Chapter Text
Ryland Grace was not prone to being surprised at this point and time in his life. He woke up at the same time. He ate all his meals at the same time (and sometimes it was the same meal every time). He took a run or a walk every day. He saw Rocky every day. His life was predictable. It was nice. It was comforting. It was not, in any way, surprising.
So when Grace stepped outside of his house, cup of not-coffee in hand, and saw something new in his enclosure he was, in fact, surprised. And a little nauseated.
Okay. Play it cool. There has to be a reason why there's a new, for lack of a word, bubble inside of Grace's biodome.
"Grace! Grace!" Rocky was wiggling from further down the pathway up to Grace's house, waving two arms with so much vigor he was giving off an excited vibration with every motion.
"Hey, Rock, uh…" Grace stared behind Rocky where inside of the new miniature dome were several other Eridians in xenosuits. They seemed to be constructing… another house. "Something you want to tell me?"
"Yes! Very excited to tell you." Rocky bounced on all his arms, his carapace bobbing with his movements. "Grace remembers exploration mission Iℓ months ago? Going to see planet previously hidden by shadow of planet ♪♪♫♪." He waits for Grace to nod before saying, "Astronauts return + days ago, and bring very exciting news!"
"Do I have to start guessing? Come on, buddy—"
"They found a second human!" Rocky spun, skittering from side to side in the sand.
Grace dropped his not-coffee.
"Okay. Okay okay okay," Grace said, clasping both hands together in front of himself. He was curled up underneath his kitchen table after sobbing for a totally-not-embarrassing amount of time. Out of excitement. Excitement and shock and also maybe a little bit of anxiety. Rocky, patient as he was, had not appreciated it but had waited on the floor for Grace to come to his senses. "I'm cool. I'm cool."
The moment Grace stood up and looked out his door and saw the new, smaller biodome, he screamed again and pumped both fists into the air.
"Grace keeps making terrible noise," Rocky said, tone flat with irritation.
"When do I get to meet him? Her? Them? I'm running out of pronouns, bud, I'm not that knowledgeable—"
"Second human required medical intervention," Rocky hummed, tapping one hand a couple times to indicate the urgency of his statement. "Eridian astronauts don't know anything about second human, just that quarantine procedures in place. Second human very sick—Astronaut who cared for second human also get sick. Radiation present."
"Are they okay?" Grace asked, brow furrowing as he tried to get a better look at what the Eridians were building. They appeared to be creating an airlock outside the front door of the new house. Were they constructing a decontamination shower inside?
"Returned home before becoming too sick. They are only astronaut who got sick, thanks to Grace's information about radiation. Proper precautions taken." Rocky scuttled down the pathway past Grace, and then motioned for Grace to follow. "Grace can follow. Rolland says to come see."
"Oh, did Rolland like their name? Last time I saw them they weren't sure." Grace had gotten into the habit of naming the Eridians he came in contact with the most, considering he couldn't actually pronounce their names without his synthesizer—which was too big to be lugging around everywhere. It stayed in his classroom cove, where it did its best work to help him communicate with the pebbles. Some of the Eridians had even gone out of their way to ask him to give them an "Earth name" despite the fact they couldn't pronounce it themselves and also he didn't really know them. Rolland was one of Rocky's engineering peers, who seemed to focus mostly on construction and large-scale maintenance of the biodome. They were around enough that Grace had asked to give them a name he could pronounce.
Rolland, who was a particularly round Eridian that appeared to be made mostly out of obsidian and some pockets of shiny, glass-like crystal, was directing the EVA bots and other Eridians with applying adhesive to the xenonite panels when they arrived. When they turned around they chittered and sounded a short greeting to both Grace and Rocky. "Friend-Grace, peer-Rocky, you come just in time. Second human inside new habitat already. Doctor ♪♬♩ ♫♪♪♪ is inside helping second human. Second human very sick, very injured. Missing limb, I know humans do not have very many of those. Very dangerous injury."
Rolland motioned with one of their limbs to another. Grace always found it astounding how any Eridian acted like he was at such a significant disadvantage by only having four limbs, and that only two of them touched the ground at a time on average.
"I bet they lost a lot of blood," Grace muttered into his palm as he tried to look over Rolland's carapace—they were taller than him by one whole Rocky—and into the smaller biodome. "Do they need blood? I'm O negative. I could donate. Humans can actually live just fine with a missing limb, but the, uh, the blood thing. We do need replacement blood if we lose too much of it."
Rocky had told him once that losing a limb was excessively traumatic for an Eridian and even potentially fatal, especially if they were still growing. For a species that was made out of rock and steaming blood they weren't nearly as untouchable as Grace would think. Grace had come to learn that if anything happened inside of them then they were terribly unprepared. It made Grace appreciative of a lot of things he'd taken for granted, being human. Though, when he'd said that to Rocky his friend had laughed at him and said he was infinitely more fragile than an Eridian. Perspective, he supposed.
Rolland seemed confused by this concept, but didn't ask further questions. Instead, they said, "Friend-Grace not to go inside. Quarantine procedures in place. For safety of both friend-Grace and second human."
"Do you guys not do blood infusions? I gave you Wikipedia, you could just look it up—I guess Rolland isn't a doctor, though. Will I get to talk to Doctor—" Grace didn't want to name an Eridian without their input, so he made an approximation of the notes of the Doctor's name, which Rocky cackled at. "Hey, come on, I tried—"
"Grace's accent bad. Bad bad bad." Rocky's tone dipped lower, indicating something not quite like sorrow. It sounded like—
"Don't talk about me like I'm dead! Stop mourning me tonally!"
Rolland returned to their work, and upon not being allowed into the mini-dome, Grace walked around the perimeter to press his face against the transparent xenonite in an attempt to see something, anything, of their new guest.
Rocky followed him dutifully, as if he was chaperoning a curious animal. Every now and then he would ask Grace a question—"Grace is excited to have companion?" "Does Grace think second-human will be as interesting as Grace?" "Will second-human watch human reality television with Rocky?"—and Grace would usually have some version of 'I don't know' as an answer. That third one really threw him for a loop—he never should have let Rocky watch Kitchen Nightmares. He'd learned phrases like "donkey dick" and "piss off."
"Maybe second-human will be good mate for Grace?"
"Whoa—Rock, that's, uh, that one's—"
"Is that one of those human personal questions Grace doesn't like?" Rocky didn't even pretend to be contrite about it. Instead, there was a thin rumble of laughter beneath his melodies. "Humans so embarrassed about facts of life."
"It's not my priority," Grace grumbled, crossing his arms over his chest. He took a few steps back onto the beach path up to his house, hoping that the other Eridians wouldn't try to listen in on their conversation. It was unlikely—Eridians liked knowing things, and they had excellent hearing. "I don't even know what this person looks like, or how they act. I don't know if we'll even like each other. Humans are pretty diverse, Rock. The best we might get is tolerance because we're the only humans around." And Grace would be okay with that. He would—he really would. Even if the thought of the only other human around hating him for the rest of his very strange life made his eyes water.
Rocky clicked his claws several times as he followed Grace up the path to his house. Grace watched as he appeared to be deliberating an answer. Or maybe another question. "Maybe second-human is reciprocal second human gender?"
Grace wished he hadn't taught the Eridians about that, but he also gave them Wikipedia. And, apparently, the entirety of PornHub. He'd only discovered that after Rocky had queued up '2 Needy Omegas in Heat Beg for Knot' or something equally as ridiculous. It had been a humiliating conversation, and Rocky hadn't even turned the porn off for it. Explaining gender to an alien whose species was monogender was already difficult ("Humans have subspecies with different parts? Inefficient. Human biology stupid.") alone without endotype ("Humans have double subspecies with extra different hormones? Human biology double stupid.") And Grace, while he definitely thought his own biology was frequently stupid, couldn't just agree with Rocky about it, because letting Rocky think he was right was a slippery slope to Rocky composing a song about how right he was about everything. And Grace had already heard four or five of those.
This also didn't even take into account the other thing, which he'd also had to explain. Surprisingly, Rocky understood the whole trans thing a lot more than everything else (Some humans choose to be different thing than what they hatched with. This makes sense. Human biology still double stupid."); and then he'd had to describe that humans did not, in fact, hatch from eggs. That one had actually had an existential horror-inducing effect on Rocky.
"That's a stretch." Grace brushed a hand through his hair tried to shrug like it was no big deal. He decided to take a seat on the little bench that Rocky had built for him on his porch, and reached over to brush one of the leaves of the apple tree that he'd planted in a pot beside the bench. It might even grow some apples in the next couple years, if he could help Adrian tweak the season cycling in the biodome. "You know I wasn't—you know that something. Happened to me, right? Like… like, I didn't used to be… an omega. It's still sort of new to me."
It was something that had only ever been theorized. Ryland Grace, for the first thirty two years of his life, had lived every day as a beta. He had never once experienced a heat, nor a rut, and he had, selfishly, liked it that way. It afforded him privileges and experiences he wouldn't have ever gotten otherwise. Only after he'd awoken on the Hail Mary, weeks after meeting Rocky, had he gotten feverish and needy for the first time in his life. He had, embarrassingly, had his very first heat in the sleeping pod of a spaceship with only the company of an alien who couldn't even touch him. Realizing that Grace had proven a theory true, about humans being able to shift endotypes in times of need and scarcity, had not made it feel any better when he'd been crying into a pillow, underwear wet and slick as he ached for something he would never be able to have. Something that had been taken from him.
Regardless of the strange scientific anomaly it was, Grace was now just… living with it. Every four weeks, for about two to four days, he would end up aroused, uncomfortable, needy, and sweaty. He didn't let Rocky visit when it was happening, mostly because the heats made him too irritable to handle being a human-Eridian ambassador. Rocky hadn't complained or even joked about it. Rocky always knew when it was time to let a subject be.
"Yes. This is source of great concern for Eridian scientists. Grace is statistical anomaly. But perhaps second-human could help?" Rocky clambered up onto the bench beside Grace and settled, arranging all his limbs around himself. "I would love to be sole source of happiness and joy for Grace. I am amazing. However, Grace requires other humans for proper imitation of natural human environment."
Okay, they were going to have to talk about how sometimes Rocky made him sound like a zoo animal. Grace knew he was ostensibly a fish in a highly regulated aquarium, and he was mostly okay with that, but some things just sounded weird being said out loud.
"It's less that I need other humans specifically," Grace grumbled, crossing his arms as he stared out over the sand where Rolland was meeting with the other builders. They looked to be finishing up. "And more like I wish that I could be closer to everyone else here on Erid."
"Which is why second-human will help." Rocky pressed the side of his carapace against Grace's side. Grace responded by laying an arm over top of Rocky, giving him a squeeze. The xenosuit, as flexible as it had gotten, was still a barrier. "Second-human can be touch-friend for Grace."
"Okay, don't say it like that. That's weird."
"Touch-friend for Grace. Grace has new touch-friend."
"I swear to Chr— Christmas! You—"
The quarantine lasted for a week. In that time Grace hadn't once seen his new neighbor. He'd taken several walks each day to try and see if maybe the other human had emerged from the house, or if he could hear anything inside. Nothing. Zilch. Nada.
After it had been seven cycles of the artificial sun, Grace woke up to the sounds of construction. He hurtled out of bed without putting on pants, or a shirt, and stumbled barefoot down the pathway that led down the hill and around to the patio of the new house.
"Grace is awake so early," Rocky said after giving a little greeting song. "I was going to come get you when we finished taking down partitions. Second-human awake but will not come out. Maybe he needs another human to assure him it is safe?"
"I mean, there's no guarantee that he even speaks English," Grace said with a shrug. He then became all too aware of just how chilly it was, and wrapped his arms around himself. Adrian kept the temperature in the biodome at a comfortable fifty four degrees for him, which Grace really appreciated as it went astonishingly well with the fog—but it also wasn't great weather to be in nothing but boxers. "Uh, I'm gonna. Real quick. Clothes."
One quick trip back up to his cottage and one outfit later, Grace met Rocky outside the door of the newly-freed copy of his own house. Grace wrung his hands, then looked down at his graphic t-shirt—should he have chosen something else?—and then realized, "Shoot, I should go get the old laptop, so he can understand you."
"Grace can translate!" Rocky chirped, and then banged a limb on the door. "Second-human, we are entering the domicile!" Then, without waiting for an answer, Rocky turned the knob and scuttled through the doorway.
The next several moments consisted of Grace having to take in three things: One, that he and Rocky needed to have a conversation about how other humans weren't as receptive to the kind of familiarity Grace expected from his best friend. Two, wow, a real other human who he could talk to! It was making his eyes fill with tears. And three, there was now a lot of yelling occurring.
"Whoa, whoa! Timeout! My hand is up!" Grace made a T with both hands, and then when that failed to grab attention he raised his hand high above his head. The other human, who Grace was now pretty sure was a him, was backing away on the ground, scooting backwards and shouting at Rocky to back away from him.
Rocky, who was chittering something about how rude it was to throw things at a guest, dutifully went still and turned to give Grace his full attention. The other human, who had pushed himself all the way back towards the far kitchen wall, turned to stare at him with a look of incredulity.
"Hey, hi, sorry about the kerfuffle," Grace said, holding out both palms to show he had nothing in his hands. He noticed that his new neighbor had a xenonite mug in his curled first, held defensively in front of himself. He also noticed the prosthetic limb. "Rocky, it's kinda rude to force someone to use a prosthetic without telling them."
"Was supposed to be a nice surprise. Grace loves surprises."
Surprising a guy who'd been fished off of an outer moon after losing an arm seemed like a bad idea at best. Grace decided to turn his full attention to his new neighbor. "Hey. Hey, I'm not going to hurt you. Nobody here is. My name is Dr. Ryland Grace. What's your name?"
The man's shoulder was shaking from the effort of holding the xenonite so stiffly. Grace watched as he tried to shake his hair out of his eyes. He wasn't lifting the prosthetic, leaving Grace to wonder if it was properly connected at all.
"You're a doctor?" the man said, his voice ragged with desperation and instinct-deep fear.
"A science doctor. I'm a biologist," Grace clarified. He motioned with one hand to the man's prosthetic limb. "I could disconnect that for you. Until you're ready—if you're ever ready."
He was slow to respond, but lowered the mug with no small amount of trepidation. "Get this thing off of me."
"That thing is a gift," Rocky said, sounding rather surly about it. Grace shushed him as he moved forward, choreographing his steps steadily so that the other man could see everything he was doing.
Grace knelt down in front of the other man and scooted the rest of the way to him. With careful, slow hands he began the process of disconnecting the prosthetic limb. There were several neuro-patch points he'd need to disconnect individually. "This might take a sec. So… your name?"
Silence followed his question. Grace snuck a few glances at his new neighbor as he worked on the arm; he was rugged and unshaven. He looked like he could use a shave. He might have been mixed race, but Grace couldn't tell—the only thing he could see that cued him in was the almond curve of his eyes. His hair hung like a black curtain in front of his face, as if shielding him.
Finally, just as he was disconnecting the final patch, the other man said, "Simon."
"Simon…?" Grace pressed, finally tugging the prosthetic away—there was a gentle pop as the suction gave way. He didn't stare at the stump, which still had gnarly stitches. It probably still hurt.
"Just Simon."
"Okay, Just Simon," Grace said, cracking a smile at his own joke. "Let's start over. My name is Ryland Grace. Rocky over here—" He jabbed a thumb in Rocky's direction, who sang excitedly as he was acknowledged. "—Calls me Grace and you can too. Sometimes he also calls me 'leaky space blob' and I pretend not to notice. I know he comes off kind of strong, part of that is my fault. We're pretty comfortable and he's never met any other humans."
Grace set the prosthetic aside with reverence. It really was a beautiful piece of machinery with articulation points and everything—maybe Simon would eventually feel comfortable using it. Until then, it would do better as an option and not an obligation. He scooted back, giving Simon some space, before he rolled to his feet. Simon watched after him with scowling suspicion.
"Are you hungry?" Grace asked, thinking about when he'd woken up after a huge medical event. He'd been starving. "I could make you something. Our options are kind of limited here—mostly taomeba paste. I managed to make something that was kind of like bread out of it once. I think Adrian was working on Taoritos—that's Doritos but made out of taomeba, by the way. There's meburg—actually. Actually I don't know if you'll want that."
"Anything."
Okay, so Simon wasn't a talkative guy. Grace realized he'd been rambling, so maybe Simon just hadn't felt like there was a good place for him to insert his opinion. "I'll get something ready. Do you want to come with me, or stay here?"
"Get out."
It was the kind of answer that felt like a bucket of cold water. Okay, so Simon was still adjusting. Grace could handle that. He probably came off too strong, what with having not seen another human in several years. Rocky was great. Adrian was great. But having someone else who understood what it was like to be human wasn't going to come around any time soon. Simon was his last chance at a connection with another human.
Calm down, Ryland, he told himself. He quickly wiped away a single tear that had welled up in his eye. It's literally been ten minutes.
"Okay, okay. I'll bring something by." Grace backed away and turned slowly towards the door. "I'll bring by some other stuff too. Some like, living stuff. Don't feel like you have to stay inside either, you can leave anytime you want. The house I mean. Don't… don't try to leave the biodome. You'll die."
Smooth. He was so suave. Grace turned his back to Simon and ushered Rocky out the front door with him. When they were a few feet away from the house he said, "Okay, we have got to work on your patience."
"I am very patient," Rocky retorted, "Not my fault that second-human is crazy."
"Okay, let's be sensitive here," Grace said, taking a small amount of offense. He could have been the crazy one if he hadn't found Rocky so early on during the mission. Simon was, for all intents and purposes, actually reacting not that poorly. "He's scared. We've got to meet him where he's at. Where he's at right now is giving him space and some food."
Rocky continued grumbling about it, but Grace could tell it was because he felt bad about his methods backfiring and not because he was actually upset with Simon. There was a scuffling to his stride that Grace recognized as embarrassment.
"Hey, let's be excited, okay? Also, under no circumstances feed him a meburger." Grace really didn't want to have to explain that to another human. Some people had really intense opinions about cannibalism. Grace would admit that he'd been horrified by the concept before he'd been malnourished and riddled with scurvy. The end result of his DNA grown into lab-meat was something that tasted pretty good and was also one of the few things that he could eat that wasn't just vitamin dusted amoeba paste. He'd stopped feeling weird about it. Someday he was going to have some kind of greenery, but for now he had meburgers.
"Okay, so we've got some taomebread… I think I have a few squares of chocolate left from rationing, I could give him one. Shoot, I forgot to ask about allergies… Guess he said 'anything' so I'm going to take that as food restrictions. How long until Taoritos are a thing?"
Grace and Rocky traded conversation back and forth, until Grace had put together a stunning little gift basket; and sure, the "basket" was actually a xenonite cube he put laundry in that he'd upended, and maybe the gifts in it mostly consisted of a clean outfit, some hastily packaged food, and a tiny figure of a fox that Rocky had made him out of xenonite, but it was what he had to share.
Grace didn't try to go inside. Once he reached Simon's door he set the cube down and knocked on the door, calling out, "I'm leaving you some stuff! I'll give you some space. I'm just up the hill. In. In the only other house here. If you need anything, feel free to come get me."
After the delivery, Grace asked Rocky if he could have the rest of the day to recover and Rocky gracefully took his leave with promise of returning the next day. Rocky even told him he would inform the pebbles' that school was cancelled for the next couple of days so that Grace could welcome his new friend.
Grace waited until the door was shut behind him to burst into tears.