Note: I'm hearing, and I've only been studying sign language and deaf history & culture for about nine months, so I definitely don't know everything. If anything I say is misleading or incorrect, please tell me! I don't mean to and I apologize if I cause any offense as that's very much not my intention
I imagine the basics of the plot is the same, but I have some ideas about Ryland and how he interacts with Rocky
- He still teaches science, just at a Deaf middle school
- When he meets Rocky, Rocky can understand him perfectly fine, but Ryland can't hear any of Rocky's music
- The equivalent of Deafness is present in Eridians, so luckily it isn't too hard for Ryland to get Rocky to understand that he can't hear him
- Eridians created something similar to morse code to communicate, where other Eridians will rhythmically tap on the deaf Erdian's carapace and different lengths, pressures, and locations of the touch mean different things
- Ryland talks mostly in ASL, which Rocky picks up on fast, even faster than he did on English because many American signs are iconic and the grammar is more similar. However, he does create several new signs that are usually fingerspelled because Rocky didn't know English spelling. Rocky learns some simple signs he can use to communicate basic ideas with the fingers and hands he has. He doesn't particularly need to, but he likes that it makes Grace happy
- Ryland learns to understand Rocky through the different vibration frequencies of his music. He creates a system that connects the device, worn on his wrist, to Rocky. It transfers the vibrations clearly, and different areas of the device will vibrate depending on the key, note, and octave
- Even so, together they work to create a combination of morse code and Eridian code
- When doing EVA's, Ryland talks to Rocky using the tap code because the suit's fingers don't allow him to sign well
- When Ryland's hands are otherwise busy, he'll talk in tap code using his feet
- He'll also talk in tap code when he's extremely tired or injured and wants to say something simply
- A few times, both of them talk in tap code just to have a moment where they're actually speaking the same language
- Many times Rocky gets confused by the noises Ryland doesn't realize he's making
- There are also times when Rocky has to ask Ryland to mute alarms, because Ryland couldn't hear that they were blaring
- When Ryland's arm is injured, his device is destroyed. He gets even more stressed and overwhelmed because it's so incredibly painful to just try and get a point across. The tap code wasn't extensive because they preferred ASL and vibrations to communicate so it wasn't usuable in every situation. Since Rocky hadn't learned how to recognize two-handed signs when they're only one-handed, they have to take a break and work on more language