Behold! My Stuff!

location: Grace being American, I imagine the main exhibit would be at one of the Smithsonians (or affiliates). originally I went with Space Center Houston, but the National Air and Space Museum in DC might make marginally more sense. it’s pretty small, but they do also literally have Neil Armstrong’s spacesuit and the command module from Apollo 11, so a Hail Mary exhibit might make a nice companion.

name: Earth’s Saving Grace: The Story of Project Hail Mary (if this was real life it would be called like “The Lockheed Martin Hail Mary Exhibit” or something equally asinine, but this is fake so I can ignore that <3)

actual artifacts:

at least one of the Beetles probes (probably Ringo, idk I’m attached to that one for some reason) 

xenonite taumoeba breeder tank 

replicas of the yellow and red jumpsuits grace wore, with highlights on each of the individual patches and what they mean + the patches that were on Ilyukhina + Yáo’s suits

a small replica of the astrophage panels used to power the Hail Mary

I imagine Grace kept some kind of physical research journal while working on Stratt’s Vat, that would be in here

interactive:

tech panel breaking down time dilation + the difference between the actual time the hail mary traveled to tau ceti, the time as experienced from earth, and the time as experienced by the crew onboard

tech panel that teaches about base 6 + Eridian numbers, and has a little quiz where you’re given a number in base 10 and have to convert it to base 6 (or you’re given a number 0-5 and have to pick the Eridian equivalent) 

tech panel with a 3D model of Rocky you can spin around and click various parts of to learn about Eridian biology (or at least what they know of it from Grace’s logs)

tech panel comparing the planet characteristics of Earth vs Erid, + potentially Venus vs Threeworld +  maybe Sol vs 40 Eridani A; I’m not sure how comprehensive I want this panel to be actually thinking through this a Sol/40 Eridani A comparison would be built in, as I envision you being able to both look at the planets themselves side by side and switch views to look at their orbits around their hosts side by side 

other elements:

one of those semi-enclosed movie rooms with the big wall projection(s), where they loop through a curated collection of the video clips sent back by Grace [when the museum is busy this part of the exhibit in particular is packed]

wrapping around the exhibit is a timeline of the entire mission, from the Petrova line discovery all the way to the Sun returning to full brightness (and when they have confirmation that 40 Eridani A has also returned to full brightness, I imagine this would be added as well) [the actual line part of the timeline is red, of course]

a dedicated wall with pictures of all of the big players in the mission, and a placard naming them all. Stratt is at the top (which she hates), with Grace immediately beneath her, and then the remaining astronauts side by side underneath him, continuing down through technicians scientists etc. Grace never took a mission picture the way the rest of the astronaut crew did, so it’s just his final yearbook photo as a teacher. it’s led to a number of conspiracy theories online that maybe he never actually agreed to be the tertiary scientist, but it’s explained in the exhibit as highlighting that he wanted to be remembered as a teacher, not an astronaut

I mean full-on khaki-shorts-wearing, traversing-wilderness-with-nothin'-but-a-machete Adrian who yoinks snakes outta trees and pets swamp puppies and will unflinchingly dig around in elephant faeces for signs of a rare parasitic tapeworm if needed.

Oh, humans eat socially? No problem, Adrian has observed many many animals eat. Did you know that an obscure species of small underground dirt creature from the north side of Erid also eats socially? Adrian can give you a not-so-short presentation on them.

Oh, the human has no external carapace and so its internal sounds are absurdly loud, wet and off-putting? No problem, Adrian was just conducting an expedition last month researching the incredible eridian animal, the Wet Loud Worm from the south-east region of Wet Loud Wormland. They're desensitised, it's fine.

Oh, Grace leaks often from many orifices and it can be a bit of a learning curve to get used to? No problem for Adrian, see Wet Loud Worm paragraph again!

Being written by a cishet white man.

Ah! Jokes! But seriously, that is actually part of it lol

Grace's worst: he never shuts up. Asocial tendencies. Devalues himself while also aggrandizing himself and yes it's very contradictory and annoying. He's just like that. He's avoidant. Of responsibility and risk, personal and professional. But he wants to be rewarded for being special, and he wants to be liked, so this leads to him being flaky. He wants to be in control, but fears the responsibility, so he prefers others to take the lead while resenting and envying them. He has a deep seated drive to be correct, and always has to get the last word- relationships and his academic career suffer here. If he believes he is right, you are not convincing him otherwise. He is very focused on his own life and rarely reaches out to others. He's entitled and often inconsiderate of other's emotions, and tends to prioritize only himself. He likes to use humor to diffuse situations and deflect problems, even at really inappropriate times. Related: he cannot read a room for shit, so that makes him oblivious. Willingly so, in my opinion, which would also make him a liar, but this is up for debate (he is a biased narrator of his own life lol). He has cowardly tendencies, basically. Holds a grudge over perceived and real slights for decades. He lashes out when angry and yells a lot. In the movie, he breaks things. Also he eats diner food for breakfast every goddamn day. What the fuck. How do you afford that as a teacher! Buy some groceries! Learn to use a frying pan!!!!!!!! good GOD man

Grace's best: Huge softie! He's very sensitive and he's not afraid to appear vulnerable or weak or show emotions like sadness! He is very curious and willing to learn new things. His intellect is pretty vast- he's smart, well rounded in a lot of subjects, and he's funny. Goofy. Silly. He makes people laugh. He has a very disarming personality and comes off as charming to many. People like him (when he actually spends time with them). When he actually lets himself connect with others, he deeply cares for them and overcomes his most antisocial tendencies (for the most part). He's usually kind and often accommodating (when he likes the person). Has a knack for unconventional problem solving, as well as arts and crafts. He's impulsive and quick acting when he's given a problem he believes he can solve. He really is a good teacher, and he loves teaching kids. He would make a really good uncle.

Rocky's worst: BOSSY. Controlling. Impatient, demanding, often brusque to the point of rudeness. Short temper. Mean humor. High maintenance social needs. Clingy. Oftentimes dismissive of human issues and comfort. This is worse in the book and played for laughs a lot, but Rocky has a really hard time dealing with the reality that Grace is Human, the fallibility of Grace's mind, and the concerns Grace has about his quality of life. (I feel terrible for saying this bc it's not his fault but) he is unimaginably lonely and deeply traumatized and not dealing with it, like. at all. Or at least not in healthy ways. This seeps into every part of him. He's a workaholic and he keeps busy so he's not distracted by his perfect memory of his various traumas. He's impulsive. And secretive. He does not give out personal information without cause and even with cause he stays clandestine about it. You are never getting a straight answer out of him if you've pissed him off recently, either. And I like to believe that Movie Rocky lies for fun. just because. To fuck with Grace.

Assumptions:

Air at 29 atm and 230C has a density of only 0.02 g/cm2, which is essentially 0

Water is 1 g/cm2

Eridians are 5 g/cm2 (rocks are 2-3 and metals are 5-12 so I'm going with a funky average with nice numbers)

xenonite is the same density as Eridians

xenonite barrier is 2% of the radius of the ball (1cm for a 1m ball)

I can do all my calculations assuming Earth gravity because bouyancy/weight would both be affected equally by the double gravity, thus cancelling out

We can estimate the radius of a pebble by picturing them loafing cutely into their carapace

In order to float, the ball has to be less dense than water; however, water displacement is directly related to density, so

to be comic-accurate, we're looking for the balls (with pebbles inside them) to be roughly 20-50% as dense as water.

Let's start with the xenonite shell:

% of ball that is xenonite = (volume of outer shell - volume of inner shell)/(volume of outer shell)

= [(4/3)πr{outer}^3 - (4/3)πr{inner}^3]/[(4/3)πr{outer}^3]

= 1 - (r{inner}/r{outer})^3

= 1 - (0.98)^3 = 6%

So the density of the ball alone is roughly:

6% x 5g/cm3 + 94% x 0g/cm3 = 0.29 g/cm3

We're already pretty much there without adding a pebble!

Now let's see what radius pebble we'd need to get to 0.5 g/cm3:

[% of volume taken up by pebble] x [density of pebble] + [% xenonite x density xenonite] + [% air x density air] = 0.5g/cm3

% of volume taken up by pebble = (0.5 - 0.29)/5

= 4% of the total ball volume

What a cute little pebble!!

but remember volume scales by radius cubed.

% of ball is pebble = volume of pebble/volume of ball

= [(4/3)πr{pebble}^3]/[(4/3)πr{outer}^3]

= [r{pebble}/r{outer}]^3

0.04^(1/3) = r{pebble}/r{outer}

...so the radius of the pebble is about 35% the radius of the ball!

To find the maximum size of a pebble that can float, let's say the density of the entire ball has to be 0.95 instead of 0.5:

% of volume taken up by pebble = (0.95 - 0.29)/5 = 13%

13%^(1/3) = 50%

However, this would mean they'd be mostly underwater (like an iceberg)

So the pebble has to use a ball that is at least 3 (for safety) times taller than its loaf height in order to float!!

like seriously I thought it was a silly little comic that won't get much attention so I decided to feel a little guilty and force myself to handwave the science for that cartoon cuteness sake. now that it got A LOT of attention I was seriously starting getting worried 😅

why do we have similar range of hearing

why do we have similar technology that got us here

why do we have a similar level of intelligence

and Rocky answers in most engineer answering philosophy questions way ever:

to hear the predators sneaking up on us

worse technology -dead by astophage. better technology - problem solved on site

that is unless Grace answers himself with appropriately shower thought answer:

why do we have similar range of hearing

why do we have similar technology that got us here

why do we have a similar level of intelligence

and Rocky answers in most engineer answering philosophy questions way ever:

to hear the predators sneaking up on us

worse technology -dead by astophage. better technology - problem solved on site

that is unless Grace answers himself with appropriately shower thought answer:

on being yourself