Chapter Text
Something must have gone wrong with inducing his coma, he reassured himself, standing shakily in the middle of the tall, industrial room. He would get his memory back soon. Hopefully.
His mind was still muddled, a plan of action forming painstakingly slowly: find any other signs of life and figure out where the heck he was.
The obvious starting point was the tall ladder on the wall, leading to a closed hatch. The medical bot was constantly moving, a monotone voice repeating “Self-ambulation detected,” and “What’s your name?”
It took longer than he would like to admit, the droning voice of the bot not helping his frustration. Eventually he made it halfway up the ladder, pausing to take deep breaths and shake out his tired limbs.
He let his eyes wander around the room at the higher vantage point. He stilled his gaze on two beds similar to his, only mounted and pushed into the wall. Right. He had noticed them earlier, but you know. He had been busy. Forgetting his own name.
Curiosity spiked, he shifted his objective to investigating what might possibly be other humans. There were harnesses and bars attached to the wall that he used to shimmy over. He was at the level of the lower of the two, one bed about seven feet above him.
He winced, close enough to note that the body was covered in a white sheet and did not have any of the necessary medical lines attached. He gently pulled back the sheet, a pit settling in his stomach at the ghostly white face of a dead woman.
He took a moment to stare, willing his brain to give him any sort of memory. Nothing.
He sniffled, letting the sheet fall back and steeling himself to check the other body.
Oh.
This was good news, he reassured himself.
The body was definitely not dead. From his angle, he could hear the soft whirring of machines keeping them alive. Climbing higher, the body was encased in a similar bag that he had found himself in. He reached his hand over to the zipper, only to pause. Is it safe to just wake them up?
His curiosity overrode his logic. He slowly unzipped the bag, stopping when it reached the body’s neck.
Holy moly.
Wait. He turned his head at an awkward angle, attempting to look at the face straight-on instead of upside-down.
Yeah. Okay. What the heck was going on.
The body was a man. A man who he recognized—deep down in his bones—that was practically identical to him. A twin? A clone!? What had he gotten himself into?
At some point he gives up on staring at the man, switching to attempting to wake him up. Nothing works, and he doesn’t understand enough about the medical side of things to start ripping devices out.
Eventually he has to move on, exploring his environment and figuring out who the heck he was.
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He finds out his name is Ryland Grace. He’s in space. That’s not our sun. Grace feels out of place, a constant reminder in the back of his mind that something is wrong.
At some point he gets himself together, cuts his hair, and decides to pay his respects to Ilyukhina. He had discovered their personal belongings, able to put a face to a name. The odd part is that both Grace and Ilyukhina have personal items, yet the third bag does not match the man who was weirdly identical to him.
The third bag was labeled Yáo, and some photos in the bag immediately told Grace that this was a Chinese man who was supposed to be on the ship, but was not. A clone of Grace was in his place. It was as if the man had switched places in the last few seconds before launch, no time to make adjustments.
Grace hoped Yáo was somehow alive and safe on Earth, living worry-free and not stuck in freaking space. On a suicide mission, Grace had the pleasure of remembering. He tried not to dwell on that memory.
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His memory came back in bursts once he had a general idea of who he was. Dr. Ryland Grace, middle school science teacher recruited to help solve the problem of the Sun dimming. Despite having the gist, Grace couldn’t shake the man in the dormitory, still stuck in a coma. The medical bot refused to touch him, “Manual-direction required.” Grace would go down just to stare at him every once in a while, willing his brain to remember anything.
Right. He was kinda glossing over the alien that had conveniently moved into the Hail Mary. Grace had named him Rocky, because, well. He looked like a giant spider made of rocks.
Rocky’s star was dying too. Grace had figured out how to translate Eridian, spending way too long enduring Rocky’s snarky comments as they painstakingly figured out how to communicate.
Rocky had asked about the other humans on Mary. Grace avoided the question, but summarized: “I’m the only one awake.” There. Successful white lie that meant he could avoid answering questions that he didn’t know the answer to.
They had eleven days to travel to a nearby planet, Tau-Ceti-E. They were going to investigate the Petrova Line and find out why Tau-Ceti wasn’t dimming. That meant eleven days stuck in the ship with Rocky.
Grace and Rocky quickly grew close. Two lonely aliens united by the mission to save their respective stars. Grace started to pick up Rocky’s body language, certain musical notes that indicated tone. In turn, Rocky accepted that humans were weird but more technologically advanced than Eridians.
Rocky insistently questions Grace’s weird behavior, to which Grace is confused—then realizes Rocky is talking about Grace’s flashbacks. As Grace keeps getting random memories, he tends to stop everything he’s doing, stare off into the distance for a few seconds, then blink back to reality.
One of these gives Grace a full picture of the original Hail Mary crew. Commander Yáo, the pilot, Ilyukhina, the engineer, and DuBois, the scientist. Grace has more questions than answers.
Grace have memory, question?
Grace blinked, straightening in his chair in the lab. “Yeah bud, just a memory.” Grace frowned, the scenarios running through his mind. What happened to Yáo and DuBois? He still didn’t have an answer to his clone problem.
Rocky tapped his arm to the ground, not-so-subtly telling Grace to pay attention. Important memory. Grace stop work and heart pump faster.
Grace sighed, spinning to face Rocky, who was sitting in one of his many xenonite tunnels running throughout Mary. “I’m fine. I just wish I remembered more about what happened on Earth before I got here.”
Rocky thought for a second. Grace pulled his pencil from behind his ear, idly spinning it around his fingers. Humans remove memories on purpose, question?
“No, no, I don’t think so.” Grace reassured Rocky. His gut felt otherwise, a shudder running through his body at the unknown. Humans were not known to be the most kind-hearted. “I told you this before, it was probably the coma. I’ll be okay.”
Rocky fidgeted like he wanted to protest, but turned back to his xenonite tools. Grace let out a breath he didn’t know he had been holding. He turned back to the table where he was tinkering with something unimportant.
Grace let his mind drift, something that he had begun doing often in the downtime they had. The ship was silent other than its typical creaks and groans, as well as occasional clinks from Rocky.
Out of seemingly nowhere, there was a loud thud from somewhere below the lab. Grace jumped, standing immediately. Grace opened his mouth to ask Mary what was happening, only to hear a faint robotic voice coming from the dorm. “Eye movement detected.”
Eyes widening, Grace stood stock still. There was no other explanation; his clone was waking up.
He knew Rocky would have noticed even earlier than he had. Grace darted his eyes over to Rocky, realizing that Rocky had been speaking. Grace, what happen, question? Hear other human awake. Intruder, question?
Grace opened his mouth to reply, only to frown. “Wait, how did you not hear him already? Can’t you hear the entire ship?”
Humans weird. Rocky thought Grace sentimental over sleeping human, not let go yet. Grace not know about sleeping human, question? Rocky tapped his arm against the ground, impatient.
Grace groaned, “Yes, I knew he was there but I couldn’t wake him up. I thought it would be easier to ignore it and you wouldn’t notice. We’ve been kind of busy.” Grace dragged his hands down his face, skewing his glasses. “What should we do? Go find him?”
Yes! Rocky cheered in short, high pitched notes, obviously excited for more science. Want to meet new human.
Hesitating, Grace looked around the lab. Should he bring a weapon? What if his clone was evil?
Grace was saved from having to make a decision as a thudding sound suddenly grew closer, the clone climbing the ladder and getting to the hatch.
New human is threat, question? Grace heart rate fast.
“Um, not sure pal,” Grace forced out shakily, backing away from the hatch.
The hatch opened slowly, obscuring the man from view. Grace couldn’t help himself, leaning closer. This had been one of the biggest mysteries that came with losing his memory.
The hatch fell shut, echoing through the lab. Grace blinked.
The man standing in front of him was definitely a clone, alright. His hair was surprisingly shorter than Grace’s had been when he woke up. Maybe he found the scissors already. He had something closer to a beard than stubble. His nose was more crooked than Grace’s. He was wearing some of Grace’s clothes, frankly looking ridiculous in a Cats t-shirt and red jumpsuit tied at his waist.
His expression was surprisingly neutral, hands raised slightly to signify he wasn’t dangerous. “Ry?”
Grace probably looked stupid, mouth opening and closing like a fish.
“It’s me, Colt. Do you remember me?” Colt shifted his weight between his legs, nervous in a way that didn’t seem natural to a man like him.
The words on Grace’s tongue died out. His heart beat faster, his brain reaching for a memory. One second he’s on the Hail Mary, the next he’s back on Earth.