Chapter Text
They are about an hour away from landing on Erid, and Grace is panicking.
His hands are shaking as he checks the cameras for the 200th time in the past day, and he still can't seem to calm his nerves. Rocky is leaning towards him judgementally, clearly not happy with his life choices.
"Why Grace no sleep, question? Stupid and shaky for first meeting. Bad bad bad."
As if Grace didn't feel bad enough already. It wasn't his fault that he couldn't get to sleep last night. Knowing that you have to represent your entire species to alien life-forms doesn't exactly calm your nerves. "Yeah, yeah, yeah, I get it, 'Grace stupid when no sleep', but how am I supposed to get any rest when all of this is happening?!?!" He gestures frantically to the screens in front of him.
In less than an hour, Grace is going to be facing a planet's worth of aliens, and he will have to convince them that he is worth the resources to keep him alive. What if they think he's not worth the trouble? What if they decide to attack Earth the moment they find out aliens exist? There's nothing he could do to stop them! He's just a leaky space blob who was too cowardly to even volunteer to go on this mission-
Rocky's ball slams into his legs, breaking his train of thought. "Grace think too much. Grace Rocky save stars! Eridians love you."
The notes have a concerned undertone to them. Most of what Rocky says nowadays does, after Grace had to start rationing and begsn to get stuck in his head way more often than before. He feels so much more tired recently, and it hasn't gone unnoticed in the slightest. Rocky tries to hide his worry under the usual playful banter, but that hasn't gone unnoticed either. They have a mutual understanding, and neither of them are willing to break the peace by bringing it up.
Grace sighs. "I'll take your word for it for now, buddy, but we're gonna have to see when we get down there."
Rocky makes a disbelieving note, as if the thought of the other Eridians not accepting Grace was inconceivable. He turns away, continuing to work on his project that has been his main focus for the last couple days. He's putting the last finishing touches on celebration jewelry for Grace, stating that he'd need it for all the partying that would happen once they returned with the solution. Grace had also pointed out that wearing familiar clothing would make him seem more approachable and less dangerous, which Rocky have him a "look" for and said that he didn't need any help in that department. Which, true, but also very rude.
The celebration jewelry had been done for days, but Rocky kept messing with it, saying that it needed to be "perfect". Clearly, despite the nonchalant air he put on, Grace was not the only one stressed about this landing. Luckily, right before the space elevator was in view, Rocky declared it finished and passed it into the airlock for Grace to put on.
Grace put it on frantically, trying to get it secured around his arms while keeping an eye on the cameras. There was a landing pad on top of the elevator, which wasn't too much of a surprise since the Blip-A had to be able to return somehow, but it seemed weirdly... beat up? Like it had been used many times since the Blip-A first took off. Grace wondered idly if the Eridians had started to develop their own space program. He really hoped not. Without knowledge of radiation, they would be sending so many more Eridians to their death.
It also seemed very empty. There was a crew there, presumably to help with the landing, but not nearly the amount he would have expected to greet a mystery ship that was either holding your planet's heroes or an alien life-form. The crew also didn't seem as excited as he anticipated them to be, looking very unenthused and bored, as if this was a frequent thing. Of course, Grace only had the body language of one Eridian to go off of, so those might be their "I'm-so-excited-that-I-can't-even-move" stances. Who knows?
There did seem to be one more Eridian coming up the elevator though, and this was one that he recognized. They were about 1.5 times Rocky's height, with their carapace color matching the Rocky's green spots, and small pops of Rocky's signature orange-brown. Clearly, this was Adrian.
...
Grace was not ready for this. He thought he would have a bit more time before meeting Rocky's mate, but he was very wrong. Now he had to go out there, meet the Eridian that Rocky named a whole planet after, and somehow not make a fool of himself. That was never going to happen.
Rocky quickly noticed the change in heart rate and started rolling around eagerly. "What Grace see, question?"
Grace swallowed loudly. "They have a crew ready to help land the ship. And... I think I see Adrian."
Rocky froze, before making the loudest, most high-pitched noise that Grace has ever heard him make. He started practically bouncing off the walls, holding the high-pitched note while repeating "Adrian" over and over again. It seems that Grace's anxiety was not shared between the two of them.
In a few moments, the ship would touch down, and the Eridians would be able to see inside. The anticipation was almost too much to bear, but Grace just took a deep breath and reassured himself; everything will work out. It has so far, and now he has his best friend with him to face anything that happens.
Though sometimes he makes strangulation very tempting, Grace thought, as Rocky just got louder and louder the closer the ship got. But finally the ship was touching down, and it was like the world froze. Then Adrian was moving.
Faster than he thought an Eridian could move, they were at the airlock, clearly about to start pounding at the door, and then they just stopped. Rocky did not share in that hesitation as he quickly rolled into the airlock and cycled out the air as fast as possible. He went crashing into Adrian, which finally got them to react. But instead of the tearful reunion that Grace had expected to happen, Adrian wrapped their long arms around Rocky's ball and took him as far from the ship as possible. They seemed... terrified. And based on how the crew was standing, they weren't the only one. What happened? What did he do to make them so scared? Since he was stuck on the ship for the time being, he moved his way to the airlock and watched as Rocky and Adrian had a very intense conversation, hoping that the results would lean in his favor.
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The only thing going through Rocky's mind was that his mate was right there. He just had to get through that airlock and would be able to interact with them for the first time in almost 600 years. He didn't even notice that Adrian had frozen up before he was barreling into them at full speed. But he did notice when the arms wrapped around him (his ball, why did he have to still be in this stupid ball, he'd gladly suffocate if he could just touch them again-) and, instead of the embrace he was expecting, he was dragged to the complete other end of the landing pad. He was confused, but not enough to stop himself from desperately pressing up against the side of the ball, as if he could feel Adrian's carapace if he pressed hard enough. "ADRIAN!!!" He yelled, because he could never say it enough times to make up for the years they've spent apart.
This, at least, was returned. "ROCKY!!!" They shouted, wrapping all five arms around the ball as best they could while wearing a xenonite suit. "I thought you were dead! How are you alive, question?!?!"
That is a very long story. Just as he was about to explain the jist, Grace made his presence known again by making his way to the airlock, probably to get a better view of the outside. He moved slower than Rocky would have liked. The rationing has been taking a toll on him, and he needed help sooner rather than later. But when he focused back on Adrian to explain the situation, he noticed that they seemed utterly horrified. "Adrian, question?" He asked, concerned that he missed something important.
"Rocky, there is a human on your ship," Adrian stated quietly, as if they were scared of what would happen if they spoke any louder.
That wasn't a word that Rocky recognized, but it seemed to combine the notes from "organic" and "horror". It didn't take a detective to figure out that they were talking about Grace, and that they were basically calling him a flesh monster.
"I know that there is an alien" (he refused to use that new word to refer to his best friend) "on that ship. It's his ship."
Adrian shook their carapace, as if trying to dispell any confusion between them. "No, it is not just any alien. It is a human."
They emphasized the word like that would aid in Rocky's understanding, but all it did was create even more questions. "You have met aliens, question?"
Adrian made a confused noise, before remembering something. "You were gone before the Collective."
"The what, question?"
Over the next 30 minutes, Adrian gave a mostly complete rundown of the Galactic Collective. Rocky was astonished. For most of his life, aliens were just a theory, and not a serious one at that. It was something that Eridians would use for fun hypotheticals and not much else. Now, not only had he become best friends with one, but his planet had joined an organization made up of over a hundred alien species. It was almost unbelievable. But not as unbelievable as what Adrian said next.
The Collective had a ban on interacting with, contacting, or even going near Earth, because humans were the most dangerous intelligent species known to the galaxy.
Adrian seemed very serious about this, so Rocky tried to hold it in, but a few chitters slipped out anyway. This escalated into full-blown hysterical squealing, as he started rolling his ball back and forth uncontrollably. Grace? A dangerous, horrifying alien? That is the funniest thing he had ever heard in his entire life.
His rolling intensified as he imagined Grace trying to sneak attack him, proceeding to trip over his own feet, and landing face-first in his Taumoeba breakfast. Trying to see him as anything close to lethal was an exercise in futility. Hilarious.
Wait. The Taumoeba. Rocky suddenly shot back up onto his arms. "Adrian! We figured it out! We know how to save Eridani!"
Adrian had been highly unamused with the laughing fit, but immediately perked up at this. "What, question? You figured it out, question?"
Two of their arms started doing jazz hands from excitement. "Yes! We are saved! How do you stop the Astrophage, question?"
Rocky stood proudly. "Grace and I figured out that Astrophage has a natural predator called Taumoeba. We bred it so that it could live on Threeworld and eat the Astrophage!"
Adrian hummed happily, though a bit of puzzlement showed through. "That's great! Who is Grace, question?"
Rocky started to move back towards the ship. "The alien! You can come and meet him while we grab the Taumoeba from the ship."
His path was immediately blocked by one of Adrian's arms. "No. There is no way you getting back on that death trap. Not after I just got you back."
If Rocky had eyes, they'd be rolling so hard that they would pop out of his carapace. "Come on, Adrian! Those stories can't be real. Grace can barely function without me, let alone kill me in my sleep."
Adrian was not convinced. "I've been given proof many times to backup those claims. I wouldn't just ignore our neighbors less than 20 light-years away if I didn't have a sufficient reason to."
Rocky knew that Adrian would have fact-checked each account very thoroughly, but Grace being a danger to Rocky was such a ridiculous thought because- "He saved my life. Twice, Adrian. He could have easily died either time, but he risked his life to save me and all of Erid. There's no way I could see him as anything other than a friend after that."
For some reason, this did not seem to calm Adrian down. If anything, this caused their stress to double. "Oh no, this is bad bad bad. This is terrible."
This was not the reaction Rocky was expecting. "Why is this bad, question? I don't understand."
Adrian's notes were full of dread. "You've been pack-bonded."