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It got a bad rap, but, so far, Grace didn’t have many problems living inside a bubble. Only in the beginning did it really feel like one, before the alien scientists on the alien planet got to work on mimicking Earth. They had it almost perfect now. It was a little scary, actually, to think about the sand and the water and the cloudy sky as… not really being any of those things.
The cognitive dissonance made Grace dizzy, if he made the mistake of thinking about it too much. Which happened sometimes. Because… you know, scientist and all. Old habits being like cockroaches to kill and all that.
Grace sat on the imitation beach. He listened to the waves roll in and leaned back on his hands, his fingers sinking into clumpy, damp sand, the weight on his palm compacting the particles beneath it.
Rocky approached in his version of a space suit, moving with a swiftness that did not make any sense for his stony, segmented body. He stopped beside Grace. His front legs tapped the sand without denting it, a gesture of impatience.
He spoke, a now-familiar mix of melodic tones and grinding vibrations. What you doing, question?
Grace shrugged. “Nothing. I’m on break.”
Does not sound safe. Rocky shifted, angling his body first one way and then the other, trying to ‘see’ in a way that was completely inapplicable to light-sensitive human eyes. Standing on break, the structure may fail and Grace will fall.
“Not that kind of break.”
What other kind of break is there, question?
“The kind where you just… stop doing things for a while.”
Oh. Rocky went still.
Grace turned back toward the pseudo-ocean. He looked without seeing, letting his mind wander. The peace he found there was new and startling. It was liberating to not have to worry about anything in particular. No more dying suns or ends of worlds or impending, isolated death. He could imagine shapes in the clouds without feeling guilty about it, like he was wasting seconds, like a clock was ticking down.
After another minute or so, Rocky spoke up again, the vibrations lower this time—a grumble. Break is boring.
Grace chuckled, stretching out on the sand. “Break is nice, Rock. We just saved our planets. We deserve a break.”
What do we need to do to not deserve one, question?
“Nothing.” Grace turned from the beach back to Rocky with a smile. Not an imitation of anything, but a real, true friend the likes of which he’d never found on Earth. “We sit here, and we talk, and we just… hang, you know. Together.”
Together, Rocky repeated, his ‘voice’ lifting, his version of the word translating to a few different concepts. It was the same combination of sounds he used for ‘both’ and ‘trust,’ as well as a kind of conjugation of the tones indicating ‘loyalty.’
“It sounds better when you say it.”
All sounds better when I say it. Grace language ugly.
“Grace language efficient. Every time one of your scientists introduces themselves, I forget why I needed to talk to them in the first place.”
They both laughed, then, the wildly different sounds clashing and bolstering one another at the same time.