Imagine an au

Where Yao still dies (sorry Yao ily)

Grace is still in a coma when they reach tau ceti

And ilyukhina survives and makes first contact with Rocky

Ilyukhina and Rocky are both engineers, they get along super well, but THEIR ONLY SCIENTIST IS STUCK IN THE DAMN COMA AND THEY DONT KNOW HOW TO WAKE HIM UP

Imagine they’re stuck there just near tau ceti for like… months, just hoping grace is gonna wake up soon because they have no fucking clue what to do

They’re throwing shit at the wall to see if anything sticks

They’re doing INSANE experiments together

They’re merging the ships into 1 big batshit insane ship piece by piece until they’re both unrecognisable

Grace wakes up

Finally

Amnesiac ofc

To a ship he’s never seen before even though he was a big part of the hail Mary’s development

And 2 crazy ass engineers absolutely hooting and hollering in excitement

Earths most devoted daughter

progress under the cut :3

Well... Yes and no.

The last time Ryland Grace was CONSCIOUS of any human touch was when he was knocked out. Absolutely true.

But the last human contact he would have had was Yao and Ilyukhina. Who were told that he was scared about panicking during launch and asked to be sedated. Who did all the pre flight checks before the Hail Mary launched. Who would have carefully, gently carried Grace to his bed in the dormitory, made sure he was secure, and initiated his coma procedure.

There would have been love there. Remember Ilyukhina throwing her hands high and saying "welcome to crew!" Remember Yao saying how he hoped Grace would say yes. Remember how much the crew trusted Grace, Stratt's First Officer, the guy who helped them so much, and was so kind to them, and was the one who they entrusted their preferred methods of suicide to. Who thought they were wonderful and brave.

They would have tucked him in. Maybe brushed his hair out of his face. Maybe said something kind to him before initiating their own coma procedures.