A fluffy Grace and Rocky fic of them playing in zero-G…enjoy…
“hey, Rocky, i’m gonna turn off the centrifuge, okay? go get in your suit.”
a familiar chirp from somewhere else in the ship can be heard, and then the pitter patter of paws again xenonite as he makes his way through his tunnels. Ryland can hear him singing to himself, and he chuckles. he sometimes forgets Rocky hears literally everything.
“what Grace laugh at, question?” he can hear the hiss of the airlock and then a different, but also newly common, pitter patter of xenonite against aluminium.
“nothing, bud…” he smiles, ready to click yes to confirm turn off centrifuge. “you in your suit yet? get down here, slowpoke.”
Rocky scuttles into the room, and Ryland confirms to turn off the centrifuge. slowly, everything begins to feel more weightless. slowly reducing gravity until they hit zero.
Rocky skitters mid-air, letting out a chord and attempting to swim through the air towards his friend. Ryland laughs softly and pushes off of the wall. he glides over and grabs Rocky, tucking his legs in around him and rolling forward in a somersault. its surprisingly ‘Grace’ful
“gotcha!” he lets go of him for a moment to spin him upright and then wraps his arms around his carapace. Rocky’s main arms wrap around his neck to hold on.
“why turn off gravity, question?”
Ryland gives him a squeeze. “thought we could have some fun in zero-g! enjoy being weightless for a bit.”
he hugs him close, bringing up his legs to embrace Rocky with his entire body. Rocky’s other arms wrap themselves around his middle, holding on tight. they eventually lose the energy required to propel them through the air and end up being suspended still in the air.
he releases Rocky from his arms and he does the same. Rocky takes Ryland’s hands in his paws. his feet touch the floor, and he uses it as an opportunity to push them back to the middle of the room and thrust them around to make them spin. Rocky giggles in delight, other arms kicking happily behind him.
“c’mon, lets go look out the window.” he guides Rocky to hold onto his shoulders and he pushes off of the wall, floating through the halls and the other rooms, using the ropes he tied up to steer himself and gain more momentum.
“cannot look, but will come. want to be with Grace.”
that warms Ryland’s heart. oh, hes just the sweetest. and he doesn’t even know it. even when he bullies me, Ryland thinks.
he finally makes it to the ladder and climbs up it at lightning speed, pushing open the hatch and crawling through into the room.
he pushes off of the floor over to the window. when they get to it, he reaches behind him and scoops up his friend, who trills happily. Ryland pulls him into his arms again and finds something to wedge his feet under so he doesn’t float away and using it to pull himself towards the floor and “sit”.
Rocky’s arms loop around his neck, hands going up to mess with his hair. Ryland had taught Rocky how to pet his hair for when he remembered something bad, and he ended up enjoying the experience more than he did. he loved how it felt against his paws and how easily he could push it around and move it. Ryland wasn’t complaining.
“you’ve been a little quiet today, Rock. doing okay?” Ryland points out, one hand coming up to pet the top of his carapace. it’s not like Rocky to be quiet, but he did see evidence of a project on his work bench when he was passing by. he assumes it’s a surprise. Rocky is always overjoyed to tell him when he’s making something unless he wants it to be a surprise.
“i was concentrating on project, statement. happy happy happy to be close to you now. needed break.” he wraps his other arms around his middle to stop himself from drifting away. “hair soft.”
Ryland smiles, leaning his head sideways so it places itself onto Rocky’s arm where it rested on his shoulder. “i like when we’re close, too, bud. you know that, though.”
“yes. Grace very clingy.” Rocky chirps a giggle. cheeky, but Ryland cant say he’s wrong. he likes to follow Rocky around the ship just so he can be close to him. the other can’t deny how he panicks when he cant hear Ryland’s heartbeat if there are loud alarms or if they’re at opposite sides of Mary.
one time they ended up being at either end of the ship. and Rocky, being his paranoid self, panicked and ran, trilling unhappily and calling out his name. he had soon assumed that Ryland had spontaneously died until he heard his frantic footsteps towards him, terrified that Rocky was in pain from all his scared trills. yeah, he wouldn’t get out of Ryland’s lap for hours after that.
he stares up at the stars, watching as they appear to twinkle. he’s thankful for the stars. he can’t imagine how dark and lonely space would feel without them. it would’ve only felt lonely for a while, anyway. until Rocky showed up. ever since that day, loneliness hasn’t made its way back to him since. this is all he needs.
he smiles and bumps his nose to the front of Rocky’s carapace. “wish you could see the stars. they’re beautiful.”
“boring.” a snarky chirp.
he frees his feet and Rocky crawls over his shoulder, holding on as Ryland makes his way back through the ship and to their main hang out spot. its the largest room in the middle of the living quarters. it had once had more lab stuff in, but he had migrated it all into one room.
he has a spare bed in there that he mainly uses as a sofa. he spent some time on sewing something onto it so that he could strap himself in to stop floating away when they turned off the centrifuge.
“listen, just because you can’t see it doesn’t mean it’s boring, we’ve been over this.” he glides over to his “sofa” and grabs the edge, pulling himself down so that he can lie on it and put his legs up against the wall. he clips himself down.
Rocky trills, bitter that Ryland had pried him off of his shoulders in an attempt to irritate him. it worked. luckily Rocky understood banter. it would’ve been awful if he didnt. Ryland would be the meanest human hes ever met.
“is boring! just white dots like Grace say!”
he pushes all five arms against the ceiling of the ship and sends himself flying towards Ryland, ending up accidentally doing three somersaults and crash-landing into his lap.
he lets out a little ‘oof’ on the impact and flips him upright, giggling. Rocky grabs the fabric of Ryland’s flight suit/makeshift trousers to climb up his legs, and then wraps three arms around them. they’d done this many times. its just playing. “yeah, well how else do i describe stars to someone who cant see them. to someone who cant see full stop. they’re little specks of light in the sky.”
“boring.” he reaches his other two arms down towards Ryland’s face, and Ryland lifts his hands up to his paws, tapping them and holding them, pushing eachother’s arms back and forth gently.
“no, not boring. just evolve to grow eyes and i can show you.”
“cannot do that. Grace stupid, question?” two taps against his leg.
“hey! no, im not stupid! it was a joke.”
Rocky slips a little, losing his grip. he lets out a chord and steadies himself by tightening one of his arms and returning his paws to Ryland’s palms. secure. “joke bad. Grace stupid anyway.”
“i’ll send you out the airlock if you’re not careful.”
Rocky trills in mock annoyance, batting his hands away and mimicking crossing his arms like he had seen Ryland do when he was annoyed. “Grace love Rocky too much to do that.”
Ryland smiles, looking up at him, letting his arms flop down either side of him. Rocky grabs the fabric of his flight suit with his three paws and stretches out to pat at Ryland’s face. he giggles and bats his arms playfully.
he eventually loses his grip. xenonite doesnt have much grip on the fabric. Ryland scoops him up out of the air, hugging him tightly. “get over here, you…”
Rocky flails, protesting the hug. he kicks all five limbs in the air. Ryland knew he didnt mean it. as soon as he had made the xenonite suit, he understood what all the hype was about hugs. plus, it meant he could hear his heartbeat better when he was pressed to his chest.
“and yes, i do love you too much to send you out the airlock.” he holds Rocky tightly until he stops flailing, before picking him up and taking his paws in his hands.
Rocky stretches himself up towards the ceiling of the ship. playing in zero gravity meant a lot of acrobatics, apparently. but Rocky was like when a cat loves to be pet in a way that requires you cupping its face and using the force of the universe as your hands slide down its face. he loved to be tossed around by Grace like a pizza.
“love you too, statement.” the moment was cut short by Ryland pushing his arms so that Rocky flips around and around, giggling like a maniac and trilling happily. he grabs a hold on his carapace and spins him. Rocky stretches all five limbs out, looking almost like a ship wheel. the image made Ryland laugh more than he already was.
he grabs him and pulls him back into his arms, folding his legs over him so he’s cuddled from all angles. “reckon i’ve got all i need right here…”
Rocky trills again. Ryland can tell the difference between his chirps and trills and what’s happy and what’s unhappy. it’s obvious to him now. Rocky’s arms wrap all around him, and he lets his legs fall back into a comfortable position.
“wanna go throw eachother around somewhere else?”
