Chapter Text
For days, he holds vigil in the entrance of the med bay.
Grace doesn’t quite have memories of anything similar, but he’s picked up on it in a handful of the various movies they’d been binging through. Sometimes in the dramas, there’d be a solemn scene where someone would perch tirelessly in a stiff backed chair, hands clasped, watching over some cancer ridden loved one. Most times it ended well. A miraculous recovery for a feel good story. Sometimes it didn’t, and that was part of the lesson.
Rocky hates those ones. As much as he wouldn’t outright admit it, Rocky gets emotional about that stuff. It makes sense. Rocky’s a total sap at mere mentions of Adrian, there’s a yearning there, but Grace can’t really blame him for that either.
Sappiness aside, both of them take their watch very, very, very seriously.
Armando does good work. Within hours the stranger’s fully diagnosed, mostly cleaned up, and strapped to the exam table for safety’s sake. It’s better than letting the guy drift around in zero gravity with the laundry list of wrong he’s inflicted with.
Long story short, it’s a guy. Man. Only a measly couple inches shorter than Grace and built like somebody who’d make a good linebacker with a healthy dose of steroids. Not as if he isn’t halfway there, he’s beefy, genuine certified beefcake (scratch that thought). But there’s a distinct sallowness to the stranger that makes his mass seem somehow improbable.
Then again, Grace woke up ripped. More ripped than he had been before. Which is saying a lot.
The feverish, still freaked out part of his mind wonders if getting shot into the bowels of space just comes with a free muscle inducement, but the more rational side of him screams ‘corellation does not equal causation!’ and drops that train of thought altogether.
So Grace hovers, too hesitant to actually enter, and soaks the stranger in.
From here, a good fifteen feet away, Grace can only see his left side. And it’s… bad.
Obviously, the left arm hadn’t been salvageable. In fact it’s probably still inside the SM-13. Neither of them had much interest in approaching the ship-submarine-worst-ever-spacecraft in favor of keeping watch. Instead, the Stranger has a nicely stitched up stump and a scar that traces all the way up the exterior of his shoulder. More scarring mottles the side of his neck, a constellation of wounds that could’ve been older, all manifesting in a raking of flesh so severe it pulls his lip slightly back and bares his left canine and first molar in a permanent grimace. He’ll be lucky if he isn’t blind in that eye. If there’s anything left of that eye, because there’s a scar tracing straight through his brow.
That’s the extent Grace can visually see, aside from his thick dark scruff and the halo of wavy black hair floating around his face.
Per Armando, there’s more going on there. Broken ribs on one side to start. The motherlode of all concussions, dehydration, and a surprise not-so-fun-sized dose of radiation poisoning. Not to mention the inevitable oxygen deprivation.
Sure, the Stranger’s lived… this long. But if he not only continues to survive Armando’s induced coma, intubation, and whatever drugs are deemed necessary to repair his bodily functions; it’ll be extraordinary if he wakes up with a fully functioning brain.
Oxygen deprivation is a piece of work.
Since being floated into the med bay a little over a week ago, the Stranger hasn’t stirred. He’s gone back to that mask of stony slack nothingness he’d been when he was bathed in blood.
And yeah. It’s blood.
Human blood. Specifically. Which is just terrific news. Armando practically had to scrub him raw, pulling apart tatters of clothing here and there with such little effort it’d practically disintegrated. No doubt there’s still more of the stuff clinging to unmentionable sides of him. It makes Grace shudder just to consider it.
Rocky’s the only one of them bold enough to actually go into the medical bay. All he has to report is that Armando recovered something from the Stranger’s remaining hand, and that his right side appears to be mostly intact. ‘Accurately human shaped’ was the explanation.
They have shifts.
But Grace can’t bring himself to step over the threshold.
It feels, jarringly enough, as if he’d be wrongfully entering some kind of holy space. As if his entering would suddenly make reality click into place and the Stranger would evaporate as nothing more than a collective hallucination between friends.
At the same time, he can’t bring himself to leave either. A combination of that is one; not wanting to backtrack towards the SM-13 or the airlock unless absolutely necessary and two; the aforementioned fear that the Stranger will up and vanish.
Rocky thoughtfully nudges the gurney out for him to build himself an improvised bed, which he does.
They promptly surround said improvised bed with every spare whiteboard they can find.
For the proverbial crime scene they’ve stumbled across, there’re a million things that don’t make sense.
Such as: how the hell did the Stranger get here.
A cursory attempt at diagnosis via the Hail Mary’s system proves that, as expected, there’s no way a literal rustbucket submarine the size of a reefer van could be capable of lightspeed travel. It just isn’t. It’d quite literally evaporate. Even if the little entourage of astrophage hitched to the back was proof the SM-13 had some source of radioactivity in it –alongside Armando’s diagnosis– it’s not for the purpose of propulsion. Because it has a pair of propellers in the drums strapped to its bottom. As much as he knows the answer to be improbable in the circumstances, Grace fumbles on his glasses and scrawls out the calculation.
Probability of this being sent from Earth as is? Impossible. Without lightspeed travel, it would’ve taken over 18,563 years to reach them. Which means that either the cavemen and mammoths banded together to slingshot this out to them, or more likely; it’d been attached to some other vessel.
As for any sign of that?
Zip. None. Notta.
Then there’s the calculated volume of blood or iron-something that’d been caking the walls and the hull beneath the floor, which’s in the ballpark of a horrifying 4,000ish gallons, minimum.
He hopes that isn’t human, even if Armando had methodically asserted the blood (yep, still horrifying) scrubbed off the Stranger was, in fact, human in origin, and very little of it in comparison belonged to the Stranger.
Acquiring any real answers means going back out into the SM-13 though.
Grace isn’t about to do that. Considering Rocky’s clear contentment in tailing him the short distance to the bathroom, to get food and back, Rocky isn’t keen on it either.
Eight days in, surrounded by unhelpful calculations, Grace finds himself hovering cross legged over his bed, quilt and jumpsuit top tangled around his waist, well aware he’s starting to get hungry again. Rocky interrupts his aimless thoughts.
”Grace thinks human will survive, question?”
Stomach twisting up in knots just thinking about it, he sighs. Then he runs a hapless hand through his hair and ends up almost knocking his glasses off his head.
“...I dunno. I hope so. I really, really hope so.” He posits heavily. “But even if he lives he might not… y’know. Be all there.”
”Is right there.” Rocky asserts, before rotating in his sphere. ”Unless there is the missing piece inside–”
“No! No,” he flounders. It’s easier right now to occupy his attention with Rocky’s aimless drifting, scuttling around, bumping against the floor and the ceiling and the wall like a DvD screensaver. “No I mean that oxygen deprivation usually damages human brains pretty bad. So his brian not be fully functioning.”
Disappointment fetters out. ”Oh.”
For a moment, Rocky simply drifts. And then he continues.
”But will survive limb gone, question.” There comes that concern again, blatant as can be. His humming is a slow thing, meandering, weighed with a similar tone to their earlier, heavier conversations about Grace’s current inability to return to earth.
Propping his chin in his hand, he peers over at the Stranger again. As expected, he hasn’t moved. Thankfully the layers upon layers of bandages, recently changed, obscure the grizzly nature of the wound.
“He has so far.” Is the measured response offered. But after some consideration, Grace elaborates. “Humans can survive alright without a limb. Sometimes they can get ‘prosthetics’, which are manufactured metal and rubber copies of limbs so they can blend in better. Or if they can afford it there’re some mechanical ones that do basic grabbing functions. But uh– yeah, with the right care humans can survive a lot.”
”Is hard for Eridians to not have leg.” Rocky supplies. ”Hard to move fast. If gone while ‘sleeping’, will not fix fast. Could die.”
“...did that… happen to somebody you knew?”
”When small.”
“I’m sorry. That must’ve been hard.”
”It is long time ago now. Part of learning, but- still want to fix.”
Leave it to Rocky to be an optimist despite the hard stuff. Cracking into a faint knowing smile, Grace reaches out to lightly bat at the biosphere. He earns a thump back from one of Rocky’s forelimbs at the spot, an attempt at playful, but Rocky’s thorax tilts like he’s preoccupied.
“Hey, you’re not a half bad fixer.”
”Full good, question?” He chimes hopefully.
“Full good.”
Gazing back over towards the Stranger, Grace sighs again. Then he absently reaches for the one recoverable thing they’d found so far.
Having opted to keep it close, he fishes it out of his pocket. A pendant. Slung on a leather cord is a glass pendant with what appears to be some kind of seedling preserved within. It’s dainty, still green, teeny-tiny roots stretching to the metal frame. It’s been cracked, the inner ridges unable to be fully cleaned of… the blood.
”Still not know Stranger human’s name,” clicking faintly, Rocky knocks himself down from the ceiling to drift towards Grace.
He grimaces.
“I know we probably have to at some point, but I’m not a big fan of going back into that thing. It creeps me out.”
”Not know is all human matter.”
“M’pretty sure it is. I’m honestly glad you can’t see color or smell this time. It… I know you aren’t sure, but I know it was all blood and guts in there. Maybe not all human. Hopefully not all human, but it was all over everything. I know what that stuff looks like. What it smells like it’s like– look, it’s just what I saw. I know what I saw.”
”Rocky not need evidence. Happy… cannot see smell human matter. Would be bad, bad, bad.”
Slightly chagrined for a second, he releases another breath and eyes the pendant as Rocky continues.
”But SM-13 has computer, yes question?”
“It looked like it. If it’s not corrupted.”
”Could have information. Or message. Or Stranger human’s name.”
That’s true. As much as he really hates to admit it, Rocky’s right. On top of that, the computer in there could have information on travel history, past coordinates, whatever vessel or propulsion system it’d been attached to. Its purpose. All over again, the image of the SM-13 interior comes flooding back. Deep, dark, like the interior of a fleshy cave he’d accidentally crawled into. Fleetingly, he wonders if that’s what the explorers who first piloted cameras into the Titanic felt like.
Like they’d stumbled across something awful, like their mere presence even remote was a bad open. Like it was haunted. Like they didn’t belong there.
”...or could name Stranger human.”
“We can’t do that. He’s got his own name, we can’t just change it all the sudden because we feel like it.”
”Not feeling. Easier.”
Shooting a dissatisfied frown Rocky’s way earns a sharp chirp. There’s a lilt to his warble, the snarky kind. An attempt to lighten the mood a little bit.
Then his stomach growls.
Rocky groans. ”Grace is loud, too tired. Ugh, eating time.”
Despite the pang clambering through his stomach, Grace finds himself reluctant to move from his spot. He’s… eaten. Made hurried trips to and from the tiny ‘kitchen’ and the bathroom and back all with the comfort that Rocky would continue to monitor the situation. That the ship would alert them immediately if things changed. He must be taking too long to think, because Rocky’s sphere bumps into him stubbornly.
“Okay, okay! I’m going!”
Flipping the pendant into his palm once more, Grace slides it into his pocket and kicks off his improvised bed, dragging his quilt along with him. One more worried glance back earns yet another nudge and the Eridian equivalent of a huff from Rocky, so he keeps moving.
The ship’ll do it’s job. Armando’ll do it’s job, he just has to trust that.
Quilt trailing behind him like a cape, he makes his way through the main hall to the foodstore. Having taken it upon himself to follow, Rocky drifts along with occasional bumps against the wall. He continues his line of questioning absently.
”If Stranger human survive, Grace Rocky will make…” a warble. “Question?”
“A prosthetic?”
“Yes.”
“It’d probably be a good idea, but it might take a lot to figure out how to make it mechanical. Operational? But we could figure it out, for sure.”
”Hm. Stranger human balance wrong.”
“That’s true,” he agrees lightly, hauling himself along the data corridor. “I know you think us humans can be weak sometimes, but we’re pretty adaptable! We’re like… bendy. And we can take care of each other like you guys do. The whole arm thing? I think that’s the least of his problems. Plenty of humans’ve lost limbs and end up just fine.”
”And Stranger human will not leak because human exterior fixes while sleeping.”
“Exactly.”
Unmistakably, there’s a low hum of… envy? Is that envy? Considering Rocky’s period of healing after the whole centrifugal spinout accident, it’s a touch surprising, but from what Grace understands about Eridian biology? That’s hard work. Exhausting, extremely complicated work actually, and it’d only taken Grace himself a few days to fully scab over the gash on his arm.
By now they’ve drifted into Grace’s sad little kitchen area, and he hauls out a packet of top ramen and starts prepping some water to be boiled. It floats listlessly in a glob around them, and Rocky allows himself to linger slightly into the corner to observe. As soon as the whole eating process starts, he’ll probably flit away and occupy himself with something else, but food prep and food consumption are two very different things. But for now, Grace wraps his quilt around his waist and moves along.
”Rocky still think about why Stranger human here. Think… there is other ship, statement. Only way for SM-13 to be here.” Continuing, Rocky lightly knocks one of his forelimbs against the side of his ball. He’s never been one for silence. ”But there is still more questions. About inside. Human matter. And why limb detached.”
Grace shudders. They’ll have to do some research eventually. They’ll have to, which means they’ll have to go back into that awful haunted place and scrape enough gunk off the walls to find… what, a control box? A fuse box? Chip storage? If there’s any information about another ship it’d be in that, but again, it just– Grace doesn’t wanna go in. Doesn’t wanna think about that.
”Was disconnected from force, maybe? Injury?” Rocky continues to weigh, very much the Sherlock in this situation. That tracks. Without particularly thinking, he finds himself offering something.
“There wasn’t– well, it could’ve been force. And it wasn’t clean, so maybe. Or something happened where he needed to get himself loose.”
”Loose from what, question?”
“...I dunno. This’s weird. Like a locked door mystery.”
”Locked door mystery– like human culture artifact ‘Clue’, question?”
Snorting, Grace leans back into the room to drift. It’s an effort to stir the hot water in without it escaping the cup, but he’s gotten good at it.
“Clue’s a good example. But it was also welded shut from the outside, which is even weirder. That shouldn’t’ve happened, and if it was an emergency that still would’ve taken time. It could’ve been force, or– it reminds me of Soul Surfer or something. Or that Ralston guy? The rock climber?”
”Rocky not know ‘Ralston’ guy.”
Occupied with the whirlpool of noodles and ramen flavoring, he shakes his head.
“Long story short, there was this rock climber who fell and his arm got trapped under a boulder. He was stuck for five days trying to wait for help, but eventually he had to uh… cut his own arm off. Otherwise he would’ve died.”
Visibly and audibly, Rocky shudders. ”Oh!”
Still wildly stirring his ramen noodles, he doesn’t look up. Obviously Rocky doesn’t like it. It’s clear by the weird flux in tone of the translator, and honestly Grace doesn’t blame him. But he nudges himself closer off the wall in unspoken interest.
So Grace continues.
“Sometimes when humans are in dangerous situations, we get an influx of hormones. Adrenaline! And it forces our brains to decide what to do to survive, and it also enhances most of our other survival-based bodily functions. Psychologists call it ‘fight, flight, freeze’, and there’s a fourth one, but that’s irrelevant. Anyway, it just. We have to be a little bendy to adapt and keep living.”
”When Grace went fishing, stayed out on ship. Did not drop the taumeobas, even when Rocky say to give up. Is adrenaline, question?”
Nodding slowly, his shoulders slump. “I’d say so, yeah. But so’s when you punched out your ball and dragged me to the med bay. You didn’t have to.”
”But could not see Grace die.”
There he is. Sappy guy. It’ll be impossible to get over the sheer sincerity in the gentle resonance of Rocky’s ‘voice’. Peering up, Grace swallows down the instinctive lump in his throat that forms at the thought.
“I know.” He manages to sigh. “Thanks. But I couldn’t let you go back home empty-handed.”
”...Grace make Rocky stupid. Stupid human surviving.”
A watery little laugh escapes him, brow jumping. “Hey! It worked out, didn’t it?”
*”Yes, barely. Statement.” Rocky asserts, before continuing back on the previous line of questioning. ”Every time Grace talk about humans surviving, is always very hard. Always have to do something very, very bad but if wrong, is bad wrong.”
“That’s what other humans are for,” he posits. His ramen’s coming apart in shreds. “There’re fossil records of our ancestors surviving life-threatening injuries but living to old ages, because others made sure they survived.”
Rocky drifts down again, biome slowly spinning as he hovers closer to where he’s learned Grace’s line of view is. It’s remarkably pointed, and he settles his forelimbs squarely. Grace stops stirring.
Rocky’s quiet for a second. Which is really saying a lot, because Rocky isn’t very often quiet, Eridians as far as he knows just aren’t quiet because quiet drives them completely nuts. Their brains are too big for it. But that in itself speaks enough. Grace knows how he feels about other humans- and the entire truth of that circumstance isn’t exactly out, no, but Rocky’s smart. He hadn’t come to terms with dying out here when Rocky offered him an out. Of course he hadn’t. Who'd be so cruel to strap someone into a ship and send them off with no way of getting back?
Grace’s humans, to a degree. A degree enough that most described forms of human collectivism seem to settle in Rocky’s interpretation of mankind unevenly. Almost too optimistically.
Almost.
”Grace Rocky take care of Stranger human. Will survive.”
Man. Suddenly his stupid ramen is the least important thing in the world again.
Of course they have their mission. Grace’s completed his half in a way, sent the Beetles off back home to Earth, and now he’s just running the extra curriculars of going to Erid and figuring out how to survive there. It’d been something he wasn’t hugely pressed on.
But now there’s an entire other human being in their ship and it doesn’t feel real. There’s an entire other human being in here who’s alive and not doing so great, and it’s thrown a wrench into Grace’s adapted perception of normalcy.
He’ll survive, probably. But will he live?
That’s a big question. Grace isn’t sure the answer he wants is gonna be the answer he gets. In fact, he highly doubts it.
This is his self appointed mission now. Among securing the taumeobas tenfold, it’s taking care of this Stranger no matter what.
And getting answers.
That’s the hard part.
‘ᴇʏᴇ ᴍᴏᴠᴇᴍᴇɴᴛ ᴅᴇᴛᴇᴄᴛᴇᴅ.’
Grace’s entire body leaps into his throat. Eyes shooting wide, he freezes, entirely believing he’d just hallucinated the notification. But when he glances over? Rocky’s frozen too, legs spread a little wider, before he sharply tilts Grace’s way. Eye movement means brain activity. Hopefully. Most likely. Brain activity means brain function at least which also means it’s working properly.
Which means Mister Stranger could be waking up.
The only other human he’s seen in almost twelve years could be waking up.
Oh god, he’s waking up.
Abandoning his ramen cup to the zero gravity of the kitchen, Grace lurches for the nearest handhold and flings himself towards the main hall. He can quite literally feel his heart in his throat, beating and pulsing and definitely not helping the panicked nausea sloshing around his entire insides. No way. Not at all. Behind him he can hear rocky scrambling to thump around and keep pace, just as eager as him to get to the med bay.
”Eye movement is good! Question!?”
“Very good! Very very good!”
“Amaze amaze amaze!”
‘ᴄᴏɢɴɪᴛɪᴏɴ ᴀꜱꜱᴇᴍᴇɴᴛ: ᴡʜᴀᴛ ɪꜱ: ᴛᴡᴏ ᴘʟᴜꜱ ᴛᴡᴏ?’
From the medical bay, the computer system continues to chatter away just like it had when Grace first came to. Echoing down the hallway is a telltale gag.
‘ɪɴᴄᴏʀʀᴇᴄᴛ.’
Yep. He’s up.
Rounding on the corner to the med-bay hall, a sound rips from the space that would’ve sent Grace skidding to a halt. Instead his hands fly up to whatever rungs he can grasp onto, grunting when Rocky all but collides with him.
It’s not just a sound. It’s a roar. Guttural and sharp and deep from the chest, sputtering, and it takes a millisecond for Grace’s heart to drop from his throat straight past his butt and out his toes.
“Aaaaaauuuuuughhhh!”
There’s a crash. Armando’s motor goes wailing away. It’s all just noise, disgruntled and confused and entirely basal, not even really an attempt at words. Another near deafening crash sounds from inside the room. Rocky’s biosphere is hot against his back as they hover, terrible silence clinging in the air.
Silence aside from the havoc being wrought in the med bay.
The dread’s back. Ten times worse, sending a cold sweat along his entire spine as he instinctively pulls himself back. It’s instinct now. Instinct soaring through his veins telling him danger.
Danger.
”Danger, danger, danger!” Rocky manages.
“Oh fudge. Okay, oh no–!”
”Yaaaagh! Ah!”
There’s the adrenaline again. Turning sharply with his grasp onto the wall and push them back. Then without thinking, he turns and gives Rocky’s ball a shove. A panicked sound rattles out of him, but Grace doesn’t stop. He just goes.
One glance back is more than enough to prove to him that running’s the right choice.
One of his whiteboards is flung into the bend in the hallway. And then a couple pens.
And there comes the Stranger.
With one hard kick against the ceiling, he propels the both of them towards the cockpit. Rocky squeals.
The Stranger’s an absolute tornado behind them, wobbling haplessly through the zero gravity without a single ounce of grace or practice. He has no idea what he’s doing. But that doesn’t make him any less terrifying. He’s a whirlwind spiraling through the space, colliding hard into the bend in the hall with a pained yelp, wild eyed.
By the time he looks up? Grace and Rocky are more than halfway to the cockpit. Another roar rips out of him, and Grace yelps.
“Ooooh no!–”
”What Stranger human doing!?” Rocky manages.
“No idea! Don’t wanna know!”
He’s charging them. This guy is straight up charging them with his nonsensical yelling, scrambling wildly after them as best he can. It’s not fast, but it’s desperate enough that stopping is out of the question.
Seconds later, they’re in the cockpit, and the door is promptly sealed.
Rocky rounds on him.
”Was that no brain function question!?”
“I dunno! I dunno, holy– Christmas Eve, I wasn’t like that when I woke up! I don’t think I was like that when I woke up!?”
”Stranger human is danger!”
“Obviously!”
They’re promptly answered by a loud bang! against the cockpit door. A squeal scatters out of Rocky, a yelp from himself, and the banging doesn’t stop.
Bam bam bam!
Okay. Maybe it wasn’t the best idea to peel an unknown person out of a blood cocoon inside a rusty submarine floating through space at a completely improbable location. Maybe that wasn’t ideal. Maybe some things were better left alone.
Bam bam bam! Bam!
Is he crazy? Disoriented? Is there something Grace should know about people having different reactions when coming out of induced comas? What if he’s rabid!? Or something else?
Bam bam bam!
Even through the door, Grace can hear him breathing. It sends him backing up further, shamelessly into Rocky’s biosphere as both of them skirt past the chairs and practically into the recess of one of the viewports. There’s a grunting, heaving breaths now that the banging seems to have faltered. For the moment at least.
Still, Grace holds his breath.
If he doesn’t make noise, the Stranger won’t know they’re there. Even if he obviously saw them come in here.
Rocky scuttles in his ball, slipping out from behind Grace with a low chatter. Very slowly, as quietly as he can muster, he pipes up.
”Is still outside.”
“Yeah I figured,” he hisses out.
Crap. Now they’re locked in the cockpit with a crazy guy in the ship. This is– this is bad. Like really awful. Out of the toaster and into the frying pan bad, because there’s no telling how things are gonna play out with ripping around the ship on a rampage being the guy’s first reaction. While wounded no less!
Great.
“I think,” Grace pants, fumbling for his glasses. “I think we should just stay in here for a little bit.”
”And let Stranger human destroy the ship.” Rocky blanches. ”Very bad. Bad bad bad, are all humans angry when waking up from a coma?”
“I don’t think so!”
”Adrenaline.”
“I guess, uh,” he mumbles out. “I guess he’s a fighter.”
”And we are ‘flee’ers. Not good. Will need to leave the cockpit someday, statement. How long until adrenaline hormone is gone?”
Tilting his head to and fro, Grace debates it. “An hour?”
”Still long enough to destroy ship.”
“We’ll figure it out, we uh– okay. Okay, yeah, we don’t want him to destroy the ship. So…” Turning hurriedly, Grace manages to rip his eyes from the door and shake himself from his shocked stupor.
He can work with an hour, give or take. Rocky’s got more of his biosphere in here, and they have the controls. They’re in charge. They call the shots.
“Mary?”
‘ʜᴇʟʟᴏ, ᴄᴀᴘᴛᴀɪɴ ɢʀᴀᴄᴇ.’
“I need you to lock the lab and lab storage compartments.”
‘ʟᴏᴄᴋɪɴɢ ʟᴀʙ ᴄᴏᴍᴘᴀʀᴛᴍᴇɴᴛ. ʟᴏᴄᴋɪɴɢ ᴇqᴜɪᴘᴛᴍᴇɴᴛ ᴄᴀᴘꜱᴜʟᴇ.’
Letting out a puff of relief, Grace slowly backs himself into the pilot’s chair. Out the corner of his eye, he can see Rocky attaching to his cockpit environment, weaseling through the forming gap in his ball to get in. There’s no more yelling or grunting or banging from outside, but he bites back the urge to ask if Rocky can hear him and instead considers if the Hail Mary’s automated responses could be heard throughout the ship.
What else do they have around the ship?
Turning hurriedly in the chair, he scans the controls. Rocky shuffles to sit as far away from the door as possible, as close to him as he can manage, and chimes in.
“Mary, lock airlock doors. Do not unlock doors until cockpit says.”
“Smart. Smart, smart, smart.”
‘ʟᴏᴄᴋɪɴɢ ᴀɪʀʟᴏᴄᴋ ᴅᴏᴏʀꜱ. ɴᴏ ᴏᴜᴛᴇʀ ᴄᴏᴄᴋᴘɪᴛ ᴏᴠᴇʀʀɪᴅᴇ ᴘᴇʀᴍɪᴛᴛᴇᴅ.’
Okay. Okay, all the major stuff is locked up. They’re in charge.
They’re in charge and they have a possibly rabid stranger possibly rampaging through their ship.
He needs a camera.
Wildly searching around the tubular cockpit, he spots the astrophage viewport, the ejection overrides, the controls, all the monitors and stagnantly blinking lights that don’t tell him anything in particular. The maps–
“Camera. Camera, camera, camera…”
”Can humans have less adrenaline faster question?” Rocky asks, offering two short stamps. Clearly he’s still shaken up from all that, leaning far away from the door.
They’re safe in here. They’ll be fine. It’ll be fine.
All Grace has to do is not think about the guy with his wild halo of dark hair and panicked face and stump arm flying towards them with a vengeance. Like they were the ones who wielded him into a submarine and slung him into space.
Making an effort not to kick anything important, Grace hauls himself towards the ceiling. At least he still has his quilt. Worst comes to worst the two of them can cower under it like a pair of little kids staving off a bad dream.
“I don’t think he’ll be in the mood for any breathing exercises.” Grace posits. Without realizing it, he keeps his voice low. “I don’t– uh… uh, moving around?”
”Stranger human is moving.” Rocky agrees hopefully. ”Fast. Dumb. No control.”
“Got it, got it, maybe… he’s got no idea what’s going on maybe. Probably. Right? Yeah.”
Carefully, Rocky clambers to cling to the roof of his enclosure. ”Are there interior comms, question?”
Good question.
“Mary? Do we have internal comms?”
‘ᴀꜰꜰɪʀᴍᴀᴛɪᴠᴇ. ɪɴᴛᴇʀɴᴀʟ ᴄᴏᴍᴍᴜɴɪᴄᴀᴛɪᴏɴꜱ ᴀʀᴇ ᴀᴠᴀɪʟᴀʙʟᴇ ᴛʜʀᴏᴜɢʜᴏᴜᴛ ᴛʜᴇ ꜱʜɪᴘ.’
Of course. They’ll have to talk him down.
Sparing a glance Rocky’s way, he offers a feverish grin and a nod. This is workable. Manageable. Hopefully. They can talk him down. Worst comes to worst, if he manages to start moving his way around on his own, they can lock him in another room to survey the damage.
Whatever had happened in the med bay didn’t sound good. There’s bound to be damage.
This is all a million times more stressful than he thought it’d be. Why couldn’t the guy have just woken up, spat out his intubation tube and flopped lamely around like Grace did? Why couldn’t he have just got his head back on his shoulders so they could figure out names, so Grace could slowroll the fun fact that his best friend and only other crewmate is an alien? Why’d he have to do all that?
Oh crap, this guy won’t know about the whole alien sitch. That’ll be a lot to deal with too.
But that’s a future Grace problem.
Tightening the quilt tied around his waist for good luck, he pushes himself back into the pilot’s chair and slides it over to settle beside Rocky’s enclosure. With a friend around, he can trick himself into thinking he’s somewhere near confident in handling this.
“And where’s the new guy?”
‘ꜱᴜʙᴊᴇᴄᴛ ɪꜱ ᴄᴜʀʀᴇɴᴛʟʏ ʟᴏᴄᴀᴛᴇᴅ ɪɴ: ᴄᴏᴄᴋᴘɪᴛ ᴇxᴛᴇʀɪᴏʀ ᴄᴏʀʀɪᴅᴏʀ.’
“Patch us through.”