Chapter Text
Sunsets in the biodome were always stunning, even if they were really just tiny electric lights projected through xenonite panels hundreds of feet above the beach. The light from the artificial sun hit the waves and sparkled against the water just like any sunset back on Earth — As far as Simon knew, at least. He’d never seen a real sunset in person; his experience of them was limited to videos on The Mary’s archives, Grace’s occasional recollection of them from Earth, and the dome itself. Simon didn't mind though, the biodome was his home now, had been for several years, it was his normal, part of his routine, and he was able to take comfort at the sight of it. All the pinks and oranges painted on the sky made it easy for Simon to let go and fall into the calm illusion. He had spent almost every evening down here after the first year of his arrival on Erid. At some point, Ryland had found out about it and would join him on occasion, sitting with Simon on the boulder he had chosen for his sunset lookout point.
There was the crunching of gravel beneath sneakers heading toward Simon on his perch. Ryland had his hands in the pockets of his knit cardigan as he approached, stilling once he was near Simon. Behind the zipper and the knit foxes on Ryland’s sweater Simon could see a T-shirt with a ridiculous science pun in a faded print. He couldn’t even read what it said anymore, maybe something like “all the good science puns Ar” – ohhhh “All the good science puns Argon” — making the connection Simon cringed a little internally. He hadn't seen that garment in some time.
The dark haired man looked up at the blonde and gave him a warm grin. The blonde returned the smile and, extracting his hand from his pocket, pointed almost awkwardly at the empty space next to Simon on the rock.
“Mind if I join you?”
Simon rolled his eyes but moved over to give the blonde room on the stone regardless. The scientist scooted up onto the rock and joined the gardener with a gentle smirk on his face.
“Soooooo… ya come here often?” Ryland asked with a ridiculous wiggle of his eyebrows.
Simon stared incredulously at the man before allowing himself to burst into giggles. The dark haired man shoved the other playfully with his left shoulder. “God, how did I get stuck here with fuckin’ dork like you?”
Ryland grinned with pride at the reaction he had managed to draw out from his raven haired companion. He wiggled his head back and forth and hummed triumphantly before bumping it on Simon's left shoulder and setting it to rest. “Oh, whatever! My dorky-ness is just part of my unending charm!”
Simon sighed and made a face of faux exhaustion directed towards the blonde before he laid his head on top of Ryland's, revealing in the warm press of the scientist’s body against his own. The scientist pressed closer to his companion and wrapped his arms around the other man's waist tightly– The grip was nothing short of a python clutching its prey, but at this point in his life, Simon had gotten used to it.He hummed warmly at the contact and laid his hand over Rylands on his side. The two sat for a second in silence, just breathing in the smell of salt and the scent of their shared shampoo before the gardener broke the quiet.
“So do you wanna talk to me about what happened today? You only ever get this clingy when your day is shitty.” The blonde man groaned into Simon's side, exhausted. Simon knew him too well. That fact was a blessing and a curse at times. Ryland didn’t wanna talk, sometimes he felt ridiculous when he did, because it always went one of two ways– One, he exploded into a horrible yelling rant, or Two, he got three words out before rolling onto his back and bursting into tears of frustration. Regardless, he knew he would talk. Or try at least. He always tried with Simon, after all the two went through and the years they spent warming up to each other they promised each other they would be as honest and open as they could be.
Ryland peeled himself off of the dark haired man's broad shoulder reluctantly and sighed. “Rocky and Adrian.” Ryland paused and fought to find words, “I mean, not so much them, but all of– it's just, they– Urgg!” Ryland slid his thumb and pointer finger behind his glasses and pressed hard into the lids of his eyes until he saw geometric patterns spring out from behind his irises. A nasty habit– Simon always took the pleasure of reminding him– that he had picked up sometime on his journey in The Mary.
“This is getting ridiculous, Si. I feel like I’m losing my mind out there.” The blonde pointed helplessly over his shoulder at the exit of the biodome with a thumb before resting his elbows on his knees and plopping his head into his hands. He felt Simon’s hand drift over and rest on his right forearm, pressing comforting circles into the flesh with a calloused thumb.
“I wanna make the lecture happen. I know it could help Erid. And I feel like I owe it to all of Erid for just letting us be here but– It’s getting too much?” The blonde cringed at how his voice inflected and pitched higher as he grew more frustrated. Simon, of course, noticed Grace's growing discomfort and leaned over, pressing against the blond man, acting as a sort of living weighted blanket. Grace flushed at the contact and just at how easily he calmed down because of it.
“But every single time that I try and make a suggestion on how it should be done, I’m shot down and forced into silence by some mush brained BOULDER who thinks they know human communications more than I do? The actual HUMAN GUY. And all of them keep going back and forth on if it should happen at all because apparently, they're all worried about who gets to know what first and if one population knows less about whatever then– then– well I don’t know exactly, no one will give me a straight answer on that either– And the cost! No one will ever shut up about the costs!!! But like, guys! We are talking about educating every Eridian schooler on the planet about every in and out of modern human society so as to pass knowledge of other life in the universe so as to better understand different life forms! So DUH, it’s gonna cost a pretty penny– But it’s for SCIENCE and LEARNING and–”
Grace was quickly interrupted by Simon grabbing his face, steadying him and forcing him to look fully at him. “Ryland, please God, take a breath. I know you want to help, I know that you have big plans and big hopes and big dreams, and I know that you are stubborn enough to force them into fruition–”
Simon let his hand drop from the grip that it had on Grace’s face, “but you've clearly been pushing yourself too hard.” Ryland scoffed, and pulled at a loose thread on his cardigan. Simon hummed as a response before he smirked and leaned closer to Ryland. Simon continued “I don’t think any one would blame you for stepping back for a bit. And even if someone on the council did say anything, I’m positive that Rocky would beat em up for it. You know better than anyone how he gets about you.”
Ryland couldn’t help but chuckle. The vision of his little sedimentary friend whistling Eridian cuss words with the dexterity of a professional flutist on his behalf was beyond entertaining. Simon’s heart clenched at Rylands' laugh the way it always did and couldn't help but smile. The dark haired man continued and looked up at Ryland, tracking his face as always. Mapping out all of its textures and colors and markings.
Simon sighed, turning to the ocean again, “Besides, I could use a break too. Adrian and her team have been pushing hard for results on the hybrid plants–” Ryland felt embarrassment rise in his body, he’d been so preoccupied with the council, he completely forgot about Simon’s projects. While Ryland was negotiating with the council for the lecture, Simon had been breeding and developing entirely new organisms, crosses between Human and Eridian diets– basically the man was building the universe's first ever galactic super food, digestible for both humans and Eridians. Ryland, I swear, you gotta learn to get your head out of your ass, think of others just for once. You always do this, hone in too hard on a lead of some kind and ignoring every other part of your existence and the people around you.
Over his own internal monologue, Ryland could hear Simon still talking and cursed himself for not listening again. Simon was looking towards the sea, his speech growing more and more animated, moving his hand along with words that Ryland couldn’t actually focus on. He had suddenly become very busy looking at the dark haired man next to him– large shoulders, a broad existence of a back, a powerful arm, covered head to toe in scars that Ryland wanted to trace his hands over hundreds of times over, and hair that fell like black silk over his shoulders.
Simon’s eyes sparkled along with the falling beams of the sun on the waves in the biodome– the irises looked completely black, but Ryland had learned over his years of knowing the man that in the right light they were a deep bronze holding a bright orange hazel ring that circled his pupils. Ryland’s whole body simply ached when he looked towards the man. There were certain moments just like this where just being near this other human made the scientist feel like he was hit with a thousand semi trucks. Simon had the capacity to be so painfully beautiful and soft and quick and kind and complete and it hurt Ryland in such a warm way.
“-- so now I think I’m on the way to finding an easier way to pollinate by hand. Of course there’s still stuff to work out with Adrian, but she said that she’d look over the final plans with me sometime next week so we can move to building it all up.” Simon turned to the blonde with a smile and again, Ryland had to force air back into his lungs before he drowned in the pools of Simon’s eyes. Simon tilted his head and looked peacefully into the eyes of the scientist, who was again floored just by making eye contact.
“Sorry, took the spotlight from ya there. You were saying something about the, erm, boulder in the council?”
Ryland sighed and smiled back at Simon, lowering his forehead down onto Simon’s left shoulder. “Forget it, I'm done thinking about all that mess today.”
Ryland went quiet and closed his eyes, focusing on the smell on Simon’s work clothes: dirt, and sweat, and something herby that he couldn’t quite place. The duo sat still on the beach and leaned into each other once more while a particularly large wave crashed and then dissolved on the sand. It was at this point that Ryland had an idea. His head shot up from Simon’s shoulder, barely missing a collision with the other man's jaw on the way up.
“Simon!” Ryland practically yelled, Simon jumped and brought his hand to his collar bone– it was a gesture that Simon made every time he jumped, he'd have to ask Simon about what the purpose behind it was at some point. Simon lowered his hand once he realized there was no real threat, other than whatever epiphany Dr. Ryland Grace had just had, which could arguably be worse.
“Damn it Grace!” Simon nearly shoved off of the rock the two were sat apon. “Tryin to give me a fuckin heart attack!”
Ryland stumbled before shooting his arms out and quickly regaining his balance on the rock. He flipped excitedly over to face Simon with a massive grin on his face. The scientist reached for the gardener’s hand, ecstatic, and pulled him off the rock to join him on the gravely beach.
“We are going on vacation!!” Ryland threw his hands along with Simon’s up to the sky as a show of presentation.
Simon stared blankly at Ryland with his shoulders pressed up close to his ears awkwardly.
“What now?”
Ryland’s eyes widened and he felt the heat of embarrassment rise on the back of his neck. He smoothed down his shirt and cleared his throat, “Right. You wouldn’t know– whole life lived on a space station and whatnot–” Ryland pushed his glasses up further onto his nose, “A vacation is when people spend a certain amount of time away from home and–”
“So like prison?” Simon interrupted, with an eyebrow held high on his forehead, folding his arm around his chest. “I’ve had plenty of that. It’s not as fun as it looks in your movies, Ry.”
The blonde quickly waved his hands out in front of him and shook his head, “Ohhh, no, no, no, no, no. Vacation is voluntary. It’s a thing you want to do. You go somewhere where you don’t live and explore, and eat too much food, and stay at a hotel where you don’t have to clean up after yourself because someone else is paid to do it. It’s fun!”
Simon squinted his eyes skeptically before slowly nodding his head up and down. “So, it is like prison… just a TV action movie prison.”
Grace ducked his head in defeat and sighed. “Okay, so… No. Let's just watch family vacation at my place.”
**********************
After roughly three hours– making popcorn, getting pjs on, fighting through the entirety of The Mary’s extensive catalogue just to find the film and then actually watching it– Grace looked expectantly at Simon from the other side of the couch.
“Soooo~ waddya think?”
Simon was still looking at the screen with a look of faint horror before snapping his neck towards the source of the question and locking eyes with Ryland.
“That looks fucking awesome. Please, we have to vacation.”
The next four hours were spent on the floor with Ryland, Simon, a dozen storage containers, and every single item of clothing either of them owned sprawled across the floor of Grace’s living room.
Ryland was laying on his stomach, a pen in mouth, scouring through a list of possible vacation spots. The one thing that both parties had seemed to forget, was that Erid was full to the brim with places entirely uninhabitable for all human life. The list that Grace had put together for places that humans could go– without fearing for lack of o2 and every other aspect that was needed to keep fragile humans alive– was narrowed down into practically nothing. There was the biodome or the lab connected to the biodome.
Grace groaned and let his head fall heavily onto the note pad on the floor with a soft umph. Eventually the scientist lifted his head enough to turn it towards Simon across the room. The gardener was laying flat on his back holding his toothbrush limply in the air, concentrating very hard on its color when put in the way of the light cascading down from the ceiling bulbs.
Simon seemed to sense Ryland’s eyes on him and lifted his head from the floor to gaze back at the entirely dazed and exhausted microbiologist.
“So?” Simon raised a brow helplessly with the question. “Waddya have?”
Ryland bunched his eyes closed and then snapped them back open, trying hard to fight immense frustration and sleep at the same time. He dropped his head back down to look at his list and made a low, dissatisfied hum.
“Here, or forty five meters away from here.”
It was Simon’s turn to groan now. He threw his tooth brush to the side and watched it tumble under the mossy green couch taking residence in Ryland’s front room. He knew he’d have to claw the hygiene instrument out from behind cushions eventually but currently he couldn’t care less. Simon flung his right shoulder over his left and flopped onto his stomach, taking on a form that was not visually unlike a beached whale. The gardener then half, one-armed military crawled, half shimmied across the hardwood floor to gaze with the scientist at the list.
They stared in exhausted silence at the lined paper on the floor, covered in scribbles, smudges, and Ryland’s barely legible handwriting. Simon pursed his lips, touched his cupid's bow to his nose and sighed heavily.
“Well. It was a fun idea, I guess. We had a good go at it.”
Ryland sunk back onto the floor finding a pillow to yell into in defeat. Simon returned to laying on his back, running his hand through his hair which was now tangled and frizzy. Simon’s hand caught in his own tresses and he had to spend an embarrassing amount of time freeing it from his scalp. Ryland went limp against his floor pillow and sighed. Silence descended on the living room once more and Simon could see the artificial stars in the sky twinkle and waver on the biodome sky when he looked out the window.
Simon suddenly squinted at the window furiously, focusing hard on the Xenonite glass separating the two men from the cold breeze and the stars outside. Then he launched himself up into a sitting position and pointed an accusatory finger at the glass.
“Ryland! I think we’re stupid!”
Grace's gaze followed the arrow of Simon’s arm and landed on the window that the gardener was zeroed in on.
“Huh?” The question hung lamely in the air before splatting onto the floor like a wet tissue. Simon took the reins of the conversation and stood up making another effort at pointing towards the window.
“The Xenonite. We make another Xenonite bubble like the biodome– much smaller and more portable with out the whole weather rig– it’ll be more like the parts of The Mary that Rocky was living in on the way to Erid. Portable and lightweight, that way we can pitch it up anywhere we want.”
Simon paced across the room, at some point reaching down and taking hold of the note pad they were using earlier and gathering a marker from some other area on the carpet, as he continued to brainstorm. Simon settled at the dining room table, slipping one leg beneath him and taking a seat. He pulled at the marker cap with his teeth and spit it into the popcorn bowl still resting on the table.
“We talk to Rocky and Adrian and see what they can cook up in terms of a decent spot for spending a couple nights somewhere decently private and scenic. While they do that we print the Xenonite panels in the lab and recycle the life system from The Mary– Don’t worry I’ll find a way to reattach it when we’re through with it.” Simon put the marker to work, mapping out a sketch of a xenonoite prism with three off shoots– presumably the entrance, bathroom, and bedroom– spidering off of the main space.
“Hey, did Rocky weld the panels together or was it just a latch mechanism like those ‘leg- ows’ that you showed me? Doesn’t matter I’ll just-”
Ryland’s jaw was on the floor– maybe even past that. He sat still on the floor in complete awe.
“I can’t. And then. Did? YOU–” Ryland’s head swiveled from the window to Simon while his mouth fought to find words, any words at all. Every once in a while, Simon would unintentionally remind Ryland that he came from a world of recycled hightech, and sci-fi cults. A place where you had to be quick on your feet, make your own missing piece of a puzzle. A place where, if you didn’t shape yourself into the smartest or the fittest version of yourself, you were destined for death.
Simon had turned himself into all of these things and cheated death with those tools time and time again. Ryland felt himself swallow painfully. When did his throat get so dry? Ryland let his eyes fall on Simon, hunched over the table, brow furrowed in thought, giving small scowls to the paper below him as if it had personally offended his whole family line– Is it weird to say that Simon working on a puzzle is a massive turn on? Can he say that?
Simon was still talking, mostly to himself at this point. Occasionally he would stick the butt of the marker in between his teeth and mumble around it while he thought through the construction and practicality of a xenonite airbnb. Ryland found that he was horrifically jealous of that marker– lucky fucker, just gets to sit there resting between sharp cainines and rows of perfectly set teeth in a hot mou– HOLY HELL, RYLAND! Calm yourself!
“I think our biggest enemy might be the plumbing system but then again, finding something permanent for the houses wasn’t toooo rough. Hey, what do you think about a spa bath? Is that too much work?”
“Simon.” Ryland’s voice was gruff. Holding a gravel that was so far off from what it typically was.
This made the dark haired man halt; the marker still hanging halfway out of his mouth. He raised his eyebrow at Ryland. Ryland was staring at him, mouth half open and eyes wide. He looked a little like he had just run a marathon. He was panting, it was freaking ridiculous. Ryland felt embarrassment, anxiety, and something else that he could place but didn’t want to think about, curl in his gut.
Simon’s brows furrowed again as he looked down his nose at Ryland, still on the floor, still huffing and puffing like a mad man.
“Yeah?” The question was asked slowly. Simon was a little worried that if he talked too loud or too quickly the blonde would skitter off like a spooked animal. The man before him definitely looked frightened in some way. Or was it…. No. No, it wouldn’t be…. Right?
Ryland started to stand, Simon’s breath hitched quietly watching him move closer to where he was sitting. Ryland’s glasses had hit a light from the room causing a glare to form on the lenses, the glass shimmered as he finally reached the table and stared down at Simon. Simon had to lean up to meet his eyes. They sat still like that for what felt like hours, until eventually Ryland turned his head and looked down at the blueprint that Simon had been putting together.
“I… is everything-” Simon could feel his lungs finally fill with air, he hadn’t realized how shallowly he had been breathing. He was still staring at the blonde man above him, searching for something– any type of clue as to what the fuck was happening– behind the glasses of the man over him.
Something in Simon’s chest curled as Ryland reached down closer. Ryland felt like his heart was going to explode. Simon was looking at him, analyzing and calculating. Ryland was looking back, his tongue coming out to wet his lips for a second before retreating back into his mouth.
Simon’s lips were parted and he was breathing so quietly and the way he was sitting forced him to look up at Grace and his neck was exposed and Ryland was losing his ever-loving mind.
After a moment Ryland chickened God, I’m going to hate myself for this later and reached past Simon’s shoulders for the note pad. Picking it up with a less than steady hand and adjusting his glasses with his other. There was a pause. The room felt heavy, and closed off, and neither would admit as to why it was.
“I-I’m just gonna call Rocky and see what he can work out with this.” The scientist turned his back and walked with the notepad clutched in his hands, to his study, leaving Simon alone in the living room.