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The Man From Mars AU started in May 2026 when I posted a few sketchy comics of an AU with a language barrier, just making up a rough alphabet and a few words. I kept messing around with this Martian pidgin language privately for a couple of months to figure out what I wanted to do. Eventually I settled on a few goals: familiar-looking and easy to write for comics, that sounded natural when read aloud, and that revealed something about the culture(s) Simon grew up in.
On July 26, 2026, the dictionary had gotten big enough that I made a post inviting my Tumblr followers to participate in a game where they could help Grace figure out Simon's language. I made an online database where people could review submitted asks, answers, translations, and view a glossary of confirmed words.
On Aug 8, 2026, I posted this summary of events as a catch-up for people following this AU after the first six responses had been translated, because I realized some of the AU details were scattered across multiple comment sections and easily missed. Some of the events mentioned here will be expanded on in other chapters of this archive. Click here for the original post.
What's happened so far?
Simon's initial wake-up call was pretty rough, to say the least. He remembers the all-consuming pain and terror, fighting against an unknown threat in the darkness before being pinned down and sedated... but not before an alien medic was injured in the chaos.
Due to the assault, Simon is deemed dangerous and banned from the surface of Erid for the duration of a lengthy (and rather unprecedented) judicial process. Grace originally planned for him to recover in the dome, but that's now off the table... and there's only one other sovereign human 'territory' available.
This is how the Hail Mary becomes a jail cell parked at the top of a space elevator.
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Grace feels horrible about what happened. He ensures the Hail Mary has everything available that Simon could possibly need and does his best to advocate for Simon (such as explaining that it's not reasonable to keep a human on house arrest for a "short" 30-50 year proceeding). All Simon has to do is recover and provide his testimony, then Grace can prove he's not actually dangerous. Easy, right?
Wrong. Simon speaks an unfamiliar dialect that doesn't exist (according to the archives) and will barely give Grace the time of day. All they know is his name, that he's originally from Mars (??), and that he apparently went through something horrible (but definitely doesn't want to talk about it). Worse, the language barrier makes miscommunication... alarmingly easy.
Simon is much more comfortable interacting with the ship's computer, Mary. Since she can't translate Simon's language without a decent database, Rocky hatches a plan. He knows that Grace's students have expressed their curiosity about the second human. Why not let them ask the questions?
Grace is skeptical, but he figures it can't hurt to try. He leaves a note for Simon, then consults the pebbles and lets them ask their questions. After a few clarifications and translations, he sends them up to the Hail Mary's onboard messaging system.
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For Simon, being a "prisoner" is a familiar role in a situation that is otherwise throwing him for a loop. His warden is a madman who not only lives alone with an alien species (and apparently has been for some time), but asks far too many questions and... is generally strange.
Surely this alien species and their pet human wouldn't be keeping Simon alive unless they wanted something from him, right? Better offer and accept only the bare minimum, just to be safe.
But nothing has happened for the last few weeks, and Simon is frustrated and bored. He's exhausted Mary's conversational scripts and Grace now leaves for days at a time doing who knows what (he always reassures Simon he'll return soon, despite no sign that Simon even cares).
This time, Grace left a note that said something like, "Going to let the young aliens ask questions so they stop pestering me - you can ignore if you want." After asking Mary about a couple of the words, Simon scoffed and threw the sticky note in the trash. As if he was going to fall for that.
When the messages pop up on the computer a few days later, he goes against his better judgment. The novelty is just too tempting. He should at least open them and see what information his captors were trying to get out of him, right?
He catches enough meaning to understand the questions are... innocent. Almost child-like. They ask after his well-being, about his interests, what his life on Mars was like... some seem to think he's on Mars right now.
Maybe they actually are from students.
Maybe it's safe to answer a couple of them...
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