IDK

Like, an Eridian scientist will go to the other side of a glass wall, not even a seperate room, to let out all their emotions and be so confused when Grace can sense it

But on the other it would be so funny if he was like, maybe its early into his arrival so he's doing better but he's still kinda brain fried from all the malnutritions

And so the Eridians are arguing about something infront of the clear-xenonite wall of his medical inclosure/room, and he's lost all since of shame and social etiquette, the brain fog is strong with this one. He's just trying to practice his Eridian by following along to a Level 10 Fast-Passed Angry Eridian Conversation, hes processing words, not context.

But he's like standing AT the floor to ceiling window, just watching them in the dim light shining through from his room, cause they're blind right, they can't see him, and clearly they can't or they'd like, move right???

And it takes the Eridians probably an embarassed amount of time to realize, no the Human isn't just standing by the wall coincidentally, its "front" is towards them, its "head" is tilted down so its light-receptors are directly trained on them.

Its definitely watching them through the wall some how. It has been for a while.

And there's just this moment where they go quit and still like "when he looks at me, and I look at him, and he looks at me, and look at hiiiim"

And then Ryland remembers "Wait, fudge, the CAN see me they're just my kind of blind!!"

And then they're all scrambling away from the glass wall like cats from a cucumbers.

Bonus if Adrian was one of those Eridians. They and Grace vow to never tell Rocky. Rocky finds out anyway, and the day they're giving Grace a tour of his new house, Rocky taps at one of the windows like,

But on the other it would be so funny if he was like, maybe its early into his arrival so he's doing better but he's still kinda brain fried from all the malnutritions

And so the Eridians are arguing about something infront of the clear-xenonite wall of his medical inclosure/room, and he's lost all since of shame and social etiquette, the brain fog is strong with this one. He's just trying to practice his Eridian by following along to a Level 10 Fast-Passed Angry Eridian Conversation, hes processing words, not context.

But he's like standing AT the floor to ceiling window, just watching them in the dim light shining through from his room, cause they're blind right, they can't see him, and clearly they can't or they'd like, move right???

And it takes the Eridians probably an embarassed amount of time to realize, no the Human isn't just standing by the wall coincidentally, its "front" is towards them, its "head" is tilted down so its light-receptors are directly trained on them.

Its definitely watching them through the wall some how. It has been for a while.

And there's just this moment where they go quit and still like "when he looks at me, and I look at him, and he looks at me, and look at hiiiim"

And then Ryland remembers "Wait, fudge, the CAN see me they're just my kind of blind!!"

And then they're all scrambling away from the glass wall like cats from a cucumbers.

Bonus if Adrian was one of those Eridians. They and Grace vow to never tell Rocky. Rocky finds out anyway, and the day they're giving Grace a tour of his new house, Rocky taps at one of the windows like,

Ryland Grace has made it all the way to his bike with Eva Stratt at his heels, so her trusted security team has correctly assessed it's time to move in the cars, and Carl is approaching off-screen.

Grace comes out of the little "I don't know why that makes me such a nut!" rant, and there Carl is, stepping up into frame exactly next to Stratt. Tall, broad, unimpressed, unmistakably a force to be reckoned with, unmistakably a trusted professional.

But also a nameless goon at this point. An extension of the threat Stratt seems to represent to Grace. A depersonalized tool.

Grace clocks the cars, his presence, the unfolding situation, instantly and incredulously. And he does something clever, something he always does, which is to call attention to the absurdity of the unspoken threat by trying to force the situation into a normal mold.

"I'm sorry, I didn't catch your name."

Turning Eva's nameless goon into a person with agency. Trying to force a relationship that hinders coercion.

Ideally, this would force them all to acknowledge how abnormal they are acting and retreat a little to keep up the appearance of normality. Or admit to what they are doing by refusing. Either way, the ball shifts out of Ryland's court into theirs.

Neither happens, though.

Carl sees exactly what he's trying to do with that and interrupts him mid-question. "Carl." And then keeps staring at him the same way as before. One word, and we already know so much about him.

He is not a nameless goon. He is an individual named Carl.

And he fully supports what is happening there. Because nothing is normal and it's stupid to pretend that what is happening isn't happening.

So yes, while he bonds with Grace over silliness and is the astrophage-coparent and instigator of Carl's Hypothesis... he is also entirely introduced to us as the man who will wish Grace the best of success on the mission while he's being sedated on the ground. Because Carl has a personal opinion about what is at stake.

"Sun's really dying, isn't it?"

Like he was just calling human eating disgusting, what was he going to do, say "okay actually the way Eridians eat is so incredibly gross we do it in private sound-proofed rooms"? And cede the conversational high-ground and sense of species superiority to Grace??? Nah, it looks beautiful, definitely.

Then Grace says "show me" and Rocky is stuck now, he's committed. So he just bucks up and goes all-in. It's not like he'll see the human after this is all done, he can pretend it's totally normal just this once.

Like he was just calling human eating disgusting, what was he going to do, say "okay actually the way Eridians eat is so incredibly gross we do it in private sound-proofed rooms"? And cede the conversational high-ground and sense of species superiority to Grace??? Nah, it looks beautiful, definitely.

Then Grace says "show me" and Rocky is stuck now, he's committed. So he just bucks up and goes all-in. It's not like he'll see the human after this is all done, he can pretend it's totally normal just this once.

*cools ur dashboard down*

On a completely unrelated, but still kinda related, but not really, note:

I once made a pie out of pears because my mother told me it wasn't possible because they had too much water so the only way you could bake them was in a cobbler.

I made them into a pie. I called it a "Spite Pie".

I rubbed it in her face for two weeks.