Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

Project Appreciation: Part One, Subject A

Part One will be based on a previous conversation with Rocky and Colt, and done without Court’s knowledge. 

Maybe also without Colt’s knowledge either – subject open for review later on.

Modify original design found on the Earth Archives, as causing a spark in space is A Big Time No. Compressed air will have to do the trick. 

Projectiles? Will have to make them from scratch – perhaps crochet?

Important! Tell Rocky he is categorically not allowed to use this on anything breakable. Perhaps make a target to encourage him to fire at that? 

Handle Court’s annoyance at another time.

***

Gathering supplies for his little project was much harder to do in secret than Grace had initially expected. The Hail Mary was, comparatively next to something like the ISS, a tiny spacecraft and had not really been designed with this length of trip in mind. 

It had been intended as a home for a few months, not four years, and a home for three people at that. Rocky’s tunnels took up valuable square footage, especially in the larger areas like the lab and dormitory, and ducking underneath the xenonite whilst trying to juggle lengths of PVC piping was hard enough to do without the added pressure of doing it on the sly. 

What was making this all the more difficult was that Grace could not count on Rocky or Court to be in the same places at any given time, especially now Rocky had his X-EVA suit and could come and go as he pleased with minimal noise. He had been less bothered about Colt noticing, as Grace knew his twin would definitely try to help rather than hinder. But that ran the risk of Colt asking why Grace was doing this, and he didn’t want to reveal all just yet. 

“Fudge.” Grace tripped on what seemed to be a discarded shoe in the middle of the corridor. PVC pipes clattered to the floor and began to roll in every which way, Grace scampering after them to collect them in his arms. He straightened, promptly hit the top of his head on one of Rocky’s tunnels, and dropped all the piping again. “Fudge!” 

“You okay, bud?” Court’s voice drifted from the dormitory. 

“Yeah – Colt, stop leaving your stuff everywhere!” Grace yelled, kicking the shoe against the wall and hurrying on toward the Don’t Go Crazy Room. 

He nearly had all his supplies gathered there now. Grace had found a little access panel in the floor that housed the screens’ wiring system, and after some very careful manoeuvring of the wires to one side, binding them together in neat bundles with zip ties, he had cleared out a secret cubby.

Dropping lightly down onto the floor of the simulation room, Grace stacked the pipes beside him and felt around for the panel’s seams in the floor. It was nearly entirely hidden from him, so he didn’t have to worry about Court or Colt stumbling across it, and Rocky would just think it was another storage room if his echolocation ever picked it out. 

Project Appreciation, as he had dubbed it, was two days old and Grace was thoroughly enjoying himself. 

It was coming up to four weeks since he’d regained his full stock of memories. He had been given back some of his responsibilities aboard the ship, and more had been promised to him as he continued to get stronger. Grace had found the slow reacclimation annoying, completing the meagre handful of tasks within the space of a few hours and left wanting more. 

But then he had tried to prove he was ready for more and had begun to run a series of complicated experiments trying to differentiate the living organisms in a test sample of Adrian’s air. All he had managed to do was give himself a killer migraine and ended up in bed for the next day and a half, trying to sleep it off. His punishment for being – in Colt’s words – a ‘massive idiot’, was his day-to-day schedule being reduced yet again. 

Which meant Grace had a handful of hours of free time per day and nothing to fill it with. And thus Project Appreciation had been born. 

Grace had always considered himself non-eloquent. If he thought about it too hard, he fumbled with words when trying to say something heartfelt, said something cringe-inducing when he needed to be serious, (whoomp, there it is! Grace’s toes curled even to think about it) or in the harder situations he found himself in, would simply say nothing at all and rely on Colt. 

He wanted to tell the others how much it meant to him that they’d stayed by his side, through thick and thin and had always been there to catch him when he fell. That their kindness and patience seemed to spring from an endless well, offered up freely to him and all the sweeter for it. 

It was all in Grace’s head, and despite how many times he had said ‘thank you’ to Court, Colt and Rocky – all of whom had waved him away telling him his thanks were unnecessary – he could never quite pour the depth of what he truly felt into those two simple words. 

Making something, though. That was, in Grace’s mind, a physical manifestation of his feelings, something given back, not as repayment, but merely as a gift. And, as a bonus, it filled his time with non-strenuous work, whilst keeping his hands and mind busy.

Looking into the secret nook, Grace catalogued his store of snaffled items and mentally ticked them off. Duct tape, check – they had tonnes, so a few rolls vanishing wouldn’t arouse suspicion. Sturdy metal wire and pliers, check. He wasn’t looking forward to having to bend it into shape, and Grace wondered if he could get away with midnight soldering without disturbing anyone. PVC pipe, freshly acquired today. He wasn’t too sure why the stockist team of the Hail Mary had deemed these necessary, but he was glad to finally have a use for them. 

Colt had found the small supply a few weeks ago and had thus far challenged everyone to a ‘sword’ fight, tried cutting a few into different lengths to make some sort of musical instrument, and set up a run of them through the corridor between the dormitory and lab to race shelled peas down. Needless to say, even if Court would be categorically unhappy with Grace’s new invention, his displeasure might be mitigated by his removal of an outlet for Colt’s shenanigans. 

Admittedly, he was perpetrating more shenanigans but between the two of them, Grace knew he got just a fraction more leeway than Colt due to his store of credit for previous sensible behaviour. 

The only two things Grace was missing before he could begin assembly was a canister of compressed air, and something Rocky could fire. 

Grace was not a man who went back on his word. He had told Rocky he would make him a potato gun, and so he would. 

But a problem had arisen straight away in part one of Project Appreciation, when he realised that there were no potatoes on the Hail Mary. Grace had asked Colt, wondering if there were any in the greenhouse, but Colt had shaken his head. 

“Sorry, Ry, I don’t have any to grow plants from. It’s possible there are some slices or chunks in the meal boxes, but I don’t want to sort through those in case we waste them. And besides, I’m not sure we would have enough soil to grow them in.” He had patted Grace’s shoulder in sad solidarity. “I miss fries too.” 

Grace had schooled his expression into disappointment – which hadn’t been all that hard, but it wasn’t over the lack of fries. 

It had stumped him for a time, because the whole point of Rocky’s present was for him to be able to be a menace. Although, Grace had reflected, firing potatoes via way of compressed air was probably asking for trouble in a pressurised vessel. Especially when the videos he’d looked up of proper potato guns had them launching the root vegetable at genuinely terrifying speeds. He didn’t fancy broken ribs if Rocky missed. 

Closing the access panel, the piping now hidden away, Grace decided that the rest of today could be taken up with an innocuous-seeming craft activity. It was his work-around for ammunition, and it probably wouldn’t be questioned if any of them saw him working on it. 

Pulling himself up onto the metal walkway and heading out, Grace practically collided with Rocky, the Eridian in his X-EVA suit and less visible than usual in the dimly lit hallway. 

“Hello, Grace.” 

“Hey, Rock, what’re you up to?” Grace kept walking, hoping Rocky would follow him and not inspect the Don’t Go Crazy Room. 

Thankfully, Rocky scuttled along at his side. “Came to find Grace for Eridian lessons. Grace late.” 

Mentally smacking his forehead, Grace shoved his hands in his pockets and tried to perfect the definition of ‘nonchalance’. “Oh, sorry, pal, I was just on my way now – needed to check, uh, something in the simulation room.” 

Whilst more active work had been taken away from Grace, Colt had insisted that Eridianese lessons be added into their combined schedule. Rocky, naturally, was the teacher, but Grace did his due diligence as a TA and kept their unruly classroom of two under control. 

Colt had, predictably, asked to start with all the curse words Rocky knew. 

Court, oddly enough, often mysteriously disappeared a few minutes before their lesson began, citing something terribly important to do and please, do go on without me. 

The fourth time he had done this, Grace had found him crouched in the airlock chamber and watched wryly as his older brother noticed his presence and immediately began to inspect the Orlan EVA suit’s boots. 

“You’re truanting.”  

“I’m not, I’m …” Court had searched for an excuse, apparently hadn’t found one and finished lamely, “I’m busy.”

“Colt and I detailed the suits last week, Court.” Grace put his hands on his hips. “You’re worse than some of my middle-school students, I’d expect this from Colt, but not you.” 

“Don’t do the disappointed teacher’s voice, Ry.” Court stood with a sigh. 

“Don’t make me a disappointed teacher, then.” He had grabbed Court’s arm and pulled him out of the airlock chamber toward the lab. “I thought you’d like to learn another language, you could be quad-lingual … is that what it’s called?” 

Court could speak, read and write in Russian and Chinese – although he would self-efface and say his Chinese was passable at best, but Grace knew that wasn’t the case. The Sierra Program had made sure of his skills.

“I mean, yeah, I’d like that, but …” Court had broken off, running his hand through his hair in a way that Grace knew meant he was embarrassed. 

“Court?” He had stopped them in the corridor, unwilling to subject his older brother to discomfort in front of the others.

“I can’t sing.” Court blurted out, and then buried his face in his hands, groaning as Grace began to chuckle. “Shut up.” 

The Eridianese lessons had, as part of his and Rocky’s curriculum, practical speaking sections. The human voicebox was nowhere near impressive nor complex enough to produce true Eridian language, but some single-note words or simple sentences could be achieved through humming, whistling or, as Court seemed so reluctant to do, singing.   

“Ry, I can’t carry a tune in a bucket, you know that. These lessons are painful, especially next to you – and Colt.” Court had leaned back against the corridor wall. “You can sing, and Colt just doesn’t care.” 

Grace suggested they make Court an instrument, so he didn’t have to join in vocally but still learnt the ins and outs of Rocky’s native language. He had then been threatened by Court with bodily harm if he was handed something like a recorder to play.

“Have we got both of our students?” Grace asked now, wondering if Court had decided to try his chances on the hull of the Hail Mary whilst still in flight. 

“Yes, both Colt and Court waiting.” Rocky bobbed up and down a little as he walked. He’d been ecstatic when Colt had asked to learn Eridian, and Grace knew the lessons were truly the highlight of Rocky’s week. 

The lessons meant a lot to Colt too. Grace asked his twin outright before their first lesson why he had wanted to learn a language that was far more intricate than anything they had on Earth. Colt had looked at the floor and said that it was something he’d promised himself, during Grace’s unconsciousness: Colt would ask him to teach it when he woke up. 

He didn’t need to say anything more, and Grace had pulled him in for a hug. He understood the weight missed opportunities carried. 

Entering the lab, Grace spotted Colt and Court sitting by the window, paper strewn out across the floor. They had printed out a sheaf of stave paper to use, as learning Eridianese essentially meant learning musical theory to even make a start. Colt was searching through the pile, brow furrowed and muttering under his breath. He thought he heard his twin hum a brief section of a scale, warming up. 

Court, on the other hand, was trying to balance his pencil on a fingertip. Grace couldn’t help but grin at the role reversal these lessons caused in his brothers.   

“Lesson begin now,” Rocky chirped, coming to stand in front of the pair. “We do family words today.” 

An idea hit Grace so suddenly that he paused in the act of sitting down. He had the perfect excuse. “One sec, Rocky – I’ll be right back.” 

Scrambling upright, Grace hurried toward the dormitory, pulled out his personal kit and rooted around in it. A moment later he came up with his two prizes: the crocheted Earth, a relic left over from another life, and the single crochet hook that someone had put into his bag before launch. He had always wondered if that had been Carl. He’d seen Grace absent-mindedly crocheting on lunch breaks or else when waiting for experiment results to come back. 

Grace had been in the process of making Carl a scarf. He had patterned it at one end with four black dots, and had planned to stitch in the words ‘The Carl Hypothesis’ once it had been finished.

Like all the other detritus he’d been forced to leave behind, Grace wondered where the half-finished scarf was now. 

He gave himself a little shake, gripping the crochet hook tightly. Kicking his kit-bag under his bed, he headed back to the lab, listening as Rocky’s true voice lilted through the air. The translation software remained off for the duration of the lesson.  

“Siblings.” Rocky pointed between Court and Colt, and then as Grace entered properly, at him too. “Siblings.” 

“Brothers?” Colt guessed. He smiled when Rocky did jazz hands. 

“Colt, where do you keep the twine?” Grace asked, opening drawers at random. 

“Bottom drawer, fourth on the left.” Colt said. “Why?” 

In answer, Grace tossed the Earth beanbag at Colt, who caught it effortlessly in one hand. “I used these as prize tokens back at G.C. Middle. Cash them in at the end of the week for something, incentivise learning. Y’know – bribery.” He found the twine and retook his position beside Rocky. “I’ll make some more for you two.” 

Not a lie, per se. Just some of the completed benabags might go missing – and then reappear at high velocity, hopefully not aimed at him. He’d never crocheted with twine, but aside from it being not as soft as yarn, he couldn’t really see any remarkable differences. 

Grace noted from the corner of his eye that Court had sat up a little straighter, and he knew he’d finally gotten his older brother’s full vested interest in the Eridianese classes. Court would deny it vehemently, but he had a competitive streak a mile wide that he’d done his best to keep hidden from Grace and Colt as they’d been growing up. 

“Wouldn’t it be ‘siblings’, not ‘brothers’?” Court apparently had no issue with being competitive now his brothers were adults, however. “Eridians don’t really have gender, do they?” 

“Yeah, that’s right – Colt, hand it over.” Grace cast on with his twine and tried to smother a smile as Colt began to protest. Picturing the pipe he’d stolen earlier, Grace estimated the maximum width a projectile beanbag could be and let muscle memory take over in earnest.    

“Parent.” Rocky said. A little shudder ran through him and he made a dismissive gesture with his two front claws. “Family,” he said instead. 

“It’s okay, bud, you can say that.” Grace reassured him. He had been trying to curb Rocky’s concern that saying the wrong thing might upset him. But no matter how many times Grace had told him he was fine to talk about his past, even tangentially, Rocky seemed continually reluctant.

Colt looked curiously between them. “Those were two different words, right?” He had a go at mimicking the first, flattening the last note a tad, but otherwise it was recognisable. 

“Parent.” Grace said for Rocky. “The first was ‘parent’, the second was ‘family’.” He tapped on the side of Rocky’s leg, directing his full attention to Grace. “Is okay, talk about parent. More family words.” 

The ‘about’ and ‘family’ were the hardest parts of the sentence to get right, being made up of chords and not a handful of notes. But they had perfected their pidgin language within the first few weeks of knowing one another; he knew Rocky would get the gist. 

“That’s still mad,” Colt muttered, Court nodding as he looked, a little wide-eyed, between Grace and Rocky.

“Grace is sure, question?” 

“Yes.” He returned his attention back to his crochet, and without looking up said, “If you can tell me verbatim what Rocky and I were just talking about, you can have the beanbag.” 

Human and Eridian laughter lifted into the air as Court and Colt both began to talk over one another. 

***

Colt was onto him.

Sneaky Grace was not, and unfortunately it was a skill he had never perfected. He wondered if Court would give him some sneaking lessons, and then immediately dismissed the idea. Court wanted to leave his espionage days behind him, he’d made that very clear. Grace wasn’t about to go digging up his older brother’s past simply for the sake of being able to lie with a little more fluency. 

Colt had caught him in the middle of the night soldering the trigger and firing systems together, having given up on trying to bend the metal wire into the desired shape he wanted near instantaneously. His efforts had left him with a short cut across the palm of his hand, the wire rudely not cooperating with him. 

“What the hell are you doing, Ry?” 

Grace lifted his goggles into his hair and stared sheepishly at his brother, soldering iron still in his hand. “Uh … nothing?” 

Colt folded his arms and made it clear he wasn’t going anywhere until he got a better answer. 

“Well, what are you doing, it’s the middle of the night, Colt!” Grace tried for stern and missed the mark by a few hundred miles. 

“I came looking for you, because as you say – it’s the middle of the night and my little brother, who has a history of insomnia-induced bad decisions, has gone walkabout.” 

“We’re twins,” he grumbled under his breath. He knew he’d never gain any ground with Colt over his continual usage of ‘little brother’, but Grace had to try. 

Colt came over and peered through the half-light at what Grace was attempting. 

It didn’t look half bad, in his opinion. Rocky, now with a full range of movement, would need a trigger to squeeze in order to launch a beanbag. The trigger had to be connected to some internal mechanism that would quickly open a release valve on the compressed air tank – which he had yet to source. It was quite simple, really, but Grace knew it would be effective. 

“What’s this?” Colt hovered his hand over the metal wire for a second to judge if it was still hot, and then carefully picked it up, pulling the trigger with his index finger and watching the whole mechanism move back and forth. 

“It’s for …” Grace glanced hurriedly around the room. “The breeder tanks?” He tried not to wince at the accidental rising inflection. 

“Uh huh.” Colt said. “Sure.” 

Grace snatched it back, set it on the workbench and, a little too forcefully, snapped his goggles back into place. “Ow. Anyway, I’m fine, as you can see, so you can go back to bed.” 

Colt didn’t move. 

“Bye.” Grace flicked on the soldering iron, and resolutely turned back to his work. 

“Ryland.” 

The next part was melting the end of the wire, ready to curl it into a rough loop and attach it back to the main strand. He touched the iron to the metal, and waited. It didn’t melt. Glancing down at the power supply, Grace saw it was off. 

“Is that hot?” Colt was still standing by his shoulder. 

“No – did you turn it off?” Setting the iron down, Grace twisted in his seat and glared at his twin. 

“Is it going to burn down the Hail Mary if you leave it there?” 

Colt’s question made him blink, nonplussed. “Uh, no? Why, what do – hey!” 

In one – annoyingly fluid and practiced – motion, Colt grabbed him, set him on his feet, ducked down and threw Grace over his shoulder in a fireman’s carry. “No more two a.m. engineering.” 

With that, he began to march back toward the dormitory, Grace doing his best to fold his arms whilst hanging over his brother’s shoulder. Colt couldn’t see him, but it made him feel better about the whole injustice of it all. 

Dumping Grace back onto his bunk, Colt pointed firmly at Court and mimed zipping his lips shut. Wake him, and you’re dead. 

It was common knowledge between them that once Court was awake, he often found it incredibly difficult, if not impossible, to get back to sleep again. Years of honing reflexes to work on a hair-trigger unfortunately could not be unconditioned so easily. 

Go away. Grace rolled over to face Rocky’s xenonite chamber, and realised he still had his goggles on. He threw them bad-naturedly across the room. 

Over the course of the next day, Grace had seen from his peripheral vision Colt continually haunting his footsteps. It was a little disconcerting, but Grace couldn’t get rid of his twin without Colt asking him why. It was necessary for Project Appreciation to slow to a crawl, and Grace began to think about giving in and telling Colt about this stage of the Project, and just had to hope he didn’t extrapolate it out to the rest of them from there.

“You’re spending a lot of time in the Don’t Go Crazy Room, kid, is everything okay?” Court asked on the morning of day two of Colt’s continual observance. 

“Yeah, I’ve noticed that too,” Colt added, giving Grace his best guileless look. 

His options were either to respond, or try and get down the Taumoeba breakfast everyone was picking at with very little enthusiasm. Grace opted for the Taumoeba. 

“Ry?” Court’s expression was beginning to move from concerned to very concerned, and Grace felt a small pang of guilt. He was supposed to be showing his gratitude for them, not causing yet more worry. 

“Sorry – no, I’m fine, I just haven’t got too much to do at the moment, so I thought I’d catch up on some TV.” Another half-truth: Grace often did have some banal programme playing in the background as he continued to tinker with Rocky’s gift. His guilt then deepened as Court looked downcast. 

“I know you’re bored, Ry, and I’m sorry. But maybe it’ll be a good learning curve for you, now that you don’t have to be solely responsible for the ship anymore.” Court had shown his diligence in learning the minutiae of how the Hail Mary operated and the science behind it all. He had stepped into his role as a fully-fledged Commander so seamlessly it left Grace wondering if Court had known the information all along, and was just humouring him throughout their designated science lessons.  

“I’m sure he’s finding ways to occupy himself,” Colt said, side-eyeing Grace. He downed his Taumoeba, shuddered exaggeratedly, stood and clapped his hands. “Right, I’ll be in the control room, I want to see if I can mess with the humidity in the greenhouse. Rocky! You ready, bud?” 

Rocky tumbled into sight, for once in his tunnels rather than the X-EVA suit. “Gross morning ritual over, question?” 

“Yep, come push buttons with me.” Colt headed for the control room, Rocky hurrying along overhead in his wake. 

“Don’t blow us up!” Court called over his shoulder at Colt’s retreating back. He regarded the Taumoeba. “Mm, okay, here we go.” Finishing his breakfast in three gulps and slamming the beaker down, Court said, “I might have to give you full access back to the lab, kid, this stuff is the worst.” 

Grace perked up. “Really?” 

Whilst his little endeavour was occupying his time and keeping his mind ticking over, it wasn’t really all that much of a challenge. And, he noted, if Court was willing to give him back his lab time, sourcing and making the compressed air tank would be a lot easier than having to quietly sneak the necessary items into the simulation room.    

Court’s expression softened. “Are you really that bored, Rylie? I just don’t want you to push yourself too hard, that’s all.” 

“It’s been a month, Court, I’m sure something would have happened by now, if it was going to.” There was no bite to his words, Grace was merely laying out a fact that, even if it had been incrementally day by day, he’d come to believe. “You’re right, it’s good to have someone else trained and able, and trust me, getting some time off after months of work is definitely nice …”

Court rested his forearms on the table and leaned in a little. “There’s a ‘but’.” 

“There is,” Grace admitted. “I just want to be able to be a full member of the crew again, that’s all.” His gaze flickered between Court and the polished metal of the lab’s workbench. “I like it when we’re all working together, even if we’re in different rooms. Feels … right, somehow. Does that make sense?” 

“It does,” Court said with a gentle smile. “You’ll always be part of the crew, Ry, a slowing down of responsibilities doesn’t change that. There was a reason Stratt decided to send three people up here, after all. This,” he gestured around the Hail Mary, “wasn’t meant to be crewed by one.” 

“Two, Rocky was here as well.” 

Court rolled his eyes, but his smile didn’t fade. “Two, then, but you know what I mean.” He stretched his arms up over his head, flexing his fingers out. “Okay, how about we add in … three extra hours a week for you to do whatever in here? Does that sound fair?” 

Grace opened his mouth to argue for five hours, but Court’s expression told him to save his breath. “Yeah, alright.” 

“And that’s not three hours in a row on one day, either.” He stood, clearing the breakfast beakers to one side. “One hour, every other day.” 

“Fine.” Grace tried very hard to not drag out the word like a sulky teenager. A raised eyebrow from his brother told him he’d failed. 

“Right, since Colt has commandeered the control room, I’ll be in the dorm if you need me – I think we’re almost out of clean clothes. Nearly twelve light years away and I’m still sorting out yours and Colt’s laundry.” 

Court made to leave, Grace looking around the lab in anticipation for a full unsupervised hour’s work, when he paused in the corridor opening.

“Hey, kid, what did Colt mean about you keeping yourself busy?” 

Cursing Colt’s inability to keep his nose out of anyone’s business and Court’s uncanny knack for picking up on the smallest thing, Grace began to randomly move some of the stuff left out on the workbench. “Oh, nothing. You know what Colt’s like he just … says stuff.” That, even by his standards, was poor, and Grace turned away from Court so he could silently yell at himself.  

“Okay …” Court sounded unsure, and Grace glanced back at him. “You’d – you’d tell us if you were struggling, right?” 

“Yes. Absolutely.” Grace said earnestly. Court shuffled a little, and Grace decided he needed then and there to fully lay to rest his older brother’s concern. “I’ve got this idea for a project, but I’m not quite ready to share it yet. That’s all.” 

Court’s shoulders dropped fractionally, relief in his expression. “Intriguing – good, well, don’t –” 

“Work too hard on it, yes, Court, I know.” He grinned and made a shooing motion. “I’ve only got fifty minutes of lab time left, so, respectfully, please go away.” 

Court raised his hands in surrender and began to leave. “Same applies to you about blowing stuff up, Ry!” 

***

Resting the amalgamation of duct tape and PVC pipe on his shoulder, Grace peered through the still open end of the piping and pulled the trigger. It clicked into place, exactly where the release valve of the air canister was going to go. 

“Yes!” Lifting the now nearly complete not-potato gun (he really needed a better name for it than that) above his head, Grace took a bow for an audience of no-one in celebration. 

Despite his intentions, Grace hadn’t actually found time to source the compressed air canister in his first allotted hour alone in the lab. Instead, he’d half-started five experiments, losing interest in each just after their inception and turning to something else instead. With only ten minutes left – he’d set a countdown on his trusty stopwatch to show Court he was willing to follow the new rule to a tee – he had then realised he’d completely wasted his time, made a mess, and had absolutely nothing to show for it. Before the stopwatch had beeped irritatingly at him, Grace had made an extensive list on the notepad wall of everything he wanted to do over the next few weeks. 

Slightly put-out with the betrayal caused by his own excitement, he’d swung by the dormitory to tell Court he was done, and that he’d be in the Don’t Go Crazy Room for a rest. He’d also asked if Court would redirect Colt away from him, if his twin came looking. 

Court had agreed, seemingly under the impression that Colt was simply getting on Grace’s nerves and that he needed a bit of space. 

Now that Grace knew with certainty that the mechanism would work, he decided that tomorrow’s lab session would be dedicated to sorting out the final component of Rocky’s gift. He would finish the small arsenal of beanbags instead. 

Some had been used in their Eridianese lessons, that much was true. Court was still reluctant to actually have a go at speaking it, but he answered questions with much more enthusiasm now. Colt was ahead by one beanbag, and Grace knew that Court would do his utmost to take the top spot from him. 

Muttering to himself as he lifted the not-potato gun (beanbag gun? he thought, then immediately discarded it) off of his shoulder, Grace made a mental note to reinforce the barrel with another layer of duct tape, to ensure that if the plastic did shatter, it wouldn’t send splinters everywhere.

“What is that?” 

Colt, between the two of them, acted far more on his instincts and impulses that Grace did. However, on the occasions Grace did act on impulse, it was usually to his extreme detriment. 

At the sound of his twin’s voice, Grace decided that the best thing to do, then and there, was simply throw Rocky’s gift to one side and let it clatter onto the floor of the Don’t Go Crazy Room. “Nothing!”        

Colt leapt from the walkway and picked it up. “Is this where all those pipes went?” He turned it around and peered down the barrel. “What is it?” 

Sliding to the floor himself, Grace reached out and set both hands on the not-potato gun and tried to tug it out of Colt’s grip. “It’s nothing that concerns you, go away.” 

Pulling his arms closer to his chest, Colt canted his head to the side. “Is this what you’ve been doing in here? Building … whatever this is?”   

“Colt, seriously, give it back.” Grace tried to bend Colt’s fingers off of the barrel without much luck. 

“Tell me what it is and then maybe you can have it back.” Colt was smirking at him now. He knew he had Grace beat in a competition of contested strength. 

“None of your business.” Grace said through gritted teeth. He decided then that Colt was also having too much downtime, because his brother was only this annoying when he had run out of things to do. 

“If you’re making something why didn’t you ask Rocky for help?” Colt shifted his weight and lifted the not-potato gun above his head. 

“Because!” Grace snapped back. 

He wasn’t all too sure where his irritation was stemming from, and he stopped his attempts to get the gift back to examine it. A second later he realised it was because everyone had already done so much for him, so he needed to give that back, somehow, in equal measure. Kindness was, in his book, reciprocal. 

And perhaps there was something stubborn deep down about being able to complete an entire project singlehandedly. Grace could tell Colt all of that, knowing he would back down. But then they’d have to talk about it, and Grace was fed up with talking and just wanted to do something instead.     

So he did the very grown-up thing and trod hard on Colt’s toes. 

Grace neatly caught the not-potato gun as Colt instinctively doubled over to hop on one foot and swear up a storm at him. He scrambled back onto the walkway, not entirely sure where he could make a dash for it, but before he had even regained his footing he felt the scruff of his t-shirt be yanked backward.  

He toppled off of the walkway and straight into Colt, who made sure to catch him securely so he didn’t truly get hurt. They struggled with one another silently for a few seconds, Grace trying to hook his socked foot around the back of Colt’s knee as Colt tried to get him in a headlock. 

If Court walks in, Grace thought distantly, trying to shove Colt’s hands away from his face, he’s going to wonder if we’ve somehow become eight again. 

Colt, inevitably and as always, won. He looked down at Grace, grinning. Grace let himself hang limply in the headlock he’d been caught in, trying to blow a strand of hair out of his eye. Half of the simulation room was nauseatingly blurry, his glasses hanging off of one ear. 

“Give up?” 

“Yes.” He tapped twice on Colt’s arm, and was immediately released. Sighing, he lifted himself to sit on the walkway, wincing a little as the movement tugged at the scarred skin of his arm. 

“Hey, are you –” Colt began, mirth fading as he saw Grace’s discomfort.  

“It wasn’t you, don’t worry. I had another one of those massage things with Armando yesterday.” Straightening his glasses, Grace nodded at the walkway, indicating Colt should come and join him. 

Colt hopped up beside him. “Okay.” He nudged Grace in the ribs. “That was fun, we should do that more often.”

“No, thank you.” Grace reached out and pulled Rocky’s gift toward him, and then handed it over to Colt. “It’s for Rocky, that’s why I didn’t ask for his help.” 

Colt turned it this way and that, clicking the trigger a few times in thought. Grace saw the moment it dawned on his twin what he was holding. He looked incredulously at Grace. “Court told you not to.” 

He shrugged. “Court told me not to give Rocky a potato gun, this one will only fire beanbags.” 

Colt’s growing smile became wicked. “As if he’s going to care about that loophole, you’re going to be in so much trouble.” 

“Want to help?” There was no point keeping this part of Project Appreciation a secret anymore, and besides, despite his initial annoyance with Colt’s stalking over the past few days, there was a growing sense of rightness now that his brother was sitting next to him. 

Roughhousing had always been a very Court-and-Colt thing, Grace happy to watch passively on the sidelines. But that little bout had shaken something loose inside of him. Whilst he definitely needed to keep Colt’s part of Project Appreciation secret, wanting to surprise his brother wholeheartedly with what he had planned, Grace suddenly remembered the promise he had made to himself in the mere handful of hours before Court had first woken up. 

He would, against all odds, relearn joy. 

And some of the happiest times in his life, now that he had it all back in place, had been doing something ridiculous with Colt by his side.

It all passed through his mind in an instant, and he wondered if some of it had shown on his face, as Colt slung his arm around Grace’s shoulders. “You’re only asking so Court shouts at both of us, aren’t you?” There was no trace of sarcasm or accusation in Colt’s voice, and Grace heard warmth there that he realised he’d missed.  

“Yeah, obviously.” Grace grinned at him. “Court said I was allowed to do something to say thank you, and this is what I’ve chosen to do.” For Rocky, he added mentally. 

“Oh, he’s going to jettison you from the ship.” Colt said gleefully. “Tell me what I can do.” 

***

“Do it!” 

“I don’t want to hurt you.” 

“Then don’t aim for my face.” 

Grace bit his lip, suddenly realising the weight of the not-potato gun. Or, as Colt had dubbed it, the O.W. gun. 

It stood, he had told Grace proudly, for ‘Only Weapon’, since it was going to be the only weapon aboard the Hail Mary. Grace had pointed out that any of the scientific instruments could be weapons if they tried hard enough to make them so, to which Colt had countered that it should be called the O.W. gun because that was the noise people were going to make when Rocky inevitably turned it on them. 

The spectre of Yáo’s gun had lurked in their conversation, neither one of them acknowledging it. It would do them no good to linger on the kill-kit, still hidden somewhere on the Hail Mary. Rocky was adamantly refusing to disclose its whereabouts until everyone was feeling strong enough to look at it again, if only to jettison it. 

With a little effort, Grace pulled his thoughts back to the more enjoyable task at hand. Rocky’s gift had been completed that morning. Colt had done a superb job at running interference on the other two, as Grace found an empty gas canister and used the atmospheric regulator controls on one of their disused breeder tanks to fill it. Grace had appeared casually in the control room at the end of his allotted lab time and asked if Colt would help him figure out why screen six in the Don’t Go Crazy Room kept glitching. The pair of them had hurried through the corridors, trying to stifle their laughter. 

And now it was time for a test run. 

Colt stood at one end of the walkway, the pillows, blankets and repurposed soft storage containers pressed into a pile on the floor beneath him, just in case the O.W. gun was far more powerful than either of them expected it to be. 

“Do it, Ry, come on – we don’t know how long Court and Rocky are going to be.” 

The pair were still in the control room, Colt having asked them to try and locate the underfloor heating settings on the environment command panel. Grace knew this was an immensely difficult task, as the Hail Mary had no underfloor heating to speak of. 

“What if –” Grace began, letting the long barrel dip a little toward the floor. 

“Ry, it cannot hurt more than rolling a car.” Colt braced himself, pointing at the centre of his chest. 

“Okay, then,” Grace said resignedly. “Three, two, one.” He squeezed the trigger. 

There was a slightly muffled thunk, and Grace barely had time to register the brown blob that went hurtling toward Colt, before a dull pain spread through his shoulder and arm from the sheer amount of recoil from firing. 

Twin yelps of “Ow!” echoed through the Don’t Go Crazy Room. 

“Least the name’s apt.” Grace groaned, dropping the gun and massaging his aching joint. “You good?” 

Colt was leaning, doubled over, against the wall, similarly rubbing his sternum. Apparently, Grace had missed Colt’s chest but succeeded in knocking the air from him. He gave Grace a thumbs up. “It works.” He wheezed. 

The sound of hurried footsteps met Grace’s ears, heading in their direction. “Colt!” He hissed, dropping to the floor and quickly opening the hidden access panel. He shoved the O.W. gun inside, angling it so it would rest flat, and just managed to kick it closed as Court and Rocky rushed in. 

“Rocky heard pain noises, are Colt and Grace okay, question?” Rocky hurried over to Grace, tapping a claw against the walkway in order to inspect him. 

“Colt, you good, kid?” Court ducked down, a hand resting on Colt’s back as he peered worriedly up into his face. 

“M’fine.” Colt managed, straightening up, doing his best to not look pained and breathe normally.  

“Grace hold arm close, arm hurt, question?” Reaching out, Rocky gently clasped Grace’s wrist and pulled the limb toward him. “Not burned arm.” He tilted his carapace to one side, a visual cue for confusion. 

“Someone better start explaining, now.” Court said, his eyes fixed on the pile of cushions beneath the walkway, suspicion beginning to dawn on his face.  

Grace saw immediately what Court was thinking, and decided they had no better excuse to give. “We were bored.” He tried to look rueful, still letting Rocky manipulate his arm this way and that as if to make sure there were no new injuries. Grace shot Colt a look, hoping his twin would pick up what he was trying to spin. 

“Uh – yeah,” Colt’s eyes flicked down to the soft pile beneath them, and back to Grace. 

Grace nodded infinitesimally. 

“Yeah, I was trying to show Ry how to fall properly backwards off something like you’ve been headshotted. Y’know, like this –” Colt turned on his heel, jerked at an invisible gunshot, his head snapping back, and toppled off the walkway neatly into the padding below. 

The display was enough to get Rocky to release Grace and hurry over to where Colt had just been. “Colt okay, question?” 

Court, however, did not seem to share Rocky’s concern. He had tiredly placed a hand over his eyes. “And let me guess – you both decided to have a go at the same time, and either landed on one another, or on the floor?” 

“Ry’s got really sharp elbows,” Colt sat up from the pile, doing jazz hands for Rocky, and then tapping where the beanbag had hit him. “Winded me.” 

Grace flexed out his arm, pretending to inspect his ‘sharp elbows’ and then rolled his wrist a few times for authenticity’s sake. “We’ll be more careful.” 

“I dread to think how you two are going to cope with another three years of relative boredom.” Court muttered. He turned away, waving a hand dismissively at them. “Just don’t break anything.” 

“We won’t.” Grace and Colt said in tandem. 

“Colt teach Rocky human falling technique, request.” Rocky stepped from side to side, trying and failing to curb his enthusiasm. “Looks fun.” 

“As long as you don’t land on me, Rock, sure.” Colt pulled himself back up onto the walkway, and then did a little doubletake. “Oh, hey, Ry, one of the beanbags ended up in here.” He scooped it up and tossed it to Grace. 

“Weird.” Grace said, pocketing it. “You and Court can battle it out for it later on.”

They spent the rest of the afternoon with Rocky, Colt teaching them both all that he could with the limited space and equipment available. Rocky, it turned out, had a flair for the dramatic – Grace had always known this, but it seemed to come as a happy surprise to Colt – and did very convincing backward dives off the walkway to land on the top of his carapace, legs curled up and one twitching sporadically. 

He would always, however, give Grace a quick thumbs-down the moment he landed, and Grace knew it was the Eridian’s way of trying to assuage any anxiety he might have felt seeing Rocky ‘die’ in front of him. It only made him all the more eager to hand over Rocky’s gift, knowing it would never encompass the sheer amount of love Grace felt for him, but hoping that Rocky would understand regardless. 

Eventually, after Grace remained sprawled out in the pillows and blankets a little too long after trying to perfect Colt’s headshot fall, Colt hauled him out and told him to rest. He agreed, dashing out of the Don’t Go Crazy Room to grab his laptop and a handful of strawberries to share, and then settled on the floor to continue watching Colt and Rocky’s tireless antics. 

Pulling up a blank document, Grace channelled his nonexistent graphic design skills to make three slips of paper to give to Rocky alongside the O.W. gun. Having seen the power he’d accidentally built into it, and knowing that Rocky had a mischievous streak, Grace didn’t particularly fancy part one of Project Appreciation backfiring on him and causing subsequent injuries. 

He would have to explain to an alien what a ‘coupon’ was, and that he could only use them once, but Rocky was smart, he’d get it. 

Typing one of their names at the top of each slip, Grace hit the print button and rushed off to collect the paper before Court could come across it, just as Colt managed to land a somersault, Rocky cheering wildly for him as he did so. 

***

It was the last Eridianese lesson of the week. Grace sat by Rocky’s side listening to Colt absolutely butcher the pronunciation of their home star, Sol, and kept glancing at the clock. 

He’d usually play a game or simply kill time with his students in the last five minutes or so of their final class on a Friday. No one was going to get anything done, and Grace often thought that if his colleagues would just succumb to five minutes of chaos, they’d save themselves a lot of issues handing out weekend detentions a couple of minutes before three o’clock. 

Rocky, though, was a cruel taskmaster and was determined to keep his students diligently working until the full hour was up. Grace was secretly pleased that his status as ‘cool teacher’ had followed him to another star system. 

Willing the second hand to move a little faster, Grace tried to remain calm and composed despite his thoughts continually wandering back to the O.W. gun, ready and waiting, in the Don’t Go Crazy Room. He’d even tied a little ribbon around it. 

“Almost correct,” Rocky said kindly after Colt had finished his interstellar introduction. This lesson was all about practicing and comprehension, so Rocky’s translated voice ran as it usually did overtop of the Eridianese.   

They had decided it would be polite to greet whatever Eridian embassy was sent to them,  upon their arrival, in their native language. Grace just hoped that Colt could fine tune his pitch in the intervening three years they had left; he didn’t want to be responsible for a galactic war in case his twin accidentally insulted their hosts. 

Although, he reflected as Rocky demonstrated the word ‘star’ again, Court is more likely to start a war simply by staying silent and glaring at everyone who comes near us. He needed to find a way to fix Court’s continued flat refusal to speak Eridianese, beginning to feel slightly anxious that Rocky would take it personally. 

“Grace, do demonstration, request.” Rocky flicked his knee, effectively drawing him from his thoughts. 

“Which bit?” Grace reached over and picked up the last – and most coveted – beanbag from their small collection of lesson supplies. 

“All. First one to translate Grace’s introduction wins lesson competition.” Rocky waved his front two claws in a motion that could only be trying to convey exciting suspense.  

“High stakes,” he said seriously. 

After some back and forthing, everyone had agreed that the prize for the most beanbags collected by the end of a week would be a mug of hot chocolate from their very limited supplies. Grace had asked Court quietly if he could have one of the sachets now to store in his kit bag for their arrival on Erid and, upon hearing his reasoning, Court had actually gone a little misty-eyed. Grace kept it tucked safely beside the book Colt had bound for him.  

“Okay, ready?” He looked between Court and Colt, grinning slightly as they both leaned in toward him. “Name is Grace,” he skipped the Eridian equivalent of ‘hello’, it was far too complicated to ever get right. “I am from star system Sol. T-r-a-v-e-l-l-e-r with friend Rocky.” 

Some words they had resorted to spelling out phonetically or with the individual notes that constituted the Eridian alphabet. Grace had taken a few crash courses on ASL to better accommodate some of his students, and he was pleased to find that this method wasn’t all to dissimilar from the concept of finger spelling. 

He decided to add a little more to the end, just to really test his brothers’ comprehension. “Grace Rocky save stars.”

Colt tapped his pen against his chin. “Can we have the notes?” He pointed to a blank sheet of stave paper. 

“Nope.” Grace said, popping the ‘P’ and sitting back against the window. 

“That first bit was you introducing yourself,” Court said slowly. “And then I heard ‘Sol’, so I assume that was about where you came from? The rest was too quick, I didn’t get it.” He looked, a little dejectedly, at the beanbag still clutched in Grace’s hand. 

Colt was humming through the notes that made up the word ‘traveller’. “‘T’ and definitely a double ‘L’, and I think there was an ‘A’ – Ry, do the fourth letter again, it was either a ‘V’ or a ‘W’.”

“Traveller!” Court all but shouted it, playfully shoving Colt over as he began to complain that he nearly had it. “You introduced yourself, where you came from, said you travelled with Rocky and –” He faltered. “There was one more part.”

“Grace mean, added that bit to test siblings.” Rocky said. “Rocky thinks Court wins.” 

“He cheated, I did all the work!” Colt fumed. 

“Rocky said the first one to translate it, wins.” Grace tossed Court the beanbag. “You started to work it out, but Court told us the meaning first.” He watched and wondered vaguely if he should do something as Court gave in to complete childishness and waved the beanbag in front of Colt’s face.

Class dismissed, with Court heading in the direction of the dormitory to claim his prize, Colt following him and whining about the unfairness of it all, Rocky began to gather up the loose leaves of stave paper. He tucked them neatly back into their plastic wallet and offered it up to Grace to stow away on one of the high shelves. 

“Colt grumpy, statement.” 

“Yeah,” Grace said with a laugh. “He loves winning, he’ll be mad about that for ages.” He felt a soft tug on the leg of his jumpsuit, and looked down to see Rocky standing right by his side. “Hey, pal, you good?” 

“Grace and Rocky do something together, question?” Rocky tapped two fingers together. “Grace has been busy, I not want to bother but – miss Grace, a little.” 

With an awful swooping sensation in his gut, he realised that Rocky was right. Over the past week, the only time he’d actually spent a solid amount of time with his best friend was during these lessons, and when they’d snatched an hour or so with Colt after the first test run of the O.W. gun. 

“Oh my gosh, I’m so sorry, Rocky.” Grace knelt down and set a hand atop Rocky’s carapace. “I haven’t been avoiding you on purpose, I promise – I was just working on something.” 

“Is okay, Grace likes to be busy. Perhaps we be busy together, question?” Rocky tilted his carapace upward a little to show he wasn’t upset. “Can Rocky see what Grace was doing, question?” 

“Absolutely.” Grace paused, and then leaned down and pulled Rocky in for a hug. “I can show you this and then I have the perfect thing we can do together.” Once Rocky’s part of Project Appreciation had been completed, Grace could think of no-one he would want more by his side to begin work on the next stage, this time intended for Colt. 

“Excite!” Two gentle claws came up to encircle Grace’s back, the pressure firm but light. 

Grace broke away, stood, and beckoned, Rocky trotting behind him as they entered the Don’t Go Crazy Room. 

“Watch Earth moving pictures, question?” 

Grace didn’t answer, and hopped off of the walkway, kneeling by the access panel. 

“Grace, question?” 

As he began to open it, Grace said, “So, on Earth, there’s this thing humans talk about called ‘love languages’. They’re different ways people show affection for one another – and it doesn’t have to be romantic affection, either, it can be platonic, familial, you name it.” He looked up at Rocky. “Now, I was never really one for the romantic variation, but otherwise I would definitely say the way I show people I care for them is through gift giving.” 

He pulled out the O.W. gun and set it on the walkway, jumping back up to sit next to Rocky. 

Rocky trilled at the gift, his passive echolocation clicks intensifying as he inspected it closely. “For Rocky, question?” 

“Yeah, pal, this is for you.” Grace ruffled his hair nervously. “I just thought I should find a way to say thank you, y’know. For everything you’ve done for me, quite literally since we met.” He indicated the gun. “I know you like spending time with me, and might consider that thank you enough, but this has been a long-time promise. Remember when I said I’d make you a potato gun?” 

Rocky swung his carapace up to Grace, back to the O.W. gun, and back to Grace. He let out a little squeak of excitement. “Yes, yes, yes!” 

“You hold us all together, Rock, and nothing I can say will ever convey how much that means to me – to us. But you also deserve a chance to cut loose a little and have some fun. We all do.” From his pocket, Grace pulled out the three coupons he’d made. “These go with it, and there’s some spare beanbags in that access hatch for you to use as ammunition.” 

Rocky was turning circles whilst doing wild jazz hands. A high-pitched muddle of words accompanied it, Grace catching, “Amaze!” and “Rocky loves, thank, thank, thank!” in there. 

“Only stipulation,” Grace said, an unrestrained smile on his face. “These bits of paper allow you to fire this at each of us once, and once only, okay? I might have made it a bit too powerful, so aim for places that aren’t … uh, breakable. Deal?” 

Rocky gave him a double thumbs-down and warbled, “Deal!” 

Grace gestured to the O.W. gun. “It’s all yours.” He didn’t bother with a tutorial – Rocky was, after all, one of his planet’s finest engineers. He’d figure it out. 

***

Figure it out, he did.

He had had a hard time choosing which slip of paper to cash in first, but with his decision made, Grace and Colt waited quietly in the airlock, the latter ready to throw the interior door closed and seal it. 

“Hey, Rock. What have you got there?” 

“Court stand at end of corridor and Rocky will show.” 

“Uh, okay?” 

Colt shoved Grace down, both of them lightly whacking the other with backs of hands, trying to control the laughter that threatened to give away their hiding place. They watched Court pass the door, a bemused expression on his face. 

He stopped, out of sight, at the other end of the hall nearer the lab, Rocky presumably just outside the control room. 

At least he’s being responsible, Grace thought and wondered if he could use that in his defence when Court inevitably tried to kill him in a moment. 

“So, what –” 

A rush of air, a muffled thunk, a streak of brown twine and then – 

“Ow! What the fuck was that?” Court yelled. “Rocky, what –” He stopped dead, and Grace and Colt watched Rocky streak past them, having dropped the O.W. gun in his hasty retreat. 

“Grace present to Rocky! Colt help also!” He called as he skittered away. 

“Traitor!” Colt hissed, just as the sound of Rocky’s interior airlock opening caught Grace’s ear. A smart move, all things considered. Xenonite was, after all, nearly unbreakable. 

A beat. And then, “Ryland, Colton! Get here, now!” 

“Close the door,” Grace said urgently. “Close the door!” 

Colt slammed it shut just as Court appeared, staring daggers at them through the little porthole window. He ducked down, Grace and Colt looking at one another with dawning horror over their mistake to not make Rocky’s gift Eridian-atmosphere compliant. 

Court held up the beanbag in one hand, and the O.W. gun in the other. 

“It’s okay, I can wait.”