Chapter Text
The first thing he became aware of was a faint beeping. Slow, calming. It took him a second to register it wasn’t a warning alarm, or one or Armando’s feeding timers. It was the very nostalgic sound of a hospital monitor. Yes, that was a heartrate being counted aloud.
He frowned. God, his brain was slow today. He couldn’t for the life of him conjure an explanation for why there was a heartrate monitor sounding next to his ear. The ship just didn’t have one. He tried to open his eyes, but they were so heavy it was a struggle.
Finally, a slow blink allowed a strip of harsh white light into his retina. Straight away, that was weird. It wasn’t the same light as the Hail Mary.
What the heck?
Slowly the room came into focus, and with it, Grace's panic rose. Where was he? This was… This was…
A hospital room.
“Dr Grace?”
He flinched away from the voice, scrambling to sit up. His whole body hurt. Pain lanced through his arms as he tried to prop himself onto his elbows. An awful, gnawing pain radiated from his insides, like all his muscles had been ripped to shreds. He panicked further.
“Please lie still…”
Sit down and we do it differently.
The flash of memory came at him out of nowhere. Shit, this was not good. He didn’t know where he was or how he got here, but he didn’t trust a single soul other than Rocky.
Hands were touching his arms, gentle pressure keeping him in place. The touch was alien. He didn't know who it belonged to. He didn’t know what was happening. But he knew he hadn't felt the touch of another person for… a long time.
“Whe-” His voice was like sandpaper. “Wher’m I?”
“You’re safe, back home on Earth. We’re on a Chinese aircraft carrier.”
Who was that voice? He didn’t recognise it. He focused on the vague shape of the person - woman - standing on his left. She was silhouetted against a bright window, the light and his pain making it hard to see clearly.
“My name is Dr Nash. We’ve been looking after you since you splashed down five days ago. Do you remember?”
He frowned, screwing up his eyes in an effort not to shed tears from the pain wracking his stomach. He wanted to sit up, but he was so weak. “I’m on Earth?”
The woman was looking him over with a calm, commanding expression. She exuded a quiet confidence that somehow managed to put Grace at ease. More than that, she had a kind face. Not like the guys who had-
He stopped the half formed memory in its tracks.
“Yes.” She nodded. “You got the Hail Mary into orbit. We sent a Soyuz up to rendezvous. They brought you back down, but you were on the edge of starvation.”
He knew that. Now that the initial panic was starting to subside, his foggy thoughts were returning in trickles. Faint memories of astronauts entering the Hail Mary. Taking him from his bed. Images and shapes, rather than clear recollections.
Wow, he’d been totally out of it. He didn’t remember being in the Soyuz or any of the re-entry at all. Either he passed out, or they put him under.
Was that right? Could he trust this was real? He could very well still be on the Hail Mary hallucinating.
He took some pained breaths, trying to clear the fog clouding his brain.
He’d been on the brink of death for the past few weeks. He knew that much. Everyday had been a battle to keep down one bag of coma slurry. He hated his body for rejecting it, but even just the smell of stuff sent his stomach roiling and his gag reflex working overtime. If he did manage to swallow anything, it swiftly came back up. Yes, in those last few days and weeks he remembered not having the strength to even make it to the toilet to be sick.
“Stomach hurts,” he wasn’t proud of how whiny he sounded, but he needed this woman to know that the pain was nearing the point of becoming unbearable, just as it had been on the Hail Mary.
By the time he’d eaten the last of his pre-prepared Taumoeba pouches he’d become too weak to make any more, so he fell into malnutrition as his body slowly started to eat itself.
That’s right - the fog was clearing now, the pieces coming back together. He’d managed to record a radio message to Earth as he’d entered the solar system, knowing he would be too weak to function by the time he actually arrived in orbit. He told them he was coming back, and that he needed help. They wouldn’t be confused - hopefully they had already received the beetles explaining everything.
He sat suddenly upright. “The beetles…” The thought jumped to the front of his brain, demanding an answer.
“We got them,” Dr Nash answered immediately. “They arrived just a few months before you did.”
At that moment, the door opened and a nurse in army fatigues walked in. Her eyes widened at the sight of Grace awake, and she glanced nervously at Dr Nash.
“Rida, go and get Dr Lokken.”
The nurse left without a word. Grace stared after her. She was only the second human he’d seen in... However many years it had been.
His heart ached. He instinctively looked to the ceiling. Rocky would be back home now as well.
Tears sprung from his eyes and he gasped in overwhelming emotion.
“Hey, it’s okay,” Dr Nash was saying. Grace barely heard her. He didn’t want her.
She put her hand out to comfort him, but he flinched away.
He didn’t want to lie in this bed a moment longer. He sat up as best he could - which was easier than he’d first assumed. He’d been used to 1.5G for so long that coming back to Earth’s normal gravity gave him a sense of lightness. That, and the fact that he’d finally been fed enough nutrients to give him some of his strength back.
He pushed the thin blanket off him as his socked feet touched the floor. Instantly, blood rushed from his head, making his vision black out and bile rise in the back of his throat. He might have swayed, because Dr Nash’s hands were suddenly on his shoulders.
“Woah, easy there cowboy…”
He ignored her. He was incredibly thin, but he could do this. Once his vision returned, he fought against the pain in his stomach and pushed her gently out of the way as he stood. Then sat down again as his vision swam again.
“Dr Grace, please sit back down-”
He ignored her completely, stumbling back to his feet as soon as the black dots in his vision cleared. Gripping the bed for support, he stumbled over toward the window, pulling whatever IVs he was connected to with him. It was only a few steps to the window, but soon his hands pressed against the glass as he stared wide eyed at the ocean on the other side.
It stretched on for as far as the eye could see.
Waves crested and fell. Grey sky coated the horizon. In the distance, a bird flew high, so far away it was barely a dot.
It was Earth.
He sobbed, his heart swelling to twice its usual size, all at once doubling the love, the relief, the joy. But also the terrible, dreadful sense that he’d left something behind.
Someone came up beside him, gripping his elbow to support him. And just in time. His knees were about to give way, either from his weakened physical state or the emotional release. Someone else was on his other side, probably nurses, and he was being helped back toward the bed.
His vision was gone again, this time not from vertigo but salty tears pouring down his face. He was gasping, blubbering, maybe saying something. Voices tried to soothe him from all around, but he couldn’t hear them over the emotion bursting to get free in his chest. He was sure he couldn’t contain it. His frail body was surely going to crumple under the weight of it all.
After a few minutes in which he just let it all out, his breathing finally calmed and the tears dried up. He could finally process the words being spoken to him. God, it had been so long since he’d been surrounded by people. He didn’t know how to act. He must be coming back to himself now because a shade of embarrassment registered somewhere. Surely ‘Earth’s Saviour’ or whatever they were going to label him shouldn’t be acting like this: a total mess.
“Sorry,” he said to no one in particular.
There was a team of medical personnel around his bed, some military, some not, and they were all doing an excellent job of making him feel not so embarrassed.
“We know it’s a lot, Dr Grace, and it’s going to take time for you to adjust. But how are you feeling physically? Are you in any pain?”
Yes, his whole body was in pain. Not a sharp, harsh pain, but a dull, persistent soreness where his muscles had atrophied. And the stomach cramps that had eased off while he’d been overwhelmed, but now returned with full vigour.
“Everywhere,” he murmured sardonically. “I’ve only been starved.”
A couple of the nurses laughed awkwardly, but others looked unsure if there was any humour there.
“Um, could I have some water please?”
“Of course,” Dr Nash said, nodding to one of the army nurses. “We can up your pain medication if you need it.”
He shook his head. He hadn’t realised he’d been on any - it definitely didn't feel like it - but with his body in such an abysmal state he didn’t want to throw anything at it it wasn’t ready for. A sudden thought came to him. “What year is it?”
The nurse returned with a half full cup of water, which he immediately started sipping. He tried to restrain himself, but his body had instincts and he couldn’t hold back from finishing the entire thing.
“2052.”
He spluttered.
Twenty seven years. He’d only consciously experienced five.
He knew that was roughly correct, had been expecting it, but it was still somewhat shocking to have it confirmed. He would have liked to go back to Grover Cleveland and see his students, walk back in like the hero the whole world thought he was. But they wouldn’t be there anymore. Heck, was the building even still standing? What consequences of climate change and global economic decline had happened to the school? To his apartment? To the city he called home?
“Is…” he didn’t even know how to phrase it. “What’s the state of the world now?”
Some of the team looked at each other uncertainly, while others looked down.
Instantly his heart rate spiked.
“Am I not supposed to ask that?” he joked nervously.
No one really seemed to know what to say. Even Dr Nash shifted her weight and gave him a look that said, some shit’s gone down.
“Why am I on an aircraft carrier?”
“Dr Grace, we’ve been instructed not to talk to you too much about any of that. You made it back safely, most of the Earth is still standing, that’s what you should focus on. You saved it from a lot worse.”
He stared at her, trying to read her eyes. “That’s not as comforting as I think you mean it to be.”
At that moment, the door broke open and Grace’s eyes flickered over to the woman who just crossed the threshold. Twenty seven years older, hair much greyer than it had been even back then, was Dr Lokken.
When she saw him, her lips spread into a massive grin. Grace felt his doing the same.
“Dr Grace….” She looked at a loss for what to say, and Grace couldn’t blame her.
It was like staring at a ghost. Her eyes were wrinkled at the edges, her skin tougher and more mottled, but it was her.
“Alright,” Dr Nash said. “If you don’t need any more pain management, we’ll leave you be for a while. Come on everyone.” She effectively cleared the remaining doctors and nurses from the room, leaving the two old colleagues alone. “Press the buzzer if you need anything,” she said as she shut the door behind them.
Lokken grinned at him. “You don’t look a day older.”
“Neither do you.”
It was a blatant lie of course, but she grinned harder.
She had to be in her seventies now. Grace was kind of surprised to find her on the ship.
Unsure exactly what to say, he started with the obvious. “How’s it been, the past twenty seven years?”
She crossed the room and took a weary seat on the edge of his bed. She shook her head, a light still glinting in her eyes. “Oh no, we’re starting with you.”
Grace rolled his eyes. He always hated talking about himself.
“Well I made it, not least because of you.”
She waved a hand dismissively.
“Seriously. The ship was… exceptional. I couldn’t have done it without the centrifuge.”
“It did what it needed to do. I’m glad it worked.”
They fell into a companionable silence. Eventually Lokken spoke again.
“So you met an alien.”
Grace huffed amusedly. As soon as he did, his heart broke all over again. The smile fell from his lips. “Yeah,” he nodded. “He’s awesome.”
“You miss him.” Her eyebrows were raised, but it wasn’t a question.
He had to look out of the window to hide the tears that sprung to his eyes. He couldn’t speak around the lump in his throat, so he just nodded.
God, his first twenty lucid minutes on Earth and all he’d done is cry.
He couldn’t talk about Rocky yet, so he steered the conversation away. “Seriously Lokken. Why are we on an aircraft carrier in the middle of the ocean?”
She took a breath, nodding as she mulled over her answer. “Mostly for your protection. But also Earth’s.”
“What?” That stopped him in his tracks.
She nodded in affirmation. “Your protection because you’re such a high profile figure now. That comes with inherent security risks. And Earth’s protection because you’ve been in space for so long and been exposed to a vast number of alien microbes. We can’t risk any possible transference so you needed to be quarantined.”
Well… that made sense. Even though he obviously wasn’t infected by any alien diseases since his exposure to Adrian’s biosphere four years ago.
It would make sense that they’d still want to be safe. Who knew, maybe he did have some crazy alien virus and the incubation period was just a very, very long time.
Whatever.
“In that case, shouldn’t you be in a hazmat suit or something?”
She smiled. “Everyone on the aircraft accepted the risk.”
Huh. Probably because they knew there was no risk. But he still knew nothing about the state of the world. What if being on this ship, exposed to potentially deadly alien viruses, was a better option than remaining on land? “So California is still standing? The continents haven’t sunk?”
“Oh God, no.” She realized he was only half joking and hurried to reassure him. “Most people live in the cities now. A lot of people died, but society didn’t completely collapse. Leclerc’s estimates were fortunately on the higher side of the margin of error.”
“How many?” he asked quietly. He wasn’t sure he wanted to know. All this time wondering, worrying…
Lokken paused before answering, her voice as low as his in the sudden quiet. “Twenty percent.”
Grace closed his eyes.
One in five.
Five kids from each of his classes. It was… unthinkable. Unbearable.
Of course, the distribution of deaths definitely wouldn’t be even across all countries and territories. Maybe more Americans survived. There was no good in picturing Olivia’s face, or Rehka’s or Abby’s or Kevin’s or Trang’s. No point wondering.
He did the best he could.
Maybe one day he would be brave enough to find out.
“The Hail Mary team?” That was easier to enquire about. They were his friends, some of them closer than others, but he didn’t feel the same crushing responsibility when it came to them as to his kids.
Lokken nodded. “Most are fine. Being part of the project granted a lot of us protection and favourability within our own governments.”
Something twisted in Grace’s gut. And it had nothing to do with his broken stomach.
He hadn’t mentioned anyone in particular, and neither had Lokken. He couldn’t tell if she guessed he wanted to know about someone specifically, but right now he was happy with the vague answer that most of the people he’d known were fine.
“That’s good,” he answered, because otherwise the silence would become awkward.
She watched him for a long moment. He returned his gaze to the window. He still couldn’t believe the sight beyond it was real.
For the first time in years he couldn’t see a single star. He was suddenly desperate for the clouds to clear and the sun to set. If the conditions were right, 40 Eridani was visible from Earth. He’d actually be able to see not just Tau Ceti, but the place beyond it where half of his soul remained with his friend.
Once again, the fissure down his broken heart cracked and widened, and tears threatened to fall. Jeez, he really had to stop thinking about Rocky.
“Grace?”
He turned back to face Lokken. “Yeah?”
“You did it.” She tilted her head, eyes burning right through him.
He looked at her. For some reason, the words stunned him. Yes, he had. Sure.
But he hadn’t done it alone.
He desperately tried not to think about Rocky, but it was impossible.
Fine, he could think about him, but he definitely couldn’t talk about him, not least because of the barbed wire coiling around his throat. Even if he wanted to discuss it, he wouldn’t be able to get any words out.
Lokken looked so… proud?
Grace was an empath, normally to his detriment, but as he looked at her he felt… nothing. None of the joy shining out of her face was reflected in him. Half of him was missing, and the half that was in this room didn’t deserve a single drop of the praise she was lauding over him.
He winced. “Do you…” God, this was hard. “Did you know?”
Her lips parted slightly, and her eyes darted down. “Know what?”
Well. She had basically just answered that question. He shook his head, trying to get to the shameful truth. “You were there when-” he stumbled, Stratt’s name sounding foreign and unwelcome on his tongue. “When Stratt asked me to go.”
“Yes,” Lokken said.
“And when I was unconscious you would have been in charge of the launch procedure.” He paused, watching her expression carefully. “Did you know?”
Lokken’s mouth pinched together, and she straightened her neck. But she didn’t answer.
“You must have,” he answered for her.
She closed her eyes. “I didn’t know,” she said, shaking her head. “But… once you were brought to the medical wing… it was clear to those of us who knew you what must have happened.”
Grace pursed his lips. He nodded once. It was only confirmation of what he had thought must have been the case. Maybe Yao and Ilyukhina were convinced by Stratt, since they hadn’t been as close with Grace, but the rest of the Hail Mary team? The ones that he worked with everyday for years? They would have known.
Stratt would never have told them, and they had no power to question anything she said, especially so close to launch. But they had suspected.
Oddly, it gave Grace comfort. It should have filled him with shame to think that the people he was closest with correctly assumed he was a coward. Maybe the fact that they knew him so well and still supported him was what negated that.
“And the whole world still thinks I volunteered?” he clarified.
She gave him a serious look before nodding.
“Everyone here?” he gestured to the corridor outside.
“Grace,” she began. “You deserve your happy ending. You saved the world.”
He scoffed.
“It’s true. Whether you like it or not. Whether you chose to go or not, you found the Taumoeba. You saved us. Nothing will change that.”
“I don’t want a pep talk,” he said firmly. Suddenly he felt very, very sick.
He missed his friend.
“Do you want me to leave you?”
Did he? He wasn’t sure. He’d been alone for four years, and every day he had wished for company. But this whole situation was overwhelming. He definitely had not processed that he’d made it back yet. Without the joy and relief that he’d first experienced when he woke up, there was only shame and something much, much more painful.
Being back here finally confirmed that he’d never see his best friend again. Being in space, even light years apart, felt like he had the option to turn around any time, even if it was logistically impossible. Being on Earth… it may as well be a different universe. A whole other plane of existence. There was a barrier that couldn’t be crossed, a distance too great to travel. His time with Rocky felt like a dream, more and more intangible the longer he breathed the free air.
He was home, but he’d never felt further from where he was supposed to be.
He sighed, leaning his head back against the bed. “Just for a bit. I’m pretty tired.”
Lokken stood, unoffended. “Take all the rest you need, Dr Grace.”
She glanced back at him as she reached the door, but Grace had turned away from her.
Sorry for being an asshole, he thought toward her as he heard the door shut. He lay sideways so he could watch the sky outside the window. His last thought before he drifted back into sleep was that hopefully, when he woke up, it would be dark outside and he could scan the stars for where he thought his friend might be doing the exact same thing.
When he woke up, he remembered where he was. His stomach was painfully tight, but it was a familiar hurt. The room and corridor outside were quiet. He blinked his eyes open, stirring under the soft blanket - wait, this was his blanket.
The quilt from the Hail Mary that he’d slept under every night (and many days) since leaving Earth. He panicked, wondering if everything had been a hallucination and he was actually still aboard, but then logic took over. The room was the same. The window was still there, the soft grey light of pre-dawn seeping in over the ocean. Someone had just provided him with the quilt. He grunted, sitting up. He smelled it. Hmm, okay, that had definitely been washed. Properly. Come to think of it, it must have stank when they first got their hands on it. Just like him, probably. No, definitely.
A decade of relying on sponge baths was no joke.
Had they been up and retrieved his possessions from the ship already? That wouldn’t make sense, he must have been wearing the quilt when they took him into the Soyuz.
However it got here, he was grateful.
He swung his legs off the bed, and when he didn’t immediately get a headrush he detached the IVs from the cannulas in his hand and elbow, and unhooked himself from the monitor. Slowly, he padded over to the window. The sea was dark, almost pitch black, but it wasn’t the waves he was interested in. Above the water was a much prettier sea. Stars glinted in the near black, the constellations so familiar he could cry all over again. Despite the faintest sunlight threatening to breach the horizon, the stars remained perfectly visible, twinkling with various luminosities across the vast expanse of the sky. His eyes searched the ocean of lights for the constellation Orion, finding it almost immediately despite not having a clue where he was as a reference point. It was the right way up, so that told him he was in the Northern Hemisphere, for starters. He quickly pinpointed Rigel, Orion’s foot, and after a second of squinting, the faint, faint light of 40 Eridani.
“Hi, bud.”
Maybe he shouldn’t be so emotional. This was definitely unhealthy. It wasn’t normal for your first thought when you wake up and the last thing you think about at night to be your best friend. He needed to get some perspective.
Needed, not wanted.
Jeez, the years of isolation and near starvation really did a number on his psyche. He was sure there’d be a whole line of world class therapists and psychologists lined up if he asked for one. No doubt someone would suggest (or maybe order) him to see one at some point soon. However much help that would be.
He tore his gaze away from Rocky’s home star to focus on his own needs.
Perspective.
He needed the bathroom, and he felt gross. His stomach was still painfully tight, as were the rest of his atrophied muscles, but he knew that was something he couldn’t fix on his own without the help of medication. The first two, he could manage.
Looking around, he caught sight of a door that he really hoped led to an en-suite. He cautiously turned the handle and… bingo. It was the kind of handicapped bathroom you’d expect to find in a hospital, which suited Grace just fine. Walking wasn’t exactly the easiest of activities for him right now, so he graciously clung to the handles as he lowered himself onto the toilet and took care of his needs. He stood and looked at the shower wistfully, but there was no way he was up for that just yet. Instead he splashed water from the sink over his face, removing the tackiness from all of yesterday’s dried tears.
That was better. The reflection looking back at him looked nothing like the man Eva Stratt had commandeered from his classroom all those years ago. Despite what Lokken had said, he had aged. A few years and lack of sunlight weren’t the most devastating changes made to his face since then. His cheekbones were hollowed out from starvation, his skin pale and thin. His hair was longer than he usually kept it, as was his stubble. The fact that he didn’t look like a total caveman was due only to the fact that Armando had been taking care of all that for him while he’d been bed bound.
A flash of memory burned across his retinas of Armando and Rocky, synchronized jazz-hands in action as he tried and failed to argue with Rocky about space onboard the ship.
He blinked.
He grabbed a towel and dried his face, deciding that he needed some fresh air. He still hadn’t breathed in the actual atmosphere yet. At least not consciously. He went back to the bed and threw the quilt that he’d accidentally formed an attachment to around himself. If he could, he wanted to get up to the deck. That was the goal, anyway. No doubt either his own exhaustion or the staff here would stop him before he got there, but there was no harm in trying.
As if scared of being caught, he hesitantly looked out of the door before opening it ajar. There was no one in the corridor, but it was a very small corridor in fairness. His was the only door that led off it. The lights were off - with any luck, nobody would be on duty.
His heart was hammering in his chest as his stick thin legs carried him down the hallway, which led into what appeared to be the entrance to the medical wing. A round reception desk was in the middle, and - just his luck - a young woman dressed in army fatigues manned it. She caught sight of him just as he ducked back behind the wall.
Shit.
She definitely saw him. And now he was hiding like a kid caught stealing food from the fridge in the middle of the night.
“Dr Grace?” She called out, rising from her seat.
Well, there was nothing for it now. “Hi,” he said, sauntering out from the corridor with as much false bravado as he could muster.
“What are you doing up? Do you need any pain relief?”
“Eh,” he waved a hand dismissively. “I’m fine. Right as rain. I’m just going up for some air actually, so…” he started to move around the desk, but she put a hand out to stop him.
“Dr Grace, you should wait until occupational health-”
He sighed audibly, dropping his head to his chest. “Come on.” He muttered it more to himself than her.
She removed her hand from in front of him. “Look, if you really want to go, I can’t stop you.”
He looked up. “You can’t?”
“No,” she said, confused. “You’re not a prisoner.”
It took a moment for the words to process. “I’m not?” He looked at her.
She looked at him.
“Right. Sure. Okay. I’ll just… be on my way then,” he smiled uncertainly at her, trying to reclaim what little dignity he had left as he hobbled toward the exit doors.
Well that was…weird. He was 100% sure she would have escorted him back to his room. Best not to look a gift horse in the mouth, or whatever the expression was.
Using one hand to keep the quilt around him like a cloak, and the other to grip the wall for support, he followed the exit toward a flight of narrow stairs. Oh boy. It was slow progress, but he wasn’t in a rush. What did he have to be hurrying for these days? Each step burned his thighs, the cold iron mesh harsh against his bare feet. He needed to pause every couple of steps to get his breath back, but eventually he managed it. The landing came out onto a much wider, more specious corridor, with full length windows on the left that gave floor to ceiling views of the sea.
He stared at it, the beauty momentarily taking his breath away.
Outside. He needed to be out there, not just staring at it. Jeez, where was the actual exit? He scanned the hallway and his eyes landed on exactly the words he’d been hoping to find: Exit to Deck 3. The sign pointed in the direction Grace was already facing, so he dragged his now trembling legs onward. He really hoped his body wouldn’t give up on him now. The carpet was soft underfoot as he trudged on. It was only a few metres until the corridor turned a corner, but it felt like a marathon. He’d really exhausted himself up those stairs. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d done so much physical exercise.
Finally, he reached the corner and found a pair of large glass doors that opened to the deck. He almost cried in relief. There was a button to the side - he took a gamble and pressed it. The doors slid open.
He was immediately assaulted by a strong breeze that whipped his hair around his temples and filled his nose with tangy, salty air. It was so overpowering that at first he couldn’t get a breath in. He choked down a mouthful of air - pure, natural, Earth air - and tilted his face upwards.
He savoured the smell, the taste, the temperature. It was… just how he remembered it.
A tear slid down his face. It was quickly whipped away by the sea breeze.
He took a second, shuddering breath.
And a third.
On the fourth he stumbled forwards, more properly onto the deck. He gripped the quilt tighter around him, terrified it would fly away in the wind as he moved towards the railing. He didn’t want to get too close to the edge. He was so skinny that one good gust of wind and he’d probably be swept off the ship himself.
It was loud, and cold, but in a good way. It was real. Not a man-made, artificial, synthetic proxy. No scientist on Earth could simulate this. He paced a short way down the deck, before giving up and sliding to the floor. He didn’t have any more energy left. He propped himself up against a balustrade and let his legs stretch out in front of him, facing the sea. Yeah, this was nice. He leant his head back and savoured every second.
“Hey!”
He blinked himself awake, the voice stirring a repressed memory… he was being chased. They were coming for him, he was running-
“Hey! You can’t be up here.” A figure was standing over him, wearing all camo and carrying… Shit, that was a rifle!
He quickly put his hands up as the man’s face came into view. Sunlight had begun to seep over the horizon now, and the soldier was silhouetted against it. He was tall, burly, and looking angry. That was all Grace could discern from this angle.
“Sorry, I-”
“Dr Grace?” The man cut him off before he could finish his explanation, which was just as well, as he had no clue what he was actually going to say. “I’m sorry, Sir, I didn't recognise you.”
What?
“Do we… know each other?” Grace tried, frowning up at the guy who still had one hand on his weapon.
“No, Sir. My apologies. Do you need any assistance?”
American accent. Hmm. “Nope,” he began slowly. “I was quite happy here on my own, thanks.”
“Do you require medical, Sir?”
“Medical- What, no. If I’m allowed up here, please allow me to be up here.”
The soldier appraised him for a second, then nodded sharply, turning on his heel in whatever direction he’d come from.
Grace had definitely fallen asleep out here, but he wasn’t mad about it. He was more irritated that he’d been woken up. Now he had to try again. He was so tired, and his stomach was in a lot of pain. It had grown worse since he’d left his room and at least when he was asleep his body didn’t hurt. He sluggishly brought his knees up to his chest in an attempt to soothe the pain, but it didn’t help. He pulled the quilt tighter around his body as he twisted to his side, curling up tightly.
A few minutes later, footsteps approached. Several sets.
Grace could already tell they were for him. “Leave me alone,” he groaned. He was sick of being fawned over, and the pain was making him even more irritable. He vaguely registered that he should be grateful and accepting of their help, but he just didn’t have it in him right now.
“Dr Grace, you have been out here far too long.” One of the doctors from yesterday crouched beside him, a hand on his shoulder. He shrugged it off, curling away from him. “I’m fine,” he grumbled, wishing more than anything they’d leave him alone.
The doctor mumbled something indistinct to one of the others, and Grace’s heart skipped a beat. They were conspiring.
“What are you saying?” he protested, trying to sit up despite the pain in his stomach. “What are you doing?” He scooted away from them over the deck - or tried to. The doctor who had been speaking to him reached out again. “Dr Grace, you’re not well, we need to get you inside now.”
Like hell. He wasn’t a prisoner. The lady inside had told him. “No. I’m staying out here.”
“You’re shivering and clearly in a lot of pain. If you develop pneumonia your body has no way to fight it-”
“I’m fine!” he argued. Why couldn’t they believe him? Why were they trying to force him? “Do not come any closer!” He shrugged off the hand that tried to coax him up, pushing it away fervently.
At that moment, his stomach gave a particularly painful clench and he cried out, keeling onto his side.
“No, don’t touch me!” he gasped.
More footsteps, the sound of wheels. Then hands, on his arms, on his legs. Turning him, rolling him. “No!” he shouted. They wouldn't take him. Not again. He was finally free-
“Hold him,” someone with a deep voice commanded.
His quilt was gone. Where was his quilt?
Of course it was gone. Just like all his other worldly possessions. They’d sent him up to space with five t-shirts and a disco ball.
They took everything, in the end.
“Get off me!” he cried. “Don’t do it!” He was thrashing, but he was on a bed. Hands kept him from flailing to the floor, but he’d rather be in the dirt than in their hands.
The dirt pressed into his face, glasses becoming askew as his arms were yanked behind his back-
“Stay calm, Dr Grace, you’re alright.”
No, he thought desperately. I’m not. This is not alright. “Get… off…”
The next thing he knew was darkness.