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I am bored. I am beyond bored. I am every possible synonym for bored.
I am sitting on a spaceship, with the first sentient alien ever known to humankind, more than a decade of light years away from earth and heading to an alien planet. And I am bored out of my freaking mind. Rocky is sitting next to me in his enclosure.
I lean against the clear Xenonite, the warmth of his natural atmosphere soothing against my anemic body. Tauamoeba can only get someone so far away from dying of malnutrition.
Rocky seems to notice my slouching and melodramatic sighing. “Why not watching movie, Question? Take break time, question? Need sleep or need... eat, question?” Rocky chimes, I can’t be bothered to translate in my head- I look at the computer.
“Eugh..” I groan, dramatically flopping onto my side. I pause the terrible movie currently playing. I miss coffee. I could poke around in Mary’s coding while Rocky's asleep and get her to prescribe me stimulants, but I feel like Rocky would somehow find out. He is annoyingly protective of me. I don’t mind it much, I’m protective of him. “I’m good. Really.”
“Need rest. Grumpy, angry, stupid.” Rocky sighs, pressing his carapace against the xenonite wall. He can’t actually pick me up and force me into bed like Armmando can, his little pattern recognition lizard brain knows better than to force my dumb simian brain into sleeping- it doesn’t work.
That doesn’t stop him though.
“Need rest. Grumpy, angry, stupid. Statement.” Rocky repeats, entirely disregarding my efforts to ignore his words.
“Not tired, just.. Bored.” I shrug, yawning.
Rocky tries to press closer to me, it’s endearing. “Why make exhaust sounds if not need rest, Question?” Rocky tends to simplify his speech when he thinks I’m ‘stupid’.
“Ah.. Human Brain thing.” I offer unhelpfully, curling up on the linoleum. Is the floor linoleum? What is a spaceship’s ‘mental health’ room made out of? Stainless steel? Frick me I don’t care.
“Unhelpful, Define further.” Rocky points out the obvious, tapping a claw against the Xenonite rapidly. I sit back up, I don’t want to worry him.
“Humans can get uh.. sick- if they don’t have enough to do. It’s called boredom. Humans.. are alive for much less time then Eridians. We’re ‘impatient’- impatient is one of those compound words we talked about- ‘im’ meaning going inside itself, as in the opposite. Patience is being able to do a boring thing for a long time.”
I rub my face, putting my glasses back on the bridge of my nose.
“Yes yes, remember. Eridian children do this sometimes, we call ♫♫ø♩♭. Why become sick, question? How sickness look like, question? How to fix, question?”
I crack my knuckles with a sigh, putting in the Eridian word for ‘Impatient’ into my computer. One would expect an alien race to be put off by the habit of choosing to damage their own ligaments. And he is. He doesn’t tell me not to, though- because I’ve lied to him that it’s normal for humans.
“Uh, well I've not got a lot going on. I don’t have problems to solve and stuff… it’s dumb. Humans just- we aren’t built for this. Your brain assumes that you’re going to feel this way.. Forever. And you just..”
I stutter, I don’t want to talk about this. But Rocky is going to worry and squeal at me if I don't talk about this. Or he’s going to go on my computer when I sleep and I’m going to wake up with a Zoloft prescription from Armmando.
“New word: Apathy. In the same way sadness can turn into depression, boredom turns into apathy. It’s when human brains get so bored they stop caring about things.. and uhm.. they stop eating, they stop caring. It’s hard to fix because it’s not something like bacteria- it’s a brain thing. Sometimes it goes away on its own. Sometimes not.”
“Grace make very little sense. Rambling. Need to sleep. I do research.” Rocky makes many annoyed sounds, hitting his claws against the Xenonite.
I’m not tired, maybe if I lie down for long enough he’ll stop obsessing over my health.
I drag myself to the zero g-bed and click the seatbelt over my hips, rolling over onto my stomach with my arms crossed under my head- tucking my nose into the negative space. Rocky hates that I sleep on my stomach, but he does acknowledge that I sleep better when I do.
The ship is still moving, I don’t need to have the seatbelt clicked in. I’ve gained a somewhat Pavlovian response to the pressure after almost a year in this stupid ship. Also, I sleepwalk when I’m stressed. And when I’m not stressed.
“Why eat finger keratin shields, Question?” Rocky sings, clacking away at the laptop I gifted to him when I thought I was never going to see him again. The notes startle me out of my daze.
“Mmhgn?” I mumble through my pointer finger. Oh. I’m chewing on my nails. I guess that would be weird to an Eridian. “It’s a human grooming thing.”
“Grace grooms when anxious, notice.” Rocky clacks two hands together, thinking. “Rocky… worried.”
“I’m alright, It’s.. ah- it’s a self-soothing behavior.” I close my eyes. I’m not really tired, but it beats eating.
“No understand word before ‘Behavior’.” He’s settled into his ‘bed’, not to sleep- but he keeps his sleeping enclosure next to my bed. It’s not really a bed so much as it is like… a display mount? Made of Xenonite (obviously), it’s spherical in shape and incredibly smooth, a mottled brown and dark grey color. It looks natural in formation, like a favorite pillow Rocky’s brought from home. He sleeps draped over it like… I dunno- a big spider over a rock? Use your imagination.
I should ask him about it someday.
“Uh, yeah it means like, calming yourself down. Sometimes humans do it just- without thinking about it.” I mumble, curling up to Iluyukhina’s stuffed bear. Was it weird to keep it? Yeah. But you didn’t save humanity, so really- who are you to judge, person I’ve made up in my head to represent my internal turmoil about the fact I, a grown man- spend every night curled up to the teddy bear of a dead woman I spent four years in a coma next to.
“Human brain odd. Do things without thinking, but brain job to think. Cause damage to self in order to calm down about imaginary damage to self. Hallucinating during rest, requires poisoning to be comfortable socially. Weird, fleshy organ with weird fleshy body.” Rocky’s carapace shudders, squirming. It’s clear he’s been waiting to say, why? I don’t know, maybe in Eridian culture you’re only allowed to call each other squishy and inefficient at nighttime. Is it even nighttime?
“Yeah, it’s weird. I didn’t choose it, bud. None of us do.” I mumble, reaching over to pat the top of his enclosure.
I sleep for a few hours, it’s restless and fitful. I get up multiple times to pee only to stare at my thinning hair in the plastic funhouse-like mirror.
When I do wake up, Armmando is grooming me. You never really get used to waking up to a robot with shears. Great, now I’m going to be itchy from all the little hairs. It’s nice that they bothered to program a nice haircut in, they could have just buzzed me.
Rocky is there, he’s still on the computer- now spinning three different Xenonite.. objects. It’s different then what he’s been working on for the past few months (He insists it’s a ‘surprise’ and will not tell me, I don’t know either.). It’s like.. a jigsaw puzzle.
Oh that is so sweet. And so terribly impossible to solve. It’s all one color, and most of the pieces are identical and fit with any other piece. Rocky is melting down his first attempt at the puzzle. He’s listening to whale sounds in there, apparently they’re soothing in some way? Who am I to judge?
“Good Morning, doctor.. Ryland Grace. The onboard time is… 18:35.”
So around 6pm. Great. Great job Ryland- fantastic sleep schedule. Rocky usually waits to greet me until I stretch and groan. That’s because anytime he has not waited, I promptly groan at him and roll back over to keep sleeping.
“Mornin’” I mumble to either Rocky or Mary, really- does it matter at this point?
“Grace!! Feeling improved, question?” Rocky chirps excitedly, I can’t find it in myself to be honest. He’ll know I’m lying though. I go for a half truth.
“Something like that.” I contract the muscles around my face into a smile.
“Grace teaches Rocky earth school! Rocky will be student. Go!” Rocky chirps, practically buzzing out the notes.
“Whoa whoa whoa- what?” I find his words drawing my lips into a stupid, toothy grin.
“Grace say Grace brain is apathy because task is done, but task not done! Rocky have much to learn, Grace teach Rocky, Rocky learn earth things- Grace have task to do. Grace say Grace loved being school adult, why now stop, question?”
That.. is more kindness then I have been exposed to since my kids made me a birthday card and mailed it to me over the summer.
I cry for approximately an hour, through tears I manage to reassure Rocky he did a good thing and that I am simply having a dumb human moment. Or Mary is able to- unimportant.
I sniffle, leaning against the enclosure. “Thank you, buddy. You’re too nice to me.”
“Wrong.” Rocky says simply “Grace savior of all Rocky love, Rocky will save what Rocky love. Rocky will love Grace always. Impossible to be too nice.”
I cry for another hour, curled up to his hamster ball, whimpering and blubbering like a baby. I think I've earned this one, to be fair I think that most times I cry.
—
“Rocky, you have a perfect memory. It is a choice that you do not raise your claw before you interrupt me.”
I’m sitting with Rocky in the room I woke up in more than a year ago, him in his ball and me in front of a whiteboard. I spliced together an Expo marker for Eridian use a few days ago. It's still in the prototype phase, also- not sustainable. I don’t have an infinite amount of materials like Rocky’s Xenonite seemingly does.
If I open the end of an Expo marker, squeeze out the pigment and let the alcohol evaporate, then suspend the pigment in PolyethyleneGlycol- then thicken it with Guar gum. Basically, I ripped a marker open with my teeth, spilled it everywhere- scraped off the pigment once it dried and mixed it with hand sanitizer and Thick-It. It’s thick enough for Rocky to read.
I sigh, watching as Rocky chirps out an Eridan swear word and clacks two appendages together in a thinking motion, raising a third limb in malicious compliance.
I smile, feeling my face contract into an obnoxious smile. “Yes, Rocky?”
“What is point of so many layers on Earth? Erid only one layer, Erid. Works.”
The scientist in me is instantly defensive, I would point out how his species doesn’t know about relativity or radiation if those topics weren't exceptionally cruel to bring up around Rocky. So I don’t, I bite my tongue- I don’t actually. Rocky can see those types of things and is already very freaked out by my tongue and larynx. Next time he annoys me I’m going to explain how baby teeth work- no, wisdom teeth. Yeah.. I should write that down somewhere.
“Well, Erid does likely have tectonic plates. Have you ever sent probes into the ocean to look around?” I sigh, one would think a fourth grade science lesson with an extraterrestrial that has an eidetic memory wouldn’t take long, I beg to freaking differ.
“...Rocky not know.” His melody is irritated, I suppress the smile twitching at the corner of my mouth. I don’t gloat, he’s already doing me a favor by entertaining my squishy human brain.
“So, the core temperature of the earth is 4,400°C to 6,000°C..”
—
I’ve been sleeping better recently. Rocky has been forcing me to follow a routine he made up called “♩♫♭♭♩♫♭-♭♩♫♪♬-♬♬-♫♭øø”
I figured out that it’s a sort of mottled English and Eridian compound word, using Eridian words but English grammar rules. Translating roughly to “Astronomical-Sane-and-Not-Dead’. How thoughtful.
When I wake up, Rocky will bully me into the shower and then into clean (ish) clothes. I don’t actually have any soap, but it’s nice to wash off. Rocky reassures me that the ship has more than enough fuel to scrub my water and my oxygen if I shower twice a day and hyperventilate for the next four years (not that Armando would let me, the nannybot would likely just.. drug me for my own safety.)
After I shower, it’s Tauamoeba slurry time. Rocky and I have been working on making different flavors, mostly I google what chemicals are okay to lick and he sits next to me, weaving Zenon and pointing out obvious things that I have missed.
The flavors range from weird sweetish aftertaste, to a sort of mud-like fermented flavor. Fun. I recently taught Rocky about taste (He was very uncomfortable, but sat through it because I sheepishly agreed to explain human reproduction.)
Rocky understands the main six flavors, Salt, Sour, Savory, Sweet, Bitter, and Spicy. I had some trouble explaining to him why humans enjoyed painful food. Why humans ate in public, as a social bonding activity. The conversation evolved into food scarcity in early evolution- then evolution, agriculture, mesopotamia-
In essence, Rocky has many questions about earth. He has a very long list of questions (he keeps a digital record for my sake), and during our ‘earth lessons’, I try to answer them.
Rocky asks me questions about my life, careful, calculated questions- likely from a therapy 101 book he had the ship read to him. On days like these, I’m glad Stratt violated every single copyrighted law on earth.
I sit next to Rocky on the floor, Mary leading me through a stretching routine in the screen-laden room. The screens glow with a littered California beach, it’s not even close to being at home.
It’s like when you need chapstick and you lick your lips, not really helpful- but it’s better then nothing when you’re hurling through space and all out of stupid chapstick.
“Grace.” Rocky startles me, giving off a small Eridian chitter of laughter at my human reaction.
I don’t remember closing my eyes, but I open them to look over at Rocky. “Yeah, bud?” I mumble, I woke up an hour ago and incredibly stiff. Mary suggested stretching, Rocky demanded stretching.
“Grace.. happy, question?” Rocky gently hits his claws together, an anxious habit of his that I’ve come to adore.
“Yeah.” The response comes from me without a question. It draws itself from my chest and through my voicebox. “Grace is happy, statement.”