planet adrian
ryland grace x reader
a/n: reader is on the ship with ryland, adrian trip goes wrong, grace and reader suggested relationship
There was only one pilot’s seat, of course, so you were thrown.
You could feel your heartbeat in your ears. A heavy rhythm pulsing out of the growing wet spot by your temple. You touched your fingers to your head and they came back sticky with blood. Your ears were ringing.
Where was Ryland?
A shrill musical sound pierced your ears, high with worry and frenzy and cutting through the ringing. Something slammed against another part of the cockpit.
“Rocky!” You heard him shout.
Everything was filled with panic.
How did you end up on your side? You tried to stand up, but found your body fighting against an enormous pressure weighing you down. There’s too much gravity.
You knew that all three of you now were careening out of Adrian. The ship was being torn apart. We’re accelerating.
You pressed your hands firmly into the floor, head drooping downward, willing yourself to stand up. All the air had been knocked out of you, and you struggled to find new breath as your side and back burned with the impact against the ship’s floor.
Think!
Standing on your own two feet wouldn’t work. What would get you to the cockpit fast enough?
The light entering the ship was flashing in and out now, heavy and red with all the warning and hazard signs on the pilot screens, so you were almost in complete darkness.
EXCESSIVE CENTRIFUGAL FORCE.
Thunk.
Thunk. Thunk.
What was that??
You forced yourself forward, dragging your body toward the other two by your hands and elbows, like an army crawl, eyes up as the ship continued to accelerate and hurl through space.
Eject the fuel tanks!
The controls almost looked ages away from you, inching away from your fingertips more and more.
Everything was happening too fast. Ryland was suffocating seven feet away from you, you could hear Rocky’s distressed cries, and you resisted the urge to clutch the side of your head, forcing yourself to move forward, forward still.
You saw Ryland reach out, hand shaking, and flip the first of the switches needed to eject one of the tanks. The rest was a blur in more flashing lights and darkness.
And then you saw him. “Rocky, no!”
He was ramming himself into the side of the transparent xenonite.
“No, no, no, stay in there! I’m here!”
“♫♩♫♩♫♪♫♩♫♪!”
You finally reached the control panel, almost entirely hunched over and finding it hard to keep your balance.
Other switch… off.
The ship wouldn’t be torn apart anymore, and the spin would stop worsening. The body next to you was quiet. Ryland was unconscious.
Get him to Armando. Medical help.
You reached for him, feeling like your skin was drained, your eyes dropping as the pulsing in your head increased, louder and louder.
Everything was turning gray. No. No, no, no… wait!
You hooked both your arms under his shoulders and dragged him out of the chair. He was heavier than someone you could carry, but it couldn’t matter now. You scooted backward, bringing him toward help out of the cockpit. It was a losing battle. You wrapped your arms tighter around his chest as he leaned forward in a slump. You were close enough to feel the heat of his shallow breathing against your cheek. Hair covered your face and mixed with the blood that was spreading to your forehead, but you kept moving blindly.
“♫♩♫♩! ♫♪♫♩♫♪♫♪!”
Stay awake! Stay alive!
Almost there…
🪐
“Excellent. You’re with us.”
“Wait… what?” You knew your face looked dumbfounded for sure, and you got the sudden impression that you didn’t want to look even remotely stupid in front of this woman.
“This will be your life now. This is all of our lives now.”
Eva Stratt turned very briefly toward you again and motioned to the man next to him.
“This is Dr. Ryland Grace. He has been the leading scientist on the astrophage breeding research. You two will be working closely together.”
It was a windy day in North Carolina. You had been stopped on the way home. It was a weekend, you were caught off guard and looking less than presentable while picking up some groceries, and were now talking to a strange but bluntly present woman, a man in a yellow coat, and a small group of… guards? Like Men in Black style?
“I don’t understand. I’m an engineer, not a scientist.”
“So you say. And yet, your paper on the discovery of the mass energy of neutrinos in Astrophage has been extremely helpful to us, and we’d like to thank you.”
“By kidnapping me?”
Grace chuckled. “The work you did was incredible.” He said. “And you’ll get used to it. I mean, none of us really have a choice, right?”
🪐
It definitely didn’t feel like you ever had a choice as you dragged Ryland by his shoulders, your arms burning and head still stinging. You felt your knees buckle.
Crap.
You collapsed to the floor on your side and felt space close in around you.
Just out of reach of Armando’s arms.
You groaned, and felt yourself reaching toward Ryland’s hand. You were laid on your side toward him, and him on his back. It was like everything paused. You felt any hope for humanity disappearing from your fingertips as they gradually closed around your companion’s. You thought you felt him, ever so slightly, tighten his grip on your hand right back.
Quiet.
There was a shattering sound, and a sharp hiss. “♪♪♪—----!”
What?
More hisses. The invasive smell of ammonia. Rocky was wailing in the entirely wrong atmosphere, and you forced your eyes open for a brief moment to see black smoke trailing toward you.
A pair of hands (claws?) picked up you and Ryland, inching your bodies closer to help. Something stung, sharp and hot, against your skin. Both your arms burned white hot for only a few seconds before you were placed back down onto the cool spaceship floor.
You were too weak to shout at him, to cry, to demand he build himself back into safety.
But you were being held now. An IV drip was inserted into your veins, and the mechanical comfort of Armando reached for your head, reached for bandages, reached for antiseptic.
Rocky…
You could hear him stumbling away. Was he leaving you two to die himself?
You felt your mind slipping away into unconsciousness as the sounds of hissing and musical desperation carried away farther and farther from you.
🪐
The loss was clear as soon as you woke up. Your head pounded, and you knew most of everything on the ship was thrown around and destroyed before you opened your eyes.
But you were alive. And so was he.
But if that meant…
Rocky was nowhere in sight. There were bandages around your head and your side, and you were wearing what felt like a hospital gown. There was an IV drip inserted into your right arm.
You laid there for a moment. Time asked nothing of you. And then, you slowly lifted your head and sat up.
“Grace?” You asked softly. He looked in worse condition than you. But he was okay now. No response, though.
“I’ll let you, uh… I’ll let you rest.” You said to him, then looked up vaguely toward the ship. “Water?”
A bag of water was delivered to you, and you drank it in its entirety, grateful for the soothing liquid.
Then you gently swung your legs over the bed, letting your feet hit the floor, and you gradually moved along by holding the side of the wall, tracking…
This black smoke and ash, all over the ship.
The trail ended when you found Rocky. He was encased in the clear xenonite again, but completely collapsed. He looked like a corpse, but… you wouldn’t know what a dead Eridian looked like.
Immediately, your mind buzzed with grief. Was he dead, or asleep?
A brief movement. He raised his head, a weak but sure sign that he was alive.
Oh, thank God. You walked up to him, kneeling down and pressing your hand to the edge of his encasing.
There were footsteps behind you, soft ones with great caution and effort similar to you.
“Is he…?”
You turned. It was Grace, bandaged and looking tear-stricken. You were surprised when your voice caught in your throat.
“He’s alive.”
It took about four seconds for Grace to make his way to you, and you embraced each other. He held you tightly, fingers gripping at your back with a warm suffocation. He buried his head into your shoulder. You hugged him back just as tight, fingers brushing against what felt like a new scar forming along his forearm, matching one you had on your bicep now, wrapping your arms around his neck.
“...I’m sorry.” came out muffled.
You blinked in surprise. “For what?”
He sniffled and loosened his grip, just a bit, to look you in the eyes. “I don’t know, I mean we… we almost died.”
You shook your head. “You did everything right. You were brave out there.”
His breath hitched at that last part. His hands came down and found yours.
“I thought I almost lost you.”
“I thought the same.”
There was a pause. Then, a small, whispering sound behind you two.
“♪…”
You wiped your eyes and headed over toward Rocky, Grace following beside you. He placed his hand against the xenonite wall and side.
“I’ll watch you sleep, buddy. But uh… you gotta wake up.”
divider credits: @sisterlucifergraphics
