Work Text:
when will I feel this
as vivid as it truly is
[x]
_
It’s a miracle I had the discipline to save the last bag for tonight. Then again, life’s nothing but miracles anymore.
I watch him hum along to the end credits. Not like we haven’t watched Ghost before, but something hits different tonight. No, everything hits different tonight. Preliminary hypothesis: half a bag of vodka on a chronically malnourished stomach.
Or, the other thing.
When I can’t watch him anymore for reasons we don’t need to examine, I look at the walls and the walls look back. Like I’m seeing them for the first time, but they’re unrecognizable from the first time, having fully adapted to their environment. Formulas, diagrams, fun little descents into psychosis littered across any writable surface. Underexposed selfies from the night we found Ilyukhina’s Polaroid. Letters to home we couldn’t send. The relics of Rocky’s poetry phase; the relics of my poetry phase, grammar-corrected by three guesses who. Xenonite panels stacked in a corner under a pile of old breeder tanks. Dirty socks and burned-out bulbs and ration lists, inventory lists, lists of Rocky’s pet peeves. A toothbrush sticking out of a test tube, defying explanation. Evidence of a shared life. An impossible, death-defying, life-threatening life.
A miracle.
Rocky’s ball rolls into the laptop hard enough to snap it shut. “Grace having unsaid emotion, statement.”
Straight to business, as per. “Not question?”
“No. Is obvious.”
I fling the quilt over his ball. He shakes it back to the mattress.
“Say.”
“It’s stupid.”
“Yes. Grace stupid. Love anyway.”
Tonight, that’s all it takes. That and roughly double the standard tongue-loosening dose of toxins.
“I wish I could touch you,” I say.
It hangs in the air, heavy as xenon, worse than it sounded unsaid. Loud enough and sad enough that I’m already bracing myself for dismissal, Useless to wish for impossible things, waste of brain, bad for health—
“I wish, too.”
My heart doesn’t get the chance to flip.
“Have wished for long long time.”
I shut my eyes and swear the centrifuge shuts down. “Me too.”
Nothing to analyze here; no new data to parse. We’ve talked it all to death, methodically, clinically, miserably. Fun fact, touch starvation is universal. My own calamitous forays into human intimacy, not so much.
By the time I realize I’m rubbing my scar, he’s pressing a claw—that claw—to the flex panel, stretching the laws of physics to reach me, to shave off another few inches between us. If we were still in our poetry era, maybe something-something about a morning glory chasing the sun, but I’m only drunk and we’ve already blown whatever the heck this door is clean off its hinges, so.
“You could grab my other arm, give me a matching set.”
“Not funny.”
“Little bit.” I smile, then press it into the ball. He hasn’t protested a kiss in years. Tonight of all nights, he wouldn’t. “Hey, it’s the closest thing to a mate mark I’ll ever get, you know.”
Silence. Drop-dead, deep-space silence.
“It’s a joke, Rock.”
“Understand.”
Okay. Comedic limit unlocked. Great. Fine.
“Apology.”
“What? No, don’t, we’ve talked about this.” Ad nauseum and to little avail.
“No. Not apology for scar. Apology for...” The frantic cricketing of his fingers could probably start a fire. “Cannot give proper mate mark.”
Can't what now?
He’s sloppy with syntax when he’s tired, but nobody’s sleeping tonight. I beg my useless temporal lobe to wring out the ethanol. "Rocky..."
"Can make human equivalent."
"I—what?"
"Not yet. Not here. Need special materials. On Erid."
"Materials for… what?"
"Metal band for left hand, fourth digit."
Zero-G has nothing on this.
"You..." I claw at the fringe of sobriety. He's thought about this. Researched this. "You want to make me a ring?"
Not just any ring. What the fu—
"If Grace want. Would make anything. Give anything. Do anything."
Mary, shields up.
The first thought is the worst thought: It took him until tonight.
"Rock, that’s…” Not what we are? Something we should run by Adrian first? The most romantic thing anyone’s ever said to me?
Screw it.
"What would you do if we could touch?"
The eyeroll chirp, loud and clear. First chord I ever picked up. Shocker.
"If we could touch, would touch. Grace drunk, extra stupid."
And thus ends our brief detour into who-are-you-and-what-have-you-done-with-Rocky.
"No, I..." Cards on the table, in for a penny, all that. "Specifically. What... would you touch first?"
I stare at the ceiling. Once a coward, always a coward.
"First. Touch cheek to clear away leakage."
The laugh that rockets up my throat shakes the first drop free. "Why am I crying in this scenario?"
"Grace crying now."
It hurts to smile this big. Good hurt, good good good. "Okay. Fair."
Not about to argue when he's already given more than I asked. I can live off that long enough to rekindle my own survival instinct. Poor thing's been hobbling on its last leg for months. It's getting harder to hide it from him. Harder not to—
"Second. Learn face."
My chest caves in on itself. I force the lungs back into action before he can notice.
"Gentle touch, all over. Study frail human features. Hair texture. Composition of flesh." The music of him swells, then ebbs. "Feel Grace smile."
That's when I realize. He's watching me.
"Third. Measure pulse at base of throat."
Eyes shut. Brain follows their lead. "It would be racing."
"Yes." Soft as the touch I can almost feel. "Like now."
My body lights up to its own wavelength. God, what are we doing. "What else?"
"Continue. Chest. Ribs. Press down, examine function of lungs. Heart. Fragile life force. Must protect. Protect forever."
And now I'm drunk on something new entirely. "What else?"
"Hands." No beat missed there. No surprise. He's never hidden his intrigue for the intricacies of human interphalangeal joints. "Count each bone. Make sure none missing. So delicate... breakable."
I'd let him break me. I'd let him anything.
"Then, test dexterity."
A hurricane swirls from my head to my stomach. "How?"
"Give Grace something to hold. To squeeze."
"Something... of you?"
"Yes. Many many parts to choose."
Yep. I'm hearing colors.
"Next, test muscle function."
"H-how would you do that?"
"Hold Grace down. Pin limbs to measure strength resistance." A low, discordant arpeggio trills up from his vents. "For science."
I'm floating, weightless, massless. A ripple in the cosmos. "For science."
"Grace..."
"What if I didn't resist?"
Every single digit he has is fidgeting with another. "Defer testing. Move on to pleasure experiment."
Holy ravioli.
It’s a darn good thing I’m too weak to get hard and too drunk to question the fact that I would. Another miracle. Curse. Whatever. "For science?"
"No." The vibratory frequency he's transmitting pings right to my nerves. "For us."
My soul floats out of my withered body and straight through the airlock. I barely manage to save my voice before it jumps ship next. "Can I touch you too?"
"Yes yes yes. Pointless question. No need ask."
"Where do you want me to—"
"Everywhere."
Oh. God. "Tell me how." Better yet, "Show me."
The frequency lulls to his lowest resonance. Self-control. The strain of restraint. "Don’t... want to say. Want... to wait. Until we can do. One day. Better technology."
One day. On a wing and a prayer, like everything else. The flex panel sears into my palm when I reach for his claw, six millimeters and a universe between us. Even with the calluses, I still max out around five seconds. Gotta milk each one to the last drop.
"Grace." He pulls away before I burn. Standard fare. "Grace. My Grace. My brave, beautiful Grace."
Is this what dying feels like? The heck was I so afraid of?
"Yours." My tears roll down the panel's edge, level with his carapace. They could be his, now. "Always yours."
I'm vibrating. The mattress is vibrating. Rocky is vibrating. Everything's—
"Grace."
The engine hasn't slowed in so long. Four years long. I forgot.
Feels like someone just flipped an hourglass.
I shove my other unseared hand to the flex. He's already waiting for me.
"Grace… if we could… if Eridian scientists…"
"You are now approaching the orbit of star system 40 Eridani. Estimated time of arrival is two hours, eighteen minutes."
Thank you, Mary.
Fire races under my skin. There's still enough burn salve left in the lab. I smile until he feels it.
🎶