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The floor is cold.
Not that he really expected it to be any different. The ship did kind of give off that icy sterile clean space lab vibe. Grace didn’t remember laying down on the floor but that’s where he is. Had been there awhile on account of the pins and needles. He was Curled up with his back pressed against the wall, one hand cushioning his head the other splayed limply. He had found a spare hoodie in the crews personal items compartment. Courtesy of his Russian friend.
He lay against the cold surface and stared blankly at the wall across the way. Rocky was working on something on his side of the airlock and grace watched numbly. Breathing for some reason was really hard. Lungs stuttering every time he tried to inhale. Everything felt shaky and vaguely spinning. Warm water blurring his vision every few seconds as rouge tears would periodically drip down his face. He managed to find enough energy to pull his limbs just a bit closer to himself to try and stave off the anxiety that was paralyzing him. Being in space, as fun as it was kinda sucked. The weight of responsibility on his shoulders was absolutely crushing. He remembered more earth memories and with that felt a general sense of all consuming doom and dread over his mission and a soul crushing feeling of loss. He wished his mom was here. He wished anyone was here. He wished there wasn’t a wall and incompatible living conditions between him and his only friend right now. He wanted a hug so bad. But he’d never have one again.
His lungs stuttered harshly at the thought and he moved for the first time in hours to move his arm to hide his face. To hide his vision. This was honestly very pathetic of him. What must Rocky think of this? He no doubt can sense his heart going a mile a minute within the confines of his chest. Must think humans are worthless. Or at least that he is. He shouldn’t be here. He shouldn’t be in space. He shouldn’t be alone. You would think that after years of living on his own and avoiding socializing that he’d be used to this kinda thing. The soul crushing isolation.
The fingers of his free hand not trapped under his head clutch at the fabric of the hoodie. Grip weak and lacking energy but desperately trying to cling to anything. He can’t do this.
The ship feels so constricted yet empty at the same time and he still felt like he was falling apart.
His voice was cracked and hoarse, trembling just as much as the rest of them “ro- rocky” it came out weak but Rocky still heard him with his superior senses and perked up, twittering anxiously himself and moving over to the xenonite panels. He taps on the material. “Grace feel better question?”
Grace tried to say more but couldn’t get anything else out passed the growing panic. He felt his vocal cords make a high pitched whine and just clutched harder at the hoodie and hid more. He couldn’t slow his breathing at all as it picked up pace.
Logically, in the distant part of his science head, he knew he wasn’t dying- no that was saved for later. He knows it’s just his brain misfiring and dumping chemicals where they don’t belong. And even though he knows it doesn’t help in the slightest in calming him.
“I- I can’t-“ he tried to speak again but lost it in a haze of fear and loneliness. He finally managed to find the ability to move his arms and did his best to hug himself tightly while laying on his side in a heap of lumpy emotionally distressed human. Trying to ground himself in any sort of way but it wasn’t doing a single thing.
Rocky tapped on the wall hard, the rest of his feet stepping in place constantly unable to do anything but worry from a distance. “Tell me how help.”
“Cant” Grace managed to sob out and he finally lost whatever meager control he had been maintaining throughout the day. Unable to do anything as the black hole pit inside consumed him.
Rocky took a step back from the wall trying to think of what to do. He didn’t like it when his human got like this. Although it’s never been this bad in their time knowing each other and trying to figure out how to save their planets. Rocky knew the pressure to find a solution and soon had been getting to Grace pretty significantly. But he didn’t realize that something like this would happen.
Eridians were a calmer species, not that they didn’t freak out on occasion or have other intense emotions, but humans were a deeply sensitive and social species according to their chats on psychology.
He didn’t know if eridian methods of comfort would work here but he literally had no other ideas or options. He moved back to the wall and put a hand on it as He started to sing. Vocal cords thrumming to the soft melody of their language. It was a song they would use on hatchlings to keep them calm.
It vibrates more than it carries, a low, layered hum that seeps through the xenonite and into the metal, into the steel floor, into him. Not quite audible to human ears but Grace feels it. In his ribs. In his teeth. In the hollow, aching space in his chest that won’t stop clenching.
At first, it doesn’t register as anything different then his life support generators running.
It’s just extra noise.
Another sensation on top of far too many sensations that are so overstimulating. his pulse still hammering, his own air choking him as he continues to not be able to get a deep breath in, the dizzy tilt of the room that won’t settle because in space there is no down even with gravity.
But it doesn’t stop. Rocky doesn’t stop.
The rhythm is slow. Intentional. Repeating. Not random in the slightest.
Grace’s fingers twitch weakly against the fabric of the hoodie.
The sound dips, rises, variations of intensity in the vibrates like something wrapping around the edges of his awareness and refusing to let go.
It just… exists.
Grace’s breathing still comes too fast, too sharp, but something in the pattern starts to snag his attention in spite of himself.
The hum continues, unchanged even as he continues to struggle to catch his breath or calm down or stop crying.
Rocky continues, Unbothered by how badly he’s failing to keep up.
Another tear slips down his temple, disappearing into his hairline as his eyes squeeze shut tightly.
“Rock—” he chokes again, but it’s weaker now, fraying at the edges instead of snapping outright. “Please buddy I can’t—”
The song shifts. Not dramatically, just enough to be noticeable. The rhythm stretches, slows. Longer intervals. Lower soothing tones.
Grace doesn’t realize he’s trying to match it at first.
His next inhale drags in a fraction deeper.
Still shaky. Still wrong.
The exhale that follows doesn’t completely collapse.
His grip on the hoodie tightens again, but this time it’s less frantic. less like he’s trying to hold himself together and more like he’s just… holding on.
Rocky keeps singing. Encouraged as graces limbs relax from being so tense back into being a limp pile.
There’s a faint scraping sound—like he’s adjusted his stance to press more of himself against the wall. More surface area. More contact. More vibration bleeding through.
Grace turns his face slightly, pressing his forehead harder into the cold metal.
“I can feel that” he whispers, voice wrecked. “That’s—”
His breath hitches again, but it doesn’t spiral as violently.
“I can feel it” he repeats, softer.
The song answers.
Or maybe it just continues.
Grace doesn’t know. His thoughts are still too tangled, too heavy, like wading through mud.
But the panic attack, sharp and suffocating, eases just slightly.
It doesn’t disappear. It just… stops climbing.
Which is new.
His lungs still stutter, but they start to finish breaths now. Not all of them. Not cleanly. But enough that the black static at the edges of his awareness recedes a fraction.
His shoulders shake with the aftershocks, small, involuntary tremors that he can’t quite suppress.
“I’m sorry” he mumbles into his sleeve, the words automatic. Reflexive. “I’m sorry, I’m—this is stupid, I’m wasting time, I should be working, I should be—”
The song doesn’t change.
Doesn’t speed up. Doesn’t get louder.
It just… stays slow.
Steady.
Unconcerned with all the doubts in graces head that put him like this in the first place.
After a while his heart began to not be as erratic. Didn’t feel like he was falling anymore. He could breathe again. The tears drying against his skin in crusty tracks. He was so tired. he didn’t have the energy to move yet. Just kept pressing his head against the cool floor and let it ground him.
The song faded away and he blinked his eyes open to look at Rocky who shifted around in concern.
“What happen question?”
Grace cleared his throat and managed to get his paralyzed body to make words, fought through the bone deep exhaustion and numbness “Just…got Scared”
Rocky moved away and Grace closed his eyes again. He heard movement and assumed his alien friend went back to whatever he was working on but instead he heard the hiss of the airlock. It’s been awhile since Rocky used the hamster ball due to the addition of the tubing but there he was. Rolling over to his prone form.
The ball came to a stop right in front of him and Rocky used one of his hands to tap against the surface “I am here Grace. Not alone.”
Grace managed a weak meager smile and his eyes stared to water all over again. Voice wavering “thanks buddy” he made a monumental effort to unclench his hand clinging to the hoodie of his dead crew mate and reached out, lightly pressing his fingers against the xenonite where Rocky still had his hand, wishing for the the world there was no barrier between the only other soul for light years.
Grace sighed as the worst of the anxiety faded way just leaving him slightly shaky. “I’m ok.” We wasn’t sure if we was trying to convince Rocky or himself.
Rocky adjusted himself to get comfortable in the ball, leaning against the side closest to Grace.
“Will be ok. Sleep. I watch.”
And Grace drifted off to sleep knowing that Rocky had his back.