one of the last scenes of the movie is grace saying goodbye to earth. a real goodbye, this time
his last conscious moments on earth, he was pinned down, screaming and crying and desperately clawing at the grass as he was ripped away from home
but this time, he calmly and confidently takes a seat in front of the camera, wishes humanity well in his absence, and signs off before he heads off to sacrifice himself
thinking thoughts about eva stratt in ace attorney verse bc of that banger art
all her animations are very reserved, a la courtney sithe
insists on her own guilt for everything she's charged with, a la lana skye
the charges she's in on do not include what she did to grace specifically, because the truth of that is a huge secret
speaking of secrets...PSYCHELOCKS OUT THE WAZOO
max amount of red locks about the truth of grace's addition to the hail mary just before launch day. they take forever and a day to get through
the reason she tries to hide what she did to grace isn't self-preservation, it's because she told grace he'd be remembered as a hero. that was the only thing she could do for him, so by god she tries her best to be true to her word on it. she mutters an apology to him when the truth is made undeniably clear
black psychelocks about just how much her position as the Project lead and everything she did with it weighs on her soul. one of the locks is about how much grace truly meant to her as a friend and confidant. another about the shame she feels at not having put measures in place that would have prevented or mitigated the research center disaster. one about all the human deaths that occurred thanks to her best efforts to buy humanity time. one about the human deaths that occured despite those best efforts. the weight of the world is a lot to have on one's shoulders, and it hurts a lot, actually, no matter what she says
I've seen so many posts lately about how Grace wouldn't add swears to their translator but I 100% think he did.
He's not morally against swearing, he said holy fucking shit when he saw the Blip-A for the first time, the only reason he doesn't swear normally is because he trained himself out of it because he teaches middle schoolers. If I'm remembering right, he even calls one of the kids a smartass in his internal narration at one point. He's spent so long not swearing that he's not just going to fall out of the habit immediately.
We know that at some point, he learned Eridian swearing anyway because Rocky swears in the final chapter of the book. And I think he learned most of them when Rocky reamed him out after leaving the taumoeba collector out at room temp.
Plus, Rocky is an adult and Grace treats him like one, which includes adding swear words into their translator so that Rocky can express himself.
reminder also that during aforementioned reaming out, it wasn't grace who refused to enter translations for the swears rocky was flinging at him, but rocky who refused to provide translations for him. so grace probably had to either wait to fill those in until he had more context clues and could translate them more confidently or ask for translations again at some point further down the road
on the back of this post, i think it would be funny if during the trip to erid, grace fell out of his teacher-induced no-swearing habit and fell into swearing nearly as much as rocky, because yknow. it was just the two of them for years. and then he had to re-form the no-swearing habit once he started teaching again
I've seen so many posts lately about how Grace wouldn't add swears to their translator but I 100% think he did.
He's not morally against swearing, he said holy fucking shit when he saw the Blip-A for the first time, the only reason he doesn't swear normally is because he trained himself out of it because he teaches middle schoolers. If I'm remembering right, he even calls one of the kids a smartass in his internal narration at one point. He's spent so long not swearing that he's not just going to fall out of the habit immediately.
We know that at some point, he learned Eridian swearing anyway because Rocky swears in the final chapter of the book. And I think he learned most of them when Rocky reamed him out after leaving the taumoeba collector out at room temp.
Plus, Rocky is an adult and Grace treats him like one, which includes adding swear words into their translator so that Rocky can express himself.
reminder also that during aforementioned reaming out, it wasn't grace who refused to enter translations for the swears rocky was flinging at him, but rocky who refused to provide translations for him. so grace probably had to either wait to fill those in until he had more context clues and could translate them more confidently or ask for translations again at some point further down the road
i've always wondered what human speech would look like visually in the POV of eridians in the same way eridian speech is written as music notes in the book and my favorite version of it i've seen in fics is when words are written as phonetics in rocky's POV :-) oh and also that one post about rocky and grace figuring out random words they can say in the other's language
once again these are all from like the same two canvas files in procreate judging from the same color background. also straight up had a dream where grace and rocky figured out how to make gnocchi out of taumoeba hence the making gnocchi over a bunsen burner
“This means… of Rocky, possessive. Of the speaker.”
“My.”
“Correct. But only for names.”
“So you’re calling me…?”
Rocky repeats the word: “My Grace. Yes.”
“Are there other Graces? Why do you need to specify?”
Rocky considers this, tapping his xenonite-encased claws idly against the floor.
“No other Grace,” Rocky says. “We just do this.”
“Like an honorific,” Grace guesses. “It goes before everyone’s name? Everyone you know?”
Rocky whirs in surprise. “No, no, no. Not at all.”
“Okay, then who? What makes me qualify?”
Rocky is silent for a moment.
“...Does this offend Grace?” he asks, voice lower.
Grace blinks. “No! I don’t think so. Is there a reason to be offended?”
“Good,” Rocky says, relieved. Grace is starting to recognize what Eridian relief sounds like. “No, no reason.”
“Who else do you call that?”
“You don’t have this on Earth?”
Grace considers. What for, friends? He couldn’t call Marissa “my Marissa.” That would be weird.
“I still don’t know what it means,” he settles on. “So I couldn’t tell you.”
Rocky groans in frustration. He’s a very impatient tutor. “We just say it.”
“Are you my Rocky?” Grace asks. He hits the two keys to make the my note.
“I don’t know!” Rocky says. “You decide this.”
“I decide? Who do you use it for?”
“You. Adrian. I will use it for my pebbles.”
Grace blinks. “So few?”
Rocky shifts. “I am… you do not have the word yet. Eridian who works alone often, not close to many other Eridians.”
“What, mechanical engineer?”
Rocky chitters with amusement. “Acceptable.”
“Is Adrian your only friend?”
Rocky draws back, like he’s taken offense. “I have friends. Coworkers. But different.”
So just Adrian. And him.
“This worries you,” Rocky says.
“Adrian is your mate,” Grace points out. “I’m not your mate.”
“Correct. You are not. You do not like to be a mate.”
Grace isn’t sure how to respond to that, so he ignores it.
“I’m your friend,” Grace says.
Rocky hesitates, for a second. “...Correct.”
“Like your coworkers.”
“No.”
Grace sighs, rubbing his hand across his face. Okay, maybe that’s fair. It’s not like he felt about any of his coworkers like he feels about Rocky.
“Best friend,” Grace amends. “You’re my best friend, too.”
Rocky hums. “Acceptable.”
“Just acceptable? Now you are offending me. Can you just explain?”
This makes Rocky fall silent for a minute longer than usual. Grace is half-ready to apologize and to say let’s move on and to retype his own name without the superfluous my.
“The Earth ‘best friend’ is not strong enough,” Rocky says finally. “It does not translate this way.”
Grace runs his fingers through his hair, a little nervous, for some reason. “Okay.”
“It is…” Rocky pauses. He has to pause more often, now that they’re not using the translator, to simplify his language. “It means that I am not Rocky without my Grace. You are part of… of the whole. When I wake up, I think of you. When I work. When I eat. When I think I am going to die.”
Rocky speaks slowly, but it’s still a lot of Eridian for Grace to grasp all at once. Even as he works out the sentences in his head, he can feel hot tears rising in his eyes.
“It means that when you are sick, I am sick,” Rocky continues. “And it means I will take care of you, because taking care of you is taking care of myself.”
Grace bunches up his sleeve, wiping it across his face, blinking furiously.
Rocky’s voice is soft. “So Grace is part of Rocky. Grace is like a cell. You see? My Grace.”
Grace is quiet, for a moment, trying to get himself together. When he speaks, his voice is shaky.
“...Oh.”
Rocky hums, pressing his carapace gently against Grace’s arm. “You are leaking. Does this make you sad?”
Grace shakes his head, sniffing, crossing his arms across his knees and resting his chin on his sleeves. “Not at all.”
“Good, good.”
“I feel like that,” Grace mumbles. “Just like that. Just exactly—exactly like that.”
“About your old mate?”
“Don’t act stupid. You know I’m talking about you.”
Rocky hums, burrowing closer. Grace curls one arm around his carapace. That’s not enough, so he leans over, dropping his head down so his forehead presses against the xenonite.
“My Rocky,” Grace whispers in English.
“My Grace,” Rocky echoes in Eridian. Grace can recognize the note at the start. He will add it when he plays Rocky’s name.
“How long have you called me that?” Grace asks. “Must’ve been a while. I didn’t notice it change.”
