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Sometimes when Rocky woke up, he wanted to hide from sleep forever.
He had everything that he needed to survive the fear. His own atmosphere, centering him in his body. His own air, fresh rather than recycled, that he was able to breathe for the first time in decades. All the food and minerals he could possibly want. And most importantly, Adrian. Adrian’s warmth and protective, all-encompassing gaze there for him when he woke up, the intimate brush of eir carapace against his, the uniquely melodic cadence of eir voice.
He’d missed em so badly.
But sometimes, when he awoke from that void, the panic gripped him again. What if he never woke up again? What if he did wake up, and everything he’d just gotten back had vanished?
Adrian hadn’t been on the ship, so Adrian would never be able to fully understand. He loved that about em. He needed that about em. But sometimes, he needed the only person who shared his fears.
After eating with Adrian and polishing each other’s carapaces, he told em that he needed to go for a walk. E hummed understandingly, returning to eir newest construction: a model for a new communication device, modeled loosely after Grace’s description of Earth “telephones,” but intended for interplanetary distances.
By the time Rocky secured himself in his protective suit and crawled into Grace’s habitat, he was already breathing easier. Rocky could hear the endlessly varied waves in Grace’s little ocean, folding and collapsing over one another, water upon water. So much water for such a little planet. Tugged by the moon, he’d said. When Rocky had swam in it, he’d felt suspended, as if lost in the vast weightlessness of space.
Close to Grace’s house, he listened carefully. Grace’s breath was long and deep. He was snoring slightly. The soft sound waves rippled over Rocky’s carapace, allowing his muscles within to relax.
He hadn’t brought a key with him, although he wouldn’t really need one to get in. But Grace’s door wasn’t even locked. Trust, Rocky thought, and felt his heart leap with tenderness.
He crawled into Grace’s room and climbed quietly onto his pillow. He held still, thoroughly sensing Grace’s body to ensure he was okay. Yes, breathing as he should; yes, heart pumping precious blood; yes, all bones and tendons in the right place. He nudged Grace’s head gently away from where it was bunched up to his shoulder so he’d be less sore in the morning.
Rocky felt the beating of his own heart, strong and steady. How different Grace’s was. Grace was bigger than Rocky, yet full of soft, wet muscle protected by nothing but a layer of supple skin. It was easy for Grace to bleed; Rocky had seen him bang his head and elbows several times while on both of their ships, the skin breaking open to reveal blood made vivid by oxygen, or else blood pooling beneath the skin, turning tender and warm. Grace could only handle light touch, unable even to withstand the pressure of Erid’s atmosphere.
What an astonishingly strange and fragile creature.
Rocky sighed. He couldn’t help it — despite Grace’s heroism and courage, Rocky sometimes felt like he was in the presence of a baby, or a very small and endangered creature.
He folded his legs beneath himself to watch Grace. He wished, not for the first time, that he could touch Grace’s hair without his suit. It looked so soft, so delicate. Grace swore that his hair didn’t feel anything, that it didn’t have nerves, more like scales than tentacles. But Rocky wondered.
Rocky paid attention to the movement of Grace's eyes beneath his lids, their erratic flicker back and forth. How odd the eyes, little whizzing spheres, sensing light, too sensitive to touch. Part of that strange coalescence of organs that identified humans as much as Eridians' tattoos, but limited by the confines of genetics. Grace had said, too, that he had “dreams,” that the eyes moved while dreaming. Rocky wondered what it must be like to dream, and how Grace could possibly feel safe doing it on his own. Rocky’s fear of the void, that was one thing — but at this moment, Grace’s brain was showing him visions entirely out of his control. Rocky knew that they were frightening sometimes. “Nightmares,” Grace called them.
Rocky hummed an Eridian sleep-watching song. He hummed it quietly enough that Grace’s human ears certainly couldn’t hear it, but he hoped that his body would feel it. The vibrations would gently buzz in his bones and regulate his nerves, his pulse, and assure him that he was safe.
When the habitat began to grow slightly warmer, Rocky knew that the simulated sun was rising, and Grace was bound to wake up soon. And when he did, he would watch over Rocky if he grew tired again. Neither of them would be alone.