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He didn’t want to do this.
Easing himself down onto his lab stool, Grace shook his hands out. A shiver stabbed every nerve in his spine. He winced. This needed to be done. It did, but it didn’t change the fact that he wanted to curl up and die at the prospect. As Armando took its position in front of him, laying out the materials across the tabletop, Grace felt tears build in the back of his throat.
Biting his tongue stifled them from squeaking out, at least.
Hissing between his teeth, he watched as Armando guided the needle into the vein of his arm with robotic ease.
He exhaled hard. Inhaled harder. Willing his hammering heart to slow down, Grace felt the back of his shirt sticking to his sweaty skin. The needle didn't hurt but the pain didn't matter because, back then, it hadn't hurt much either, did it?
In fact, it had barely been a pinprick of pain.
The syringe stick smarted his thigh for only a second before his world had pitched into darkness–
“Whew,” Grace huffed, puffing his cheeks. He shook his head. “No, no, not thinking about that. Nope. Mm.” Biting his lip, he glanced back to where the needle tip was buried under his skin. His stomach flipped. “Mhm.” Below him, the first blood bag was already a quarter of the way full. He watched as red bulged against the plastic, dripping in and filling it out.
Focusing on the donating process forced his brain to shut up.
From across the room, Rocky asked, “Grace brain hurt, question.”
With a click of his tongue to his teeth, Grace shook his head. “Not hurt, no. Just…working through some stuff.” He hung his head, breathing deeply. “I’m good,” he whispered.
He just needed to breathe.
Armando unclipped the first blood bag from its collection site, sealing it and replacing it with another. Grace stared at his shoes as he croaked, “Doing good, doing good.” He felt queasy, though from the blood loss or the needle stick itself, he wasn’t sure. “Never done better.”
“Grace lie.” Rocky rolled closer, tapping against Grace’s leg in his ball. “Why Grace keep doing this, question,” he asked, singing low in displeasure. “Grace hurt.”
Glancing down at his friend, Grace rubbed his eyes behind his glasses. “I already told you. Like, just two weeks ago.” With a heavy blink, he sighed, “If I get hurt, I need blood. And there’s nobody here to give me blood, so…I have to donate to myself. Just in case.”
“Rocky remember,” he said. “Confused. Grace already have blood. Why more blood, question.”
Reaching across the lab table for his coffee, Grace’s hand trembled. Shaking his palm out, he flexed his fingers as he scooped the mug up and took a careful sip. It was bitter. Cold. He’d made it hours ago when he’d first realized it was donation day but had forgotten it in lieu of zoning out at the lab wall. Panicking in silence had taken precedence, after all. “Uh,” he began softly. “Because humans need a lot of blood if something goes wrong. A lot.”
“Rocky no like,” Rocky said.
Scoffing a hysterical little laugh, Grace nodded. “Me neither, pal.”
“Collection complete, Doctor Grace,” Mary announced.
He deflated as Armando guided the needle free and settled a soft cotton ball over the syringe site. As soon as it was taped down, Grace leapt to his feet–
Too fast.
Everything swam. Slapping a hand to the tabletop, he groaned, blinking slowly. “Geez.”
“No, no, Grace hurt, question,” Rocky stammered as he scurried closer. “Sit, sit, sit.”
He waved Rocky away. “No, I’m fine. I’m not sitting here. I…” His eyes snagged on the needle in Armando’s claw a few feet away. The pressure of phantom hands pinning him down seized his breath. Grace twisted, grabbing at his back. He slammed into the table. Startled, he reared around again, his wide eyes jumping to the exits. “I need to leave.” Breathing felt like sucking air through a straw. He scrambled out of the lab, stumbling over the lip in the doorway and nearly faceplanting.
“Stop, stop, stop,” Rocky called after him.
Grace forced himself to walk despite his waning energy.
Rocky rolled after him. “Grace hurt! Heartbeat irregular. Fast.”
“I’m fine!” Grace hollered over his shoulder. “I just…” Folding over, he planted his hands to his knees and gasped.
Why couldn’t he breathe?
“Grace,” Rocky hummed. Flush against Grace’s leg, his friend pushed through the xenonite webbing, his clawed hand taking hold of Grace’s calf and squeezing rhythmically. “Calm, calm, calm.”
A gentle hum reverberated through the air.
Starting soft at first, the sound rang like a choir through a church hall, the notes both sweetly high and serenely low. Grace breathed in. His eyes slid shut as a weighty exhaustion washed over him. Pulse slowing, he swallowed hard as the humming deepened into a rich reverberation that left him feeling floaty, almost faint. With a head full of cotton and his tongue heavy in his mouth, Grace pulled himself upright with a sigh. Blinking, he murmured, “What…?”
“Calm, calm,” Rocky said. The rhythmic squeezing continued.
Grace closed his eyes. “Wait,” he whispered. “What’s happening?” He felt as if he were floating through fog.
Terror gripped his heart.
The hum smothered his fear before his body could react.
“Wait,” Grace whined, clapping his hands to his ears. “Wait!”
As Rocky quieted, the hum petered out. Anxiety slapped Grace in the face. He reeled. Heartbeat skyrocketing into his throat, he wheezed. “What did you do?” He clutched at his shirt, his pulse hammering against his palm. “What was that?” Carefully, he curled around himself, slamming his back against a wall as he scratched his arms. “How did you do that?”
Rocky clicked his claws together, thinking. “Hm. Eridian pebbles like music. Calm. Rocky sing and calm Grace.”
“Music?” Grace whispered, his voice cracking. “You…were singing to me?”
“Calm,” Rocky said. “Music is calm.”
His friend wasn’t wrong. Grace had never felt so suddenly and irreversibly content. For those few seconds, he was a weightless thing seemingly incapable of worry or fear, lighter than a feather in his own thoughts…
Chemical sedation had felt nauseatingly similar.
“Let’s not do that again,” Grace mumbled. Shaking his head, he added with a chuckle, “I’d rather just have a good old fashioned panic attack.”
Beside him, Rocky hummed. “Rocky no like Grace hurt.”
And I don’t like being restrained, Grace wanted to say. He wanted to scream it, cowering into the corner like a child. But as he watched Rocky fiddle about, his worry evident despite his lack of expression, Grace said, “I’m okay.” Nodding hard, he repeated, “I’m okay. Yeah.” Twisting on his heel, he stomped back into the lab.
Armando had put away the blood collection materials - needle included - and, as Grace stepped in, he made a beeline for the taumoeba breeder tanks.
Maybe he just needed to do some science? A little experimentation here, testing a new hypothesis there, keeping his brain occupied because, otherwise, the darkness would creep back in. The hands, the pressure, the screaming that echoed in his nightmares as he begged for them to stop, please, I can't do this, no, no–!
Grace jolted himself into the present.
With rapt attention, he pulled free one taumoeba farm and opened the container–
It was empty.
“What the–?” Twisting around, Grace rushed for his microscope. He jammed the entire farm under the lens and frowned. Inside, dried translucent debris flaked off the edges of the xenonite system. When he tapped the edge of the farm with a gloved hand, more flakes rained down into the container.
They were dead?
Why was the taumoeba dead?
Dread punched him in the gut.
He scrambled to the other tanks along the wall, yanking open the far left incubator and ripping the farm free. Squinting, he found it populated. Thriving. Almost overpopulated. Jelly-like goo oozed off the xenonite walls. A sigh ripped free from his chest as he doubled over in relief.
Good.
Some taumoeba was alive then.
“Grace okay, question,” Rocky asked from outside the lab.
Nodding, Grace said, “Yeah. I’m okay.” Then, turning to the middle taumoeba incubators where he’d pulled the first batch, he mumbled, “Something’s wrong with incubator C. It killed the taumoeba.”
“What,” Rocky said.
“Don’t worry, we’ve got plenty. The rest look okay,” Grace said as he peeked into the other incubators. “It’s just column C that killed them off. I don’t know why, though. Let me just–” Unclipping the incubator tower, Grace scooted it towards him as slowly as he could. The xenonite rattled inside. One breeder farm toppled. It, too, was empty.
As he pulled the tower away from the wall, Grace scowled as he saw a mess of tubing and dangling wires. Something was hissing as if under pressure but he couldn't see what through the darkness.
“Dangit,” he mumbled. Squeezing in between the incubators, Grace squinted, prodding around. Something back there was hot, the skin of his fingertips jolting against the heat. “Hey, Rock, could you get me a flashli–”
His hand smacked a swollen pipe at the joint.
A bang ripped through the lab, deafening and bright.
Grace flew backwards.
He blacked out.
For a second, he was nothing. He was nobody. His body sat suspended in the silence, unable to act nor react.
“Warning: oxygen levels compromised, contaminant detected.”
Everything ached; head, back, sides, stomach, limbs.
“Warning: oxygen levels compromised, contaminant detected.”
Groaning, Grace winced as Mary’s admonition echoed in his ears, hollow and loud.
“Warning: oxygen levels compromised, contaminant detected."
He cracked his eyes open. Red light bathed the laboratory in a garish glow. With a wince, he let his head fall back, thunking against the floor. “Rock?” he called, voice muffled in his head. “Rocky?”
The alarm shut off.
“Atmospheric contaminant successfully dispelled,” Mary said. “Atmospheric conditions stabilizing.”
What happened?
Blinking hard, Grace threaded his hands under him and pushed up–
His stomach exploded in pain. A scream cracked up his throat as he writhed against the sensation of something in his stomach. Solid, unmoving, and pinning him down. Grace squirmed. His foot twitched, smacking a table leg.
“Rocky,” he whined. “Rocky! Buddy, can you hear me?”
Twisting his head to the right, he glanced over the laboratory. Almost everything looked to be intact, thankfully, with only a tipped over centrifuge and displaced stools and handheld tools to worry about.
Swallowing hard, Grace sucked in a careful breath.
He looked down.
A piece of pipe was stabbed through his middle.
“Oh crap,” he whispered, his eyes widening. “Oh crap, oh God. Okay. Okay.” Hands skittering down to the wound, he couldn't stop his sob. His shirt was soaked in blood. How far had it gone? It felt as if it were pierced through his entire torso from top to bottom. “Oh my God.”
“Grace.”
Tilting his head back, Grace watched as Rocky rolled forward slowly, his ball intact but a segment of the xenonite cracked. His friend wobbled up to his side, chittering low.
“Rocky…” Grace croaked, wincing as pain began to double every second. “I– I don't know what to do. I don't know what to do. Oh my God, I–”
“No panic,” Rocky interrupted.
“Oh Jesus, crap. Son of a biscuit–”
Rocky said, “Calm Grace, question.”
Lip wobbling, his tears fell. He whispered, “Don't…leave.” Coughing and swallowing a subsequent scream, he pleaded, “Don't leave. I can't… I can't…”
Pinned down.
Couldn't breathe.
“Please! I can't do this! No, no, no!,
“Calm, calm,” Rocky said softly. “Grace trust Rocky, question.”
Gulping, Grace nodded hard.
Rocky began to hum that sweet, high-and-low melody again.
Grace felt his rabbitting pulse slow, his eyelids growing heavier as the seconds passed. Above him, Armando wheeled close. Grace watched as the robot eased two mechanical arms under his shoulders and knees, lifting slowly.
The pain, too, was stunted.
He heard himself whine but his head was too foggy to register the sound for long. As Armando began to whisk him away, Grace let his body go limp.
Rocky sang, following close. He stayed glued to Grace's side.
Slowly, Armando settled him on one of the cots in the sleeping area. Its arms moved deftly, claws pinching and shifting as it cut his shirt free. An oxygen mask settled over his mouth and nose. It gathered a needle–
Grace’s chest hitched. “Wait.”
Rocky's hum grew louder. Grace's head lolled to look down at his friend. Crawling up into the xenonite tube next to his bedside, Rocky’s song echoed through the sleeping quarters, impossible to ignore.
“Wait…” Grace whispered. Armando slid one needle into the back of his hand. Another claw readied a bag of his blood, hooking it high above his head. It prepared a second syringe of clear fluid. “Wait. Wait.” Grace felt himself flail. His brain lagged behind. Armando pinned him down. “Stop! Please!”
“Please remain still, Doctor Grace,” Mary chimed. “Surgery will begin promptly after anesthetics are administered.”
Another sob wracked his body. Pain exploded through his torso. “Please–!”
“Calm, calm,” Rocky cooed. Through the xenonite netting, he squeezed Grace’s hand. “Calm, calm, Grace. Rocky here. Rocky watch Grace.”
He tossed his head back with another weak wail.
“I will not leave,” Rocky said.
Grace glanced over to him, eyelashes clumped with tears.
He let the syringe slide into place.
As soon as the anesthetic flushed through his body, Grace felt unconsciousness calling.
“I can't…” he choked. “I…”
As his eyes rolled back, he didn't get to say, don't leave me.
Grace resurfaced to silence.
“Eye movement detected.”
A tapping echoed through his numb mind.
“Grace.”
Rocky?
“Grace wake up, question.”
He couldn't talk. Not yet.
“Good morning, Doctor Grace,” Mary began. “Procedure: successful. Penetrating abdominal injury addressed. No major organ damage detected.” As he listened, the words went in one ear and out the other, his mind too airy to focus. She continued, “Pain management medications administered. Next dose in four hours, three minutes, and twenty-seven seconds.”
Hearing the telltale clatter of Rocky’s claws on the xenonite, Grace cracked his eyes open to his friend inching closer. They were practically face to face–or, well, Rocky’s version of it. The thought had Grace smiling, not yet capable of a laugh. “Hey, pal,” he whispered. “You're okay?”
“Rocky not hurt,” Rocky said. “Grace hurt. Grace stupid, statement.”
That punched a wheezy laugh out of him. It stung. “Yeah, I know.” Blinking up at the ceiling, Grace slowly brushed over his abdomen. He was naked from the waist up, his middle swaddled in heavy bandages. To his right, he watched as his blood dripped down an IV tube and into the back of his hand. “Guess that stuff came in handy after all,” he whispered.
Rocky perked up. “Grace need much blood. Much, much, much.”
Pain pierced through his side with every breath. Another glance to the needles under his skin had him fidgeting, his fingers wriggling at his sides, itching to rip those things free–
Hands on his back, his shoulders, shoving him into the grass as he screamed–
“Rocky,” Grace said, his breath catching on his panic. “Please keep singing. The song. I–”
He swallowed hard.
“I trust you.”
Like a ship calling to the shore, the hum that began filling the room felt distant and gentle. Within seconds, nothing hurt. Everything was peaceful. He felt lightweight and floaty.
Rocky pushed through the webbing between them, tapping Grace's shoulder just above the collarbone. “Calm, calm, calm,” Rocky said. “Good, good. Grace feel comfortable, question.”
Between the pain medication and Rocky’s song, Grace felt more than comfortable. He hummed his affirmative. Swimming in the silence of his own head for the first time in a long time, Grace sighed.
“Grace,” Rocky began softly. “Why hate needle, question.”
His tongue felt thick, the words heavy in his mouth. “It's…how they got me aboard–how my friends back on Earth got me on this mission.”
“Grace didn't want to be on mission, question,” Rocky asked.
With a shallow shake of his head, Grace hummed, “I begged them not to send me.” The inklings of a panic attack reared its head. Rocky’s song drowned it out. “But they did it anyway. They had to sedate me. Knock me unconscious. They used a needle to do it.”
The ship went quiet.
Rocky’s claws clacked next to him. Still tapping against Grace’s collarbone, he said, “Why, question.”
“I had no one to miss me,” Grace said, Stratt’s voice overlapping his own in his head. “And I was the best for the mission. I understood the astrophage inside and out, so.” That gentle hum grew louder, ringing through the ship like a cat's purr. Grace’s eyelids drooped. He whispered, “Rocky…?”
“Rocky would miss Grace,” his friend said. “I love you.”
As sleep called for him, Grace felt himself smile as he said, “I love you, too, bud.”