Chapter Text
A month went by and Simon and Grace settled into a fairly quiet and cozy routine. Grace would teach his class a few times a week (with occasional guest star appearances by class favorite: Simon the Other Human). Simon ended up getting on pretty well with Adrian, while they worked with Rocky to help build Simon a prosthetic arm. It was still pretty early in the prototype phase given how little Eridians understood about human biology, but not too shabby all things considered.
An extra room was built onto Grace’s home with the intention of being Simon’s bedroom. After one restless night of trying to sleep alone, being awoken with the night terrors that had previously subsided, Simon returned to his original sleeping arrangement. Rocky was quite pleased to hear that Grace had finally adjusted to the Eridian culture of co-sleeping so well.
The food options were still extremely limited, but now at least included some solid foods devoid of Grace’s genetic material! He was still banking on never having to tell Simon about the dark days of eating only meburgers. Despite the meager rations, Simon managed to stay fit as ever. Maybe even more so now that he had a consistent source of nutrients. And sweet sweet potable water.
Clothing was still at a premium as making edible food took precedence for Eridian scientists. Grace eventually conceded to giving up a few of his precious novelty science t-shirts to Simon who chopped the sleeves off to get a better fit. Grace kept quiet his inside thoughts that this was visually, a vast improvement. Plus, there was a silly irony to looking at a grizzled soldier wearing a tank top that said “Never Trust an Atom, They Make Up Everything”.
It was yet another beautifully foggy day in the Terrarium. Or Twilight Zone. Or Human Zoo. Whatever Grace felt like calling his little habitat that day. It was one of Grace’s days off (nobody worked on ∀Day here), and Rocky was over messing around with Simon’s new prosthetic arm. Grace laid out in the sand, scrolling through a tablet that thanks to Stratt giving a middle finger to all Copyright law, contained virtually every book ever written. He looked for something interesting to read on his lazy ∀Day off.
Simon sat down in the sand next to him. Grace was still getting used to looking at the patch of xenonite attached to Simon’s flesh where his prosthetic connected. His skin had already started to heal surprisingly well around it, and it covered a myriad of scarring left behind by the lost limb. It looked almost natural. Rocky was currently in possession of Simon’s arm and was hard at work on the little outside workstation he had set up outside of Grace and Simon’s house.
“Wall-E is growing nicely.” Simon said, looking over to the tiny greenhouse-for-one he and Grace had built for the sprout. Grace had insisted on naming the plant after the movie he always showed his students at the end of the school year. Simon didn’t seem to mind. They both teared up at the end of the film on Simon’s first watch.
“It is! I’m still trying to figure out what kind of plant it is, but it is not matching any record I have of Earth plant life. Wherever you came from, plants are built different.” Grace said with a smile, sitting up and setting his tablet aside.
“Where I came from there were no plants at all, so beats me. Growing up we were just told the seed pods would grow into trees, they never told us there were different kinds.”
“You know what that means right? On Earth if you discover something new you get to name it! This new species of whatever it is will be all yours to name.”
“Good that Simon pick name, Grace bad at name things!” Rocky chimed in from the distance. Darn his impeccable hearing.
“You name one amoeba after the planet it comes from and suddenly you're terrible at names.” Grace rolled his eyes and turned in Rocky’s direction, “At least I didn’t try to name an entire planet Medium Rough Texture Circle Planet!”
Simon laughed at the exchange. His good moods became more frequent as time went on. The guarded survival instincts ingrained in him would likely never go away completely, but Grace had certainly noticed a vast improvement.
“Anyway! What iconic piece of Earth media should I subject you to tonight?” Grace schemed, “I was thinking Jurassic Park? Man takes science too far. Only bad things happen. Dinosaurs.”
“What are dinosaurs?”
“Big scary things that are trying to eat… You know what scratch that one off the list. And scratch off Jaws while we’re at it, you would not like that one.” Grace mentally made a list of any movie including oceans or big scary things trying to eat people that were NSFS (Not Safe For Simon). He added Yellow Submarine to that list.
“What about the one you were talking about where-” Simon’s thought was cut short by an ear splittingly sharp screech. A sound that sounded like a heinous combination of an out of tune organ mixed with an overactive radiator, “AGH, what the fuck is that?!”
“Oh I’m surprised you haven't heard that yet! It’s a noise Eridians make when extremely frustrated or upset. The first time I heard Rocky blow up like that we figured it’s essentially the Eridian equivalent of cursing like a sailor while throwing a tantrum.” Grace said calmly, despite the obnoxious sound blaring from Rocky’s workbench.
“You never taught him human swear words? Actually don’t answer that, of course you didn’t. I don’t think I’ve heard a ‘fuck’ or even as much as a ‘damn’ from you in the whole two month’s I’ve been here” Simon spoke up to try to cut through the ongoing noise.
“In my defense, do you really want to have to listen to all this AND the translator spitting out expletives?”
“Yes. That would be hilarious.” Simon joked, but was obviously becoming increasingly more annoyed with the racket Rocky was making, “How long do these tantrums usually go on for?”
Grace looked over just in time to see a wrench sailing from Rocky’s workbench into the sand several feet away, “Oh, you know, depends on how frustrated he is. The first few times, I just put on headphones and tuned it out, but then I remembered one key thing about Rocky. He is easily distracted.”
“And how do we go about distracting him before my ears start bleeding?” Simon asked.
“Uuuh I usually just loudly change the subject to whatever I think would get his attention.”
Simon’s expression changed to something Grace was all too familiar with teaching middle school. The look his 12 year olds had when they were about to cause mischief.
“I know something that will get his attention.” Simon said, staring directly into Grace’s eyes.
“What did you have in mi-”
Before Grace could process what was going on the air got knocked out of his lungs and his back was slammed into the sand. There was a heavy weight on his chest. And face. Wait, face? Oh my GOD they were kissing.
Much to Grace's utter shock, his assessment was right and that certainly was Simon’s lips on his. Grace did not have much knowledge or experience in this department, and was an incalculable amount of years out of practice. But he was sure about one thing: this was freaking awesome dude.
The panic set in almost instantly that he had absolutely no clue what he was supposed to be doing with his hands. Before he had a chance to attempt to figure it out, the kiss was over as soon as it started.
With another thud in the sand, Simon landed flat next to Grace, Rocky standing over both of them.
“GRACE TELL ROCKY CANNIBALISM BAD! Why Simon try to eat Grace question??????” Rocky fumed with concern.
Grace paused for a moment to take in the sheer absurdity of the situation. He removed his crooked glasses and wiped them off with his shirt (they had gotten a smidge foggy in the heat of the moment). He took a deep breath.
Grace now had the unfortunate task of explaining the human act of kissing to an alien.
“Rocky. Calm down, it's not like that! It’s called a kiss and it’s what two humans do when they… really like each other.” Grace wanted the sand he currently laid in to swallow him whole.
Simon, on the other hand, was cracking up.
“Do I want to know why you taught him about cannibalism and not kissing?”
“Like I’ve told you, you do NOT want to know what I had to eat before you got here. And why would I need to explain this to him, Eridians don't even have mouths!”
Rocky’s panic quickly shifted to excitement, “Long last Grace finally stop being stupid and find mate! Happy, happy, happy!”
“UGH sure fine! If you’re so happy about it, how about you give me and my new mate some space? Alone.” Grace conceded.
“Yes, yes, Rocky go home tell Adrian right away!” Rocky said, speeding back towards the exit to his home.
Grace and Simon laid there next to each other in the sand. Not too unlike the position they found themselves in most nights to watch the stars. Simon turned his head to face Grace.
“When two humans really like each other huh?”
“You’re almost insufferable as Rocky, you know that?”
“But you still really like me?”
Grace turned to look him in the eyes, “You’re my favorite human on Erid.”
Simon smiled at the stupid joke. Yep. That’s why Grace liked him so much.
“I will say that was a pretty solid distraction plan. I mean it usually takes me forever to calm Rocky down from one of his moods. I’m just saying if we ever need a distraction again… that was… uh… a good plan. And we should-”
“Grace just shut the fuck up for once and kiss me”
And for the first time in his life, Dr. Ryland Grace, shut the fuck up.