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"Project Hail Mary was a mission years ago to figure out why the Sun is growing cold, which would affect the Earth's climate negatively. We sent three people up to space to figure out why Tau Ceti is unaffected. The crew members has sent us an update," says quite possibly the most infamous person in the world. Her voice is loud, and reverberates across the room for everyone to hear. Multiple world leaders and lead scientists that are still alive after all of this time lean forward, invested in what she has to say.
"The beetles have returned." That gets the room going, voices murmuring to the people next to each other. She understands their curiosity and possible excitement—it was an expected surprise when the Beetles landed, and one that filled her with her own exhilaration. The emotion did not last long though, there is the possibility of failure.
Not that she thinks the crew failed.
"Stratt," says one of her crew members on her vat. She looks up from paperwork, giving an unamused raise of the eyebrow. The member shifts on his feet, opening and closing his mouth a few times, before finally speaking.
"The Beetles have made it to Earth and are being recovered right this moment." That got her going. She sands up, papers falling onto the floor.
The hallway to the meeting room is quiet, save for the footsteps coming from one very infamous Eva Stratt, and several others. Because she led the mission, it would be considered outrageous that she would not be the one to brief the meeting and project the undoubtably-there recordings inside of the Beetles.
The only problem is she is convicted. (Barely, who knew having connections all over the world could help with problems like that? Stratt does, and utilized it.)
So, she is being led into the meeting room with two guards by her side. Despite this, she holds herself up high, chin up. She is not afraid of them.
She is more afraid of what might be in the video logs.
Enough reminiscing. She doesn't have time for that. Stratt clears her throat, the projector loading as she uploads the loggings onto the device.
"What we are about to watch for the first time is recordings from the Project Hail Mary. These videos may very well save humanity. Let's see what the Hail Mary Crew has discovered." She presses play, sitting down at the head of the table, turning her chair towards the screen.
She feels her breathing tighten when she sees Grace for the first time, in literal decades for her. He looks the same as she last saw him—on the ground.
Well, almost the same. His hair is disheveled and overgrown, and he has a bewildered expression on his face. That is never a good sign when he has that look. But still, she feels warm seeing him again, like an old friend. Though she doubts he considers her a friend after what she did to him.
"I…" he begins. Everybody leans closer, some nearly leaning off of the table as he talks, completely unaware of how he's captured an entire room's attention. "Have absolutely no idea what I'm doing, or why I'm here."
Silence. Pure quiet as everyone takes this in. Eva's heart does not drop, even as somebody from the back talks.
"Well, we're fucked." That gets everyone going. Postures slump, expressions change to worried ones, and the energy of the room shifts to a stressed one.
"It was a pleasure knowing what life is like on Earth before we died," said another.
"Nonsense. I am sure Dr. Grace has got this under control." Stratt says this with confidence. She is slightly confused, where is Ilyukhina and Yao? Shouldn't they have explained what was going on?
"Nothing is under control," Dr. Grace continues. "I woke up here," his voice grows increasingly strained, "with two dead bodies. Up in space! Why am I in space?!"
Somebody faints. Stratt takes a deep breath in. Something went wrong, Ilyukhina and Yao are dead. This is certainly not optimal. In fact, the opposite.
But… Stratt still has faith in Grace.
"I'm dead. A dead man in space."
The rather worrying video ends, and the next one begins to play—this was a rather short one. She hopes not all of them are this short.
In this video, Grace has the camera resting somewhere behind him. On the ground of the airlock, are the two deceased members of the mission, wrapped in blankets and dressed in their astronaut suits.
He's giving a eulogy as best he can with the limited memories he has. It's more detailed so Stratt suspects he regained some back when looking through the storage.
His voice is hard to hear, she recognizes it as somber though. He's sad, and it makes sense. They died before the mission even began. He is totally and utterly, lost in space. This was not what she planned.
When he finishes speaking, he places a picture in Yao's bony hands, and Ilyukhina's stuffed bear next to her side, under her arm. He leaves the airlock, and goes to the button to open the airlock to eject the dead bodies, now among the stars.
While this film was longer than the other one, it ends with Grace's hand reaching towards the camera.
Stratt pauses, looking around the room. Ilyukhina and Yao are deceased. Very few people personally knew them in this room, and Stratt feels lucky to have known them for as short of a time as she got to.
It was better than nothing.
"How is he going to do this? The mission is over—failed." Said one of the lead scientists, who put their head in their hands, rubbing the temples on their forehead. Their voice is full of doubt and dejection, which appears to be the general reaction.
She checks over how many video logs there are, not expecting it to be very much, maybe one or two more. She was wrong, there was eight or nine left.
She clears her throat, they don't have time to mourn. "Eat us continue," she says, voice strict. She presses continue, believing that Grace figured it out. After all, why would there be so many video logs left if he didn't?
In this recording, Grace is more cleaned up. He no longer has a beard, and is wearing one of his science pun shirts that got packed away.
"So. I kind of remember what I'm supposed to be doing? The gravity's different because I'm in space obviously, but that isn't our sun. My sun? That's Tau Ceti. Not the Sun." Grace runs a hand down his face, glasses falling down and barely hanging on by both ears. He looks down at the floor.
"Astrophage." He looks back at the camera lens. "That's why I was sent here, right? To figure out why Tau Ceti isn't dimming from the Astrophage. I remember that now." He puts his glasses back on the bridge of his nose. "Oh how I do not have this." There was a near-collective wince.
The video clipped for a moment, and now Grace is standing with a whiteboard that asks the question 'who am I?' Good, he's trying to actively remember himself. If only Yao and Ilyukhina were there to help him… they died before they woke up. Stratt believes in Dr. Grace's capabilities. There was a reason she sent him up there.
"New plan. Circle around Tau Ceti, use the petrovascope, check for anomalies. It's not much, but better than nothing." Grace smiles softly. "I hope it's better than nothing." He sighs, then looks out of the window.
Then, a ping sounds out. "Bip-A detected." Grace freezes, eyebrows furrowing and bottom lip sticking out. "What..?"
Stratt sits straighter than before. What just got detected? She suspects it'll be figured out soon. At some point.
"Blip-A detected." The computer repeats again. Grace looks at the camera and waves, before shutting it off, much to the frustration of everyone in the room who wanted to know what was in there.
"What could Blip-A possibly be?" Complained the same person who had fainted before. Stratt recognizes him to be a prime minister. One who talks too much, evidently.
"Well, we'll figure it out if we continue watching," Stratt says, before adding, "without interruption." That gets the prime minister to close his mouth without a snooty retort. She gets shot a few dirty glares.
She focuses instead on playing the next clip, and inserts the next video in with a tremoring hand that none of the others could see, but she could feel.
Ryland Grace looks exhausted. His shoulders sag, and he looks like he has not gotten a good night's rest in a while. He takes his already dangling glasses off, staring intently at the camera. Stratt is immediately intrigued.
She straightens up, her full attention on the recording.
"So," he begins. "I met an alien. He's uh… well. We've been working to figure out each other's language for a few days." He turns the camcorder to said alien. "Rocky's hearing is… crazy." Grace whispers. Rocky? Who is that? Stratt is worried.
Grace readjusts back to his original position sitting against the wall. "I set up these tubes—he's very picky, I put them one way, and he goes "no, wrong. Bad." And the shows me how it should be, which I had just done, so it's not even like it had to have been that bad."
"Who Grace talking to, question?" A voice—presumably Rocky—rings out. An alien. Grace has met an actual alien, and all he can talk about is how bossy the alien is… actually, that is very on brand for him.
"No one," Grace replies, shifting the camera, and pointing with a finger off to the side. "Look, he's all the way over there." Rocky, who is hard to see at this distance, appears to wave.
"Hello, Grace!" Rocky greets.
Grace talks even softer now. "I don't think he can hear me now—"
"Yes Rocky can. Rocky hear Grace."
Grace talks to such a quiet point the microphone struggles to pick his voice up. "What about now?"
"Yes now."
"Now?"
"Yes! Dumb. Rocky hear Grace very well."
Grace sighs, sounding tired. "Personal space is at a premium on this ship."
The clip cuts again—either because of editing or maybe some other reason, and now Grace is sitting on one side of the Hail Mary, with these glass-like tubes everywhere. Next to him, is the aforementioned alien from before. Stratt pauses, disbelief filling her.
"Holy shit." Says Ellington, one of the lead scientists. "That's an alien."
"Yes," Stratt responds.
"He met an actual alien," says the other lead scientist, Pritchett.
"This whole mission is about dealing with aliens." Stratt says, eyebrow raising. However, she understands. She honestly expected the Astrophage to be the only alien humanity would meet for a very long time. This is a shock.
"Yes, but this is an intelligent, non-microscopic organism. That a human—Grace, found!" Ellington says with a deep urgency. "This is insane."
Stratt takes a deep breath. "Let us continue, we cannot waste time. Which is of the essence."
Stratt unpauses. "Rocky, say hi." The alien—presumably yet aptly fitting named Rocky—waves, a human gesture. A succession of trills sound, and somewhere close by, a translator starts voicing for Rocky.
"Hello, Earth! I am Rocky. Rooocky." The alien looks almost like a spider, but with five legs instead of eight. The carapace has a flat side that faces the camera, which is presumably the face, but there's no eyes or ears or really any indication that it's a face.
"Rocky's an Eridian, from 40 Eridani. Part of a mission to fix the astrophage problem." Grace picks up the camera. "Convenient, huh?"
"The tubes—which you won't believe are made of. Xenonite, actually xenonite. But in solid form. I have no idea what it's composed of. Right, off topic." Grace clears his throat. "Eridians live in a hot ammonia based atmosphere, meaning oxygen is deadly to them, and vice versa. Meaning we need these tubes so Rocky can be on the ship."
"We've spent hours working on this translator. The voice is some guy called James, but really it's Rocky now." Grace rambles. "They can't see, but they use echolocation to see, and have these devices to aid."
Stratt actually thinks this will work now. Grace isn't alone, and seems to be putting things together well enough—looking around the room, and there's less expressions of "the world is doomed and everyone will die", which she takes as a good sign.
"Yes. Grace Rocky save stars." Rocky says. "Then we go home." Grace winces, which Rocky does not miss.
"What is it?" Rocky asks. Grace puts the camera down, and judging by the way his finger had moved, he tried to stop recording.
"I'm uh. This is a one-way mission for me, Bud." Grace starts.
"What?"
"The humans, my planet—Earth, they only gave me enough fuel to get here, and figure out how to stop the Astrophage. Then, I'm out here until I die."
Rocky looks like he's thinking. Stratt looks head-on, aware this is part of the mission. She's looking at logs of a dead man. She cannot forget that.
"How much fuel to get home, question?" Rocky asks, tapping his claw against the ground twice.
Stratt's eyes widen as she watches the video. Rocky is willing to give Grace his fuel, or some of it.
Grace could be coming home.
Stratt is filled with a hope—not the hope that the stars will be saved, but that Ryland Grace could come back.
The next recording has Grace and Rocky in the Don't-Go-Crazy room, with the karaoke machine she packed brought out and being used. He sings what she assumes is a rendition of 'let's call the whole thing off', but Rocky's translator cannot probably pronounce 'neither'… unless it's advanced enough to where he can, and it's purposefully not being pronounced.
Stratt looks away, writing everything that's been logged so far in her notes. She notices that a few people look attached to the rocky alien.
When she finishes and the karaoke is still going, she skips forward. Not out of guilt, but because…"This is time we could be using to figure out what happened and if Grace succeeded in his mission." A mission she has no doubt he completed successfully.
Stratt fasts forward to where it looks like Grace is trying to accomplish something—judging by the fact he's in the pilot seat, he's probably trying to pilot the ship. Which makes sense, Yao is gone, so there is no pilot to work the ship.
Somewhere behind the camera is Rocky's voice, which is repeatedly going "no, bad bad bad. Left! Go left, statement. Too much left! Only little bit." Ah, Grace was right. Talk about very bossy.
"Rocky, you're not helping, you're saying things are bad and not giving me sugggestions on how to fix them!" Grace snaps back.
"All Rocky die all Earth die, we die, we die, we die." Rocky says, rather solemnly.
"What are they doing?" Somebody asks.
"Piloting, I think?"
"Doesn't look like it…"
"Well, Dr. Grace doesn't exactly have a pilot, does he?"
Grace stops the ship eventually, and looks over at the camera, as if to say, 'see what I mean when I say Rocky is bossy?'.
"Rocky we're not going to fail." Grace picks up the recorder, pointing at Rocky, who is building chains, Stratt is pretty sure. "I'm learning to pilot the ship, because we discovered Astrophage is actually around Tau Ceti and goes to a planet orbiting the star, but does not leave the planet, of which Rocky named Adrian after his mate. Our plan currently is to figure out why the Astrophage goes to Adrian, but does not leave."
"Rocky here is making a lot of chain to attack to a capture net basically, and we're going to cast it down into Adrian's atmosphere." Grace takes a deep breath after that explanation.
He then smiles brightly, eyes sparkling. "We've got this."
Rocky in the background speaks up. "No. Not if Grace continue be bad driver, statement." Grace rolls his eyes, and the video ends. He looks happy.
The next time Stratt sees Grace, he is injured, and the newly formed light in his eyes that had been there for only a short time in the recordings has died.
"The mission… was a success, you could say. Rocky-" his voice cracks, but he wipes his face and continues, "and I got the Astro-eater, now named Taumoeba."
"The taumoeba was eating our fuel and breached an engine, which we lost. The hull breached, and I lost consciousness. Rocky… he saved my life. But I don't know if I can save his."
Grace is tearing up. "I put him in his atmosphere, with a heat lamp, essentially."
"Now I'm working on breeding the taumoeba for nitrogen resistance. Earth and Erid will get the astrophage predators." He looks determined.
Stratt stands up, there's four logs left, and one of them is clearly labeled "Taumoeba Farm Indtructions."
She pulls out the log. "Get this to the scientists. It's the Taumoeba farm instructions."
She wonders why it was at the bottom of the box, and not at the top, since it was so important. It was as if Grace was worried nobody would watch the other logs, if the important instructions were at the top, the rest of the box would get shoved away.
It was as if it had been a way for Grace to be like "look, see what happened to me, on this mission I did not ask to go on."
…Or because it was in order of the oldest to most recent videos made, and Stratt is looking too far into it.
But if Grace had completed his mission, where was he? Why was he not on the ship?
Stratt puts in the second to last film.
"Rocky's awake." Grace starts. Pritchett's shoulders sag in relief, and they sigh, their mouth forming, 'thank the stars'. They seem to have grown a liking to the small Eridian.
"And he's okay." The camera shifts to the Eridian, who waves in a human-sequel manner.
"The Taumoeba is done and fully altered, so it can survive in nitrogen-rich atmospheres. I'll put these videos and the instructions into a beetle, and in the others, will be the Taumoeba." Immediately, somebody talks into a cell phone, getting the Taumoeba farm project up and going.
"Earth, I'm coming home." His eyes shine, but there's a sadness behind them. Stratt assumes he's sad to be leaving Rocky. It would make sense, he formed a very close attachment to the alien
Murmuring begins. Grace is coming home. Stratt is not sure when, but it is an exciting—but highly unexpected—turn of events.
Stratt puts in the next video.
Immediately, there are red lights around the ship, and Grace looks stressed. He managed to shut down the alarm before filming this, at least. So they can hear him.
"The Taumoeba broke out. I forgot, I farmed them in Xenonite, and the fuel is Astrophage. They must have built up a resistance to Xenonite in order to eat the Astrophage." That's bad.
"Rocky's ship is made of Xenonite." And that explains Grace's stress. Pritchett gasps.
"He's going to die." Alone, out in space. Grace shakes his head. "I can't let that happen. I'm sending out the Beetles now, they will head for Earth. But I am going back for Rocky, it will take about forty-two days for me to go back."
Grace found somebody to be brave for, like Yao spoke about, Stratt realizes.
It's with another realization that Grace is not coming back. She knows when, now.
Never.
"Earth, this is goodbye. And Dr. Ryland Grace signing off." The video ends.
Stratt is silent. Somebody coughs.
"The mission was a success." She says, pulling out the last tape—it reads, 'for Stratt only.'
He had to have assumed she would still be alive after all of this time, or made a very bold move.
After the meeting adjourned, she stays in the room while everybody else files out, in order to use the projector.
She inserts the final tape, for her eyes only.
In it, Grace is sitting in the don't go crazy room, hand extended to touch the glass.
"It looks so real, doesn't it?" He asks her, a one-sided conversation that he had with a camcorder, and now she is having with a screen.
"Whoever did this, did an excellent job." Grace continues.
"If this is not Stratt, then please, shut off this tape—or watch it, I can't stop you 11.9 light years away." He looks back at the camera—at her.
"But if this is in fact Eva Stratt I am talking to… I do not forgive you." Stratt nods, expecting this.
"I am not happy you sent me up here in space to die. That was not cool." She cracks a smile at his teacher-language. The smile drops as he talks.
"…But I do understand you. I finally understand why you did this, why you sent me up here with Yao and Ilyukhina. I'm sure you saw the recording, I gave them as best a funeral I could with an amnesia-fied mind." She remembers the recording.
"I do not forgive you, Stratt. But I do understand you. I also thank you, if you never sent me up here, I would not have met my best friend, Rocky." He puts his head in his hand, and groans.
"Do you understand how frustrating you are? Because you are so frustrating. How can I feel all these things towards one person? It's boggling. I want to hate you, but I can't, Stratt. Because I understand, now. And! Ugh." Grace sighs.
"I won't be coming back to Earth. I'm going to Rocky, and we're going to Erid. This is how Eridians say goodbye, Eva." He moved his hand up and down.
On the vat—after the Sun has brightened up, as well as in 40-Eridani's system where she knows Grace is—is Eva Stratt. Where she has watched Grace's recording for her several times over.
She mimics his movements as she teaches her how to say goodbye, smiling. 'Goodbye' in the Eridian's language, and it is a gesture one could do without ever knowing it.
Stratt doesn't have peace with what she did, but she has her closure.
And end of fic!