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Eridians are not buoyant creatures.
Their carapaces are far too bulky, and their bodies are far too dense. Eridians who enter the water simply sink. The cooler temperatures inhibit their movement, leading to a slow, helpless shut down of their systems.
Oceans have claimed countless innocent Eridian lives.
It is no surprise then, that Eridian folklore centres around the sea.
For millenia, Parents have told to their pebbles tales of ghastly, long creatures that lurk beneath the water’s depth, the ♩♫♫.
They feast upon Eridian bodies, using their large forms to enclose and crack the carapaces of those who enter the water. Pebbles who stray from their parents' side are plucked and devoured in a single crunch.
It moves through water with long strides, concealing itself among murky depths. A body designed especially for enduring movement.
The myth of the ♩♫♫ was embedded into Eridian culture.
“Finish your cadmium or you will grow up small and weak, and the ♩♫♫ will steal you!”
“Yo egg-carrying-parental-figure so big, the ♩♫♫ can’t catch them!”
Following the discovery of sun-eaters, a killer from the dark-sky that froze them slowly, Eridian folklore of the sea slowly became synonymous with space. Eridian media at the start of the deep-cool period, when there was still the time to exercise resources in creating art, centred around otherworldly creatures appearing on Erid, the most popular of which drew inspiration in its design directly from the ♩♫♫.
Thus, when the saviour of their planet arrived, on a small foreign ship and missing 23 crewmates, alongside a skeletal creature with long protrusions emerging from its elongated frame Erid tensed with a deep cultural fear. The alien encompassed the horrors of their folklore, it made the rescue crew at the base of the Eridian space elevator feel as if they were young pebbles once more, scared to fall asleep in case the ♩♫♫ came and took them away.
The grotesque creature began to whistle, and in broken, simple Eridian declared:
“Hello Erid! Have eater-of-sun-eater. With Rocky”
The crew moved further back. Oh heavens, the creature was capable of mimicry.
It had deluded saviour-Rocky into thinking it was harmless, they searched for him. There, next to the creature in a strange sort of ball. Had the creature decided to hold Saviour-Rocky captive?
Cold horror swept through the crew, the ♩♫♫-like creature was toying with its food, they must remove Saviour-Rocky from its clutches with the utmost haste.
It had taken much convincing on Rocky’s part to convince the rescue crew, and then later the leaders of the psychological-thrum, that the creature had not harmed him.
That the bubble he was found in was not a prison but a safety-measure as the alien breathed oxygen.
Of course it had to breathe oxygen, as if it couldn’t get more horrifying.
Rocky insisted that the creature was friendly, and in dire need of medical attention. Allegedly, the arms and legs of the creature weren’t meant to be so thin, and it was suffering greatly from a lack of food.
Rocky recounted the bravery of the alien, that it had sacrificed its own home to return Rocky to Erid and save their planet.
The eater-of-sun-eaters, named Tauomeba according to Saviour-Rocky, had been deployed to Threeworld; the results were swift, dramatic, and glorious.
Thus, hesitantly a team of Eridians to care for the alien creature was created, to construct a safe containment for it, synthesise its outlandish food, and provide it with water. To the Alien-Care-Team’s ever growing horror, the ♩♫♫-like alien was near entirely water, relied upon water, and upon the request of Saviour-Rocky had a small segment of sea incorporated into its biodome.
It's not that Onyx was scared of the alien. He was a skeptic, a scientist through-and-through.
It’s just that the alien’s resemblance to the ♩♫♫ was uncanny, it activated a fear in his cultural subconscious that made him ever more alert of the creature’s movements.
Onyx was a valued member of the alien’s medical team. Each morning he approached it and noted physical changes, early in its treatment the alien attempted to communicate, a broken whistle that softly sang “need eat, need water”, yet in recent weeks this had become less common.
The alien would twitch as he entered the room, its light-sensing organs gazed beyond his head. Onyx dutifully took note of its mass, resting body temperature, and heart rate. Onyx moved closer to it, he found himself lacking the unease that coloured their previous interactions. The creature had grown extremely weak, and as it softly wheezed out a rush of words that caused its heart rate to spike he found himself pitying the creature.
Onyx was a scientist, he was well aware of the slimming chances the creature had of surviving long enough for the team to synthesise food.
Saviour-Rocky entered the treatment room, Onyx rushed to complete his recordings, but found himself hesitant to leave the creature.
“Grace” That was the name Saviour-Rocky referred to the creature with, “Grace, Rocky is here to visit”
Grace’s finger twitched in acknowledgement.
“Grace is brave. So brave. Team is working fast to get food. Grace get better. Grace meet Adrian”
Grace remained still, but his light-sensing-organs were focused upon Saviour-Rocky.
Onyx left the room, this wasn’t his moment to witness.
Miraculously, Grace had held on long enough for the Human-Specialist-Care-Team (formally titled Project-♩♫♫) to synthesise food for him.
Since then, his movement had increased and he had begun to communicate again. Rocky installed a temporary translation system in his containment room/home-away-from-biodome as his human terrarium neared completion.
The Human-Specialist-Care-Team could hardly believe they were ever scared of this creature. It was friendly, warm, and eager to talk in that atonal voice to any Eridian who would listen.
His long, protruding limbs were not used to enclose and crack carapaces, but rather to gesticulate wildly as he spoke, moving with a frenzied vigour that strangely resembled the Eridi-techno movement– a bizarre disco phenomena from the previous century.
Rocky’s visits became less frequent as his efforts to complete Grace’s home increased.
Grace had noted this change, and was excessively vocal to anyone unfortunate enough to be within radius of his light-sensing-organs.
“I don’t care about moving in! I’m happy here. Besides, I've hardly had the chance to talk to Adrian. We should be bonding, but no, Rocky’s trying to fast track my eviction notice.”
Onyx, who had drawn the short-straw and been tasked with conducting today’s Grace-update, gently placated:
“Saviour-Rocky visited six hours ago, he will return soon, and soon Saviour-Grace will have lots of space to explore and lots of dangerous water to enter”
Grace stretched his oversized arms, “But I’m bored!”
Onyx is starting to think he’d rather treat a ♩♫♫.
Grace’s newly opened home was a masterclass of Eridian engineering. The dome consisted of sound-conductive material around its exterior that allowed curious Eridians to observe their alien-saviour.
Grace’s house itself however was built with soundproof xenonite, much to the displeasure of an emerging subculture of Grace-fanatics.
The biodome had initially been met with hesitancy, as was common to all actions involving the strange alien. As such, the perimeter of Grace’s biodome, unbeknownst to Grace himself, had become a popular hotspot for Erid’s rebellious youth to convene and discuss the futility of Erid’s cultural norms.
Grace himself had become a symbol of this counterculturalism, he represented the potential of reinvention, as he himself subverted a myth that pervaded their culture for millennia.
Thus, every action Grace took resulted in a wave of new behaviour.
Grace stumbled over and fell into the sand?
Erid’s youth began throwing their bodies unto the ground in protest of standard walking patterns.
Grace threw his hands into the air in exasperation?
Erid’s youth began to emphasise their generational angst with wide gestures.
The most controversial, and generation-defining of Grace’s unintentional influences however had occurred one bright morning.
The Eridian sun was large in the sky, literally, it was massive, when Grace had decided he was long overdue for a picnic. He was well aware of how Erid felt about eating, and Rocky and Adrian were out on a date, so really, there was no better time to indulge in a me-burger by the sea.
He spread out his quilt next to the shoreline, laid backward and began to eat beneath the brilliant radiance of the Eridian sunshine.
Along the perimeter of his biodome, Erid’s rebellious youth – colloquially referred to as Gracevites, watched in awe. It was the perfect revolution. Sitting next to the dangerous sea, publicly engaging in eating of all things.
Thus the public-eating revolution began.
Parents were horrified as their pebbles, who tread at the precipice of adulthood, began to eat publicly, outside, and even in groups.
The cultural impact was monumental, and the perimeter of Grace’s biodome was marked informally as Erid’s first restaurant.
It wasn’t until Adrian offhandedly remarked “Grace is quite the rebel, eating in public.” that Grace realised that his biodome was partially transparent.
Fudge.
Adrian never found the intergalactic stray that their beloved brought home scary, how could they when he returned their love to them. They are however, slightly reluctant to grow close to the alien.
Their dynamic is one that orbits around Rocky, rarely do they cross paths with each other directly, and when they do it is awkward, but not unfriendly.
That changed one afternoon, when Rocky and Adrian were nearing the end of their daily Grace visit.
Rocky had been talking animatedly when suddenly he stopped, and dropped to the floor lifelessly.
The effect was instantaneous, both Grace and Adrian rushed toward him in instinctual terror. Frantically they scanned for injury. Had there been an oxygen leak? Had an old injury reared its ugly head?
“He’s asleep” Adrian voiced in relief.
“Oh thank God, I was so worried, for a second there I thought… nevermind"
“You thought we lost him?”
Adrian turned to Grace, of course they reacted the same, they have both experienced the terror of waiting, hoping Rocky would return to them safe.
“Oh, well I suppose I’ll let you watch him”
Grace turned to leave.
“Wait. This is your home, we can watch him together”
And so, Grace and Adrian sat either side of Rocky, initially they maintained the same awkward stillness their conversations often had when left alone. Until Grace, who really couldn’t stand silence, voiced:
“Sometimes I think he won't come back, when we were on Mary together it was easy, there wasn’t far to go and I knew he would always be near me. But now, I find myself waiting for him to show up. It scares me, that I don’t know what he’s doing all the time”
At that moment, Adrian understood Grace more than any other creature in the galaxy.
“Understand, Adrian waited for Rocky for a long time. Thought he would not return. Now he is back, but all I think about is the chance he will leave again”
Thus, Adrian and Grace became as inseparable to each other as they were to Rocky.
Rocky was oblivious to the turmoil his poorly timed sleep-schedule caused, and was shocked to find upon waking that Adrian and Grace were preparing to lecture him good-cop, bad-cop style.
For the most part, fears around Grace and his likeness to the ♩♫♫ had eased, yet there still remained a lingering uncertainty about him on Erid.
Rocky had discovered this during yet another interview with “Saviour-Rocky” wherein he was asked the “controversial, unspoken question” of whether the alien had threatened him during their time in close proximity.
Rocky was shocked that such a question was even considered, Grace being threatening?
The Grace who stumbled over his own feet?
The Grace who struggled to lift an eighth of Rocky’s mass?
The Grace who still refuses to teach Rocky the correct human curse words?
And so began the “Grace is Safe” movement, spearheaded by Rocky and steadfastly supported by Adrian. At all public events, Rocky began to wear a badge that read “Grace is Safe” in transcribed Eridian, which appeared much like human braille.
He began to narrate the actions of the human from outside the biodome, and had recruited some of the largest names in Eridian culture to the cause, after all it was hard to say no to “Saviour Rocky”
Quickly, the hearts of Erid began to warm to their strange, brave saviour, his alien eccentricities became charming.
Eager entrepreneurs capitalised on the movement, producing custom “Grace is Safe” celebration jewelry that was a sensational hit among young “Gracevites” and well-intentioned adults alike.
Yet, it was Grace himself who ultimately proved his harmlessness to Erid.
He had been, again, pacing his biodome, sue him! It killed time, gave him exercise, and was a fantastic demonstration for Rocky to narrate. Just as he was about to turn, he noticed a small Eridian at the corner of the biodome, standing against the two-sided interaction panel used for communication with the human-specialist-team.
Grace approached them slowly, lowering himself to the ground in a manner he hoped appeared unthreatening, and not “I’m going to drag you into the water”.
“Hey buddy, are you lost?”
He observed the pebble closely as his translator relayed the message.
They chirped in surprise, and went to run backward to flee, before realising that they were unaware where that direction led.
“Hey, hey, it's alright buddy, how about we hang here together, someone will check on me soon, and they will be able to bring you back to your parents.”
And so, Grace sat next to a young pebble for the better part of an hour, and because Grace really couldn’t stand silence he couldn’t help but entertain them.
When the pebble nervously voiced, “thought Saviour-Grace was a ♩♫♫, nasty creature who sink Eridians in ocean” Grace had thoroughly explained the concept of buoyancy, and why he is able to float, which he demonstrated, to the pebble’s horror, by running directly into his artificial ocean.
Once he emerged, soaked and shivering, the pebble began giggling uncontrollably, “Saviour-Grace look funny! Saviour-Grace not like ♩♫♫ at all!”
“Mica? Pebble-Mica?” a frantic voice yelled.
The pebble before him sheepishly turned toward their incoming parent.
“What on Erid do you think you’re doing? Take ears off you for a second and you’re gone!”
Grace approached the parent cautiously,
“Mica got lost, and I saw them at the edge of the dome. I'm sorry I was just waiting with them until I could find an adult Eridian.”
The parent appraised him closely
“That is acceptable… But you, young Mica, you are getting extra cadmium with your food for the next year!”
If there was one constant in the universe, it was that kids inevitably don’t keep their mouths shut.
So Mica rambled to their friends, who in turn rambled to their friends, and before long the demand to meet Saviour-Grace and learn about so-called "buoyancy" had resulted in a petition reaching Rocky.
Rocky, who had long been thinking about how to thank Grace for gifting him a human-thinking-machine, suddenly developed a plan.
It had taken surprisingly little effort on the human-specialist-team’s part to construct a “classroom” in Grace’s biodome. The true struggle was hiding it from Grace, who, although he was yet to voice a complaint, had clearly grown bored in his biodome, and wished to talk the figurative ears off the construction team.
Rocky and Adrian unveiled the classroom approximately three weeks after Mica had stumbled into Grace’s life, and approximately two Earth years after Grace had arrived on Erid.
And as Erid watched their strange alien fumble through parent-teacher meetings with a modified organ, and use his carapace-crushing-limbs to gesture toward a model of the solar system he had made from tinfoil, duct tape, and good intentions, they slowly disregarded tales of the ♩♫♫.
And in the generations that followed, Erid became less fearful of the ocean, because they had long learnt of the hope and wonder that the unknown can bring.