Chapter Text
The voice from the beginning of the film answered. “My son, those stars are already dead! Mere ghost-light, growing dimmer by the day…”
There was a quick flash across the screen. A young boy was standing among a group of peers, all ranging in age but children nevertheless. They were standing around the base of a large, full bloom tree in some kind of glass dome and Outside was an unimaginable red planet just on the horizon.
“Is that…Mars?” Grace questioned breathlessly. It certainly had the characteristics of the fourth planet from the sun but there was something off about it. Maybe it was the shade of red or maybe it was the sheer size, either way, the planet was as beautiful as it was deadly.
A pang of homesickness drummed against Grace’s chest, it had been awhile since he’d thought about the rest of his own solar system, not counting Earth that is.
Another flash brightened the screens, before settling on the next scene. It lasted barely a handful of seconds but this time the boy was left standing alone. All his friends were now dead at his feet. His small face was splashed with blood as he stared at the now dead tree with eyes as dead as the children under him.
As soon as Grace’s mind caught up with what his eyes were witnessing, he immediately threw himself out of Adrian’s arms and ran towards an isolated corner of the room. Once Grace was sure he wasn’t in danger of damaging anything…he stopped holding himself back and vomited, gagging through the bile and horrible imaginary that was now seared into his brain tissue. Forever.
“Grace?!” Rocky stopped what they were doing as they worriedly called out. But it was Adrian’s own trills of distress that had them moving away from the wall to comfort their clearly upset mate. Pebbles were a touchy subject on Erid, they were vastly overprotective of their young and Grace was grateful everyday when Erid showed their trust in him by allowing him near their youth to teach them.
So Grace could only imagine how upset Adrian was at the sight of dead children, even human ones.
Or maybe he didn’t have to imagine, considering he’d literally vomited at the sight.
Once Grace was sure that he wasn’t in danger of upchucking all over his friends, he wiped his chin and face as best he could and staggered back to flop heavily on Rocky, who was so focused on comforting their mate they hadn’t noticed their soon to be fleshy blanket.
“Oof-oomph!” Grace grunted as the pointy bits of the xenonite suit dug into his diaphragm. “We need to figure out a way to make you more cushion-y.” He grumbled as he wrapped his arms around Rocky who was already wrapped around Adrian. It kind of made Rocky the filling in the stone and flesh sandwich.
Everyone remained silent as they cuddled and calmed down. Grace realized that someone must have paused the movie because he couldn’t hear anything from the screens, not that he bothered to check.
Right now, Grace wanted nothing to do with the video and the events it contained.
“Grace feeling better now?” Rocky asked gently. “Heart-rate is back within normal parameters."
Grace hummed wordlessly, his sight wandering aimlessly across his friend’s markings. It reminded Grace that he’d been considering ways to incorporate Eridian symbolism into his own skin. He didn’t want to rely on scarification and while tattooing would be his first choice of permanence, there hadn’t been any equipment and ink on the Hail Mary for such an endeavor.
So Grace had been brainstorming what he could create with what was left of his resources. It was a work in progress, but it wasn’t like Grace didn’t have time.
He had the rest of his life in fact.
“Grace?”
Grace sighed as he realized that Rocky wasn’t going to let him dissociate right now. “Yeah, buddy. I’m doing better.” It was true to an extent, since he was pretty sure he vomited his last meal, which meant that there was nothing left in his guts to continue throwing up.
But there were downsides as now there was an acidic stench that was waffling through the room that burned his sinuses.
Grace knew his friends were making an effort to not look at that corner, their own sensibilities clearly grossed out by Grace’s biological actions. It wasn’t like Grace had been having a good time either, but regardless of their overall discomfort, his friends were more concerned than disgusted.
Grace was truly grateful how they were able to discard their personal comfort in order to check up on him. Rocky, he could understand to a degree since his best friend had spent years getting used to his squishy, uncomfortable bits and bobs. But Adrian was the real trooper in holding their own against all his icky humaniness.
“Have you been watching?” Grace cleared his throat, trying to get rid of the discomfort that lingered.
Rocky shifted nervously. “Partially. Mostly focused on…other activities.” They turned their body towards the screens, even though they wouldn’t be able to see the movie properly without the Eridian textured screen. “Mostly, I hear.”
“Yeah, it’s been a real shit-show since they dropped him back in the ocean.” Grace grumbled, squishing his face against one of Rocky’s arms. “I think what we just saw must have been a flashback from his point of view. He did get knocked about just before then.”
Hesitating for a second, Grace continued vocalizing his observations. “I think…I think the child was him. I don’t know if what we saw was accurate to his memories or just symbolic, but wherever it was - be it Eden or elsewhere, looked pretty damn horrible.” He squeezed his eyes shut at the memory of so many little bodies.
The horrible emptiness in the child’s eyes.
Gosh, those babies were probably around the same age as his students had been before the Hail Mary had launched. That horrible thought had him reaching up to wipe the moisture from his eyes, Grace inhaled sharply to gather his sensibilities back into place.
“Do you think the tree is symbolic as well? It looks nothing like the trees in your documentaries.” Adrian interrupted Grace’s downward spiral. “It looks…sick? And the one speaking…I don’t like them. He speaks with malice and dishonor.”
“Yeah, I got that feeling as well.” Grace agreed wearily. “Flashbacks in movies are usually ways for the audience to get a better understanding of the protagonist…which I’m assuming is our guy.” Grace’s fists clenched in residue anger. “A fudging child… and something really horrible happened. The o-other children who ended up dying must be a crucial part of his backstory.” Grace was pretty impressed with himself for only stuttering a little at the mention. “What I don’t get is if their universe is dying, then how could they treat children - their fucking future, like disposable items! How can they treat anyone like this!”
Grace’s breath shuddered, the noises from his sinuses were becoming nasal and thick the longer he withheld the urge to cry. “I’m not sure if you're aware, but those children hadn’t died from natural causes. They were…killed.”
“Do you think he did it?” Rocky asked as they scrutinized the frozen scene. It made Grace wish that they’d paused at any other instance other than this one.
“No.” Grace said firmly. Even the thought felt repulsive.
It wouldn’t make sense either. Judging by the size of some of those children, they’d clearly been older than the boy, so unless they were missing something, it didn’t look physically possible for one, small child to be able to kill that many without getting hurt themselves.
To Grace’s keen eyes, other than being blood splattered and in shock, their protagonist didn’t look hurt.
Physically that is. Emotionally was a whole other matter.
But unless the movie showed exactly what happened, they would never know the truth and honestly? Grace was okay with that.
They didn’t continue to speak about it and after a few more seconds of silence, Adrian pushed the play button.
Luckily, the flashback ended right after that last horrible scene and went back to the present.
Unluckily, it looked like the man had just woken up from the crash. There was blood leaking from multiple wounds. Most notably, his head. There were multiple scratches and bruises on his face and arms. Grace had no doubt that there were more wounds under his clothing as well. “Sh- biscuits, if the guy hadn’t gotten a concussion from any of his earlier falls, he sure as heck does now.”
The submarine was dark and silent, except for a handful of instruments. The camera button, the oxygen gauge and the bar that showed his depth meter. Otherwise the light in the cabin was barely enough to illuminate the instruments, but obviously not bright enough to help him see.
“Uh….ggh!” Grunting in pain, he eventually got to his feet. “…Hello?” He called out, shuffling towards the button to press it. The sudden flash of bright light didn’t do him any favors in adjusting to his dark surroundings as he flinched, his back hitting the wall as he blinked away the afterimages.
He lightly touched the blood covering his temples, but there wasn’t much he could do about the wound so instead he took a minute to reevaluate his current circumstances.
In the silence the sound of crackling alerted him that something else had gone wrong in the submarine. Looking down, he spotted the bursts of orange sparks under the metal plating.
The wires that made up the submarine’s internal systems below his feet had undeniably been damaged in the crash. To see what he was dealing with, the man kept taking pictures to better illuminate the space.
That’s when he noticed the service hatch.
Humming slightly under his breath, the man leaned down and tried lifting the entrance, but it was bolted shut. He wouldn’t be able to open it without unscrewing the panel first.
Getting back to his feet, he looked around and spotted the small supply hatch that he’d missed in his earlier snooping.
Sadly, it was sparsely equipped. The first object in view was a bright orange life jacket. Lifting it out, he tossed it to the side to continue searching.
At the bottom, he ended up finding an old yellow container that thankfully wasn’t locked and when a quick search didn’t yield anything else, he turned around to sit against the wall right below the button.
Opening the box, he found miscellaneous items that had seemingly been tossed inside and then forgotten.
One of the containers was marked as H2o. Water. “Uh. I had water this whole time?” Upset, he unscrewed the bottle and drank.
He tossed the empty canister aside before shuffling through the rest. There was some tape and a few other bottles of strange liquid, but no more water.
When he found an old pair of medical scissors, a slight smirk danced across his face.
“A fudging medical kit.” Grace shook his head in disbelief at the man’s emergence rations. “That’s sparse, even if this had ended up being a short run. What was the Captain thinking? What were any of them thinking?! They could have at least equipped the submarine with some actual necessities before welding him in.” Grace groaned at not even seeing a single nutrition bar or other ration in that box. “That water container wasn’t even full!”
Rocky had the audacity to actually make shush noises towards him. They’d stayed to watch for a little longer, before whispering that they were almost done - whatever that meant - and hurried back to where they’d been before Adrian and Grace had a minor meltdown.
Using the scissors as a makeshift screwdriver, he got the hatch open, dragging the cover to the side as he looked down.
“Aw, fuck that.” It was utter darkness in the crawlspace underneath, as even the emergency lights were offline.
He picked up the life vest. “Okay…” Squinting at the tiny instructions printed on the fabric right below a small bulb.
Water Activated Light.
His hand reached out, scrambling along the ground until he found the container he’d just tossed aside. Upending it right over the light bulb, he waited for the little light to turn on.
But nothing came out of the canister. Because he’d already drunk all the liquid that had been inside.
“Oh, fuck that. Stupid piece of shit, you just HAD to chug the whole…” Snarling, he looked down with self-disgust before gathering saliva in his mouth and spitting over the light.
Liquid was liquid after and now he had a tiny glow of light.
The sparks coming from the damaged wiring hadn’t stopped flashing and even as he dipped the vest into the crawlspace, it barely illuminated anything. “Fuck that.”
The man tore through the container once more, pulling out the small roll of medical tape.
Grace had a terrible premonition of what the man was going to do with that tape and he was proven correct as several strands were pressed against the button, holding the x-ray machine in a state of constant power.
It did make it so that the light flashing from the screen would keep continuously turning on without him having to physically push the button each time, but it also - “Darn it, he’s literally irritating himself continuously by doing that!” Grace exclaimed, apprehensive of what it may cost the man in the future. “He’s clearly not stupid…he should know that even for a short time, taping down that button is minimizing his chances of survival.”
Adrian worriedly clicked their claws together. “Why does the convict do this then?”
“...humans need light to see, remember? It’s too dark for him to safely crawl down there.” Grace grunted, knowing the whys didn’t stop him from hating it. “It’s both smart and stupid at the same time.”
“Ahhh, like fishing trip to Adrian.” Rocky’s far off commentary wasn’t helping calm Grace’s nerves. A part of Grace wanted to inquire how Rocky was doing so far in his hacking attempts, but he didn’t want to draw attention to it either.
He didn’t believe that Mary would harm them, intentionally at least. But there were systems in place that if disturbed, could render all of them incapacitated.
The man grunted, squeezing himself into the small, dark crawlspace. It was a tight fit and clearly not made for a man of his stature. “Fuck me. Okay…what do I do?” Crawling along his stomach, he utilized the tiny light and the occasional flash from above to illuminate his path.
"Cockpit voice recording." Reaching the end, he read the words printed on the equipment. “All that to find the fucking black box. Damn it! Ugh.” He grunted as he smacked his palms against the floor, frustrated. “Of all the fucking things! I swear, if I have to read one of those FUCKING manuals, I'm gonna lose my god damn…” A noise startled him into going silent. Flopping onto his back, he pointed the vest’s back down towards the exit.
At first there was nothing. The occasional flash of light from above didn’t highlight any abnormalities and the noise of the sparking wires didn’t increase or decrease…however the next time the light flashed from above the man saw it.
Shadows and movement.
“Oh shit, now there’s ghosts!” Grace lamented as he peered through his fingers.
Adrian chattered nervously. They didn’t particularly enjoy this aspect of humanity. The paranormal aspects to be more precise. Erid had no concepts quite like the ghouls and monsters that made up the human imagination and horror enthusiastic minds. Rocky on the other hand, perked up when he heard Grace’s comment.
Seriously, sometimes Grace worries about his friend’s media taste.
The man held his breath, looking properly spooked by what he saw. When nothing else occurred though, he twisted himself around and started crawling back.
Since he was facing the opposite way he slid in, it was only now that he saw the piece of equipment he’d gone looking for. Situated at the entrance of the crawlspace, the emergency engine restart. “Of course it was in -” Grunting, he cranked the lever before pressing the start button.
The machinery around him powered on as did the proper emergency lighting surrounding him.
Patting the box absently, he sighed in relief. “Okay.”
After he lifted himself back out, he looked around but there wasn’t anything amiss, other than the camera no longer flashing.
He bent at the waist, picking up the discarded tape from where it had fallen. The adhesive had completely melted off the fabric. “Eh, almost worked.” He dropped it and turned back to the front.
Now that power had been restored to the submarine, all the equipment was back online. The first indication that something was up was the indicator beeping non-stop.
The man looked towards the twinkling lights with mounting dread, as the instruments went wild with warnings of an impending crash.
The pressure gauges flipped their tiny arrows towards the red while the hull ratted ominously around him. For some stupid reason, the shield over the glass had gone back down while the submarine had been inoperable and outside there was visible and audible movement. A swishing object bypassed right against the glass and the man’s breathing picked up in panic.
He wasn’t alone down here. More than the skeleton, more than the alien structures and the blood ocean. The thing that had taken his submarine who knows where…it was still here.
Then…the Computer Alert System audio came back online…
Hull breach. Hull breach. Hull breach. Hull breach. Hull breach. Hull breach. Hull breach. Hull breach. Hull breach. Hull breach. Hull breach. Hull breach. Hull breach. Hull breach. Hull breach. Hull breach. Hull breach. Hull breach. Hull breach. Hull breach….
The man stared as the glass started cracking.
The man threw himself across the room.
Quickly turning the dial connected to the porthole, the metal rose slowly over the still breaking glass. Just before it was fully covered, the glass cracked under the extreme pressure and a splatter of the outside contaminate slashed across his face.
The blood must have been hot or mildly acidic because it sizzled just slightly where it touched the skin. The man’s breath stuttered in his chest as he touched his face, trembling with shock as he tried wiping away the mess.
The slash across his face didn’t disappear completely, either because the blood was staining his skin or due to his fingers already having blood on them.
His expression crumbled as he released a sob, overwhelmed by recent events. Tears flowed down, mixing with the blood across his face, as he bent at the waist with the force of his sobs.
His attention turned towards the speaker immediately though when the alarm shifted slightly.
…Hull breach. Hull breach. Hull breach. Hull breach. Hull breach. Hull breach. Hull breach. Hull breach. Hull breach. Hull breach. Hull breach. Fire. Hull breach. Fire. Hull breach. Fire. Hull breach. Fire…
“What!?” He turned and there was indeed a small fire near the back computer terminal.
“Right! He didn’t fix the issue with the wires.” Grace hissed. Leaning forward, he fidgeted with worry. The fire was coming right up from the hatch where the earlier sparks of orange had been seen before he got the submarine working again.
Through all the chaotic mess he’d gone through to restart the submarine, everyone had forgotten about the little problem of broken wiring until it became a wall of fire.
“Gosh, what does it mean when there’s a hull breach?! Is the sub actively flooding or was the warning due to the cracked glass?” What Grace wouldn’t do to get a hold of the goddamn blueprints of this submarine. Although with how shabby everything looked, there might not even be any blueprints.
Because he was getting the feeling that not only was the submarine not fit for human life, but it was a literal fire hazard the longer it was in operation.
“Lots of bad stuff happening all at once, feel sorry for the squishy human convict.” Adrian trilled sadly. Grace had felt the sub-vocal trills in Adrian’s carapace going off since the man had started crying on screen. His friend was so empathetic and Grace couldn’t even say anything since his own eyes had welled up in similar sympathy. He also had the tendency to cry at the drop of a hat even on a good day back on Erid.
There was a reason why Rocky fondly referred to his friend as a leaky blob.
Grace snorted, rolling his eyes and ignoring how wet his cheeks had become. “Movie pacing. I understand why it looks like it's happening fast but we’re probably missing hours, if not more, of footage in between scenes. It’s a good thing too because I can’t stay in this room for that long without dying of dehydration.”
“I understand what you mean though. This guy can’t seem to get a break without something dangerous occurring right after another. At least he was warned about possible fires when they first dropped him, which means that the fire extinguisher should work. In theory.”
The man hurried to pull the small suppressant off the wall and emptied the tank. The fire that was coming from underneath the floor was easily extinguished. Hopefully preventing the wires from reigniting as well. Once the tank emptied he stood over the open hatch with his face twisting in anger, terror and utter despair at his situation.
Meanwhile, the computer system never stopped its echoing warnings. “Hull breach. Fire. Hull breach. Fire. Hull breach. Fire. Hull breach. Fire. Hull breach. Fire. Hull breach. Fire. Hull breach. Fire. Hull breach. Fire. Hull breach. Fire. Hull breach. Hull breach. Hull breach. Hull breach. Hull breach. Hull breach. Hull breach. Hull breach. Hull breach. Hull breach. Hull breach. Hull breach. Hull breach. Hull breach -”
“SHUT THE FUCK UP!!” The man snapped, swinging the metal canister at the speaker, breaking and silencing the warnings. “FUCK!” He broke down, crying.
“It’s okay. It’ll be okay. Just let it out, sssshhhhhh.” Grace’s mouth moved silently with the words, although they sounded empty even to his own mind. He hadn’t felt the urge to just - hold and smooth someone as much as he did now, except maybe Rocky after they’d woken up from the ill-advised fishing trip.
Grace knew that his own share of trauma was pretty horrible, by both human and Eridian standards. But even then, he couldn’t help but feel like what this man was experiencing grossly overwhelmed his own.
Or maybe it just felt that way since Grace got his ‘happy ending’ on Erid.
He watched as the man calmed down from his outburst, sniffling and swaying on his feet. Picking up his discarded outerwear, he rubbed gently his hands over the stitched, empty sheath. Clearly the accessory was special to him and just touching it seemed to calm him down faster than anything else had so far.
The man knelt down on the ground and finally seemed ready to address his wounds. The most pressing seemed to be his forearms, both of which were still freely bleeding. Flinching slightly in pain, he pulled his shirt over his head, leaving his chest naked except for a leather harness on his upper torso.
The kit was still open and he picked out a clear container from the mess. Unscrewing the lid, he sniffed it to see what was inside.
As the man tilted the lid slightly, Grace and the others got a good look at the label. “70 percent alcohol? That’s good, he should dab a little of that on his wounds, who knows what kind of infection he’s contracting down there -!” Grace sat up abruptly, discarding Adrian’s limbs that had been gently cradling him. “Did he just fucking drink it?!”
“Man has bad, bad, bad survival instincts.” Rocky whistled, sounding almost impressed. “Bad like Grace. Now Erid has evidence that humans are universally stupid.”
“Hey! I went almost 30 hours with no sleep and was thirsty, so excuse me for forgetting that I accidentally used my coffee mug to hold some chemicals! You can’t hold that against me forever.”
“Watch me.” Rocky said smugly. Then the little shit really went in for the kill by continuing their commentary. “What is the purpose of the chest piece on the human? Is it like Rocky’s belt or a medical necessity?” Rocky gestured to their xenonite tool belt strapped along their lower body.
Grace sputtered for a moment, a whiplash of emotions boiling inside his head.
He wasn’t sure what to address first. The self-poisoning they’d just witnessed? There were easier ways to die if that’s what the man wanted - Grace hoped that was not what he wanted - and drinking medical grade sanitizer was not one of them. It wouldn’t get him drunk, but instead he’d suffer from headaches, chest pains and probably cough up blood.
Or the chest harness that shouldn’t have been sexy and yet was unreasonably eye catching.
Maybe it really was medically necessary, could there be something wrong with his back?
“I don’t know! Maybe?” Grace turned his attention back to the screen, his face flushed as he avoided looking at his friends. If nothing else, the chest harness flaunted the man’s chest muscles, but Grace was pretty sure it was doing something for his shoulders.
Grace had thought that his coma induced body mass was pretty huge, especially when compared to what Grace’s body had been like before. But his post-coma body had nothing on this guy. Grace’s medically induced muscles had been okay, but this guy’s stature was clearly built with hard physical labor.
Grace’s mouth dried up, his gaze fluttered across the screen, trying to respectively look elsewhere until he put his shirt back on.
Grace really needed to…take some time for himself. It had never been a priority, even back on Earth, but maybe he was becoming skin-starved enough to actually indulge. His friends hugged and cuddled him the best they could and they gave him blankets and items that were as soft as they could be, but Grace knew it wouldn’t be enough in the long run, psychologically and emotionally.
Or maybe Grace was overthinking too hard. It could be that he just needed to eat. He actually couldn’t recall when he’d last eaten or slept for more than a few hours. He knew Rocky could tell him - but Grace didn’t want to bring up the issue of his human restrictions unless he had too.
“I’m not dying down here.” The man grunted as he tore into his over-shirt, ripping off the sheath and using the leftover fabric he wrapped up his torn wrists and forearms. Then he cleaned himself up before redressing. He’d even taken the time to tie his hair up into a half-bun, leaving his face in full view.
He was ready to restart his journey and get back to the surface. Alive.
Standing by the console, he checked over the coordinate numbers and compared them to the map. His fingers glided right off the paper…showing his current, unforeseen location.
He lifted his head, as the gravity of his situation hit him. “Ah…I’m fucked.”
Statement.
Visibly thinking, he pulled out the piece of paper he’d kept in his pocket. ‘Cross the wires’
He turned it over and there were printed words on the other side. Realizing that the torn paper must have come from one of the manuals, he picked one up and flipped through the pages.
“Oh! Maybe he’s going to find something in the folders and - ah, no. He’s just using it for scrap paper.” Grace deadpanned, his earlier excitement cooling off.
Still, it wasn’t a bad idea. In fact, it was downright smart the more Grace thought it over.
They watched as he drew out a hand-made grid on the paper. If the map that came with the submarine was too small for his current location, then he’d just have to manually expand on it.
“Jeeze, he’s really…cool.” Grace mumbled. Flushing at the snickering from his friends. “Oh shut it! You're both thinking the same as me!”
Rocky and Adrian didn’t even bother to deny it.
The man looked at the green glowing coordinates, before marking his location on the map that he’d tapped on the wall with a little ‘X’ “Yeah.” The smallest smile twitched on the man’s lips.
Using the camera, the man marked little lines to represent walls on his map when the camera showed either a wall or some kind of impassable structure. He was becoming very expressive with his thinking process, visibly moving his arms around as he imagined how the outside looked and how it would mirror his map.
He turned the vessel in a wide circle, stopping each way to better gauge the outside world around him. When he finally pointed the submarine to the direction he’d planned on traversing, he took one more photo.
The man hadn’t stopped being afraid, but he’d become clearly motivated and calmer now.
With the smudge stick clenched between his teeth he pushed the button, ready to see more empty space in a tunnel ahead.
But that wasn’t what was on screen.
“That’s…t-that’s not a skeleton.” Grace trembled, his skin felt cold and clammy. “Guy’s…that’s not a freaking skeleton.”
“The human dies now?” Rocky asked, befuddled.
“He better the frick not!” Grace hissed, distressed. The creature did resemble the previous skeleton, which meant that it was probably the same species of creature. But it clearly had flesh along its body as its hellish beady eyes gazed at the man’s submarine as if in a deadly stare-off. It was a horrifyingly dangerous sight and Grace knew that if the creature chose to attack, the man wouldn’t make it.
They all watched with baited breath as the man continued to push the button each time the screen started to fade. Grace didn’t even blame him for doing that. Radiation aside, he wouldn’t want to lose sight of that creature either if he could help it.
Luckily, for everyone’s collective hearts, including the movie guy, the monster seemed to be slithering backwards into the tunnel behind it before vanishing from view.
Also, luckily, the tunnel ahead split into two different sections. Two guesses which way the man turned the submarine and the first didn't count.
The loud sounds of sloshing liquid filled the cabin when the creature moved. The man’s eyes flew back and forth between the screen and the front of the ship where the creature would physically be located.
The man’s shaky breathing only steadied once he realized what the creature was doing and after it disappeared down the tunnel he started speaking out loud. “Okay...sure. Good. Don't mind me! I'm just trying to go home.” His words were spoken softly as he shuffled to the front of the room and sat down in the chair. “Just - just pretend like I’m not even here. I’m sure they’re falling over themselves trying to find me, so…if you see anyone looking for Simon, tell them I’m still alive.”
“Simon.” Grace’s mouth twitched with the name. His heart was still beating fast from the jump-scare, but now that he had a name, he could feel something inside of him unclenching.
It was objectively a good name, nice and simple. Grace sighed as something in his brain finally clicked.
“This isn’t a real movie, is it?” It was a redundant question. He didn’t expect his friends to be able to answer. Although it was possible that the Mary would be able too…if they could that is.
Adrian tilted their carapace towards him, confused by his statement. “What do you mean?”
“I mean this - all of this!” Grace gestured to the screens and then around them. “What’s happening right now isn’t normal by any means. Sure, Mary breaking down is possible and even us encountering another alien species is still in the realm of plausibility.”
“But what have we been experiencing? I’ve been compartmentalizing it as best I could but I’m sure you both are thinking the same thing. This isn’t even scientific. It’s preternatural at best.”
Adrian shuddered. “Yes.”
“What if…what if what we are watching right now is really happening? Somewhere else…the future. An alternate reality or universe. Or maybe it’s something else that we can’t even fathom.” Grace’s voice got higher and higher until his words cracked.
“Does it matter?” Rocky inquired, abruptly halting Grace’s mental downward spiral. “Right now, all we can do is watch and understand.”
“Y-yes it matters!” Grace argued. “It’s one thing if this was a movie, that means no one truly died…but if it’s real. If this is really, really happening then that means that Simon is -!”
“Grace.” Adrian reassured calmly. “Breath.”
“Urgh.” Grace groaned, squeezing his eyes shut. “There are humans. Other humans out there that need help and I can’t help them.”
“Why not? Erid will help. Even if they are rude and mean.” Rocky argued back.
“Because -!” Grace started arguing before his brain caught up with what Rocky just said. “Wait, you’d really -?”
“Of course. We will figure out ways to save Simon. Save Captain and David and others.” Rocky stated it so plainly, so easily.
As if things would be that easy once they came to the conclusion that the people they were watching were real people.
Fuck. Grace loved Erid.
They all agreed to sit on the how for the moment, because even though they wanted to help, the Hail Mary was still stuck in some kind of alien orbit. So they just continued watching the movie until they could come up with a better alternative.
Grace may have found himself paying extra attention to everything. Including Simon.
Who was real.
Simon had taken to still tapping over the button so he wouldn’t have to keep on getting back up from the chair, but no matter how much tape he put over it, the medical grade tape-fabric wouldn’t stay for longer than a few minutes at a time.
He used almost the entire roll as he navigated through the unmarked tunnel systems. “God…damn it. Ugh.” He tossed the last of the roll onto the ground, where a pile of discarded, non-sticky tape had been gathering in a mess.
Flopping back on the chair, he pointed firmly to the directional arrow on the console. “I’m trusting you.”
Steering the submarine forward, Simon braced his arms as he looked back at his map, trying to drive correctly without hitting any obstacles or obstructions that littered the cave.
The side bulb went off, signifying that he was leaning too far right and as he course corrected, he arrived at the idea to place one of the manuals against the lever so the submarine was still in motion as he got up.
Once he had secured it, he quickly went over to continue drawing the map. Since he was navigating blindly, he needed to map out in real time or there was the possibility of missing something vastly important. Then he had to hurry and adjust the direction when the indicator started beeping, occasionally he’d run back to take pictures, getting an idea of what was out there.
Sometimes the pictures would just show empty tunnels, sometimes there were broken structures…then there was what looked to be a giant eye or maybe some hazy ventilation solution that was reacting like an optical illusion. “Fucking aliens.”
Simon kept at it, filling his map out while navigating blind.
“His shoulder’s bothering him.” Grace worried as he watched Simon rub his shoulders, a grimace of pain crossing his features. “I don’t know if it's the radiation or from the harsh tumbling from before; but either way, he needs medical attention.”
As he walked back and forth the length of the submarine’s inner cabin, the speaker’s systems crackled back on, showing him that it wasn’t completely dead. But instead of connecting to the tow ship above, the noise was just the computer system still sputtering out the warnings from before - “Hull breach. Hull breach. Hull bre-” The man hit it as he passed and the noise died back down.
Hours slowly passed and the repetitive actions did little to keep him awake and aware.
Simon was visibly growing tired and dizzy and before long he fell into an uneasy doze while pushing the lever forward.
Another series of flashbacks passed on the screen.
Once more the screen showed them the scene of Simon as a child, just standing in the midst of his peers, all dead at his feet. This time there was thick and sticky blood coating his hands as he looked down at his wet palms with terrified eyes.
Then the scene changed into a hazy, grey-ed out image of a woman, her hand outstretched as she gifted a knife and sheath to someone off-screen.
The next flashback was different, it was more of an echo of someone screaming Simon’s name just out of view.
“Simon! Simon!”
Back in the submarine, Simon seated in the chair as his head flopped forward, clearly unconscious even though his eyes were open.
Right behind him wasn’t the normal submarine, but an unfocused long and winding hallway. There was a shape of a humanoid in the background.
The echo of a child’s voice blending into an adult as it kept on calling out Simon’s name.
Simon’s body turned around, his eyes still hazy and distant.
The person came sharply into view. It was an older man, dressed similarly to Simon. His mouth was moving in a muffled shout and suddenly the visuals sharpened and everyone could hear him now - “Hey! Don’t just stand there! Do something -!”
Behind the man a wall of fire engulfed everything, including the man as he melted right on screen.
The scene snapped back to the submarine properly as Simon woke up from his nightmare induced nap. His hand clenching tightly to the lever as the indicator beeped rapidly in warning. He shook his head and looked down, gasping and pulling back the lever to slow down.
But by then it was too late to avoid completely and the hull banged into the obstacle he’d unwittingly aimed the submarine into.
Standing up, he went to take a picture to figure out what it was. If he was lucky, it would just be some kind of boulder or something else easily maneuverable. As the screen developed, the man’s jaw dropped.
It was another submarine.