again. “Why Earth do that, question?” He puts an emphasis on the chord for ‘do’, and it breaks when it comes out.
“Desperation, Rock.” He swallows, remembering the silent plea in Stratt’s eyes as she recounted the expected death toll to him. He then recounts the complete and utter honesty in her eyes when he had said,
“Must be hard asking everyone to, y’know.”
And she had replied,
“Actually it isn’t.”
“It does crazy things to normal people.” He concludes, letting that particularly-nauseating memory drift off in the tides of his thoughts. “The life of one person wasn’t worth the life of millions of others.”
“Yes it is.” Rocky insists. “Your life is.”
“…” Grace hums. “I’m the only human you’ve ever met, bud. Of course my life seems worth it. But it’s not that easy.”
“It is to me.” Stamp stamp.
That hollow something in Grace’s chest fills with something like liquid honey, warm and sweet and a welcome presence. He lets it drown the remaining chill like a steaming bath after a winter’s walk, just a bit too hot so it burns, but mostly a soothing entity. Rocky trills a questioning chord, and Grace gives his ball a placating tap. Rocky settles back down, and Grace resumes his slump over the panels.
”Rocky still more than angry.” He decides.
“That’s okay.” He smiles. “I’m still happy.”
“Rocky wish could understand.”
Grace hums again. “Furious.”
“What?”
“More than angry? Human equivalent is furious.”
“Oh understand. Rocky is furious.”
“Or pissed if you really want to get your point across. But that’s technically a curse word so don’t use that one.”
“Rocky like. Rocky is pissed, statement.”
“I’m going to regret teaching you that one, aren’t I?”
“No no, Grace life will be better for it. Rocky now able to express clearly. Pissed, pissed, pissed.”
The conversation is no different from one he would have with a closeted child who’s just learned a new curse word and wants to try it out. He can feel a headache storing itself away for sometime in the future, but he’s too placid right now to care. He lets Rocky get it out of his system without too many internal cringes. Though there are one or two external ones at the words he puts specific emphasis on.
Soon enough, though, Rocky seems to have let out all the steam he needed to, and settles down in the ball once more, leaning in towards Grace. The quiet tranquility takes place once more, but it does not last long.
“I wasn’t lying, you know, question?”
“About what, bud?”
“About Grace. Earlier when I said ‘like Grace’. During interruption. Was not lie.”
Grace tries to think, but the honey is slow and sticky and his mind is far too comfortable to be bothered. “You’re going to have to be a little more specific.”
“When I say ‘Like Grace’ earlier, I did not mean the story teacher was like Grace. Teacher was like Grace, yes but then specifically. You say “the bravest and most brilliant minds your planet had to offer.” I say, like Grace. I still think that. Is true still.”
”Oh.” His mind catches up, and betrays him instantly. Grace blubbers. “Including the part where I ran?”
“Including part where you ran. Grace is bravest and most brilliant human. Statement.” Then, “Erid is going to be so lucky to have you.”
Grace sniffles, and turns his head to try to keep the tears away. Not that he has a problem with crying; with so many tears shed in the duration of his existence of the Mary, he could probably have replenished the drinking water supply by now. But that he’s cried so much in the past hour that to cry now would sting more than anything. It doesn’t stop the temptation from brewing in his throat, which is quite parched now that he thinks of drinking water. “Well I think Rocky is the bravest, most brilliant, and most stubborn Eridian ever. Statement. And I am lucky to have you.”
“Was sweet until the stubborn part.”
“Not even the me being lucky to have you part?”
“No. Is ruined now.”
“Darn.”
“Rocky take back. Grace is now the bravest, most brilliant, and leakiest human. Statement.”
“You can’t take that back. Unfair.”
“Is truth. Statement.”
“It is not my fault you Eridians don’t leak. I was built this way.”
“Other humans leak, but Grace leak the most of all.”
“And how would you know that?”
“Rocky watch human films with light transponder. Grace leak the most.”
“I am changing the password to that thing.”
“If you can do that without leaking on it, would be most impressive.”
“Ouch.” Rocky freezes, and Grace quickly tacks on. “In a good way, ouch. All good ouches.” He smiles at him, and Rocky trills an affectionate tune back. And Grace, in this jovial norm he has settled into, finds himself yawning before Rocky can butt in again. Rocky stands up, stretching slightly as he goes.
“Grace sleep, statement. I watch. Wait quick.” Without letting Grace try to refute, he stumbles (more like falls but with Rocky that’s a regular thing) down the ramp and hurricanes out of the room. Somewhere further into the ship, the telltale hiss of his ball connecting to an entry point for the tunnel sounds through the room, and in no time Rocky is scrambling in his tunnel now, skidding to a stop in his designated sleep-watch area. “Now. Grace sleep.”
“Wouldn’t dream of doing it without you, Rock. Grace smiles. “Just let me…” He calls out for Armando and asks for a drink of water, then gulps it down, letting the lukewarm substance soothe his gritty throat. He smiles, giving the empty cup back to Armando, then settles back into his spot, patting the barrier next to his bed. Rocky paws at it, and for a moment, just a second in the expanse of space, they are separated by nothing more than a centimeter of xenonite, sharing everything but air and atmosphere. Even their warmth is passed between the two, and Grace wonders if Rocky can feel the chill of his own body. Then he is yawning once more and sinking to rest his head atop his pillow in the corner, and Rocky is settling back down into his resting position, legs tucked underneath him, looking more like a rock than ever. Mary, sensing somebody laying across the bed, dims the lights, and Grace is increasingly thankful that the ship is so intuitive; he would rather have slept with the lights on than get up to turn them off now.
No more than a minute passes before Rocky speaks up. “Grace?”
“Yeah?”
“…Rocky also wasn’t lying about new suit.”
“Oh?”
Rocky shifts where he lies, suddenly seeming a bit uncomfortable. “Rocky had been working on new suit for good time now. Was supposed to be a surprise for Grace.
“…oh.”
“When Grace bring up earlier, I panicked. Tried to distract by making fun. Got mean instead. Didn’t mean to.” His two claws are fiddling together. “Still am sorry.”
Grace’s heart melts. “Hey. Rocky. It’s ok.” He turns onto his side to face his friend. “Seriously. You apologized, I forgave you. For everything. It’s water under the bridge now.”
“What bridge, question? And where is the water, question? And what does that have to do with- ohhhh understand. Is human expression, yes, question?”
Grace laughs, finally, a full body laugh that shakes him and has him throwing his head back, throat clear from sand and grit. He lets the sudden manic energy settle into his chest with a healthy welcome buzz. “Yes bud, it is. It means it’s ok, so we don’t have to keep talking about it, yeah? A bridge has been built over that water, so let's use it.”
“Grace is trying to be reassuring, but is just more confusing. What bridge, question? Why are we using a bridge, question? Stop laughing, statement!!”
Grace does not stop laughing, not for a while. When he does finally calm himself, its with a long drawn out wispy movie-style sigh and a hand coming to rest on the warm barrier. “I adore you.”
“Hmm. I hold a deep feeling of admiration and care for you too. Hmmph.” Rocky had turned at some point during Grace’s manic giggle spree and is now facing away from him now, his back claw tapping indignantly. Well, facing away as much as an Eridian can face away, having no face at all.
“Kinda hard to watch me sleep from there bud.”
Rocky taps his front claw against the xenonite floor. “Can see everything perfectly from here. Is not Rocky’s fault Grace can only see one way. Shame.”
“Alrighty then. I’m going to shut my eyes, and sleep now.”
“Do. Been very long since last sleep. You will start getting grumpy soon.”
“Hey!”
“Oh, it’s starting.”
“You-“ Grace reaches over and whacks the barrier playfully before settling down, pulling the covers up to his chest. This rock sometimes! The nerve.
He wouldn’t trade it for anything.
He’s just about to let his eyes slip closed when he hears a faint,
“Goodnight Grace. Have good good good happy dreams.”
“‘Night, Rocky. I’m glad you’re here bud.”
“Happy happy happy.”
As Grace begins to drift, a final thought comes to him. Why, earlier, he’d been able to go so long without caring for the jabs Rocky poked at him a bit too hard. Why, today, he had finally broken. The answer came to him in the hazy subconscious of half-sleep, as realizations tend to do.
The answer being that before, he had purpose to disguise his emotions. An immediate task to take over that gap and leave no room for thinking. Nothing could stand in the way of getting the Taumeoba to Earth, not even the nauseating thoughts that lingered like murk in his head, slowly ascending to the surface. Even after the Beetles had taken away the very purpose of his mission, he’d had a new one: rescue Rocky. And after that? Chart navigation to Erid and start inventory and rations on food. And after that? Prevent the ship meant for short-term travel from imploding. He still had that now, but the impending severity of it all had lessened. And as thoughts leave his mind, other thoughts take over the space left behind, in this case, murk. Well a year into the journey and out of direct objectives, as would continue to be the case for the next two years, inwards had been one of the only directions outside of Rocky to turn to, and there was plenty of time to do it. With nothing to use to busy himself with, the memories had simply found purchase in his mind.
No direct objectives for the next two years. That’s a bold face lie if he’s ever known one now. Grace forces his eyes open, and to the side to land on Rocky. He’d turned around again at some point, and was watching him diligently. No side task to keep him occupied. Every drop of his attention seemed to be directed at him, which is likely why his carapace tilted to the side when he noticed Grace looking at him. Eridians cannot see, and yet his focus holds the same weight as a loaded gaze, and it settles over him like a weighted blanket.
Grace has a new directive now: love Rocky, and live out the rest of his life with him in it. Those emotions, that sand-like guilt, feel so infinitesimal now compared to the swell in his chest in regarding what he could only describe as the closest thing to a soulmate. He, being a man of science, of course doesn’t believe in soulmates, but any other word just falls extraordinarily short of even touching the precious something that Rocky is to him. So. Just for him, just for once, he will assign a word to the concept of loving Rocky. He will believe in soulmates, because despite the most logical academic parts of him screaming in protest, he seems to have found one.
He comes back in check with himself to realize he’s smiling like a dope.
“…”
”…”
”So when can I see this new suit?”
“I said goodNIGHT GRACE.” Stamp stamp.
What a treasure it is to love, and be loved in return.