Archive of Our Own

Books talked about beautiful colours.

Blue, Purple, Green, Orange, Yellow… Black… White…

Black and white. Not even colours.

He saw black everywhere. He saw too much of it. From the void beyond Eden’s window. Black looked at them down, and they cowered from it. An all-encompassing, endless hole, the belly of a beast in which they couldn’t get away from. No light at the end of the tunnel. Just freezing, numbing nothingness.

Only the light of the Tree helped.

White. He saw it too, not as much though. The lights in Eden were yellow. A dirty one. A sign of decay, of the tree failing and dying, of the dust covering the overhead lights, the brown of the buzzing LED and the muddy look of rations sliding down his throat and sluggish inside his stomach. The only white was the white of people’s eyes, rolled back in supplication. Prudish white of their tears… The white of those damned photos he had to take.

The C.O.I and the SM-13 were grey. Metal. Iron. Grey everywhere. Imprisoning him, staring down at him too. Fuck them all. The photos, too, had been black and white. Grainy and inconsistent, almost unreadable. If it hadn’t been this high on the wall, he’d have stomped on the button several times with his boot, and then the light contouring it would have a black trace of his feet on it.

Dirty white and fake black.

Even the glass through which he saw Ava had been blurry shapes.

And Red.

Disgusting, repugnant, repulsive Red.

White cells. Red cells. White photos. White light. Black box.

What. A. Fucking. Joke.

Did he cry black from the void he felt within? Or Red like the one he felt pulsing around like a heartbeat?

Most ironically, he had blood on his hands, blood in his eyes, blood coursing through his veins, blood around him, and if he laughed a bit too hard, he’d also vomit blood from his lungs.

Blood was part of him as much as he was guilty of that same blood.

He hated it as much as he hated himself and the world at large.

.

He still remembered reading a book and looking at the faded colours of the pictures inside it. They had been thumbed over and over again. Books were rare. There hadn’t been many in Eden, prioritising digitalisation over physical possessions. Digital meant tablets and chips: smaller, lighter and more convenient to transfer from Earth to the space stations. Now, those same screens and disks remained permanently turned off. They needed to preserve electricity for things more important than souvenirs. 

Vents, to circulate the stuffy air of the station, containing more than 400 inhabitants and growing by the day. Precious air for the Tree as well, which flagged and looked magnificent in its older stage. 

Lights too. Most of it was used for the solar lights, recreating the sunlight for the Tree's tentative leaves. The last single blooming bud had created a wave of tears from all Brothers across the station. The Tree was still alive and bathed in light, while they lived by with dirty, dim light. They didn't even have anything in their own bedroom, plunged into darkness at all times, except for the brilliance of their eyes shining feverishly. Only the main hub had access to some LED lights, which automatically shut off after a few hours each day. 

Books, in the grand scheme of things, didn't have any value.

They gave pretty words, but nothing else that could sustain the body. No food. No water. No warmth. No light. 

Useless.

There were very few things that could be individually possessed.

Everything was given to and for the Tree. 

Books were timidly shared amongst others. They had come from an Earthian resident who had come to Eden. Now she was soil for the later generations, and her possessions repurposed, including her two books. One was a novel, the other was an encyclopedia. Simon didn't know much about her while she was alive, but her words were etched on a tablet and hung on the Tree’s branch to serve as a reminder that she was to provide for the last living plant. Her books became "Earth’s memorabilia".

The pages had been thumbed and analysed, passed back and forth a billion times already, until they landed on Simon's hands. He had looked at the book, at the images inside, and tried to imagine what the colours must have looked like if they hadn't been bathed under this dirty, yellowish light.

He hadn't truly grasped what they could have been, the colours too washed out to be anything but another version of grey. 

.

The Petrova Line’s closest colour they could ever compare to was pink. It’s not truly pink, the human eye and brain not made to see all the wavelengths the cells reflected into their retinas.

Grace had tried to explain to him what this pink resembled once, talking about him bathing in that colour or some shit, though Simon didn’t truly understand.

Tau Ceti, on the other hand, was a beautiful green. Grace had looked at it both in wonder and a bit of resentment. Pink and green, opposite to each other, not only in colour but also in the way they balanced the curse and the cure, the astrophage and the Taumoeba. 

He had then sheepishly and excitedly shown him some other colours as well, looking away from the photos they had taken of the green planet, waving his hands around and pointing at this and that inside the ship.

Simon also discovered that plants were usually green too, and he fell in love with that colour. Not a love that made him cry, but a colour that brought him to his knees in hope. Then Grace talked to him about the seasons. And the context of them, how winter preceded summer, and spring was opposite to autumn. Death and rebirth. Blue, pink, green and brown. It should have been expected that the sickly yellow of the Tree was that of a dying plant, about to lose its last leaf and its last breath in a world of black. 

He wouldn't be able to truly express and describe the way he had reacted to this array of colours, this burst of new possibilities that shouldn't have been possible.

A selfish part of him had laughed in mockery of what he could now experience at the expense of Ava and the others still stuck deep in the blood ocean. That fucking Eel monster had thought him dead, crushed to death, but now he was above the universe, in a whole complete other galaxy or whatever Grace loved to theorise about. He had been plunged into hell by people who hoped he died a miserable death, but then he'd survived. He had seen more things than any of them could have hoped to ever dream. 

The laugh never lasted long. With the jubilation of his survival, there came the meaning behind the word 'survival': others died where he hadn’t. Like his other Brother, the one who died inside the SM-13 before him. Or everyone else who had tried to survive and scavenge for the sake of the Tree. And of course, the victims of the attack back in Filament Station...

He still grieved for them, even now. 

The mockery and disdain would ultimately turn into guilt and resentment towards fate itself. The colours would sometimes grow unbearable. The sharp sting of green, the flash of white from the light above his head, the blue and yellow that was Grace, and the twinkles of Rocky's barrier. He sometimes preferred the black void from which he'd been born.

But then, other days would be much better, and he'd indulgently watch movies and old song clips on the small TV set up for the three of them with Grace and Rocky by his side. During those precious days, he wouldn't get angry or listless, simply enjoying himself and accepting the fact he couldn't do anything other than wait. 

Simon had never been someone who could just sit and dawdle around. There had always been things to do or worry about before. But inside the Mary, he was forced to simply stare at whatever science project Grace was working on, sometimes providing a few ideas and bits in between. And if he ever needed to do something, it was mostly because Grace took pity on him (or rather, understood his need to move, the word 'pity' still not sitting right on his tongue) and made him mop the floor for the hundredth time, or make him move boxes and equipment from one side of the room to another. 

At least, they never talked much about the elephant in the room that was his body. 

His lack of an arm should have made Grace frustrated with the fact that Simon wouldn't and probably never will be in top shape. Even back in Eden, his stature had been why he'd been selected to participate in the Filament Station's battle. He was swift on his steps but could pack or throw a few mean punches. The lack of an arm had made him unbalanced, unsteady, and weakened, almost useless at first, and only half operational even months after. But Grace had just shrugged and leaned against Simon, whispering a "Don't tell him I said that, but between the three of us, Rocky is the strongest. He can do whatever we can't easily." The sharp chirps of a "I hear Grace!" had made Grace groan and then bump the back of his head against the wall. They ended up bickering. Rocky being so smug anout this small admission he'd already begun lording them over it, and Grace trying go put the Eridian's ego back into place.

The other thing had been his eye. The red one. He tried to hide it, even considered putting on an eyepatch, but other than a thin, blurry veil, he could still see, and he didn't want to go around wearing a bandage over his face. Grace remarked he'd look like "one of his kids' fav teacher in their books, minus the mask", whatever that meant.

But the reality still weghed heavy on his body. Once, he had braved a step in front of the bathroom mirror and aside from the deep 'burn marks' crisscrossing all over his face, there was that glaring, inhuman eye. The mark of his failures and what he was. A monster. He'd been touched by something unworldly. He should have become 'one' with the Eel, or with the Eye perhaps. He shouldn't have remained an individual human, he should have become Them, and the red eye spoke for itself.

It shone and stared back at him. 

Red. Red. Red. Looking at him through the mirror, through the red lens embedded in his face. 

R E D

Grace had been more than furious when he'd come into the bathroom later and found the mirror broken, pieces all over the sink and across the floor. Simon had looked away, his hand clumsily bandaged but not really knowing how to fix what he'd broken. Ah!

After a very stern lesson where, admittedly, Simon had mostly nodded along without really listening to Grace’s sermon, they had gone and fixed it back with some glue. Grace had forced him to participate, not that Simon would have fled the scene, but even though Grace had patched his own half of the mirror in less than half an hour, he'd stayed and looked down on Simon gingerly working on his own pieces. He had watched as he held down the pieces between his feet and applied glue with his hand, back bent in an awkward and painful angle. Grace hadn’t said anything, but his lips had been pressed together and he had stared, unimpressed, anytime Simon sighed or frustratingly waved the tube of glue in annoyance whenever the pieces slipped out of his hold. 

It had taken "them" a whole afternoon, and the mirror still looked like shit, their reflection distorded in million pieces. It stayed like that for three whole days, during which Simon did his best to do a perfunctory clean of himself and booted it out of the bathroom in record time. Then, 'mysteriously' the mirror was replaced by a smaller but immaculate one overnight. The other broken mirror was placed on the lab wall, Grace stating that if it was broken, at least he could use it as decoration. 

Simon still wondered whether or not that had been a jab at him or not. Grace’s voice had sounded deceptively cheerful and sheepish all while saying those words, scratching the back of his head after Simon had stopped dead in his tracks, his eyes finally landing on the new piece of furniture. In the end, they didn't say anything more and the mirrors stayed as they were.

He also forewent the idea of a bandage and instead decided to angle his face away whenever they talked, put a strand of hair in his face or simply didn’t (or tried not to) think about it. 

Sometimes, Simon even saw red.

It scared him as much as it disgusted him whenever this happened. The Mary would fall into a tense and thick, unbearable atmosphere. Both men were too stubborn to call it quits, whatever the reason was. And even Rocky, with his eternal patience, became jittery, throwing sharp remarks around but ultimately siding with Grace at the end of the day. Not that Simon would have it any other way, he'd rather have strangled the alien than let him abandon Grace. Still, it never helped the sour mood blanketing the ship whenever this happened. Simon would go almost mute, seething from the inside, and Grace would try to prod him out of his shell, but in the end, would give up. Or worse: he would insist, again and again and again, to try and get a rise out of Simon…

Until the fire took.

That was when they'd start trading seething, hurtful jabs at each other until it hurt, though they knew their limits… most of the time. Grace, in the end, would always throw his hands in the air and stomp towards the lab. Or Simon would silently sulk back inside their resting quarters. Rocky would jump and thump against his barrier, exploding thrills that the translator didn't pick up on Grace's orders. 

And every time, they'd come back at dinner time or at breakfast around the table, tail tucked between their legs and stiltedly express their apologies for whatever caused the outburst.

And they'd be back to watch a film all snuggled together on the couch. 

Rince and repeat. Rinse and repeat. Rinse and repeat. 

Little by little, the fights would recede.

A whole day full of tension would simmer down to an hour of petty grudge at most. 

Even the violence was kept to a minimum and eventually fizzled out as well. 

Simon worked his jaw at the memory of Grace punching him. It had happened a few weeks after Simon first boarded the Mary: Grace had broken his nose and made him spit out a bloody teeth when he'd said something scathing and absolutely uncalled for. He didn't truly remember what the argument had been about, like most other times, but they had ended up on the floor, scuffling about while Rocky tried to get their attention by banging his limbs angrily against his barrier, to no avail.

Then Simon had laughed and had said along the lines "no wonder you've been sent here, I bet they were thrilled to kick you out!". Next thing he knew, the back of his head viciously throbbed, and Grace was bashing his fists against Simon's face until Rocky had managed to get inside his hamster ball and threw himself against Grace's side, knocking him out of the way. Simon had coughed and wheezed, but whatever the blood - that fucking blood - had done to him, it had already begun to heal him, the teeth he'd just lost growing back and making his gums itch.

He'd lain there, unmoving, feeling absolutely miserable, listening to Grace's sobs.

Rocky hadn't even spared him a glance afterwards, making it clear that throwing Grace off him had been for the sake of Grace, afraid he'd regret his actions after he'd calmed down, and that’s all. Simon hadn’t even argued about it.

The worst of it all had been when he'd passed by the med bay and glimpsed Grace's slumped shoulders as he tended to his bloody knuckles. Even from the door, Simon had been able to see the tremors coursing through his hand. 

The band-aids had stayed for days while Simon's own mashed face healed in less than an hour. But the phantom pain of the blows had been everlasting. The remorse and rage dancing on Grace's face had also been seared in Simon's mind for a very long time.

The cherry on top that made Simon want to kill himself had been the fact that it was Grace who came and apologised first, stating that he shouldn't have hit him, no matter what Simon said. It was unbecoming of Grace, he'd said.

Simon had only been able to swallow back the poison pooling in his mouth and stuttered an apology as well, knowing well that it didn't encompass a smidge of regret he felt and the hurt he'd inflicted on the other man. Grace had looked blankly at Simon's face for a while, but then said after a pause, "No harm done. Let's go back to watch a movie. It's been a while."

And then that had been it. 

Well, not truly. But something had shifted between them at this precise moment.

Simon still lashed out sometimes, mostly pushing Grace away and accidentally making him stumble against the corner of a table or something, which always made Rocky barrel into Simon in retaliation. And Grace never minced his words, but he never punched him again, the ghost of it still haunting his eyes sometimes. Carefully hidden behind the glimmer of his glasses.

The shoves became pushes. Insults became swears. Yells became whispers.

The constant red at the corners of Simon's vision began to fade out as months passed by, and the calm days became recurrent until they became a habit, and then a steady constant. Those times when he felt like he was still at the bottom of that ocean, with death knocking at his chest, slowly but quietly disappeared.

Now, whenever he needed to beat himself up, he could always remember the sound of Grace's fists smashing against his face, and he'd be hurt all over again.

In all honesty, Simon would have preferred the red of the ocean over the luminous, wretched thing that was Grace’s expression after looking at his busted knuckles. 

.

.

.

“What do you plan to do afterwards?” Grace asked out of the blue. 

They were currently in the lab. Grace was absentmindedly fiddling with a pen, having long given up on the equation he was working on and instead swivelled around in his chair. Simon was lying on the couch, looking at nothing in particular. He usually would read or fiddle with a few constructs on his own, having grown a fondness for tinkering, to Rocky's delight. But right now, he didn't want to do anything and thus found himself orbiting towards Grace's space.

Simon didn't look up from where he was staring at his hands. He knew already what he was asking about. So he simply replied with an expressionless: “Nothing.”

Of course, it was enough to make Grace freeze on the spot and turn towards Simon, raising an eyebrow at him.

"You don’t have any idea? Rocky said Erid could make anything for us… Not even, I dunno, some stupid mountains to climb? Or a vast forest with a cabin in the middle of it, something like that?”

Simon shrugged again. The idea itself wasn't too bad after he'd learnt what a mountain looked like. Climbing a thing so big would definitely be a thing he'd love, thought mostly because of the fauna he'd discover rather than bullheadedly stomping to the top of it.

Still, not something he'd truly want.

"I never expected to live that long. I don't know. Maybe,” he said in a tone that meant whatever-is-whatever.

Grace didn't seem to have it that way.

“You've never… dreamed or something?” he insisted, twirling the pen in between his fingers. He'd always been proud of this trick, hypnotising even the most unruly kid of his class back on Earth. Unfortunately for him, it didn't impress Simon. He didn't even glance at Grace's fingers, preferring to look at him dead-eyed. 

“My world is dead and I was supposed to follow in the Tree's steps," he said in a muted tone.

There again, this guilt he felt still searing his insides once in a while came back full force, and he gritted his teeth, looking down at his lap and making sure his red eye was covered by a strand of hair.

Grace had the gall to lean on his chair, regardless of the fact he was dangerously tilting his whole body to the side, two rollers dangling in the air, just so he could maintain eye contact.

Asshole, Simon glared fondly. Still, he squared his shoulders and-

“Hey, it's fine you know. I also want to live. This is what makes us human.”

And there it was. Simon sighed and rubbed the side of his index finger across his eyes. That was something they never agreed on, no matter how much they already argued about it.

“You don't understand," he still dully repeated once again, "The Tree was, is, everything to me. I've betrayed it by surrendering. Worst in that, I should have died and yet I didn’t. Now I won't be able to provide for the Tree anymore. What's a life then, uh?"

Grace rolled his eyes. Not completely offhandedly, they were well past that. It was more of a sign that he was also tired of this conversation, but still played along the lines, over and over again. A well-oiled machine in a way, and somehow they found comfort in it, even though it was mostly them standing on opposite sides of the morality scale. 

“Then provide for yourself. Nurture yourself, live your life and then we'll plant a tree in Erid in which we can use our flesh for.”

“It is not that simple.”

He tried not to feel offended by the way Grace made it sound. The man didn't know the importance of the Tree, the influence it had on his whole existence. It ran much deeper than a simple reverence: it had been both a beacon of light and the sign of their impending doom, to watch the curtain slowly close and trap them all in the void of their death. Or whatever came after. The reassurance of a finite hope.

Still, Grace never meant it derisively. He simply couldn't understand it the way Simon did. 

“Isn't it that simple?" Grace continued, "What else do you want to do? Just… let yourself die? Because you have nothing anymore to stand for? Joke's on you, it's the same for me, but I don't plan on wasting away!"

The harsh tone Grace employed made Simon instinctively square his shoulders, hackles raised.

They already knew where this was going, yet they both hurled themselves into that can of worms headfirst.

“Don't put words into my mouth," he glared.

“Then what do you mean?! I don't have big plans either once in Erid. I don't know either, but it sure as hell is not sounding like I'm about to give everything up as soon as we land!”

“I never said that! If I wanted to, I'd have already just jumped straight out of your fucking ship! I want to live, remember?"

Grace's lips twitched, and he looked at the universe beyond the lab window. 

"You wanted to survive against a monster. I'm not sure you still understand the difference between living and surviving..." Grace finally murmured, looking hurt at Simon's words. 

They both probably were remembering the way Simon had locked himself inside the VR room and didn't come out for a long time. Grace had been forced to use a fucking laser gun to hitjack the lock.

They had found him crying, surrounded by trees. 

Simon grimaced at the memory, embarrassed and ashamed all the same. 

"I don’t know!” He looked wildly around. “I… don't know… Fuck!” he slammed the side of the wall. Grace glared at his outburst, but Simon hissed harder. “It must be so easy for you! Not everyone got a happy ending!”

“I am not asking to be all rose and rainbows. I just want… I worry about you. You... I... I enjoy your company and seeing you wither away is painful.”

“Then look the other way,” Simon sneered, already lashing out at Grace's eyes on him, which shone with something he did not want to acknowledge or even touch… He wouldn't!

Grace, as always, never heeded his warnings. He sprang out of his chair and took him by the hem of his shirt, hissing: “Do you truly enjoy hurting everyone who cares about you without thinking of the consequences? How righteous of you!”

“And I do not need someone with a hero complex!” Simon yelled back, gripping the man's wrists. He didn't kick with his legs though, they were past that. They had gone a long way, and Simon refused to waste all of their efforts in a single, petty fight.

“Will you ever admit that you need help?!” Grace's face fell. “Please, Simon. You're not alone anymore…” He looked down on the hands that still strangled Simon's shirt, swallowing thickly and his glasses about to fall over his nose. “I can't... I… I care for you. I want you by my side. I want to be by your side. I wish you'd see that you're not alone, I'm here and...” he gulped and looked away.

Simon stared back at Grace's face, realisation painted on his face.

His withering expression turned into fear, his mouth opening in shock.

“You do not mean it," he almost begged. 

Grace looked back, eyes narrowed. He wondered if it was because his glasses sat so low on his nose or because he was beyond frustrated with the other man. Probably both. 

“Don't put words into my mouth,” he snapped.

“You can't possibly-”

“Try me,” he hissed, shaking his fist. 

Simon tensed but didn't wrestle himself out of his grip. His horror morphed into something more fragile.

“You can't… I…”

“Simon, you're more than what you think. And the day you will realise it, I will probably stop getting grey hair all over my head,” Grace sighed.

Simon glared harder at the floor. An uneasy silence began to blanket both of them, and Grace cleared his throat. He shook his head and got off Simon's lap, wrenching his hands away from the other man’s shirt. He then rubbed at his face and sighed once again, immensely tired. Simon didn't say anything, didn't even move, strings cut and floating away, unmoored. 

Grace shook his head as the seconds ticked in and out of the room.

"Listen, I meant all I said, but we can put everything aside, I don't mind. How about we go check on Rocky, I'm sure he's up to mischief. I haven't seen him since this morning and I bet this is going to, uh…"

Suddenly, Simon blurted out: “Love burns red. That's what the second book talked about, back in Eden. It always showed it red everywhere. Red flame, red roses, red sky, red... Heart... But," he frowned, "I've seen enough red in my life.”

Grace's face paled and he bodily flinched away from the conversation. He tried a watery smile, he tried to sound angry, but all he could manage was a sad, hushed and hurt tone, “You didn't need to spell it outright you know? Could've saved yourself the trouble."

He was already trying to walk out of the lab, shaking his head, but Simon was faster, clasping his hand in Grace's, not letting go. It forced Grace to look away while Simon struggled with his own words. An ironic reversal of strength. "You should let me finish before thinking of the worst," he said.

To which Grace scoffed, managing to look a bit insulted even when he refused to look at Simon, "Look who's talking."

“Let me learn how to..." he cleared his throat, overwhelmed and words stuck behind his teeth, reluctant to come out. "Learn in other colours, I mean," he finally settled with, completely ignoring and almost speaking over Grace, brutish but gentle at the same time.

Grace flinched, and his eyes narrowed, "Are you seriously playing with me, because I will send Rocky to bite your fingers if you do. I don’t care that he doesn’t have teeth, he’ll probably invent some just to make you suffer. And I will not regret it in the slightest. You will have to grovel at Rocky's feet for a whole eternity!"

They both knew he wouldn't do that. The man had too much of a soft heart to unleash the hell that was Rocky's ire on anyone he cared for. 

"There were always three colours that I saw in my whole life," Simon tried again, his voice hesitant, but he hoped the sincerity within mollified Grace's twitching, "Black for my dying galaxy. Red for the blood. Grey for the iron. Let me see more. With you. That's... What I want.”

Grace's eyes widened and he crouched to stay on eye-level with Simon, who remained seated on the couch, his hand still tight around Grace's wrist. 

The turmoil inside his expression had shifted to something softer and hopeful. In contrast, Simon's own face had deepened with a forceful blankness that clashed with the way he'd hesitantly said those words. 

Grace licked his dry lips and passed a nervous hand across his hair, ruffling it before patting it back down into a 'proper mess', as he loved to say. 

“And, uh... what colour do you see me in?” he finally asked, his right knee bobbing from the force of his nervousness. He didn't really look at Simon, but his eyes never seemed to stray too far away from the couch on which he was sitting. 

Simon frowned at Grace's question, confused, “What?”

“You say you’ve seen only three colours so far. What do you see now?" he asked, lifting his chin up like he was asking for a challenge. 

And Simon was very familiar with challenges. He'd come to win them all. That's how he survived till he made it to the Mary. 

Simon huffed and rolled his tongue inside his mouth, pushing it against the back of his teeth. 

“You told me about pink. And green. Extensively," he said while pointing at the whole Mary in general. His eyes then roved on Grace's form, “Brown orange,” he said next, miming at the knitted foxes on the cardigan the man loved to wear. “Gold,” he scooted closer until Grace's hands brushed against him and only then did he release the tight grip on the man's wrist to tentatively brush the man's hair, passing it through his fingers. He watched Grace's eyes flutter at the phantom touch. Emboldened by it, trusting his guts, he then pressed a finger against the underside of Grace's eye, tracing the curve of it, from the inner corner to his temple. “Blue…” he said in a soft, gruff voice and then let his hand fall away, not really knowing what to say more. “Others…”

Grace smiled, one so soft it bordered on... something...

“Warning, I do have some black shirts,” he still managed to joke, scooting a bit closer towards Simon. 

He just huffed out a laugh, his shoulder twitching once, “That’s fine. I’ll learn to love that colour too.”

Grace smiled widely and pressed his forehead against Simon, delighted in the way the other's lips tentatively stretched in answer to his touch, gently pushing against Grace’s.

“I'll try my best to teach you all the best colours you've never seen before,” he swore, “I'll even discover some in the process, who knows.”

Grace's eyes shone.

Simon's smile was warm.

“I trust you.”

“And I you,” he answered.

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