toast

they/them

17 years old

look under cut for more info... oooooh....

maybe on the trip he was unfortunately enough to start experiencing eye problems from the. Y'know. Scurvy and malnutrition.

at first it's just light sensitivity, then things start getting a little blurry but hey, it's not that bad! and then his eyes start bleeding and it really starts to worry them.

as the time passes it only gets worse, and by the time they get to Erid things are very, very blurry. He can just make out Rocky scuttling around, and most of his work is done purely by memorizing where everything is.

Rocky is, of course, very understanding of it. He tries to make more noise, more than what he already makes, to make sure Grace always knows where he is. He makes labels out of xenonite to help Grace feel what things are, and also ends up working on the skin tight suit a little earlier.

To be honest, he's really worried about Grace. Scurvy is bad enough, now he can't see? Even if Rocky can't fully understand, he knows how important sight is to humans, Grace taught him everything about it! He worries about Grace more than he's ever say.

Once they get to Erid (and Grace isn't dying anymore) things are fortunately much easier. Living with a species totally based on sound has its perks! His house is absolutely covered in different textures and shapes, they even figure out how to make braille books for him (I think he'd start learning it a little before reaching Erid, after it finally hit him that this may be permanent)

OR!!!!! there's another option!!!!!

Grace who's been blind since birth

His life in earth was much harder. Being disabled in this society sucks. He's well aware of how hard it was to get his PhD, and the judgment he faces in academia.

Teaching was a respite, but it was still a fight to even get the job, since the school had never had a blind teacher before. But he still loved teaching, and the students loved his class.

Getting hired for the Petrova project was strange. Eva Stratt was apparently very confident in him, and I mean, he was happy to help save the world but him? He knew the way people saw him, as if he was someone to be pitied, someone who couldn't possibly be a scientist. To be truly believed in by her was a relief.

Getting put in a coma and shot into space, with 2 dead astronauts beside him, was definitely not.

Grace was confident in his abilities, but even he was surprised. How was he meant to save the world, he couldn't even see the dang Petrova line!! He couldn't fly a ship, he wasn't an astronaut!!!!

Surprisingly the ship was made much more accessible, with braille on every switch and button, and Mary describing what was on the screens.

Then Rocky shows up!!! Trying to explain to him that yes humans rely heavily on something called eyesight, no I don't have that, no I can't echolocate like you, was definitely an interesting conversation.

And Grace fucking LOVES living on Erid. Living in a society of people who also can't see and rely on sound and touch? Heck yeah! He loves the tactile art Eridians make, and learning the language, and being with Rocky, and not having to deal with the judgement of Earth.

now I know there's rules and you have to do miracles and be catholic but. I think they would bypass that because I mean.. He did save all of humanity (and Erid) from extinction and make first contact with aliens

so anyway they canonize him, assuming him dead, and then years and years later scientists are able to make contact with Erid and oh shit Saint Dr Savior of Earth Ryland Grace is still alive.... what do we do.....

and then there ends up being massive arguments back on earth while Grace is just like woahhh they made me a saint???? that's crazy... I better be the saint of something cool...

And I mean it in the sense that like.. if people see a man with a vagina/boobs/"female characteristics" he's either seen as a trans man who's destroyed his poor fertile uterus and breasts and womanly features. Or a cis man with a vaginoplasty, who's a freak that's fucking up the "natural order" or some shit

Vice versa, a woman with a penis/flat chest/"masculine characteristics" is seen as either an evil trans woman here to assault all the cis women. Or a cis woman with phalloplasty, who again, is a freak who's going against nature

and if ur nonbinary they'll try to put you in one of the categories depending on what you look like

idk it's just. Idk if this makes any sense at all. Im nonbinary and I think I'm just frustrated and tired and thinking. while watching it there was part of me that was jealous bc like. Never having to deal with society's view of gender. Billy feels like a man, but also he's pregnant with their kid, but also it doesn't matter because at the end of the day he's just him. and does it even matter if he's a man, or if ray is? It's just them in the bunker, there's nobody to push what he should or shouldn't be.