ad astra (ad meliora) ⋆✴︎ ̊.⋆ chapter six
chapter five masterlist
word count: 3.7k
pairing: fem!reader x ryland grace
You can feel Grace’s suspicious gaze on you.
He follows every one of your movements with narrow eyes, head tilted as if trying to solve a puzzle. He should be focusing on the meal you gave him a minute ago, considering it is the first ‘real’ food he has had in four years, but instead he is squeezing the food into his mouth, almost missing it in the process.
You try not to let it show how much it was affecting you, but if you had to guess, you’d say you aren’t hiding it well. Your eyelids are heavy, and fingers shaky from the potent mixture of caffeine, no sleep, and anxiety.
After he woke up, it hadn’t taken long for him to notice that you are acting off. Where you loitered around him before he went to sleep, you now watch him as closely as possible. When he went to the lavatory, you waited outside the door, and you’re sure that the only reason he hasn’t told you to back off yet is that you had almost started crying when you saw him step out of the door again.
Now, you’re sitting in the galley, silence tying both of you in thousands of little knots, tugging your gazes back and forth between each other. It is a game of who’ll break first, and for the first time in years, you won’t be the loser.
“Are you okay?”
Bold question, you have to admit. Not ‘is everything okay?’ or asking again whether you have slept well—no, he went right to the point.
“I’m fine.” His expression makes it clear that you had said it too quickly. So, you try to double down on it, “Seriously, I’m okay. Why shouldn’t I be?”
Grace sits up, and you clench your jaw, realizing that he had waited for you to say something like that; maybe you actually are the loser.
“You look like you haven’t slept well.” He pauses, and if you have to guess, you’d say he’s trying to assess how far he should go. “You look like you haven’t slept at all.”
“So?” you say, shrugging.
“That’s not… good,” he says, but it comes out like a question. “You seem twitchy.”
“You don’t know me,” God, it hurts to say that. “Maybe I’m always twitchy.”
“You weren’t this twitchy before I went to sleep,” he countered. “Did something happen?”
You bit the inside of your cheeks, trying to physically stop yourself from saying anything. Of course, something happened, and of course you want to tell him. You want to spill your guts, and then sob for a couple of hours, maybe scream a bit.
But Grace isn’t your friend, he’s your patient, and you don’t act that way with patients. That familiar mantra haunts you more than the literal end of the world. He’s the victim of heavy amnesia, and you’re the idiot by his side, doomed to spend the last couple of months of your life orbiting him, never again getting close to him the way you had on Earth.
“Nothing happened,” you say in a small voice.
Grace studies you for a second before going back to his food-sludge. “I don’t believe you.”
“Good for you,” you scoff.
“Twitchy and snappy, wow.” Grace rolls his eyes. “What’s next?”
You flinch at his dismissive tone. It hit you harder than it should. Back on Earth, something like that would have been a joke between friends, but up here it is his genuine impression of you, the only one that he has. He has been awake for not even 24 hours, and you have already made him dislike you.
“Sorry,” he mumbles and then sighs deeply. “That was not nice.”
“We said we wouldn’t apologize anymore.” Your voice is thin, trembling slightly.
He looks up, and when his eyes fall on you, he freezes. “Oh, geez! Oh, no, no. Don’t—” he gets up and steps closer to where you’re sitting on the floor. “Are you crying? You’re crying. I’m such a meanie.”
You didn’t notice when it started, but he’s right, you are crying. Silent tears running down your cheeks. But when he crouches down before you, you can’t help but let out a watery chuckle. “Did you just call yourself a ‘meanie’?”
“I—I did, yeah.” He scrunches his face. “You’re crying. What can I do to make you stop?”
You sniff. “Nothing, it’s fine.” You wipe a hand over your cheek. “I don’t even know why I’m crying.”
“This is all a lot,” Grace says.
“For you, maybe.”
“No, I think for you too. Maybe more in a way.”
You laugh at that. “More? You lost all your memories and woke up in the middle of a suicide mission.”
Grace doesn’t laugh with you, just looks at you with a soft expression in his eyes. “Yeah, and you have been part of that suicide mission for four years, remembering everything that you left behind. You spend four years mourning the world, and I think…” he sighs, looking away. “I think now you’re mourning me.”
You furrow your brows and feel more tears gather in your eyes. You shake your head slowly. “Don’t say that, please.”
When he looks back at you, his eyes are equally as glossy as yours. The blue shimmering like the ocean you’ll never get to see again. “I’m just really sorry that this is how it went. You deserve better than this.”
“You mean better than you?” You ask, breath hitching. He nods silently, and something burns within your chest. “No. Mm-mm, don’t say that. If someone can save the world, it’s you.”
He snivels. “Sure, if that’s all.”
“I mean it,” you say, trying to make him understand.
“I’m sure you do.”
You hate seeing the defeated look on Grace’s face. Sure, even back on Earth, he’d get a bit sulky from time to time, but he was never one to doubt his own intelligence. He knew he was smart, no matter what. It wasn’t arrogance, or at least not merely that. It was more a mind so active, so ready to study the world around him, that he had no choice but to go along with it. Now here he is, looking like someone had opened his head and spooned out his brilliant brain, bit by bit until all that was left is the ability to look pitiful.
“I get auditory and visual hallucinations whenever the lights go out.” The confession burst out of you before you could rethink it.
Grace looks up, alarmed. His eyes are wide and his mouth half opened. “What?”
You close your eyes briefly and take a deep breath. “That’s why I look like this. I didn’t sleep, I—” You cut yourself off, knowing that whatever you say next could change everything.
“You what?” Grace asks in a low voice.
You smile, your nerves running wild. “I monitored your heartbeat,” you whisper, hoping that it was quiet enough that the sound waves won’t ever reach him, forever getting lost in the space between you.
But, of course, because the world is unfair, he hears it. “Oh,” he says, blinking a couple of times as if needing to recalibrate himself.
“And I named almost all the objects on the ship,” you blurt out.
“Oh,” Grace says again, watching as you get up and start to pace.
“And I talk to myself and the stuff around me basically at all times. I know you know that one already, but I wanna reiterate that I do that a lot.”
“O—Okay,” Grace stutters while getting to his feet as well.
You stop your movement, turning to him. “I’m telling you this because I cannot have you doubting yourself like that. Hundreds—no, thousands of people worked day and night to get us here. I completely destroyed my brain, and our other two crew members died, all for this moment.”
“That’s a lot of pressure,” he points out feebly, and you take a step closer.
“I know, it’s horrible. I’m sorry, but this is our situation. I’m okay with what happened to me, and so is everyone else. This is what we signed up for, but only if it has a purpose. My sanity is nothing against the lives of eight billion people. So, please, don’t start doubting yourself, because right now, you’re literally the only thing I still have—the only thing I still believe in.”
He stares at you speechlessly for a couple of seconds. Then he suddenly starts walking toward you, and before you could stop it, he wraps his arms around you, pulling you against his chest in a tight embrace.
Your entire body lights up. Every nerve, every cell in you is aware of him, as he is burning his outline into you. His left hand is draped around your back, and his right one is on the back of your head, pulling you close until your face is pressed into his neck. He smells like the sterile, clean smell all fabrics on the ship hold, mixed with something that is just him—something you had last smelled this closely four years ago, and might now be your favorite smell ever. Screw vanilla, petrichor, or freshly brewed coffee; if you could, you would bottle his smell and douse yourself with it every day.
He shifts, laying his head on top of yours. “If I’m overstepping, you can tell me and I’ll let go.”
“No,” you squeaked, shoulders tensing at the suggestion.
His breath hits your hair as he exhales softly in what might be a laugh. “Then, if you want to, you could hug me back.”
The gentle reminder is what breaks you. Your arms snap around him, holding him tightly, like the safety belts on a rollercoaster. If you let go, he’ll fly off and you’ll never see him again. Sobs start to wrack through your body, shaking your shoulders, and he tightens his arms as well.
He’s murmuring something in your hair, although you cannot make out what. Your hearing is filled with static, getting louder and louder the longer he holds you before it becomes so loud that you cannot take it any longer.
You push yourself away from him. Grace looks startled at that, but not offended.
He’s your patient. He is so vulnerable up here, trapped with you. But at the same time, your heart is beating so fast, you think it’s trying to escape your ribcage to jump back into his arms. You swallow.
“Too much?” Grace asks carefully.
“No.” Yes. “Maybe.”
“Okay.” He nods. “I’m sorry if I overstepped.”
“You didn’t.” He didn’t; you did.
“Okay,” he says and nods again as if that is the only gesture that still makes sense. “I think… I think there’s a lot we should talk about. Starting with how to best handle…” He trails off, looking down at his feet.
“Me?”
“Your situation,” he says hastily.
“I’m sorry,” you whisper.
“Hey,” he scolds, although his tone is light. “We talked about apologizing.”
“Alright, alright.” You take a breath. “What do you wanna know?”
“When did it start? How advanced are the hallucinations? Can you discern between what’s real and what’s not? Is it just when the lights go out?” He fires off the questions in the way you assume he must have done back on Earth in his classroom.
You blink, momentarily overwhelmed, and before he can continue, you lift your hands. “Okay, just… gimme a sec.” You run a hand through your hair and sit back down, leaning against a cabinet.
Grace goes to sit down on the chair he sat on previously, when he halts, wide eyes finding yours. “Does the chair have a name?”
You nod, your cheeks burning.
He looks down to where you sit on the floor, before realization flickers across his face. “Is it okay if I—would you rather if I sit down on the floor with you?”
He asks it so earnestly that the burn on your face runs down your body, enveloping it like a comfortable blanket. “I can’t possibly ask you not to sit on our chairs.”
“You’re not, I’m offering.” You mull it over for a moment, although that is just for appearance. You know your answer already, you have known it ever since he sat down on Veronica, and you felt her intense discomfort as if it were your own.
Still, the words don’t quite make it off your tongue and out of your mouth. Instead, you kind of shift to the side, offering him the space beside you. He accepts it wordlessly and sits down, close enough so that your entire left side is aware of his presence, but far enough so that you’d only touch if one of you decides to reach out.
He waits patiently until you’re ready, arms balanced casually on his knees. When you start talking, you’re purposefully not looking at him. “It started about two years ago. At first, it was just random sounds that I could easily write off. Like, a beep, or something that sounded like footsteps but couldn’t possibly be because, well, I’m alone. But then it would become more frequent… one night when I went to get some water, I suddenly heard this laughter. It—it wasn’t menacing or scary; it was just laughter. For a second it sounded like a childhood friend of mine. It freaked me out so much I couldn’t sleep for three days, which obviously didn’t help the matter.”
Grace isn’t looking at you, but his eyes are slightly narrowed, head tilted in your direction. “And that only happens when it’s dark?”
You hesitate. “Not quite. Even when it’s light, I’ll sometimes hear stuff where I’m not sure how real it is. It’s never too bad, never visual, just stuff like coughs or clangs. Just any random sounds you’d hear in busy rooms,” you say. “You know when you’re kind of deep in thoughts and then think you hear something, like someone calling your name or trying to get your attention? I get that, too. It’s just that for me both options aren’t real.”
“Okay,” he says for what must be the millionth time in less than an hour. “What about the visual stuff?”
“That only happens in the dark,” you say, hoping he won’t be able to hear the slight shake in your voice. It isn’t a total lie, after all. “It’s mostly shapes, nothing distinct. Just stuff you see out of the corner of your eyes, and then realize that there was nothing there, or the old ‘is that a hat stand or a man in the corner’ situation, you know?” You trail off, pursing your lips.
“Is there more?”
“There is… sometimes…” You groan, letting your head fall into your hands. “The worst is when I can feel something that isn’t there. Like a hand on my shoulder, or a breeze in my hair.”
It feels so humiliating to lay it out like that for him. Like you’re performing surgery on yourself before him, dissecting every part of you, taking out every organ and holding them up for his inspection.
To his credit, he doesn’t look as freaked out as he probably should be, considering the person he’s stuck with in space just confessed to being a total lunatic.
“That’s good to know. Thank you for telling me,” he says, sounding like a therapist at the end of a long overdue session.
You snort. “You’re welcome. There is more from this nutcase where that came from.”
“You’re not a nutcase,” he retorts intently. “Don’t say that about yourself. That’s not appropriate medical lingo, you should know that.” He grins at you at the end of the sentence. It’s almost a miracle the way he is able to switch your mood so quickly.
You shake your head, amused. “Oh, I’m sorry, Doctor Gra—ah, shit.”
“Mhm.” He laughs haughtily. “PhD, baby,” he croons and then briefly looks mortified at himself.
“Oh, wow.” You laugh now, too, and mumble, “Asshole,” although it holds no bite.
He bites his lip, trying to stop the grin from widening.
It feels nice to sit here with him, you realize. The casualness of your conversation reminds you of the way it had been back on Earth, and while that does make your heart clench a bit, the familiarity also makes your shoulders loosen.
Grace taps his fingers against his legs a couple of times before sitting up a bit straighter. “Alright, what can I do to help you?”
Your head snaps toward him. “What? You don’t have to help me. I’ll handle it, don’t worry.”
He sighs, “I wanna help you. This whole thing will only work if we help each other.”
“No,” you say, now sitting up straighter as well. “This will work if we do what we’re supposed to.”
“Yeah, but you…” he sighs again. “Think about it like this: you cannot take care of me if you don’t take care of yourself—”
“I know that,” you cut in, but he continues to ignore you.
“And I think that it would be a lot easier for you to take care of yourself if I help you with it. Also, if I help you so that you help me, that will help me double, which is good for everyone, because if I’m taken care of, I can help you more, and the people back on Earth, right?”
You stare at him. “I don’t know. I don’t think I caught all that.”
“Perfect.” He claps his hands together. “Then we’re on the same page.”
You groan, which turns into a laugh. “You’re impossible.”
“No, this mission is impossible,” he says. “I’m just a variable in it.”
You smile, and the room falls silent. The galley has always been a place of comfort for you. You had your girls—chairs—here, it was far enough away from HAL 9000, but close enough so that you’d hear it if anything changed with your patients, and from all the rooms on the ship, it was by far the most normal.
Originally, there wasn’t supposed to be a galley on the Hail Mary. Food could be stored anywhere, and it wasn’t like you would have a fridge or oven to use in space. But when it was decided to send an awake crew member up as well, the galley was added to establish at least a little sense of normalcy.
It was your room, the closest you’ll ever get again to having a home. When it was created, you had even been allowed to decide on the color scheme. When you passed your choices to the engineers, they had gently but firmly tried to get you to change your mind, stating that you would surely get sick of it, but you stuck by them.
And you’re glad you did. Sure, the galley was a lot, with its brightly coated walls painted with swirls of light blues, yellows and greens, and the furniture which ranged in colors from throughout the rainbow. But you love it. It is like your own little oasis, in the middle of all the whites and grays found in the rest of the Hail Mary.
Your favorite parts are the insides of the cupboard doors, though. You only realized that they had been painted once you were up in space. Every door was decorated by someone on the engineering team. Some were covered with glitter and color, in what was a more childlike attempt at a painting by the less artistically accomplished of the team, and others were detailed masterpieces of landscapes or fantastical scenes.
When you had first seen in, you started weeping, and Commander Yáo and Dr. Ilyukhina—who had that point had still been awake (and alive)—had hugged you tightly. There was a lot to do, and not a lot of time, but Dr. Ilyukhina spent the next two hours showing you each masterpiece, explaining who did what, and laughing about some of the flimsier ones. They were all signed, and you two ribbed about how if the world would actually end, that the insides of your galley cupboards might be the last remains of human art, floating around forever in space until it would one day be found by some aliens, who would surely believe that humanity was a species made up of toddlers.
You thought a lot about those last couple of days before putting Commander Yáo and Dr. Ilyukhina in their comas. The overwhelming combination of adrenaline bubbling in you mixed with the fear briefly put to rest by each other’s company.
A thought that has been crawling around your brain for years now comes to the forefront of your mind, and you can no longer ignore it.
“We need to deal with Commander Yáo and Doctor Ilyukhina,” you whisper, as if scared that the two crew members would feel offended if your voice reached them back where they lay in the med bay.
Grace closes his eyes, shoulders rising when he takes a long breath. “Yeah, you’re right.” He does nothing for a second, just breathing deeply, and then he opens his eyes again to slowly get back to his feet.
He holds out his hand for you to take, and while you hesitate, you do take it and let him help you up. Once you stand you make to pull away, but he stops you by holding on to your hand lightly.
“But this conversation is not over. Don’t think I don’t realize that you’re avoiding telling me how to help you.” He squeezes your hand. “You need me not to doubt myself, and I’ll do that if, in turn, you let me help you. Help me, help you. Tell me what you need, and I’ll do it, just like we said yesterday. Okay?”
He tilts his head, his eyes trying to find yours. When they do, he smiles expectantly.
“Okay,” you say, and while you try not to mean it, his face is so sincere that a part of you wants to just surrender to his requests. It does make sense after all. It is just painful to admit that you might not be able to do the one thing you’re here to do.
“Good,” he says, and without another word turns to leave the galley. You follow him quickly, and side by side you walk to the med bay. Maybe this could work—maybe you could work.
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