Chapter Text
Eva Stratt did not initially intend to bring her husband and four year old daughter on a ship in the middle of the South China Sea.
Yet here they are.
When what Ryland later named Astrophage was discovered Eva knew she needed someone with advanced scientific knowledge who she could trust completely with humanity's survival. Her mind immediately went to her husband, Ryland Grace, there was no one who she trusted more.
Ryland soon learned how Astrophage breaded meaning he had to be taken to the Vat, where the primary Astrophage experiments took place. That would’ve been fine if it weren’t for their four year old daughter, Elizabeth. Eva and Ryland couldn’t leave her on the mainland, they had no one they trusted enough to take care of her. There was Colt, but he and Ryland weren’t on talking terms at the current moment. So the decision was made to take her with them, and now here they are.
“Lizzie-bear, sweetheart, you need to come out of your room at some point.”
Ryland has been sitting next to Elizabeth for an hour at this point, trying to coax her out of bed, they had only been on the Vat for three days and she hated it. Ryland couldn’t blame her, it was a sudden change and now she’s in a unfamiliar place full of complete strangers. Eva was already up and awake, she was always the first awake, meaning usually she was the one to get Lizzie out of bed, but today she was in a hurry. So this left Ryland trying to get Lizzie out of bed by himself on a day when she was not having it. He definitely couldn’t let her stay in bed all day, Eva would kill him if he did that, and Carl, the one who usually stayed with Lizzie for the day while her parents worked, wasn’t able to. Luckily, an idea comes to mind, a way to possibly make the Vat less scary.
“Want to be my lab buddy?”
Lizzie immediately sits up, now looking at her father. She was always curious, she would try to listen to her mom’s phone calls, even if she couldn’t understand the language. Eva calls it nosiness (lovingly, of course). Ryland calls it curiosity, and it just so happens that part of the job description of a teacher is to inspire curiosity.
“Can I see in the magnifying glass?”
She asks as she gives him puppy eyes and pouts, a deadly combo that always works on him even when he tries to not let it.
“You mean the microscope? Yeah, I’ll let you look in i-”
Ryland can’t even finish his sentence before Elizabeth is bolting out her bedroom door, still in her pajamas.
~
It’s later in the evening when Eva walks down the corridor to Ryland’s lab, having just finished a brutal all-day teleconference with the UN and needed a peaceful moment of quiet with her husband. However, when she walks in she sees her four year old daughter in the lab, in her pajamas, looking in a microscope at an alien substance that can blow up a whole state in mass quantity.
“Ryland Grace! What do you think your doing?”
When Ryland hears his wife whisper-yell at him he jumps and immediately turns around to see the very angry face of his wife, who quickly walks over and picks Lizzie up off the stool she was sitting on.
“Eva, what’s wrong?”
Ryland asks this, even though he knows very well that he messed up. He rises from his chair, his hands raising up like he got caught stealing.
“She was just looking. It’s completely safe. It’s only one dot and it’s dead.”
“You have an volatile alien organism sitting on a desk within arm's reach of a four-year-old child, Ryland.”
Eva’s voice was low, with a anger she rarely showed. She held Lizzie tightly against her chest and went out into the corridor. The door shut behind them leaving the laboratory entirely silent.
Ryland stood frozen by his desk for a good ten minutes, staring at the closed metal door. He then looked at the plastic stool he had set up so Lizzie could reach the lens, and a sharp spike of guilt hit his chest.
He didn’t finish the research he was working on. He locked down the workstation and walked down the halls of the ship to their living quarters, which was really just two interconnected rooms.
When he entered the quarters, the lights had already been dimmed. He could see though the doorway in his and Eva’s room that Lizzie was already in her bed, but clearly not asleep. She had her favorite stuffed fox tucked under her arm. A stuffy Ryland bought for her before she was even born.
Eva was sitting in their bed, she wasn’t reading any papers or looking at her tablet. She was just sitting in the dim light, staring at her hands. Ryland walked in quietly, sitting near her, the bed dipped slightly. He didn’t try to sit too close. He knew he had crossed a line.
“Eva, my love, I am so incredibly sorry.”
Ryland’s voice was barely above a whisper.
Eva doesn’t look up immediately. She lets out a breath and her shoulders drop slightly.
“I don’t have the energy right now Ryland. You did something so incredibly stupid.”
“I’m not here to argue with you. I’m here to apologize. I was so focused on trying to make this place feel normal for her. I hate that she’s stuck on this ship. I wanted to show her what her dad does, so she wouldn’t just think of this ship as a scary place. But I risked her safety, and I compromised everything you are doing to keep her safe. I am so sorry.”
Eva finally looks up and makes eye contact with Ryland. The authoritative look she usually has during work is gone, replaced by a tired look. She reaches across the bed and places her hand over his.
“I know why you did it, Ryland. You’re a teacher. You want to bring out curiosity. It’s one of the reasons why I love you. But I am carrying the weight of seven point nine billion lives on my shoulders. I can handle the governments, the supply chains, and the threat of global starvation. I can handle all of it as long as I know, with absolute certainty, that our daughter is safe here.”
She squeezes his hand, a tear slipping down her cheek, she was rarely this distressed, even Ryland had only seen her like this a couple of times.
“If something happens to her because of this project, I wouldn’t be able to handle that.”
Ryland nodded and squeezes her hand back tightly.
“No more labs for her. I promise you.”
Eva wipes her cheek and gives him a faint, tired smile.
“Good. Now go check on her. She wanted you to tuck her fox in properly.”
When Ryland enters the room he sees Lizzie in her bed with her fox.
“Hey kiddo, I know it was a big day today but it’s time to go night-night. The slumber train should be picking you up soon.”
Ryland begins the process of tucking his little girl in, making sure he does it just the way she likes it. Once Elizabeth is tucked in, she falls asleep almost immediately. While sometimes it takes time for her to fall asleep, this wasn’t really surprising. Today was really tiring after all, especially for a four-year-old.
Once Ryland knows that Elizabeth is asleep he goes back into his room and climbs into bed with Eva to get some much needed rest.