The Half-Life of Us
SUMMARY: A astrobiologist and his sole surviving crewmate are trapped together in deep space, not realizing how quickly their professional boundaries are about to completely dissolve.
Warnings: Sci-Fi Erotica, Explicit Sexual Content, Rough Sex, Fingering/Anal Fingering, Intensive Edging/Orgasmic Denial, Light Breath Play, Crying/Overstimulation Tears (Dacryphilia themes), Mild Degradation, Touch Starvation, Size Difference. MDNI!
Tags: Ryland Grace/Male Reader, POV Ryland Grace, Dom!Reader, Sub!Ryland Grace, Touch Starvation, Trapped in Space, Slow Burn to High Heat, Science Metaphors, Explicit, Edging, Mind Melting.
Total Word Count: ~3,200 words
Chapter 1: The Co-Efficiency of Friction
Human skin sheds roughly forty thousand dead cells every single minute.
Yeah. Gross, I know. It was the exact kind of useless trivia Ryland used to throw at his middle schoolers back in his classroom just to watch them write “ew” in the margins of their notebooks. But out here, in the cold, endless void of the Tau Ceti system, it was the only stupid math keeping Ryland from losing his mind. Forty thousand cells a minute. Which meant the Hail Mary wasn't just a spaceship; it was a sealed metal box slowly filling up with the microscopic, physical dust of two men.
Two men. Not one.
When Ryland first crawled out of the amnesia haze of his coma, surrounded by creepy robotic arms and the mummified remains of his actual crewmates, he thought he was totally alone in the universe. But then, in the third pod, there was a heartbeat. A steady, stubborn little beep on the monitor.
You.
It took weeks of grueling physical therapy, a lot of stomach-churning space-slurry feeding tubes, and several frantic breakdowns that Ryland technically hid by locking himself in the lab to get You upright. But now, You were here. Standing in the middle of the science bay, squinting at a digital readout of the Petrova lamps, wearing nothing but a pair of issued grey sweatpants and a tank top that showed off the sharp, clean line of Your collarbone.
Oh, great, Ryland thought, his brain instantly short-circuiting. Fantastic. He's attractive. Just what I needed on a suicide mission.
"Grace," You murmured, Your voice still carrying that rough, low gravel from months of artificial sleep. You didn't even look at him, Your fingers tapping a restless rhythm against the console. "The radiation shielding on the starboard side is fluctuating by point-zero-two percent. Is that normal, or are we about to turn into glowing space meat?"
Ryland stopped washing his beaker. He didn't mean to stare, he really didn't, but his brain was currently undergoing a massive system crash.
For months on Earth, Ryland had been isolated in a sterile underground lab under Eva Stratt’s iron fist. Then came the coma. He hadn't been touched—not truly touched, with warmth and human intent—in almost a year. Every nerve ending in his body felt like a live wire waiting for a spark. And You were standing less than three feet away, smelling like the ship’s recycled water and warm, clean skin.
"Uh. Normal," Ryland squeaked. He cleared his throat frantically, trying to sound like a respectable scientist instead of a guy losing his mind over a clavicle. "Totally normal. The Astrophage is just... settling. It’s like a car engine warming up. No glowing space meat. I promise."
You finally turned your head, a faint, tired smile touching Your lips. "Good. Because I didn't survive a suicide mission to the stars just to get micro-waved."
You stepped closer. Too close. The science bay was a masterpiece of efficient, cramped engineering, which meant any movement required a delicate ballet of dodging elbows and hips. You reached past him to grab a stylus from the magnetic strip, and Your bare forearm brushed firmly against his.
It was a fraction of a second. Just a brief, heavy glide of skin against skin.
Ryland completely froze. A physical shockwave went straight up his spine, so intense his fingers twitched and he nearly dropped the glass beaker right into the sink. His heart hammered against his ribs like a trapped bird. Holy moly. Touch. That was touch. A real, warm human.
"You okay, Ryland?" You asked, noticing how stiff his shoulders had gotten. You didn't move away. In fact, You tilted Your head, Your eyes scanning his face with a sudden, quiet intensity that made his skin feel tight.
"Yep! Fine! Great!" Ryland muttered, his voice way too high. He frantically wiped the beaker with a towel, over and over. "Just... thinking about data. Lots of data. Brain is full."
You let out a soft huff of laughter, but Your eyes lingered on his mouth for a heartbeat longer than necessary before You turned back to the screen. Ryland stared down at his own hands. He’s a man of science, but right now, the only hypothesis he could form was that if You touched him like that again, he was going to completely fall apart.
Chapter 2: The Thermal Mass of Two Bodies
The problem with the Hail Mary was that everything was shared. The oxygen, the water, the terrifying burden of saving the human race—and the sleeping quarters.
There were only two operational bunks left after the equipment shift. They were stacked vertically, little more than padded shelves recessed into the bulkhead, separated by a thin privacy curtain. But tonight, the ship’s primary life-support system was running a diagnostic cycle, which meant the heating grids in the bunk area were completely dead for the next six hours.
"It's freezing," You muttered, walking into the main cabin while rubbing Your arms. Your breath formed a faint plume of mist in the dim, emergency-red lighting. "Tell me the Astrophage didn't die."
"Astrophage is fine," Ryland said, huddled on the small bench with a thick insulation blanket wrapped around his shoulders. He probably looked like a miserable space-penguin, his teeth clicking together. "The ship is just re-routing power. It’s going to be like a meat locker in here until zero-four-hundred."
You stood there, shivering, looking at the tiny bench and then at him. The blanket Ryland was holding was the only heavy-duty thermal layer outside of the EVA suits, and it was barely big enough for one person to wrap themselves in completely.
"Move over," You said suddenly.
Ryland's eyes widened. "What?"
"Move over, Grace. Basic thermodynamics," You said, stepping up to the bench and not waiting for his permission. "Two bodies generate more thermal mass than one. If we sit separately, we both freeze. If we share the blanket, we don't. Move your butt."
Oh, boy. Okay. Thermodynamics. Sure. Let's go with that, Ryland’s brain scrambled for a counter-argument—something about personal space, or the psychological boundaries of a command structure—but You were already sitting down right next to him.
The contact was immediate and total. Your thigh pressed firmly against his from hip to knee. Ryland let out a small, choked gasp as You reached out, grabbing the edges of the heavy silver blanket and pulling it over both of Your laps, tucking it in tight around Your sides.
"Jesus, you're like a furnace," You whispered, leaning Your shoulder heavily against his.
Ryland literally couldn't breathe. Every single point of contact felt like it was branded with fire. The touch-starvation he had been trying to ignore for weeks violently rushed to the surface, making his entire body tremble. He wanted to pull away out of sheer, overwhelming panic, but his instincts—the deep, primal part of him that was absolutely starving for human warmth—forced him to stay rooted to the spot.
"I—uh. High metabolism," Ryland managed to choke out. He was staring straight ahead, his arms locked tight against his chest to keep from accidentally grabbing You. "Lots of... caloric intake."
"Mmm. Keep talking," You murmured. Your head dropped, Your cheek resting softly against his shoulder. Your eyes drifted shut, exhausted from the day's repairs. "Your voice is nice. It's warm."
A giant, heavy lump formed in Ryland's throat. He looked down at the top of Your head, the messy strands of Your hair just inches from his lips. You looked so vulnerable like this, stripped of the survivalist bravado You wore during the work shifts. You were just a guy, millions of miles away from everything You had ever known, looking for comfort in the dark.
Slowly, deliberately, Ryland let his arm relax. He allowed his shoulder to sink into Yours, absorbing the heavy, comforting weight of Your body. He let out a long, trembling exhale, his eyes stinging with sudden, hot tears.
He was so goddamn lonely. And You were right here.
Ryland didn't sleep at all that night. He spent the entire six hours frozen in place, listening to the steady, rhythmic sound of Your breathing, his heart keeping time with Yours under the silver blanket, completely intoxicated by the simple, quiet magic of being held.
Chapter 3: The Breaking Point
The tension didn't disappear when the heat came back on. It got way worse.
It was in the way Your eyes lagged on him while he worked in the lab. It was in the way Ryland's hand would shake whenever he passed You a tool, Your fingers deliberately brushing against his, lingering just a second too long. The air inside the Hail Mary became thick, charged with an invisible static electricity that had nothing to do with the ship's reactors.
The breaking point happened during a routine inspection of the fuel lines in the lower maintenance crawlspace.
It was a space less than four feet high, requiring both of them to crawl on their hands and knees amidst a maze of pulsing pipes and bundles of wiring. Ryland was in the lead, holding a diagnostic scanner, his breath echoing loudly inside the cramped metal tube.
"Okay, the primary manifold looks... wait," Ryland stopped, squinting at the screen. "That’s weird. The pressure here is higher than it should be."
"Let me see," You said from behind him.
You crawled forward, Your body moving over his until You were draped over his back, Your chest pressing firmly against Ryland's shoulder blades as You leaned over his shoulder to look at the scanner. The heat of Your torso radiated through his jumpsuit, Your breath hot and sharp against the sensitive skin of his neck.
Ryland's hand shook so violently he dropped the scanner. It clattered against the metal floor.
"Ryland?" You asked quietly.
"I can't—" Ryland choked out, his voice cracking completely. The proximity, the smell of You, the absolute weight of Your body pressing him down into the metal deck was too much. The wire finally snapped. "I can't do this, ███. I can't."
"Can't do what?"
"This!" Ryland burst out, twisting around in the cramped space until he was lying on his back, staring up at You. You were hovering directly over him, Your hands planted on either side of his head, your faces inches apart. His chest was heaving, his eyes wide and frantic. “Do you realize what you’re doing to me? You’re always close—always finding some excuse to touch me. Every glance, every brush of your hand, drives me completely insane. We’re the last two men left in the universe, ███. I should be focused on saving the world, but instead, you’re all I can think about. No matter how hard I try, my mind keeps coming back to you.”
The silence that followed was deafening, save for the low, rhythmic hum of the ship’s engines. Ryland immediately regretted it. Stupid, stupid, stupid, he thought, wanting to dissolve into the floorboards. He just confessed to his crewmate. Now it’s going to be weird forever. Brilliant job, Grace.
But You didn't look shocked at all. Your eyes darkened, a heavy, intense heat flaring in Your gaze that made Ryland's breath catch in his throat.
“You think you’re the only one?” You whispered, your voice dropping into a low, steady tone that made the air between you feel heavier. Your gaze held his firmly as you stepped just a little closer, enough for the space between you to tighten. “Ryland… I’ve been watching you for weeks. The way you move around the lab, the way you talk about science—like it’s the only thing that matters.” Your breath hitched slightly, honesty slipping through the control in your voice. “I couldn’t stop thinking about you. I honestly thought I was going crazy.”
Before Ryland could even process the words, You leaned down, closing the distance between them.
The kiss wasn't gentle. It was a collision of months of suppressed terror, loneliness, and raw, burning lust. Your lips slammed into his, hard and demanding, parting his mouth instantly. Ryland let out a loud, needy groan, his hands flying up to grip Your shoulders, his fingers digging deep into the fabric of Your shirt as he pulled You down onto him.
The taste of You was intoxicating. Your tongue slid into his mouth, claiming the wet space with a fierce, possessive hunger that made his hips buck involuntarily against Yours. The friction of your bodies rubbing together in the tight, hot crawlspace was a sensory explosion. Ryland’s mind went entirely blank, his intellect completely melting away under the onslaught of Your mouth.
You pulled back just an inch, Your lips slick, Your breath coming in ragged gasps as You stared down at him. "The lab," You muttered against his skin, Your thumb tracing his jawline with a fierce, trembling grip. "Now."
Chapter 4: The Chemistry of Displacement
The transition from the maintenance shaft to the lab counter was a blur of friction and oxygen deprivation. Ryland’s brain, normally a finely tuned instrument of logic and sequence, was failing him. It was short-circuiting under the sheer volume of tactile data.
You. Your hands. Your weight.
When You shoved him back against the edge of the primary examination table, the cold stainless steel bit into his lower back through his jumpsuit, creating a jarring, freezing contrast to the blistering heat of Your body wedged between his thighs. You reached down, Your fingers hooking into the front zipper of his uniform and tearing it down with a sharp, heavy snap.
"Jumpsuit off, Grace," You ordered, Your voice dropping into a low, quiet authority that Ryland had never heard before. It wasn't the voice of a co-astronaut; it was the voice of someone taking absolute territory. "Hands at your sides. Don’t move."
Ryland's breath hitched, a frantic, high-pitched whimper escaping his throat. He wanted to argue—he was the primary science officer, for heaven's sake—but his arms felt like lead. The touch-starvation he had been harboring for a year had turned into a physical dependency the second Your bare chest pressed against his. His eyelids fluttered closed, his heart hammering against his ribs like a trapped bird.
"Look at me," You commanded, Your palm coming down in a firm, heavy slap against his clothed thigh. The sharp crack echoed through the sterile bay, sending a jolt of pure electricity straight to his groin. "I didn't say you could close your eyes, Grace."
Ryland’s eyes snapped open, his pupils completely blown out, reflecting the emergency red lighting of the bay. He was flushed a deep, brilliant crimson from his chest to his ears. “I’m looking,” he gasped out, his voice cracking with a vulnerability that embarrassed him. “I’m looking. Please...”
You didn't rush. You reached over, grabbing a tube of medical-grade conductive gel from the lab supply rack. Ryland watched in a daze of anticipation as You flipped the cap with Your thumb and squeezed a generous, thick pooling of the clear fluid over Your fingers.
When Your wet, gel-slicked fingertips first touched the tight, un-stretched skin of his entrance, Ryland violently bucked off the table.
“Ah—wait! Wait, that’s—”
“Easy,” You said, Your voice calm but completely unyielding as Your free hand pinned his hip flat against the steel with inescapable force. “You’re too tight, Ryland. If I don’t take my time opening you up, I’ll end up hurting you.” Your hands stayed steady at his hips, grounding him as You leaned in slightly. “Breathe... and relax for me.”
Ryland bit his lip so hard he tasted copper, his knuckles turning white as he clawed at the edges of the metal table for purchase. You pushed one finger inside, testing the resistance, and Ryland let out a ragged, choked sob. It was an overwhelming, invasive fullness. His internal walls convulsed around You, desperately fighting the intrusion, but Your touch was patient and firm. You began to stroke inward, Your thumb pressing against his perineum, deliberately seeking out the hyper-sensitive bundle of nerves inside.
Anatomy, Ryland’s brain scrambled, trying to cling to clinical facts to stay sane. The prostate gland. Approximately two to three centimeters inside. Surrounded by smooth muscle. Oh, great, he was doing biochemistry during a hookup, brilliant—
Then Your finger hooked upward, striking the exact spot, and all scientific thought dissolved into a high, broken wail.
“There it is,” You whispered darkly, watching the way Ryland’s head tossed back, his throat arching elegantly as fresh tears leaked from the corners of his eyes. “You like that, don’t you, Grace? You’re already slick.”
You added a second finger, then a third, stretching him with a slow, agonizingly thorough rhythm that turned his insides to molten liquid. Ryland was weeping openly now, completely undone by the preparatory torture. His lower body was entirely loose, weeping precum onto his own stomach, primed and completely hollowed out for You.
By the time You withdrew Your fingers with a wet, heavy slide, Ryland was shaking from head to toe, completely dependent on Your hands to keep him from sliding off the table.
You didn't give him a moment to recover. You lined Your thick, rigid length against his dripping entrance. Ryland stared down at the sheer scale of You, his breath completely stalling in his lungs. You were thick-veined, heavy, and stretching him open visually before You even entered.
With a slow, deliberate lean of Your hips, You began to sink inside.
“Oh, God… ███—!” Ryland shrieked, a desperate, breathless cry tearing from his lungs as his body was forced to accommodate Your massive girth. It felt like being split open from the inside out, an impossible, suffocating fullness that buried deeper and deeper until You bottomed out, Your hips locking hard against his.
Ryland let out a long, trembling sob, his eyes wide and glazed with a mixture of shock and sheer, unadulterated ecstasy. You were so deep he could feel the throb of Your pulse against his internal walls.
“You took all of it,” You muttered, Your chest rising and falling as You secured Your grip around his waist, holding him firmly against the table. “Now we’re staying right here until you’re completely ruined, got it?”
You didn't rush the climax. For the next forty-five minutes, You subjected Ryland to a brutal, agonizingly prolonged demonstration of human stamina. You locked into a slow, heavy, punishing pace—withdrawing until almost the crowning tip left his hole, only to plunge back in to the hilt, deliberately crushing his prostate with every single stroke. The lab filled with the explicit, wet sounds of Your coupling. Ryland was completely reduced, a sobbing, whining mess under Your weight.
Every time he felt the explosive wave of a climax building in his lower stomach, the desperation became too much to bear.
“Ah... nn-nh, no, please…” Ryland whimpered, his voice dissolving into a broken, high-pitched whine of pure sensory frustration. It wasn't a shout, but a pathetic, breathless plea, completely ruined by the heat. “Don’t stop… ███, please, I’m right there… let me, please let me…”
Beneath You, Ryland's hips bucked frantically in tiny, useless twitches, his internal walls constricting in a desperate, weeping search for friction. He was teetering on the razor-thin edge of a helpless climax, his chest heaving as a soft sob caught in his throat.
But You weren't about to let him off that easily.
With a low growl, You suddenly halted Your rhythm. You buried Your massive length to the hilt, pinning Ryland flat against the desk to freeze him completely in place.
"Ah, ah, puppy," You purred darkly against his ear, Your hot breath making him shudder. "Who told you that you could cum?"
Ryland let out a tortured, wet whimper, his entire body shaking as the sudden lack of movement left him stranded and agonizingly close at the absolute peak. He tried to squirm against Your thickness, a quiet, desperate sob spilling past his lips. But You locked him down, reaching around to wrap Your fingers securely around the base of Ryland's rigid, leaking length—completely blocking his release.
Ryland’s eyelids fluttered open, his blue eyes completely drowned in tears of sheer overstimulation. He looked at Your dominant, unyielding expression and completely fractured. “███,” he wept, his fingers clawing at Your shoulders, pulling You down into a messy, wet kiss. “I’m all yours. M-Move… please, please… move.”
You stopped him once. You stopped him twice. You stopped him a third time, stretching the encounter out for nearly an hour until Ryland’s mind was completely blank, his intellect entirely burned away by the kinky, agonizing denial. He was nothing but a weeping, trembling instrument for Your pleasure.
Only when his internal walls were violently spasming around You in an involuntary, desperate rhythm did You finally release Your grip on his length. You picked up the pace to a blinding, savage blur, hammering into him one final time, driving Ryland over the edge into a messy, cataclysmic release that left him squealing.
Epilogue: The Equilibrium of Rest
Two hours later, the science bay was quiet again.
The sterile lights had been dimmed back to a soft, ambient glow. The data screens were still blinking silently in the background, tracking the course of the Hail Mary through the infinite dark, but for the first time since the mission began, the ship didn't feel like a tomb.
Ryland was lying curled on his side on the narrow examination bench, his head resting securely on Your bare chest. His jumpsuit was loosely pulled back up to his waist, his skin still flushed, breathing in slow, exhausted drafts. Your arm was wrapped securely around his shoulders, Your fingers mindlessly tracing small, soothing circles into the bare skin of his back.
Oh, wow, Ryland thought, his brain finally functioning at a normal, non-panicked baseline. We actually did that. I just got completely unmade by my crewmate on a sterile lab counter. Very professional, Grace.
But as he felt the steady, heavy thump of Your heartbeat beneath his cheek, the lingering spark of anxiety completely evaporated. The suffocating loneliness that had been weighing down on his chest for months was just... gone. Replaced by a profound, heavy warmth.
"Hey," You murmured quietly, Your voice a low rumble against his ear that made his stomach do a pleasant little flip.
Ryland shifted slightly, a soft, content sigh leaving his lips as he snuggled closer into Your side, his nose pressing into the crook of Your neck. "Hmm?"
"You're not overthinking the physics of what just happened, are you?"
Ryland let out a faint, sleepy chuckle, his fingers reaching out to lightly trace the line of Your jaw. "Actually," he whispered, a tired, dorky smile touching his lips. "I was just doing the math on our proximity. And I think the co-efficiency of friction between us is... absolutely perfect."
You smiled, leaning down to press a soft, lingering kiss to his forehead. Out here, in the cold, unyielding void of space, the universe was vast and terrifying. But inside the tiny metal walls of the Hail Mary, tucked securely in each other's arms, You both had found exactly what You needed to survive.
Hey, Writer San here. I’m pretty new to writing on Tumblr, so this is one of my first attempts at a fanfic. I really hope you enjoyed reading it and that it was to your liking…
If you have any thoughts, feedback, criticism, or even some suggestions, I’d genuinely appreciate it. Don’t be shy. Please.
Thanks so much for taking the time to read this. Bye-bye!♥︎
