Chapter Text
Darkness. Simon felt like he was being watched. He couldn’t even tell where he was. The SM-13? The new ship? Eden? A cell in prison? He was being watched, stalked and followed. Two eyes, ten eyes, a thousand eyes, staring. They judged him, somehow without words being able to drill into his head what they wanted him to hear. Never free, Butcher, undeserving, worthless, nothing, Butcher, never free, never free, never free. Something someone bangs on the walls that are rusted and clean and bloody and sterile all at the same time. Something someone calls his name, not his name, they call for the Butcher. They call him home, they call him out, they call him to give up his life and die. Walls close in, slowly, then quicker. Threatening to squeeze the life out of him as a familiar deep red liquid pours in from above, baptizing the son of Eden as he drowns in his own misery. Simon tries to gasp, taking in shallow breathes of metallic tasting air while trying to avoid the spilling blood entering through his mouth. The walls close in, and in, and in.
Never free, Never free, Never free, Never—
Simon’s eyes break open and he gasps at the sudden inhale of fresh clean air. There is a large bright light above him that immediately causes him to squint his eyes to avoid the feeling of burning pain, deja vu. He’s back on the bed again, the same one he woke up on before. He’s surprised that the COI was still deciding to keep him here after his freak out about their rock robot thing. Maybe he’s alone again, he could always try hiding again. Knowing about all the little compartments in the sides of the dormitory, Simon could probably—
“EYE MOVEMENT DETECTED.” blares a loud unfamiliar robotic voice from above, making Simon flinch as it cuts off his train of thought.
“What the fuck…” Simon mutters weakly, turning his head to the side with a groan.
“Thank you, Mary.” Says the familiar voice of Ryland from what sounds like the left side of the room, his voice getting closer as he speaks.
“YOU’RE WELCOME, DR GRACE.” responds ‘Mary’ apparently.
Ryland comes up to the foot of Simon’s cot and realizing that the bright light is irritating him, he pushes it off to the side. Then he looks back down at Simon, a guilty expression crossing over his face. Simon looks back at him waiting for something, anything that he hopes for. That Ryland will whisper in his ear, telling Simon that he was right in his assumption and that they must run away together to be free– or something like that. Or at least for Ryland to give him an explanation, what the hell is really going on, why he’s here and what this place really is under the sleek white metal walls.
Ryland sighs. “Are you feeling better?” He asks with a quiet shaky tone.
Simon mumbles, “Better… how?”
Ryland glances off for a moment, trying to find the right words. “I dunno, well rested? Less… irritated? Calm?”
Simon looks back up towards the ceiling and narrows his eyes. He didn’t feel any of those things, even though he just was asleep, he still felt exhausted. Like the dream that he had was something that he really was going through. He definitely wasn’t calm either, he woke up with his heart beating out of his chest at the thought he was really about to die. But he knows what he did before was foolish, an uncontained outburst that he couldn’t stop and was already coming out before he even knew what he was saying. Because the situation was absurd. Suddenly stars and planets existed again and were as casual as talking about what one would have for a meal. He’s lucky that the first time they didn’t just give up and kill him. The COI was willing to give him another chance in their stupid roleplay psychological torture chamber. Great. Next time, they may not be so merciful.
“I feel fine.” Simon lies as he slowly sits up, his arm wobbling slightly.
Ryland seems to fiddle with his hands while looking down at his feet. “Look, I’m sorry about what happened. I was such a moron for not prefacing better. I should have known that Rocky would freak you out and should have been more clear–”
Simon pursed his lips as Ryland spoke. He was sorry, but not about playing into this fantasy scenario, about the rock robot thing. It wasn’t some grand expression like he had hoped, it was more like recovery. Telling Simon it was all his fault for the way he acted to make Simon react the way he did. He bites his tongue. He can’t lash out again. “It’s fine.” He says almost verbatim to his previous answer.
“Are you sure?” Ryland asks, putting his hand up as if to reach for Simon before putting it back down. “You don’t have to lie to make me feel better about what happened.”
Simon stares at the researcher with an unreadable expression. He knew that must be some sort of trick, someone who must have been watching from afar waiting for him to have another outburst. Testing him to see if he was willing to be subservient this time. “I’m not. It’s fine. I just get freaked out easily after… everything.”
Ryland nods before his eyes seem to light up in realization. “Right, that’s what I was trying to get to before everything. I was trying to see if you could tell me what happened and how you got here.” He pauses. “If you remember, of course.”
Simon blinks at him. He really doesn’t understand why Ryland keeps putting emphasis on him being able to remember things. Of course he remembers, it just happened. Ryland to him seems to be the one with memory loss if anything, from him not knowing about the blood moon and all. What would cause Ryland to lose his memory? Simon didn’t really know. He keeps just looping back to the original idea of Ryland being told to pretend he doesn't know anything for whatever reason. “I want to know about how you got here first.” Simon says as he sits up, swinging his legs over the side of the cot. “How you picked me up.”
Ryland rests his curled pointer finger over his mouth in thought before turning his head. “I… yeah, I guess I forgot to do that too. Geez, Simon, I think having nothing to eat but coma slurry and taumeba is really getting to me.”
Ryland walks over and grabs a rolling stool from the side of the room before bringing it over near the foot of Simon’s cot and sitting on it so they are about even in eyelevel to one another. He gently folds his hands atop his lap. “So, where should I start from? When I woke up?”
Simon’s brows knit together slightly. “...Sure.”
Ryland takes a deep breath and lets it out as he glances off, a way to try and recall the details of his strange life story. “Okay… well it started when I woke up in space alone.”
Simon listens to Ryland as he tells a story that sounds more like a folktale or wishful thinking on the past. What he understands is this: Ryland woke up alone on the Hail Mary with all of his apparently only two crewmates dead and without his memory. Slowly as he started to explore, he started gaining them back and eventually remembered what he was doing on the mission. The point of it was to save the sun, which was dying because of something called ‘astrophage’. (Simon wished that he explained it more or anything that happened before he went into space, but it was skipped over with a simple ‘you know this part’ despite that fact he didn’t.) After more trying to get himself in order, Ryland stumbled upon Rocky’s ship, or maybe the other way around. It was unclear. After brief communication via throwing vague messages back and forth, they attached their two ships with a tunnel and met formally through a big ‘xenonite’ wall, which was what the weird clear stuff all around the ship was. After some learning to communicate, they decide to try and fix the sun dying problem together because the rock had a sun that was dying too. Long story short, as Ryland put it, they went to a planet to collect astrophage eating cells, both of them almost died, but they ended up being fine. They breed the taumeba (that same thing that Simon literally ate, ick.) to be useful in their own situations and then went their separate ways. Briefly, at least before Ryland went back for the rock because a leak in the systems they were using would apparently leave it without fuel. So, Ryland goes back, saves the rock, and now doesn’t have enough fuel for himself to go back to his planet. So both Ryland and the rock are going to its planet instead.
And that all was years ago, they had been travelling back for a long time. Ryland then randomly found the SM-13 floating in space and found Simon inside. “Now we’re here.” Ryland says, tapping his fingers together.
Simon stares at Ryland, thinking of words to say but none come up. He wants to ask things like: Why are you saying you’re from Earth when it doesn’t exist?, Why are you talking about how you saved stars when they’re already gone? or How did you find the SM-13 in space? But instead he says nothing. He wants to hear… more about this all. Finally he has an idea, Ryland thinks Simon’s memory may be faulty, so he can try and see how Ryland thinks he knew him. “So, would you mind reminding me of maybe the stuff that happened when you were on… Earth? I’m trying to remember and it’s not coming to me.”
Ryland perks up again. “I mean, sure. I don’t know how much you know and obviously I don’t know everything about you… but I can tell you everything I know about you. Thus far, at least.”
Simon leans forward curiously. “Tell me what you can.”
“Well, you and I were coworkers. We both worked on the Petrova Task Force in our different ways. You were one of the head engineers building the ship and you and I worked together quite a bit because you told you about how all the astrophage worked and you did stuff like building the engines. You know?” Ryland says with a smile. “And from what I remember, we were pretty close friends. You were the one comforting me when I was told that I was told to make the decision about going into space. I have no idea if you know it, but you were the only person who said that they would rather me stay on Earth.”
Simon so badly wants to think that what the researcher is saying is fake, but the look on Ryland’s face is just so genuine. The smile that took over his more neutral expression reminding him of the first time they met. Hell, even what ‘he’ apparently said to Ryland almost sounds like what Ryland said to him if not just slightly different to fit the situation. Whether one may be real or fake. Could either of them be fake? Ryland had so many details regarding not only his own life, but apparently Simon’s too. If this was all just a set up, Ryland could have just said he was on some non-specific mission alone and had a rock robot when he stumbled across the blood moon and found Simon. But no, it was three person mission, dead crew, dying star, alien with the same mission. Simon’s mouth goes dry but he nods. He can’t go out and say something so crazy until he’s sure of what is happening. And he’s not sure. Simon isn’t sure if he’s sure of anything anymore. “I… don’t really remember any of that stuff. Maybe more will come back to me.”
Ryland nods back. “It took me a while to remember everything after I woke up from my coma. You may not be in the same situation, but we can give it some time. Then you can tell me what happened in the SM-13. When you’re ready, though. You should recover first.”
Simon glances off, he thought his sense of reality was slipping in the sub, but this… this may be worse. “Right.”