Chapter Text
Ryland Grace had grown used to the fact that he was never going to see another human again.
He wished he could say he’d known from the second he and Rocky had left for Erid that he was going to stay. That there wasn’t a second he’d genuinely considered taking the Eridian scientists up on the offer to get him back to Earth. But that wasn’t true. There was a reason they’d started repairing the ship.
First, there was the food. Taomoeba were edible (if a bit gamey) but the prospect of eating the same food every day forever was not the most fun thing to think about, or the best on his body. Malnutrition wasn’t particularly pleasant. Then there was the gravity, built for dense Eridian bodies and not thin human skeletal structures. While it wasn’t enough to be life-threatening, arthritis was on the horizon. He wouldn’t be walking forever. He had to live on the ship for a while, which was nothing new, but it did feel odd to sit inside it all day knowing he was perched securely on the ground. And of course there was the whole never-seeing-another-human-again thing.
But then there was the synthesized food. Rocky roped some other Eridians into researching human nutrition, and thus the me-burger was born. The concept was gross, but it was surprisingly easy to get over after being stuck with coma slurry and Taomoeba for months. They didn’t stop there, though. Different flavors, different toppings, and eventually, entire synthesized meal options were presented to him by proud Eridian researchers.
On most days, Grace was a little achy at worst. Occasionally, though, he’d be shaky getting out of bed, gravity tugging at his bones and ironically making his balance worse instead of better. Rocky noticed the difference almost before Grace did, and the Xenonite mobility aids came soon after.
Then there was the biodome, carefully constructed and maintained by Adrian. It was incredibly sweet that it had even been made in the first place; Grace was ready to accept living on the ship. Instead, Rocky and Adrian got to work with a team of Eridian engineers on building not only a fully habitable area, but an artificially constructed beach. Grace had admittedly teared up a little at its completion.
The day he knew he was going to stay on Erid was long after they’d landed, when Rocky told him that they were working on the ship. That he could potentially go home again. Can I think about it? The question had fallen from his lips almost by accident, and it sent a physically painful jolt through his body as unwanted memories crashed through his skull. But Rocky hadn’t told him to decide, given him a countdown, made a joke out of his unsureness. He’d just plopped down in the sand next to Grace, chirping happily. Yes. Think about it long time. Grace knew in that moment he had nothing he needed to think about.
Most days, Grace was happy in the company of Eridians. He had Rocky, Adrian, and his students. He was surrounded by more affection than he had been in a long, long time. Most days, that was more than enough.
Some days, though, he would stare out at the open water, absentmindedly searching for a sign of life. He didn’t regret his choice, but that didn’t mean it never hurt. Later, he would find himself wandering into the Hail Mary and sitting in the simulation room, watching movies. Romances. Documentaries. Dramas. Humans making connections, breaking connections, singing, dancing, touching each other. Every time, he would only notice after the fact that his face was wet from tears.
It was on one of those days that it happened. He hadn’t yet reached the Watch The Notebook and Cry stage yet, but he was well into the Staring Out At The Sea phase. Rocky was at home with Adrian; it was past when he’d usually be asleep by now, so Grace was alone. That definitely made the feeling worse, but it did spare him having to make up an excuse for his melancholy mood.
As usual, there were no boats on the water. No shouts in the distance, no one swimming in the waves. There was just water, shimmering in the light from the artificial moon Adrian had recently installed on the ceiling of the biodome, fading as it crossed a small shadow.
Grace squinted. He wasn’t sure why it had taken him this long to question the presence of a small shadow inside his entirely empty and uninhabited ocean. It was a formless blob, but it was contained enough not to be an illusion caused by the waves. Something was there. He took a deep breath, closed his eyes, and opened them again. It was still there, a few meters from the shore. Easily swimmable. He shook his head; he was being silly. It was a trick of the light, or Adrian had added some sort of extra failsafe to keep the waves running. He turned to go inside.
Then he turned back around, took his jacket off, laid it carefully down on the shore, and stepped out into the water.
As it turned out, the shadow was bigger than he thought. As he dove under a wave, water entered his mouth and he spat it out as he reached the surface again, rubbing his eyes with one hand as he treaded water. It tasted wrong. He was inside the shadow now, and even in the dim light he could tell now that it wasn’t a shadow at all. The area itself was stained a different color, as though someone had put food coloring in a giant eyedropper and meticulously dropped it in. As Grace swam over another wave, his foot brushed something underneath him. Something warm.
Against his better judgement, he sucked in a breath and dove down, grabbing at the offending object. The familiar texture of skin met his own, cold and clammy. He gave a yelp of shock and a rush of bubbles emerged from his mouth, rising fitfully to the surface. He followed them up, gasping for air, then dove down again. He reached out. It was still there. A body. He wrapped his arms around it and desperately kicked his legs, following the waves back to the shoreline. He couldn’t properly carry whatever—or, as he was quickly realizing, whomever—it was, but the waves in combination with a surge of good-old-fashioned adrenaline was enough for him to make it back to where he could properly reach the ground. Blinking strange, murky water from his eyes, he dragged the figure out of the false ocean and collapsed next to it, gasping for breath. He sat up before his body was ready, and his vision fogged again. His glasses were a few feet away with his jacket, too far to reach without standing, but he didn’t need them to confirm what was lying next to him in the sand.
Ryland Grace had grown used to the fact that he was never going to see another human again. As it turned out, he was wrong.