Grace having mate/purpose/name tattoos via scarification. Grace having his mates rock colors on him in form of jewelry and dangling necklaces that chime and make noise like a cat bell. Grace returning to earth completely changed, almost alien, and better for it. Near unrecognizable to people who once knew him. His speech patterns slightly off, his hearing excellent, his eyes adjusted to permanent low light. Spans of tiny scratches across his arms and body permanently marking him Eridian. His name, his mates, his purpose, the petrova line connecting sol to tau ceti, thus connecting grace to rocky, permanently etched on his being. His left arm disfigured and scarred from the Eridian atmosphere, a permanent reminder of what he was willing to sacrifice for rocky, a purpose tattoo in and of itself. TO BE LOVED IS TO BE CHANGED
Erid gave Grace a home in the way Earth never could, with no expectations of a human society that shunned Grace and left him outcast- an alien among his own species. Hes more at home among real aliens than he ever was on Earth. And if- when- he returns to that blue planet he will be more alien than ever, but belonging more than he ever did.
Rocky waited forty years on the Blip-A. Grace was born and grew in that time, and though neither of them knew it, they were waiting waiting waiting for eachother to come home.
