Chapter Text
Ryland wakes feeling heavy. Like he had had one of those sleeps where the hours feel like days spent unconscious. He groans and tries to roll over. His body has that same heavy feeling, like it's dragging him down into the mattress. Maybe he'd sleep a little longer. He should at least know what time it is, though. With a groan, he opens his eyes.
He opens his eyes.
He opens his eyes.
Why can't he see? There's just this nothingness as far as he can perceive. No shapes dance in the darkness, as if he had simply had his eyelids glued shut. In fact, he can't feel that he even has eyelids. His body is numb. He can only feel the plushness of the mattress by how it cradles his body— There's no sensation other than pressure. Not the smooth texture of his sheets, the soft backing of his quilt. Nothing.
He tries to move again. An arm, this time. Lifting it feels decidedly wrong. His musculature is all messed up. It doesn't rise from his shoulder. It feels more like it comes from his flank— and there's the heavy issue, again. It feels like someone strapped lead weights to him. Had the Eridians done something to his biodome while he slept?
He attempts to speak. He doesn’t open his mouth because he can't find his mouth in the endless numbing sensation that seems to have taken over. But he tries to make noise in his throat, anyways. Air passes through him, but it feels wrong. His chest doesn't expand with oxygen, he can't feel the relief of an inhale. He tries to push the air out with a sound, and makes a noise like a dying whoopie cushion. He tries again, and manages the higher pitched sound of a trumpet out of tune.
He notices something, however. When he makes a noise, he gets a brief understanding of the room around him. He can't see it, but he knows there's a work table three feet to his left, a beaded curtain at the entrance to the small room, and a large Eridian beyond the walls. It's not much, but it's enough to piece together that he's in Rocky's home. Specifically, his workshop. Rocky slept in there often, so there was a mattress to accommodate him— Rocky had grown used to sleeping human-style in the Hail Mary. He liked a good mattress, even if other Eridians regarded him strangely for it. Grace had been in Rocky and Adrian's home a handful of times, with the assistance of his own xenonite EVA suit. It was a little farther from the biodome than was easily traversable, however, so it was a rare treat. The thing is, Grace doesn't remember being outside of his dome. He fell asleep in his bed, alarm set for the following morning to teach his gaggle of pebbles.
Footsteps are approaching. He can hear each step bounce off of the rock walls of the home. It's Adrian, his hulking figure slowly making its way over to where Grace lay. The beads rustle as the Eridian walks through them, and suddenly Ryland has a very clear picture of the room. He still can't see it, but there's carvings on the wall of Tau Ceti and the planet Adrian. Rocky had made them based off of his memory of his texture screen display. Rocky was very proud of the carvings. He can see the tools on the workbench now. A wrench, some screwdrivers, and a collection of various tweezers. There was an abandoned project on the table— a long chain with hundreds of beads strung along it. He can see an old one of Rocky's xenonite suit prototypes in the corner.
"Rocky, you're awake! You sleep for λ days! Bad bad bad..." Adrian trails off. He steps closer to Grace, carapace leaning forward. "Rocky...?"
Grace, ever so kind, tries to correct the confused Eridian. Can't Adrian hear his squishy human organs? He makes to speak, but instead only makes a noise like dying whale song. He tries again, and again, but he can't mimic human speech. He can barely move and he can't speak. Okay. In the grand scheme of things, maybe it's not so bad. Maybe it'll fade with time. Maybe Grace is sick. Surely, he's sick. It's like waking up from a coma again. He's just got to wait for sensation to return. And sight. And speech. At least he could hear just fine. Better than fine. He can even hear the heating element in the room Grace had dubbed the "kitchen."
"Rocky!' Adrian shrieks in concern. He's all up in Grace's space, now. Tapping over his skin and lifting his limbs. He can feel the pressure of Adrian's claws prodding at him. Little blips of Adrian appear in his mind's eye with every click and tap. Then his arm is in the air. And his other arm. And his... other arm. And a fourth. And a fifth. All arms. Not a leg, not even a tail. The muscles pulled at his flanks with every lift, rising this way and that.
Grace was starting to come to a conclusion that not only didn't make logical sense, but was one he really freaking did not like.
Grace was an Eridian. An Eridian that looked just like Rocky, if even Adrian was confused. But, where did that put the real Rocky?
A static buzz lights the room up in shapes. "Rocky?" Comes an unfamiliar Eridian voice.
"What?" Adrian turns and snaps at the small radio device by Rocky's workbench.
"The human is... screaming."
Ah, Grace thinks. There's Rocky.
...fuck.
Grace makes his first real attempt at standing up. He drags his arms, one by one, closer to his abdomen— carapace, whatever. He plants his hands firmly on the mattress, and pushes up. He rises a couple inches, staggers, and immediately falls to the ground like a clumsy toddler. The shock of the rock floor beneath him is a muted sensation. He can tell that he hit something hard, but there's no aches and pains along with it. Still, it has Adrian scooping Grace's body up in his careful arms. Grace goes limp in the hold, and allows himself to be placed flat on the mattress, leg-arms splayed out around him. Adrian coos something sweet to him. Grace doesn't have the words to translate in his head— but the song makes him warm all the same.
It gives him an idea. He knows Eridian. He's learned the most modern iteration of Eridianese. If he can figure out how to speak it... well. That's the million dollar question, isn’t it? How can Ryland Grace figure out Eridian vocal chords and gas bladders? From a theoretical standpoint, he knew how Eridians worked. They took in air through the vents located on top of their carapace, and it filled five different gas bladders. From there, air was released to pass over the vocal chords to make the variety of musical noises of Eridianese. Simple.
Ryland breathes in, again not able to actually feel the intake of air. He lets air out slowly, unsure how to release air from only one bladder at a time. It ends in a melody of high-pitched notes played in sync— nothing close to a word.
Adrian refuses to leave his side while Grace stumbles through the intricacies of Eridian speech. This is an issue. As much as Grace appreciates the company, Rocky could really use someone right now. He was all alone, seeing for the first time in his life. He was wet and sticky and gross like Ryland, and someone needed to be there for him.
"🎵🎶!" Grace shouts. It's close to his name— close to Grace. But it's not quite right. He played all the notes at the same time, too high pitched and warbly.
"Rocky—"
"🎵🎶!" He shouts again, a little steadier. He finally moves a too-heavy arm to tap desperately at his carapace. "🎵🎶!"
"Grace?" Adrian deciphers. "You can't worry about the human right now—"
"No!" Grace clicks. He knows how to say this word. It was a short series of clicks, similar to a human clicking their tongue against the roof of their mouth. He taps his carapace again. "Me, 🎵🎶!" He's got the short, simple sounds down, but he still can't quite grasp his own name— it's too many notes, not enough gas bladder coordination.
"Rocky, you're not making sense." Adrian speaks slowly and sweetly, like he's gently trying to guide Rocky in the right direction. But Grace wasn't Rocky. Rocky was him and Grace needed to get to him.
He tries for "switch" and ends up with another pitchy string of notes. He tries again until he gets it close enough.
"Switch?" Adrian asks for clarification. Grace sings the word again. "What do you mean 'switch', 🎶🎶?" Grace knew that that one was a pet name Adrian used for Rocky. Something decidedly sappy, as Rocky always vented steam when Adrian used it.
"Me 🎵🎶!" Grace tries to insist. "🎵🎶 me me me!"
"You're... Grace?"
"Yes!" Ryland cheers. He lights up in song, vents letting out a burst of steam in his excitement. The vents are an involuntary thing, he's coming to learn. Like human breathing, Grace doesn't have to think about it. It just happens.
"Okay, Grace," Adrian says gently. He says it like he doesn't believe him. Like he thinks Rocky's gone and lost his mind. Sicker than anyone thought from space— deluded into thinking he's an alien species. But the idea was planted, now: Rocky was Grace.
"🎶🎵🎵!" Grace tries to say next. It was baby's first attempt at Rocky's name— his Eridian name. Unfortunately for Grace, it's also too many complicated notes to control. So he says it again. And again, voice shrieking even to his own ears— or sound organs (do Eridians have ears?) Eventually he gives up and begins tapping his own carapace again. Grace had taught Rocky, Adrian, and a handful of Eridian scholars and scientists morse code. Thank whichever god looked down upon him for that.
.-. --- -.-. -.- -.--
"Rocky," Adrian says aloud. Grace does a little cheer.
.-. --- -.-. -.- -.-- / .. ... / .... ..- -- .- -.
"Rocky... is... human? Rocky— Grace." The large Eridian corrects himself. "Rocky is Grace," Adrian says slowly.
Grace taps out yes.
"Grace is... Rocky?"
Ryland shoots air through his vocal tubes and makes a sound like a groan tube. It's meant to be a victory noise. Instead it's just annoying.
Adrian stares at him for a very long time, completely still. His vents don't even tremble. Then, in an instant, the Eridian rears up and screeches at him.
"Human body snatcher!" He snarls. "Get out of my mate's body!”
Actually, what Adrian said was far more vulgar, but Grace blushes thinking about translating the... creative insults, so he chooses not to.
Grace's vents let out a fearful hiss of steam. He tries to move, to back away from the very peeved Eridian. He only manages to clatter to the ground again, limbs splayed every which way. They tangle as Grace tries to right himself. He's like a baby learning to walk again, except with nearly triple the number of legs.
"Be still, human snatcher!" Adrian hisses. He comes along to the other side of the bed and none too gently lifts Grace back onto the mattress. Grace can only whine in distress.
"🎵🎶🎵🎵🎶!" Grace says. It's supposed to be a sentence. Supposed to be 'it's not on purpose!' But Ryland still can't manage proper speech quite yet. He's learning, but it's slow and not done with any sort of scientific method. He's throwing himself at the metaphorical wall and hoping something sticks. He doesn't have the time or the know-how to do anything else.
"Stop making that horrid noise!"
"I’m sorry!" At least that phrase is simple enough. More clicking noises, less song.
"Dont be sorry, give Rocky back!"
Grace lets out another high whine. He doesn't know how to switch flipping bodies. He's a school teacher, for God's sake.
Adrian crowds Grace again, poking at his body like he had done before. As if the Eridian could discern the cause for this madness from the condition of his carapace. Adrian isn't gentle like he was when he thought Rocky's body held Rocky. He was efficient, with bruising taps that lapse on the edge of almost-pain through his rocky exterior.
"What is wrong with you!" Adrian screams. Grace has never seen him so... out of control. Adrian was calm and collected, always careful with his movements because they towered over the average Eridian. He was prized, and he strutted around like he knew it.
"🎶🎵🎵!" Grace tries again— tries to say Rocky again. They needed to get to Rocky— to human Rocky. Maybe proximity would fix this! "🎶🎵🎵!"
Quit fucking speaking!" Adrian roars.
.-. --- -.-. -.- -.--
Grace taps out Rocky's name once more. He has to do it a couple of times to be heard over the constant hissing of both of their vents.
.-. --- -.-. -.- -.-- / -. . . -.. / .... . .-.. .--.
Rocky need help.
Adrian stomps his front legs angrily. "You put my mate in a zoo!"
Grace balks. That's his enclosure, thank you very much. It wasn't his fault that reality seems to have bent over itself! At least, by nothing intentional. Grace really doesn't know how two separate alien species could switch bodies. Unless Ryland is actually dying, and he's hallucinating in his last few moments alive. What a weird way to go.
Adrian turns and stomps off, out of the room. Grace has half a mind to think he's being abandoned as Adrian passes back through the beaded curtain, but Grace can still hear his angry huffing and puffing. Grace listens intently to Adrian's movements. He's gathering the soft things from the nesting room— Ryland can hear the soft swishing of the fabric, and the way Adrian's claws smooth over it. Then, the Eridian is stomping his way back into Rocky's workshop. As the beads clink against each other and Adrian's hard carapace, Grace can see what the Eridian has done. He's fashioned a sling out of blankets, soft fabric wrapped around his carapace to hold it afloat. Grace makes a startled noise as Adrian reaches for him, but the angry Eridian pays him no mind. He picks Ryland up and situates him in the sling, all five legs tucked into the pouch. It's decidedly uncomfortable to have the fabric so tight against him. It muffles his ability to feel the soundwaves around him— he's beginning to understand why other Eridians judged Rocky's human attachments so hard. Still, he physically can't complain unless he wants to be shouted at again, so he hunkers down into the sling and waits.
No one stops Adrian on the way to the biodome. No one asks why he's carrying Rocky like an infant. The closer they get to the pressurization chamber, the faster Adrian walks and the louder this incessant buzzing gets. Still, they make it into the chamber. There's an Eridian already there, one Grace recognizes as a member of his care team. From memory Grace recalls that he's a sort of sulfur yellow, but he perceives no color now. Adrian orders the other Eridian to leave. They go without complaint— not a sound uttered.
Adrian then reaches back into the sling to deposit Grace onto the floor. He tries to get his legs up under him to stand, but he only manages a sort of dangerous lean before Adrian kicks his arms out and Grace tumbles fully onto the metal ground. The sound pings off the walls, and Grace can suddenly see the xenonite suits lining the walls. Adrian gets into his, first. Each suit had to be custom made to fit its wearer— only certain Eridians were allowed inside the dome. Adrian doesn't leave Grace waiting for long. He returns with Rocky's suit in tow.
Getting Grace inside of the suit is much more difficult than one might think. Imagine dressing a five-armed toddler, with all the squirming and bent elbows of protest. The important thing, however, is that Adrian gets it on and latches it shut. Then, he's put back in the sling.
The buzzing is even more oppressive once they're inside the biodome. Grace concludes that it's all the lights and screens that make up the dome's atmosphere. Grace supposes that this is why Rocky asks him to repeat things, sometimes. The poor guy can't hear him over the noise. It's messing with his echolocation, too. The shapes coming into understanding are fuzzy with unclear edges. He can't say definitively where that rock is, or how far the waves reach up the shoreline. The closer they get to the house, Grace begins to pick up on the sound of his own voice. It's shouting nonsensical noise, wordless whimpers and whines. Rocky.
Adrian storms into the house without announcing himself. Rocky isn't in the kitchen, so Adrian pushes through until he's in the bedroom. There, Grace can finally perceive his friend.
...God, he's so wet. Rocky is a mess of twisting, undulating organs that make up a vaguely human shape. He sounds squishy and squirmy, like a bag of earthworms. Grace nearly retches, but he doesn't have the anatomy for that anymore, so he's left just feeling sick. Is this how Rocky felt all the time? God, Grace was such a bad friend. How did Rocky stand him?
"Rocky!" Adrian shrieks once they're in the room. Rocky's head immediately turns towards them, eyes wide and leaky. He makes a sad little wailing noise, like he's trying to say "hello" in Eridian— but he doesn't have the right vocal chords or tubes or gas bladders. He's got human lungs and a human windpipe. Adrian hovers like he wants to get closer, like he wants to touch and feel that Rocky is okay. But the hesitance of touching the human is there. Rocky is wet and gross and noisy, right now.
Instead, Adrian backs up and reaches for Grace once more. The massive Eridian picks Grace up by his carapace and plops him on the mattress next to Human Rocky. Grace makes a low groaning sound as the wet undulating of Rocky's organs gets so much clearer.
He can feel Rocky's eyes on him, pupils expanding and contracting as his gaze roams over Grace's Eridian body.
"Rocky, this is Grace," Adrian introduces cautiously. He gets closer once more, and braves putting a claw on Rocky's squishy arm. "You two switched."
"Ssss—wehuh," Rocky groans. Grace assumes it's an attempt at the English word for switch. Thank god Eridians couldn't forget— Rocky knew English perfectly. Better than Grace did, some days, having found many grammar courses on the laptop. Now, all Rocky had to do was figure out the mechanics of human speech. Considering the simple structure, Grace almost envies Rocky for how much easier he has it.
"Ayceeeee," Rocky hisses next. A clumsy hand none too gently pats at the xenonite suit atop Grace's body. The finger taps light up Rocky's nervous system— Grace can perceive Rocky's nervous system, twisting and branching in little nodes from his fingertips up his arm, all the way to his spinal cord. It's as fascinating as it is nauseating. If Grace reaches his senses out further, he can interpret Rocky's face. It's wet and squirmy like the rest of him, eyes and mouth and nose all working together to make Grace want to hurl. But he can see the little fibers of his beard, and the way his hair flops messily from bedhead.
"🎶🎵🎵," Grace replies. This time, the notes are a little more spaced out, a tad more discernable as a song rather than a clashing of instruments.
Adrian hovers nervously. He doesn't appear to know what to do. Grace doesn't know what to do, either. Rocky has no such qualms. He removes his hand from Grace's suit to reach out to Adrian. Fingers brush the hulking Eridian's arm, and Grace can hear the surprised hiss of Adrian's vents.
"Dree," Rocky smiles. At least facial expressions seemed to be somewhat instinctual— although the grin was a little wobbly.
Adrian shuffles closer even though Grace knows how much he hates the squishy human body. He sets a claw on Rocky's cheek, and the human leans into it. "I'm here, my mate. I'm here.”