Chapter Text
It had been a long few years.
At first, when Ryland Grace had arrived on this strange planet with his friend, there seemed to be so much to do. He and Rocky were hailed as heroes. The saviors of Earth and Erid.
Grace did not feel like much of a hero, with his weakened body, bleeding gums and aching joints all thanks to the malnutrition, scurvy and rickets he had developed on the way. Food stores had run dangerously low, and he had suffered the consequences. Still, he put his own troubles aside in order to do what had to be done.
First, weeks of briefing the leading minds of Rocky's people on their findings, while rushing to breed enough taumoeba to save the Eridian sun. The astrophage killer was deployed. Erid’s sun was saved, along with it's two companion stars within the same system. Hopefully the Earth's sun would be too once the probes reached Earth.
After everything pressing had been achieved, the symptoms of malnutrition had caught up to him. Grace collapsed one day, while working on the Mary to breed heartier strains of taumoeba to survive in the harsh conditions the poor organisms had to soon face up in space.
He had opened his eyes to a frantic and panicked Rocky, who immediately started to bombard him with questions and accusations, calling him stupid and stubborn for downplaying his condition.
Welp, now that he had Rocky and a whole host of Eridian scientists worried sick about him, there was no other option than to address the problem.
Grace offered himself to be studied by Eridian scientists, answering question after question about himself, his planet and the human race. They meticulously asked about human biology, what a sufficient diet consisted of and in what physical conditions humans thrived in. Whole books, well, something like that, were written with him and the Mary's contents as sole sources.
What followed was years of labor in furthering Eridian science, figuring out a whole new kind of science to replicate food and other materials so that Grace could stay alive, and building a biodome where Grace could live without going absolutely stir-crazy.
The Mary was a familiar environment, but the less time Grace had to spend in that hunk of metal the better.
During these events, Grace had gotten to know Rocky’s mate Adrian.
He had heard so much about them from Rocky, and found them to be everything and more Rocky said they were. Grace had immediately been accepted by Adrian as family, being their mate’s and the whole planet’s savior.
The teal-colored Eridian was wickedly smart, just like Rocky, and took the initiative in putting together a team responsible for the biodome. It was a joy to watch the two Eridian mates work together to create a scientific marvel to keep only a single human alive and happy.
The pair worked together seamlessly. Rocky shined when following Adrian’s instructions, as the slightly bigger and bluer of the pair proved themself to be an extremely capable leader. Turns out, Adrian had been one of the top engineers in charge of their species’ mission to Tau Ceti, the main mind behind the design of Blip A.
Now, they were the leading mind behind the construction of Grace’s biodome.
The first time Ryland could walk on a beach without a suit to keep him alive had bordered on a religious experience. The man had fallen to his knees, dug his hands in the strange Eridian sand and wept. Poor Rocky ran circles around him in distress, chirping questions.
It had taken a moment before the human could answer that no, he was not leaking because he was sad, and yes, he was extremely satisfied with the biodome.
The air he breathed did not smell like the same recycled air he had been breathing for years. The strange sand with particles a size too large felt divine between his fingers.
The water, oh, the beautiful water. It was.. absolutely scorching hot.
He had stripped off the shoes from his feet and had run to the edge of the water, ready to dip his toes in the cooling water to hopefully soothe his still aching joints. Afterwards, while soaking his feet in an ice-bath, he gave some polite pointers to Rocky and Adrian.
As perfect as the beach was, it was through years of trial and error to get the enclosure in near-earth-like parameters. The Eridians were incredibly talented builders, and any input Grace gave was immediately adopted and perfected into a design that Earth could only dream of in their current scientific standing.
Well, at least the standing Grace was familiar with when he left his planet.
The leaps and bounds earth science would have to make in order to build something of this magnitude were mind-boggling to think about.
An entire stretch of beach just for Grace's comfort, climate controlled to have an air pressure and temperature survivable to humans, breathable air even though it smelled kinda funny at first, an outer shell that also acted as a display to mimic an earth sky, replicated soil, simulated weather, the list just goes on.
The gravity, sadly, was non-negotiable. At little over twice as strong as earth's gravity, it was a struggle to acclimate. Even after years of living in the dome, Grace sometimes felt like his limbs were made of lead.
It mostly happened just as he was waking up, or struggling to stay awake when his mind wanted to keep doing science while his body desperately screamed for sleep. Still, it was heaven compared to all those months inside the Mary.
The first couple of years were a blur of of activity, but once the taumoeba were deployed, science had been sufficiently scienced, a reliable food source was secured, the biodome built and most pressing questions answered, Ryland found himself in a welcome lull.
He woke up, made breakfast, brushed his teeth, worked on science with Rocky and Adrian, had long walks on his beach, worked out, ate some more and went to sleep.
Rinse and repeat.
A routine. A familiar, safe and oh, so ordinary routine. His physical condition improved rapidly, and he was back to full health surprisingly quickly. It was amazing. For about an earth-year at least.
With nothing to do, everything pressing already achieved, his reality had caught up to him. All his experiences leading up to meeting Rocky flooded back.
The cold coma bay where he woke up. The empty spaceship. The dead bodies he found when he expected other humans.
The isolation. The dread.
The rough hands pinning him down as the spreading cold of anesthetic flooded his body.
Eva Stratt’s eyes as she looked at Ryland while he screamed out his panic and betrayal. In his dreams, he could still feel the cold resignation and absolute heartbreak in those eyes as his death-sentence was laid before him.
He was afraid to sleep, afraid of those rough hands and heartbroken eyes. Afraid of the deep silence in his house with only echoes of his post-nightmare heaving. He would avoid sleep at all costs, his mental and physical health quickly deteriorating to the point where he would have panic attacks on the daily and would barely eat anymore.
Rocky and Adrian had been half-mad with worry during that particular period of Grace's life on Erid.
They had modified the biodome again and again, afraid that something in their human's living space was making him sick. They even temporarily moved in to be there to force Grace to sleep, to watch him throughout, and they helped him through his eventual night terrors and panic attacks.
It was during one of their long nightly talks, that Grace had broken down and expressed how he felt like he was living the same day over and over, how he missed having a job, talking with his coworkers, cycling to work, teaching science to curious little minds, how he missed his students, his kids. He desperately needed something to distract himself with, or he would go crazy.
At the mention of teaching children, Adrian had perked up and chirped an Eridian approximation of ’eureka!’.
Rocky and Adrian had brought the subject up with Eridian schooling system, proposing an earth science class with Grace as teacher. It was received with mixed reaction at first, the Eridians had to be convinced of Grace’s teaching methods. As fond of the whole of Erid was of Grace, they weren’t sure if an alien teaching their young ones was a good idea.
The chosen representatives of the Eridian education system were brought to the viewing window at Grace’s biodome.
The actual window was more for the human’s benefit rather than the Eridians’, and it was better than trying to teach an Eridian version of a Zoom class. Grace was nervous, but teaching elementary school science was almost second nature to him.
Soon the representatives were teetering at the edge of their rocky perches to hear more. They had, of course, read many of the writings based on Earth and Dr. Ryland Grace the human.
But experiencing and hearing about them first-hand was different.
An experimental class was approved, Grace taught a few classes of introductory earth-science to a small group of Adrian’s and Rocky’s coworkers’ children, or pebbles, as Grace liked to call them.
There was an actual Eridian school teacher to observe the first few classes, but all parties quickly realized that everyone was happy with the arrangement. Their savior human’s mental health improved drastically, the pebbles attending his classes were ecstatic to meet and talk with an actual human and to hear about a fantastical far-off place, and the parents of said pebbles were happy that their children learned first-hand knowledge about a different planet.
So, Ryland Grace was a teacher again. He had something to do. A purpose. The nightmares rarely overtook him anymore, the panic attacks were becoming rare as well. He had his best friend, new Eridian friends, his students, his little experimental batch of garden, his at-home lab, his beach, his home.
Before becoming a literal savior of both Homo Sapiens and Eridanus Sapiens, Dr. Ryland Grace never considered himself to be a man who needed a life of action and constant life-threatening problems to keep himself occupied. Actually, he still did not. But he had to admit that after an adventure such as he and Rocky had been on, his life in his little bubble of peaceful beach had started to feel.. well, he did not really know.
But.. Well, it was kind of lonely wasn't it?
Even with his days filled with talking, contact with friends and many impressionable young Eridian minds to feed information to, homework to grade, a garden to tend, it all had a deep undercurrent of loneliness.
When was the last time Grace had hugged anyone who was not inside a strange polygonal suit? When had he held someone's hand? Touched warm skin? Heck, even made eye contact with anyone? All of that seemed like something he had done in some other life.
In this life, the last time he touched another human was when he was laying his two crew-mates to rest. Before that? The rough hands.
The eyes he last looked into? Cold, heartbroken.
Grace did not know if he would ever feel warm skin, look into warm eyes or be held in a warm embrace ever again.
Going back to Earth was a possibility. The Eridians were working on the Hail Mary to get her into space-faring shape and breeding astrophage to fill her fuel tanks. But anything could happen on the way. Grace had already been so close to death in space, and he wasn’t getting any younger. If some space catastrophe did not kill him, then maybe a heart attack or a stroke would?
He knew that it was unlikely, he wasn’t that old yet... right?
Actually, his age was a headache inducing thought-problem reserved only for sleepless nights and existential dread showers.
The induced coma and time dilation of near-light speed travel made Ryland’s age into a multiple choice question. Biological, chronological or mental? The secret, correct, fourth choice was: Don’t think too much about it.
Still, life continued. Even with the still, quiet and aching space inside him, he lived.
He had everything he needed to function. The Eridians took such good care of him. They made an exorbitantly expensive and material consuming living space just for him to be happy and healthy.
Truth was, he sometimes felt like an intelligent pet, living in his terrarium with his enrichment and food and caretakers.
He wasn’t mad about it, not really. But humans were social animals. Despite all of the accommodations, certain needs were not met. But still, life had to continue.
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It was one of those slow mornings, where Erid’s gravity felt especially strong and getting out of bed seemed like a hassle and a half.
Grace had rolled out of bed still half asleep and eyes not completely open. He had brushed his teeth, made breakfast like always and had started to prepare his materials for today’s class. He was putting his laptop in a bag and sipping the last of his coffee when there was a frantic voice coming from the communicator he had on his living room table.
[Grace. Grace. A ship in the system. Not Eridian. Found human inside. Space team bringing ship now. Need Grace at the biodome entrance. Statement.] Rocky’s voice crackled through the communicator.
Grace felt a splash of mostly cold coffee at his feet when the mug dropped out of his hand and onto the floor.
He did not pay much mind to it as he took off running, leaving the broken mug and the mess of coffee behind. For the first time in a long time. There was something new. Something exciting.
Something that made Ryland’s heart beat in both hope and fear.
There was another human here.