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Rocky likes being kept busy.
On their ship, with his twenty-two crewmates, there was always something to be made, something to be fixed, something to talk about or laugh about. Even being so far from home, from Adrian, there were at least others, many of whom were their schoolmates, their friends, and sometimes friendly rivals. Sometimes.
But when their crew dwindled, when they were the last, the silence of the vast abyss was endless.
Except for the occasional ping of something breaking or moving on the ship (there was a lot of that), swaths of silence painted Rocky’s senses. And nothing changed. Nothing changed for far more years than they wanted to remember. They sometimes wished that they could open up their carapace and chisel off chunks of their brain in the hope that they couldn’t remember.
But they kept busy. Kept working. As best as they could.
Until they had heard the roar of a much smaller ship coming to Tau Ceti.
Until the strange squishy alien tapped on their xenonite walls.
Until they shared about Erid and Earth, vowing to save both.
Until Rocky saved Grace. Until Grace Rocky saved stars. Until Grace saved Rocky.
Now, they are always, always, always busy with their friend-mate. Happy, happy, happy.
Now, they’re heading to Erid.
Grace assured them that the beetles on the Hail Mary would make it back to Earth (that’s why they made four, after all), that he was okay with not seeing Earth and not going home a hero (he insists he’s not, which makes no sense, exclamation!), and that he was ecstatic to see Rocky’s home and meet Adrian.
So far, it’s been a blast. They have no shortage of Earth media to go through, whether it was movies, or listening to music (it’s a lot simpler than Eridian chords, but Rocky still appreciates it all), or playing games together. Rocky prefers the building games where they work together, but Grace likes the competitive ones, but he gets smug every time he wins and Grace cheats, statement!
Of course, they still make sure there’s no issues with the Taumoeba farms or the fuel, and thankfully there hasn’t been. But the work is done, for the most part, and now it’s time to go home.
It hasn’t been easy. Grace mutters low to himself when he thinks Rocky can’t hear (Grace dumb, Rocky can hear everything) about his food situation, about how he’ll have to ration until he runs out, how he’ll have to survive on Taumoeba until reaching Erid.
Rocky has so much food. Enough for twenty-three Eridians for several decades. For Grace, it’s a lethal cocktail of heavy metals. Rocky would be fine, but their best friend might slowly starve before they even got home.
I’ve made peace with it, Grace said, and I mean it this time, it’s not just something I’m saying. You’re the reason I want to be brave and go to Erid. And like I said, the things I got to do and see with you? Wouldn’t trade it for anything, buddy.
Well, Grace might have, but Rocky…no. They would think of something. They’d already thought of the xenonite suit so they could walk easier on the ship and touch Grace without hurting him, why not something they could do for their friend-mate?
Tonight, while Grace sleeps, Rocky angles their camera-gun at the human thinking machine, watching an Earth movie. It was ˈænəˌmeɪtɪd, as Grace explained, meaning humans drew it by hand and made the illusion of movement with it by taking a picture for every frame. Eridians had never made such a thing, and Rocky was entranced by the first of these movies they watched. They loved the young human at the center of the story, the friends she made, her growth and courage to save her parents and herself.
This movie is also ˈænəˌmeɪtɪd, this one about a human prince trying to cure a sickness he has, and he met another human in the forest with a large Earth creature Grace called a wʊlf. Rocky taps their claws excitedly. In this scene, the prince sees a strange creature in the forest with long rocks on its head, and the prince’s wound bubbles and seethes at the sight of it. Ugh, disgust! Even ˈænəˌmeɪtɪd humans were so leaky! And they ate in front of each other. Disgust, disgust!
A sob comes from behind them.
Rocky taps a button on the thinking machine to pause the movie, pivoting towards the lump of blankets and mattresses and stepping closer. Grace’s heart beats hard in his ribcage, his lungs stuttering with the sobs and words. The blankets rustle loudly as he kicks his legs, as though he’s running.
Rocky knows that human sleep is far different than Eridian sleep. Eridians completely lose consciousness, unable to move or talk or gain any sensory input while sleeping. Humans, on the other hand, wake easily, move and sometimes talk, and do something called ˈdrimɪŋ.
Grace explained that it was their brain’s way of processing all the information and sensory input it received during the day. Humans do it every night, but sometimes they can remember their drimz. It’s mostly in light, but also in sound and sometimes sensation. The drimz were also mostly nonsensical, but humans throughout history sometimes believed they could give insight into someone’s mind or even predict the future. Amaze.
But Grace also explained that some drimz caused stress and fear, especially if someone had experienced something terrible or frightening. Those were called ˈnaɪtˌmɛrz. He had a couple while working on saving their stars, but since they’ve left for Erid, they have become more frequent. Grace’s method for not having ˈnaɪtˌmɛrz is to keep himself busy and awake. Rocky thinks it’s a terrible idea and wastes no time telling him how bad it is, but their human is nothing if not stubborn.
Thankfully, Grace had told them how to help.
Rocky carefully steps closer to Grace’s body, buried still in the blankets. His light-sensing organs are leaking, which he says can happen when humans get very emotional. They can tolerate this. They begin to purr and trill softly, touching their human’s arms through the xenonite suit and shaking him gently.
It works. Grace starts with a gasp, panting. His gaze moves from the clear xenonite wall to his friend.
“Grace having bad sleep again,” Rocky says. “Don’t be scared.”
His breaths come in shaky inhalations. His heart rate slows down, but it’s still elevated. He opens his mouth, like he is going to say something, but instead another sob comes out, and he covers his light-sensing organs. Oh, it must’ve been a very bad ˈnaɪtˌmɛr.
The Eridian trills louder. “Come here…Rocky is here, here, here.” They wrap two of their arms around Grace’s blanketed body, until the xenonite suit presses against him. Gentle pressure helps humans when they’re stressed, Grace said to them once. They tighten their grip—slightly, very slightly, Grace is a very fragile human—and purrs, letting the vibrations comfort him. Their human continues to sob.
“Grace is brave human, good human. Bad sleep not real. Bad sleep lie to Grace.” They sing a few chords, the start of a lullaby meant for pebbles when they were newly hatched. If their human were an Eridian, he would still be a small little hatchling, barely able to walk.
They stay that way for several minutes, before Grace eases his grip and sits upright, wiping at his face. His heart has slowed to a normal pace, alongside his breathing. At least, in his lungs. There are fluids in his head, in holes called ˈsaɪnəsəz. Rocky can’t even imagine having holes in their carapace like that. So, so leaky.
“Grace better, question?”
“Y…yeah, buddy,” he says weakly, sniffling. “Thanks, Rocky. I really needed that.”
“Why bad sleep, question? Grace remember why, question?”
He sighs. “Just…about Earth. I drim I go back and everyone’s dead, and I’m the last human being alive, I failed everyone, and I just…” Grace shakes his head. “And I hear voices telling me it’s my fault, everyone died because I was a coward and I didn’t go and I hesitated and I ran—”
Another sob escapes from him, and Rocky trills and tightens their grip around Grace again.
He told them that he had been forced onto the mission, that he didn’t want to go but was the only option. Rocky was angry, his chords reaching a pitch that the computer couldn’t translate properly. Yet as furious as they were at the human Grace called Stratt, he said he understood why she had to. Earth had so little time to solve the Astrophage crisis before everything on Earth—flora, fauna, and humans—died. Time they took to find someone else was more living things dead later. It was desperation that sent twenty-three Eridians on their ship, and desperation sent three humans, one against his will, to a distant star, never to return. And, as they thought about it, Rocky did understand. It didn’t mean they had to like it, though.
“What…what if I’m a failure, Rock…? What if everyone did die, and the beetles go back to a frozen Earth—”
Rocky stomps three of their legs in emphasis. “Grace not fail! Grace and Rocky find Taumoeba, Grace sent all beetles, one will make it! Grace sent beetles in time! Bad sleep lies to Grace. Bad bad bad.”
Grace wipes at his light-sensing organs. “I know, Rock, it’s… drimz don’t always make sense, remember? And sometimes they just replay what you’re afraid of. And I’m afraid it…it was all for nothing.”
The Eridian stomps again. “Not for nothing, statement. Sol will be bright again, Earth live, humans live, everyone happy, happy, happy. Earth live so Erid and Earth talk one day.”
Their human curves his mouth up, and Rocky croons joyously. It was such a strange and sometimes scary gesture at first meeting, but it became comforting. It means that Grace is alive, Grace is happy, Grace is excited, and that makes Rocky feel the same way.
“That’ll be something. First extraterrestrial phone call between Earth and Erid. Here’s hoping it’s not a crank call.”
“No understand next to last word.”
“Tell you later, Rock. I’m gonna try to get some more sleep.”
“Yes, yes, good sleep this time. Grace have good sleep.”
“Thanks, bud. And thanks for waking me, and…listening to me.”
“Always want to help Grace. Grace help Rocky too.”
“Glad to hear it.” He nestles back into the blankets, curling up against the wall. “Night, Rocky.”
“Sleep well, friend-mate Grace.” Rocky crawls back to the thinking machine, tucking their legs underneath them. Once their human’s breathing slows and his heart returns to a normal beat, they adjust the camera-gun and unpause the movie.
Grace’s next sleep-cycles are peaceful, and Rocky hasn’t needed to comfort him. Not that they mind doing it, but it’s a relief that he has had good sleep. There are more good days, ones where Grace is his normal self, and they watch Earth movies and talk about their planets and talk about different species and how weird the other was as apex predator. Rocky loves those times.
But now, as if the roles are swapped, they’re the one troubled now. It’s not because of drimz nor bad sleep. Grace is sleeping and Rocky watches, of course, but they are in no mood for Earth movies or games.
After doing some quick math and converting to Eridian time, a haunting realization hit them. It was the anniversary of the ship’s departure from Erid. The last time they had seen their parents, their clan, Adrian…it was the last time they’d seen home.
Right now, Grace’s heart pumps steadily in his chest, his lungs inflating normally, without sobs. The sounds of their human’s body would be repulsive to other Eridians, but for Rocky, it’s a beloved symphony. So long as they can hear that, they know he’s alive. They scurry quietly from their habitat into the xenonite ball. They hadn’t used it in some time, with their invention of the xenonite suit, but it also took time and effort to get into it, and right now they didn’t have the latter.
There’s few places on Mary to be alone, with her being much smaller than Rocky’s, but they do find the appropriately named “don’t go crazy” room to be a good place, and apparently so does Grace. They roll on top of the platform in the middle. The screens are currently on—they can hear the hum of the electronics that power them—but without their camera, Rocky doesn’t know what images they show. They tuck their legs underneath them, listening to the electronics in the ship, interspersed with Grace’s breathing.
Rocky liked this quiet. Not like the devouring silence on their ship. They’d been glad to leave it behind. It had become a mausoleum, with only Rocky scuttling in its beams, trying to fix it and thus keep themself alive. It had held the bodies of his crew, with one survivor.
They got on the subject of funerary rites when Grace explained about Earth cultures. He said there were many, many different ones, hundreds of them on Earth, so it was a lot to boil down. Most of them had common themes and mores. Some people were buried in the soil, so they would rot and nourish it. Others would allow their bodies to be burned until all that remained were bones, and those would be crushed to a fine dust. From there, loved ones could keep the dust, or disperse it in places the deceased had loved.
For Eridians, they too had burial and cremation, but those were rare. The most common was to simply place the body in a specific place for the deceased. The organic parts of their bodies would calcify without the heat of their internal body temperature. From there, they would become their own ˈɡreɪvˌstoʊnz (that was the word Grace used), part of the landscape but also the community, even in death.
Rocky once asked Grace what he did with the other two humans on Mary. He explained that, when humans crossed the big oceans on their planet in ships, they would bury their dead by dropping them in the water. Since space was, in its own way, a vast ocean, he did the same thing by placing them in the airlock and letting it cycle them out. They would be part of the stars forever.
Grace had leaked from his light-sensing organs talking about the other two humans. He didn’t know how they died; he said the three of them were in a special, dangerous sleep called a ˈkoʊmə. It’s dangerous because human bodies aren’t designed to be asleep for that long, Grace said, so I assumed that was why they died. Eridian bodies aren’t built for that, either.
But, at least from Grace’s telling, the other two humans didn’t suffer. Their bodies were mostly intact. They had just fallen asleep and never woken up. Some humans believe that the body is just a container for the sum of a person’s heart, mind, and personality. They call it a soʊl. That’s what I had to tell myself. Yáo and Ilyukhina, the people I knew, weren’t in their bodies. Those were just the containers.
Like the other twenty-two on their ship.
Rocky had not moved the bodies of the crew. Each one still in the same position as when they last slept. Hollow shells of once-living Eridians, the bravest and boldest who wanted to save their planet…
Sometimes, they swore they could hear them still singing. Still asking, still wondering, still blaming—
Forged-from-Stress smashed one of their arms against the xenonite wall near Rocky’s carapace, screeching loud enough to shake the constructs of the ship. Rocky tucked their limbs against their body, a show of fear and plea of mercy, the family crest on their arms a reminder that they were related. But it didn’t seem to matter.
Rocky rarely cowered. They were fully capable of standing up for themself, but this was not a normal situation. The crew was dying and no one knew why. The stress and the terror turned the ship volatile and ready to explode, like a volcano. Crewmate lashed out at crewmate. Friend at friend. Family at family.
“Why you?! Why are YOU hale and whole, while the rest of us are rotting?!”
Worst of all, Rocky was somehow immune to the sickness. They didn’t know why, much less any of the others.
“Forged-from-Stress!” Leads-the-Thrum charged between them, one of their legs rearing up to smash into their outer shell. “This is no time for argument! We do not understand why, but the scientists and the doctors are working diligently to figure out this sickness! Pointing claws and throwing blame will not help!”
“Hah! That is easy for you to say! It is not YOUR child dying!”
They were right. Gift-of-Ancestors was in the medbay now, still trying to research the Starkiller as the mysterious illness ravaged their body. Rocky’s cousin, a brilliant scientist, one of the best in the thrum when it came to Starkiller. And Forged-from-Stress was their parent, and who would not be angry? If the roles were reversed, Rocky knew that their parent would be asking the same.
“Hatchmate, don’t worry about me,” they crooned quietly, but Leads-the-Thrum did not back down.
Forged-from-Stress’s vents puffed out ammonia in a huff, the fissures already present due to their name now wide cracks exposing the soft tissue. “Hmph! Always needing your older hatchmates to do everything for you, is that it? The only reason you’re on this ship is because of them! You’re useless, you ♯♫♪♯♫♪♪♫♯—”
Leads-the-Thrum smashed their leg into the other’s carapace, right in one of the cracks, and the meaty shattering of tissue and carapace echoed through the room. When Forged-from-Stress stumbled, Leads-the-Thrum lunged and pinned them down. As the other crewmembers scrambled to pull the two away from each other, Rocky scurried away, back to their workshop, away from the others…
Rocky knew now what it was. Grace had explained it. Radiation. The cosmos, the vast nothing, is not truly nothing, after all. There was nothing you could’ve done, Rock, he told them. The Astrophage protected you. You couldn’t have fixed it.
That knowledge, when he first said it, comforted them at first. Clearly humans understood the concept because they were always exposed to it thanks to their thin atmosphere. But now, it was like an impossible weight on their carapace. An invisible threat they never experienced or understood.
That none of Erid experienced or understood.
The only thing that protected Rocky was sheer luck. Their workshop was next to the engines. As one of the engineers, putting them next to the most important part of the ship was logical. Even when they were all that was left of the crew, they only moved to other parts of the ship when repairs were needed.
The last one to die was their hatchmate. Leads-the-Thrum was named as a hope for their parents, and they surely lived up to it. A celebrated leader, the one who encouraged Rocky and helped them into an engineer position on the Blip-A for Operation Kill-the-Starkiller. When Commander Mighty-Boulder died, Leads-the-Thrum was in charge of the few Eridians still left.
In their last days, they kept trying to help Rocky. Even though their body was so weak: parts of their carapace soft like that of a pebble, two of their legs barely able to hold weight, cracks forming almost overnight and silvery blood dribbling out of them. It was excruciating to watch their hatchmate, the strongest and bravest Rocky knew, waste away.
You…you will watch me sleep, hatchmate?
Of course. I’ll keep working.
I know you will. You were…always so…clever. You’ll find this out…in no time.
If I was, I’d have saved us…I’d have found the problem and so many wouldn’t have—!
Hatchmate, I know…you will find…the solution. I trust you. You…always lived up to your name, Small-but-Mighty.
They did not wake up. It took Rocky another two days before they left their hatchmate’s side.
They hadn’t been enough to find what could kill the Starkiller. They had the knowledge passed from the science Eridians and remembered all of it, but knowing and applying were two separate things. They saw the red line, they saw the many planets in Tau Ceti’s system, but how could they put them together for a solution?
Yes, the Ancestors had sent them their human Grace to help, but some days that felt like they had failed so spectacularly that the Ancestors were obliged to help them out of pity. And even then, so much had gone wrong. The Taumoeba escaping from the xenonite containers and devouring the ship’s fuel. Grace’s choice to sacrifice his homecoming to save them.
Grace worries that he may be too late for Earth. Rocky wonders if it’s too late for Erid. Their home had more time to solve the crisis, but that was so long ago. If they could force evolution to work for them, in the case of the Taumoeba, what is to say that Starkiller couldn’t do that same? That it evolved to devour more energy from Eridani, that Erid cooled into a frozen rock and their species and flora and fauna were all dead while they were in space alone with no one to watch them sleep, wondering if this was the time they would never wake up, the silence in the abyss yawning and waiting for the moment they died to devour them—
Rocky wails. The sound echoes against the thin metal of Mary’s walls, senseless and toneless warbling, untranslatable and anguished. Their legs splay out, carapace on the floor of the xenonite ball, an unholy din of chords, pitches, and somber notes raking against the air.
Alone alone alone it is too late you will never make it home
Over their own grief, Rocky doesn’t hear the rush of Grace’s heartbeat, the gasp of breath. The metal floor vibrates quickly as their human steps on the floor. Guilt settles on them like another huge weight. They forgot, forgot that loud noises wake humans, but they can’t stop yowling, screaming, grieving, lamenting that home is far away and so are their parents and Adrian and hatchmates and friends and friend-mate Grace will die before then—
“Rocky!” Grace hops onto the platform in the center of the room. He stops to analyze the screens for a couple of moments, before kneeling down to the ball’s height. His heart is beating fast, lungs working quickly but not panting from a ˈnaɪtˌmɛr.
With all the noise and caterwauling, the translator has probably short-circuited. Grace places his hand on the ball. “Rocky, buddy, what’s wrong?”
Their wailing tapers off, but trying to sing properly still takes immense energy. The translator spits out a stream of words. “Sad sad sad sad miss Erid miss Adrian miss parents and siblings Rocky bad bad bad everyone on Blip-A die die die die and Rocky fail and Grace might die and Rocky alone alone—”
They start howling again. Despite the volume and pitch, Grace doesn’t cover his sound-sensing organs. He lets out a breath.
“Oh, Rock…” He says so quietly that Rocky nearly misses it. He drapes his body over the xenonite ball in a hʌɡ. It was weird, the first time he did it, after Rocky offered their own fuel to ensure Grace returned to Earth. He later explained it was a gesture of friendship and love between two humans. Once Rocky made the xenonite suit, that was the first thing they did, and…actually, they understood completely why humans liked it.
With his body against the ball, Grace’s heartbeat, his breathing, the sounds of his digestive organs processing his meal, all become loud and clear, and Rocky’s yowls quiet down to a tolerable (at least by Eridian standards) volume. He taps one of his hands against the ball, and they place one of their claws to it.
Grace whistles, as best he can. He’s trying to learn Eridian, though most of the time he needs help from machines to make the chords for words. He’s good at whistling, though. The high pitch is one of the first noises pebbles learn to recognize. Even with its sounds coming from an alien, it feels…like home.
“Rocky not alone,” Grace says. He takes a breath and whistles again. Rocky feels the vibration. If they don’t think about it, it could almost be Adrian’s whistle, or their parents’. “Everything safe. Rocky safe.”
Their warbling trails away, still curled up on the floor of the ball, listening to Grace whistling. They sit up from their splayed position, tucking their legs back in, but still keeping one claw against Grace’s hand.
He stops whistling, then sits down beside the ball. “You feel better?”
“Yes. Thank thank thank.”
Grace leans against the xenonite barrier. “You’re welcome, buddy. Do you want to talk about it?”
They lower their carapace a little, tapping a pair of claws together. “It is anniversary of when crew of ship left Erid. Rocky miss Erid. Miss Adrian, miss family. Rocky remember crew and how radiation kill them and Rocky couldn’t save. Sad sad sad.”
“It is sad, yes. That must’ve been hard. But that wasn’t your fault. Remember what I said? You can’t fix something you don’t know about.”
“Yes, yes, Rocky know, Rocky remember, much better memory than squishy Grace.”
“Hey, I’m trying to comfort you here!”
Rocky chirps, a small laugh. That’s about all they can muster now. “Rocky think about crew. Some of ship crew was Rocky family.”
“Oh…” Grace’s voice tapers off, and his breath stutters. “Oh gosh, Rock, I’m so sorry. I can’t even imagine…”
“Rocky sibling last to die. Said Rocky would find solution. But…did not find. Grace know, Grace tell, but no solution from Rocky. Sibling wrong. Rocky fail.”
“No sir! There are no failures on this ship, you understand?” He points his finger at Rocky. “You couldn’t have known about the radiation, but the Taumoeba was us, Rock. Me and you. You told me that life was reason, you made the sampler, you designed and made the breeder tanks. It would’ve taken me ages to do that myself, if I did! Earth would have been long gone before I figured it out.”
Their human taps near the main body of their carapace, and they turn towards him. “I never would have saved Earth without you, Rocky. You understand?”
“Understand,” the Eridian says. “Rocky never save Erid without Grace, statement.”
Grace smiles and nods. They sit in silence; he looks at the screens around them. Rocky still doesn’t know what they show, but it seems that Grace appreciates it.
“Rocky think about how Grace talk about human concept called soʊl. Eridians have similar.”
“Oh yeah?”
“More like what Grace call ‘echo.’ Eridian die but leave behind their song. Song all around so Eridian hear and feel comforted.”
Their human thinks for a moment. “Yeah, that sounds like an echo if I’ve ever heard it.”
“If Eridians have echoes, do Eridians have soʊlz too, question?”
“Oh,” Grace says, in a tone that says that is a very complicated question. “I’m sure they do. I mean, you’re more than just your carapace and your sense of hearing and your voice, right? You’re brave, and intelligent, and you build incredible things. That’s all you. That’s what humans might consider a soʊl.”
“Understand,” Rocky says. “Grace have soʊl, but Grace have echo too, question?”
“I suppose I do. I mean, my song’s probably not nearly as complex or loud as Eridians, but I think it’s there.”
“Not find out now. Later, later, later, statement.”
“That’s right,” Grace replies, patting the top of the xenonite ball. “I don’t plan on dying anytime soon, Rock. I’ll keep trying to hold on. That’s the thing about us humans, we’re stubborn and resilient.”
“Rocky help Grace live. Will do whatever Grace need.”
“Thanks, Rocky.” Grace stretches his back; Rocky hears the air bubbles between his joints and spine pop. It’s always a disorienting sound and they worry that it hurts, but he never cries out from it. He stands back up. “You gonna watch me sleep, Rock?”
“Yes, yes, will watch. Apology, apology, apology for waking Grace,” Rocky says.
Their human puts his hand back on top of the ball. “Oh, don’t worry about that, buddy. I just wanted to make sure you were okay! That you weren’t hurt or something hadn’t happened to the Taumoeba or the ship. And for us humans, sometimes we gotta cry it out too. Besides, it probably won’t take me long to get back to sleep.”
The two friends walk back to the dormitory of Mary. Rocky slips out of the xenonite ball and into their habitat, where the xenonite suit waits.
“Hey, you gonna watch another movie? How was Princess Mononoke?”
Rocky burbles happily as they put it on. “Amaze amaze amaze. Happy that prince healed. Happy that prince and human in the forest stay friends. Happy that creature got head back.”
“I know, it’s great, right? My students told me about Ghibli movies. Didn’t think I’d like them, but I was glad to be proven wrong. You know, Rock, I think you’d like The Boy and the ˈhɛrən too.”
The Eridian steps out of their habitat, taking up their usual position near Grace and the thinking machine. “What is ˈhɛrən, question?”
“It’s a bird—a flying Earth creature. It lives near water.”
“Amaze. Yes, yes, Rocky watch while Grace sleep. Grace grumpy and stupid without sleep, statement.”
“Hey!” Grace says but doesn’t correct him. He kneels down to peruse through the nigh-infinite media library, before pressing the button to start the movie. “There you go. All set.”
“Good, happy.” Rocky adjusts the special camera at the screen. “Thank for…listen when Rocky sad.”
“Always, buddy.” He holds out his fist, and Rocky bumps it with one of his legs. Grace settles back on the mattress and in the blankets, curled like a small Earth creature in them. The Eridian taps the thinking machine to begin playing.
“Night, friend-mate Rocky,” Grace says.
It takes a moment for what he said to sink in. Grace never called them that until now. Rocky’s vents open, and they make several happy chitters, chirps, and warbles with the notes of joy and love.
“Sleep well, friend-mate Grace.”