You ever just, get a concept for a fic, then a concept for an oc, then the urge to write, AND THEN YOUR BRAIN COMBINES THEM ALL.
In this case, it’s a project Hail Mary fic. I don’t like species change aus usually but this one is important to the story that I can’t do the fic without it. But basically: it’s about Grace and he’s gotten old. He tries to escape death by taking the option the eridians gave him. Some part of him hates the idea that he can’t do things, that he can’t be everything, that he’s growing old. He ends up surviving as an eridian himself, but a whole new set of problems have arisen. Namely, he doesn’t understand the culture as well as he thought, he doesn’t understand how to use this body, none of that. He’s so confused and upset. He traded one set of problems for another. And now…
It was worth it, he knew that. He felt it in his bones, but he hated it. He hated it. He hated feeling worthless and alien in this society even more than he did before. And thats when he meets Grackle.
Grackle is a “soundless” Eridian (one who’s vocal cords have been damaged and who cannot process sound as well due to any reason.). She fell asleep by herself one day, thinking that it was safe enough right? She could risk it once. And she didn’t have anyone to ask at the time as she’d been too busy preparing to go into her career, she hadn’t really made any close friends she trusted and her family was busy with their own lives. She fell asleep and got attacked by a predator that fills an eridian’s body with a venom that causes build up in areas that process sound and slowly kill them. Grackle was saved by another eridian coming to stop by and talk with her about a position in the field she wanted to go to, only to find her slowly dying with this predator. She was saved, but now this society looked down at her.
(Also I know where your brain is going but no, this is not a romance. Grackle’s like barely older than a pebble. And I don’t wanna write a romance.)
The whole fic is basically Grace coming to terms with his own disabilities and his struggles with self hatred that he ran from, all the while helping Grackle who is a complete social outcast because of hers. Along with a little of Rocky healing and struggling with c-ptsd very badly. Like, REALLY badly.
I don’t know the likelihood of me actually writing this, but I can see the image ya know.
