Chapter Text
Rocky felt the 7:40 tram from Geneva arrive before he heard Grace.
The mountain habitat had its own rhythm now: pump cycles, air‑handling, the faint shudder of the hourly trams arriving at the platform.
The vibration faded. Footfalls approached on the human side of the xenonite. Rocky turned toward the wall, all five limbs braced lightly on the frame.
Two knuckles tapped the xenonite in their usual spot.
"Grace," Rocky said. "You are early."
On the other side of the wall, Grace checked the flat disk on his wrist. "I am exactly on time."
"The budget meeting is not until nine-hundred," Rocky said. "So, early."
Grace laughed. Not the careful, managed laugh Rocky had learned to recognize in their first years together — the one that meant I am fine, stop asking — but a real one, short and easy, the kind that came without calculation. Rocky had catalogued the difference carefully. He still noticed it every time.
Grace was well. That was the word Rocky kept returning to in his internal logs, which were probably not supposed to contain the word well as a technical assessment, but there it was. Grace moved differently on Earth. His spine was straighter. His steps had a particular loose confidence that Rocky had never heard on Erid, where Grace had always moved carefully, conserving energy under twice the gravity his body was designed for.
His body was bigger, too — with more soft fat and hard muscle over his internal carapace. More like he'd been when he and Rocky first met in the Tau Ceti system.
Behind Rocky, Kiri scrambled up a support bar, claws ringing softly on metal, and hooked himself near the xenonite with the effortless speed of someone who had grown up on frames and rails.
"Uncle Grace is here," Kiri's stone announced. "Good morning, Uncle Grace."
Grace's face did the thing Rocky particularly liked: it went warm in a way that involved his eyes as much as his mouth. He lifted his hand to the xenonite wall.
Kiri flexed his fingers into a fist. Grace mirrored it on his side. Their knuckles met through six centimeters of xenonite and two atmospheres of pressure difference.
"Morning, buddy," Grace said.
"Nadia taught Kiri about human family structures," Rocky said. "New words. New rituals."
"New obligations," Kiri added seriously. "Aunt Nadia says uncles are responsible for fun, snacks, and terrible jokes. I am keeping a list."
Grace pressed a hand to his chest. "A list," he said. "Of my terrible jokes."
"For scientific purposes," Kiri said.
"That is the most concerning thing you have ever said to me," Grace told him, and Kiri's chords brightened with delight, which the stone rendered as a sound somewhere between a laugh and a musical run. Grace had stopped startling at that sound approximately two years ago. Now he just grinned at it.
“Where is Aunt Nadia?” Kiri asked.
"She arrives from the JESS on the afternoon shuttle," Grace said. "Remote work this morning. Lessons with Kiri after."
“She will be pleased. I have done my homework already,” Kiri said.
"Good," Grace said. His shoulders were relaxed in a way Rocky had been tracking for three years: a slow, incremental unwinding that had started the first time Grace had gone swimming in the lake below the mountain and come back up the path looking like a different person. Rocky had logged it under recovery indicators and then quietly moved it to a folder he thought of as things that make my hearts work correctly.
"You and Adrian have a busy day planned?" Grace asked.
"Nominal," Rocky said. "Adrian has new dome thermal models. Kiri learns vocabulary. I work on configuration improvements for the relay nodes in the Earth–Erid communication chain."
"Relay nodes?" Grace shifted his weight the way he did when something moved from casual to work‑mode. "Power side or comms side?"
"Both," Rocky said. "If we treat the communication array and the Astrophage power bus as one system instead of two, we can reduce total component count by approximately fourteen percent and improve long‑baseline signal stability."
Grace’s eyes went bright in the particular way they did when an engineering problem had just become interesting to him. "Keep this up and next you’ll tell me you’ve figured out how to beat sixteen light‑years of signal delay between Earth and Erid."
"Not possible," Rocky said, then clicked once in realization. "Oh. Sarcasm."
Grace laughed, the sound sharp and pleased. "Yeah. But if anyone could do it, it’d be you."
"Accept," Rocky said simply. "But still not possible."
"Show me after lunch?" Grace said.
"Yes," Rocky said. "After your ten‑hundred meetings."
Grace snorted. "It’s not that bad."
He tapped his tablet against the xenonite so Rocky’s texture pad could read it. Rocky brushed the pad over the surface and felt the raised patterns resolve into Eridani glyphs, times, names.
"Today only," Rocky counted. "Budget planning session at nine-hundred. Astrophage research update at eleven-thirty. Pelagos dome integration at thirteen‑thirty. Human–Eridian liaison briefing at seventeen-hundred." He clicked once, disapproving. "Too many things."
"Most of those are less than an hour," Grace said. His heartbeat ticked up a little, a fast, bright flutter. "And I’m not doing them alone. It’s fine."
"Not fine if you fall over," Rocky said.
Grace put his hands on his hips. "I’ll survive my terrifying calendar, I promise. Besides, I get the fun part after lunch."
"Relay nodes are not fun," Rocky said, offended on principle. "Relay nodes are vital communications infrastructure."
"Vital communications infrastructure with my best friend," Grace said. "That counts as fun."
Rocky’s carapace flexed with a low, pleased chord he did not bother to hide. "Accept. But you still need fewer meetings."
Grace had picked up his bag and started to turn when Kiri pressed both hands to the xenonite.
"Uncle Grace," Kiri said. "Today we are having a thrum circle."
Grace paused. "Yeah?"
"Yes," Kiri said. "A formal one."
Something in Grace's expression shifted — not worried, exactly, but attentive in the way he got when he was filing information away for later. "Okay," he said. He looked at Rocky. "Let me know how it goes?"
"Yes," Rocky said. "Lab time. After lunch."
"After lunch," Grace agreed. He touched the xenonite once, briefly, the way he always did when he was leaving, and walked away down the corridor.
Rocky tracked the sound of his steps: easy, unhurried, someone with somewhere good to be. He listened until they faded into the general hum of the habitat.
Behind him, Kiri dropped lightly from his bar.
"He seems happy today," Kiri observed.
"He seems happy most days now," Rocky said. "This is correct. This is how he should be."
Kiri's chords held a thoughtful middle register. "On the ship he was not like this. He was – quieter."
"Yes," Rocky said. "Humans are not supposed to be separated from their kind for so long. It changes them." He paused. "Earth un‑changes him. Slowly. Having a family helps."
Kiri absorbed this. "But we are his family," he said simply.
"Yes," Rocky said. "And he is ours."
He reached for the corridor transmitter and turned up the gain.
"Adrian," he said. "Thrum circle now."
They gathered in the Eridian common node just off the lab corridor: a widened juncture of frames and handholds, large enough for the core eight team members to anchor comfortably. The ambient hiss of human‑pressure air was faint beyond the xenonite. Outside, through the mountain's upper viewport, the sky above Geneva was the particular pale blue it got on clear June mornings.
The Eridian node was solid and familiar now, frames polished by nearly five years of claws, but Rocky never forgot it was a temporary shell under a human mountain. The dome on the floor of the Mediterranean would be their true home in this system.
Rocky found this pleasing. He did not mention it.
They opened the way they always opened a formal circle, with their full work‑names: the name Grace had honored them with first, followed by their unique identifiers—pair‑bonds and family names left unspoken.
"Rocky‑Star‑Savior‑Master‑Engineer‑of‑Rough‑Plains."
"Adrian‑Vigil‑Keeper‑Scientist‑of‑High‑Cliffs."
"Tevik‑Path-Wanderer‑Diplomat‑of‑Southern‑Sea."
"Mara‑Strong‑Singer‑Diplomat‑of‑Valley‑City."
"Rii‑Laughing‑Chords‑Linguist‑of‑Valley‑City."
"Talem‑Deep‑Echo‑Linguist‑of‑Stone‑Nest."
"Kesh‑Wind‑Dancer‑Generalist‑of‑Storm‑Plains."
"Laru‑Steady‑Seeker‑Generalist‑of‑Rough‑Plains."
As the last name sounded, the eight of them clicked their manipulators once in unison, a sharp, familiar acknowledgement that the circle was formed. Kiri hung at the edge of the circle, not yet old enough to carry a full name‑string, simply present and quiet.
"The agenda is long‑term crew distribution," Rocky said. "Tevik needs a proposal for the human planning session next week. We have the framework. Today we confirm it."
"Confirm it, or argue about it again," Kesh said cheerfully from the high bar.
"Confirm it," Rocky said. "With some argument. This is most efficient."
Rii's chords brightened with amusement. Mara's did not, but her posture softened in a way that meant the same thing.
Tevik laid it out cleanly, as he always did: twelve Eridians remaining in Sol for the long term, twelve returning to Erid on the Perseverance once primary objectives were met. Engineering pairs staying to support dome and station. The diplomatic and linguistic pairs staying for cultural continuity. Scientists and generalists distributed by project need.
"The dome is the critical path," Rocky said. "Until it is operational, nothing else is truly settled. Once we have the dome running and the first relay nodes in the Earth–Erid chain deployed, the mission enters its maintenance phase. At that point the distribution question answers itself."
"And our return?" Adrian asked. Her chords were level. Carefully level, Rocky noted.
"When the work is done," Rocky said. "There is much to do first. The dome alone presents several years of engineering challenges." He felt his own harmonics lift at that: good problems, interesting problems, problems whose solutions had not been found yet. "The relay node configuration I was describing to Grace this morning — that alone changes the structural approach significantly. And the thermal gradient management in the deep sections is still not solved."
"It will be solved," Bera said from the side frame, with the comfortable certainty of someone who had been solving structural problems since before Rocky had his full adult size. "Give us time."
"Time is what we have," Rocky agreed. "This is one of the good things about this mission."
"We do have time," Adrian said. "And I am glad of it. I only want to make sure we use it thoughtfully."
"We will," Rocky said. He touched her nearest leg gently, the way that meant: I hear what you are not saying, and I am not ignoring it, I am only setting it aside for now because the work is real and the work matters. Adrian touched him back for a moment, then let her leg settle.
She would raise the issue again. He knew that. She was right to raise it. But not during the thrum circle.
"The humans have a phrase," Rii said. "'Building something to last.' I have been thinking about this. The dome will exist long after we are gone from this system. Humans and Eridians will use it who have not yet been born. Is this not an extraordinary thing to be doing?"
The node held that for a moment.
"Yes," Laru said, chords warm and even. "It is."
"I want to see the data from the latest deep sensor array," Talem said. "If we are building for centuries, we should understand what else is living in that water."
"After circle," Rocky said. "I will pull it."
"And the relay array schematics?" Kesh asked, with the barely‑contained enthusiasm of someone who had been waiting to get their limbs on a new engineering problem.
"Also after circle," Rocky said. "Patience."
"Kesh-Wind‑Dancer is not good at patience," Kesh said cheerfully.
“Kesh‑Wind‑Dancer is practicing patience,” Laru said at the same time, with the affectionate flatness of a long‑established work‑pair. “Results are pending.”
Tevik brought them back to the formal shape. "Then we are agreed on the broad framework. I will take the distribution proposal to the human planning session. Rocky and Adrian remain as primary leads for dome construction and station systems. All others hold current assignments pending further review."
Assent moved around the circle: Adrian, Rii, Mara, Talem, Kesh, Laru in turn.
Rocky added his own pulse.
"Agreed," Tevik said. "Circle closes."
The names were not spoken again at the close. The circle had opened with them and that was enough.
Kiri dropped from his perch and landed beside Rocky with a neat, practiced click of claws.
"That was shorter than I expected," he said.
"We agreed," Rocky said. "Agreement is efficient."
"Aunt Nadia says humans take much longer to agree on things," Kiri said.
"Yes," Rocky said. "We will work on that together."
In a few hours Grace would come back down the corridor with coffee and a tablet full of questions about relay node configurations, and they would spend the afternoon arguing productively about stellar drift and signal stability, and it would be, Rocky thought, an extremely good use of a day.
There was a dome to design. A communications relay to build.
He turned back toward his workstation, already thinking about the structural challenges, already looking forward to lab time with Grace.