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The cot in security was standard MIRA protocol. The expected time-to-action between an incident triggered and an incident answered was seconds. So Purple’s bed sat feet from the monitors, seconds from action, a dog ready to jump at MIRA’s behest every hour of the day and night.

Purple had hated the leash, but hadn’t minded the privacy of a sleeping quarters so personal. That had been a small blessing at the start, but one which faded as each mounting death turned privacy into isolation.

This wasn’t unique to security, having their cot stuffed in their working quarters. One other crewmate role was saddled with the same expectation, and it was a sensible one. Correcting the trajectory of an off-kilter ship was a task that maybe had mere seconds to get right depending on the cause. So captain, like security, spent nights in their quarters, a cot tucked away in the cockpit just beside the ship controls.

Opposite ends of the ship. An ocean of machinery between them. One living crewmate shoved in the stern, the other asleep in the bow. At least, Purple assumed Red was asleep, from what little grainy relay the security cams offered.

Purple balled and kneaded their hands into the pilling edges of the MIRA-issued sheet, and they thought for the hundredth time about bothering Red in the cockpit.

Purple didn’t. They couldn’t risk Red thinking they meant something by it. Not now. Not when MIRA was going to fire and separate Purple and Red the moment the ship touched down on Industria.

Was it weird that that thought was just a little bit comforting? Maybe not comforting, but at least understandable. Familiar. If Purple were feeling particularly bitter, they’d call it nostalgic. Because at least they’d done this before. They’d handed over a total mission failure to MIRA, and they’d tasted the bitter heel of MIRA’s boot as a thank you for the hard work of it all. They knew this song. They’d waltzed this dance. They were clear-eyed and sober-minded about the day that awaited them.

What words would MIRA use to chew Red and Purple out this time? Same as last time? No, different ones, surely. This was so much worse now. Returning to Industria with a hull of corpses, a haul of nothing, a termination of contract, waiting.

There would be no criminal charges. Purple knew that at least. Involving the law meant involving eyes that MIRA would rather keep at bay. What awaited Purple was the same as ever—blacklisting, unpersoning, exile, maybe, to some far and cold planet that still counted as employment under MIRA.

Purple shivered.

Come tomorrow, Purple would be reliving the worst day of their life.

Would it be better this time, if Red stuck to their word and stuck by their side?

That was a nice thought, Purple decided, as sleep finally stole away the edges of their sticky, tired consciousness…

…

Purple woke up.

“Oh hey hey Puuurps!!! There you are, Puuuurps. Puuurps.”

Purple woke up at a pizza party.

“Isn't it wild I'm captain now?”

Purple blinked, elsewhere and other, out of their bed,in a way that whirred prickingly uncomfortable against their brain like toy cars on a racetrack. Holding a drink, standing here, bright, lights, basil smells, noise noise noise, voices.

“So how's the job I got you?”

Purple was somewhere. Purple was staring at a wall. Purple was staring through a headache which felt like the residual whiplash of being torn through a few layers of reality.

What? And where? And who was behind them?

“Purps?”

Purple turned around, because they needed to see if the noise was what it truly sounded like.

And it was.

Organs in ice-water, blinking hard against the lights, Purple stared at the cafeteria that was colorful and bright and loud with everyone who could not be there.

“Oh, didn’t mean to surprise you."

Purple’s dizzy wandering gaze roved the room almost ravenously. Like they were a starved dog, a disbelieving pawn in some scheme, ears-ringing, bewildered, new to this world, drinking in the sight of everyone.

“Let me start over. So as you probably noticed I’m captain now—"

Tables and pizza and balloons taped to the walls. Cyan without their gored visage slipping off their face and Brown without their entrails sliced down the meridian of their body and Yellow unfrozen from the vacuum of space.

“—which was great since I needed a new security officer.”

Seated together, heads together, conspiring over a shared joke, happy, gathered, back, somehow.

Purple’s gaze shot further. Overcorrected. Readjusted. In the vent: Lime. In the back: Black and Blue. By the center table: Orange and Green.

Everyone.

Alive.

Purple was at a pizza party where no one was dead.

“Purps?”

A hand grabbed their shoulder.

“Hey, Purple?”

And Red.

Purple noticed now.

Red was staring at them.

“Why is everyone alive?” Purple asked.

It was a stupid question, composed of stupid words placed in stupid sentence order. Purple felt more than stupid for asking. But talking to a mate in a party-hat in a room full of ghosts had a funny way of superseding ego.

If Red heard the stupid in the question, they didn’t care.

“Well! That’s easy,” Red answered, rubbing a modest finger under their nose. They released Purple’s shoulder and puffed their chest a little. “I concocted my brilliant trust-ball plan, which the crew carried out on my orders. And upon carrying out my orders—I’m captain—my plan successfully sealed the hull and resulted in zero casualties.”

Maybe the camaraderie was nice, Purple thought, not being the only stupid person in the room.

“No. I’m not asking about the trust ball plan.”

“I mean it was mostlymy plan. Blue said it but I was thinking it first.”

“I’m not asking about that!” Purple cut in, curt to the point of jaggedness. Their tensing hand crushed their drink cup. Punch, sticky and red slipped through Purple’s fingers and caught Red’s uncomfortable attention. “I’m talking about everything after that.”

Red stared, silent, uncrushed party cup in hand.

“Don’t tell me you forgot—the—you know—us two!” Purple gestured their sticky punch hand outward. “Dealing with that thing! When everyone else died.”

“Hey hey hey, I’ll have you know that thing, whichI’m not allowed to talk about under NDA, resulted in zero people dying.”

“I’m not talking about the reactor, either, Red. I’m talking about the THING on the ship that kills everyone.”

Red rubbed their chin. “…That still kind of sounds like the reactor.”

“The alien imposter.”

Red stared, and the blankness of their face made them so strangleable in the moment. “The what?”

“Oh, there you are!”

Purple’s gaze slid past Red, as Red had become the least interesting thing in the room at the sight of the slid-open cafeteria doors. Time moved slowly. It all felt like having a single moment to catch a falling knife. It all felt like Purple could not move to catch the knife at all.

Slow. Staggering. Shaking. The unceremonious entrance of White’s body dragged to a halt. A few wet, guttural utterances leaked from White’s throat well below their mouth until they quieted all together. It was familiar—seeing this all—and still it was like witnessing it for the first time. That red seam that bloomed heavy along White’s throat—was it always that smooth? Their head lopping off—had it been that clean? That forceful? Their blood crawling across the floor, sloppy and gluttonous as it ate the tile—had it always been that much? That dark? That wet?

Dizzy. Oh Purple was dizzy. Out of body. Beside themselves. It was an oxygen emergency all over as their heavy breathing spread white and fuzzed edges across their vision. They dropped their sopping cup. They gripped the punch table. They needed to stay upright. They needed to understand.

Right at home. Purple’s hyperventilation blended in right at home with Red’s screaming, Green’s retching, Lime’s panicked hustle. No one watching could guess that dead bodies did not faze Purple much anymore—but doing this all again did.

Why were they doing this again?

Purple released the table. They stared at their shaking hands, clenched and unclenched them, stilled their trembling vision until their fingers came solidly back into sight. A dream? Purple smacked their face once. Twice. Too real for a dream. Or—it felt too real for a dream?

White’s body remained. The cafeteria remained. Bright lights. Basil smells. Pizza sauce.

“What are you going to do about this?”

If aliens were real, were time loops real? Were precognitions?

“You’re the captain.”

Purple’s stabilizing gaze found Green now, convincingly huddled scared in the corner, and a new lash of emotion struck them. It was rage. It was grief for all the rage Purple never got to feel as Green’s hapless puppet, strung along on their act, swayed by their innocence.

And now the sweet little worm farmer was tucked in on themself, trembling like they were a simple hapless witless witness to a carnage they didn’t start. It solidified Green into an object of absolute obsession for Purple.

This was happening again, for some reason. And there was exactly one path forward.

Purple slipped unnoticed to the center table. They pulled the plexiglass box back from its hinges and slammed a fist down on the button beneath.

“Emergency meeting,” Purple declared, in tune, and in sync with the blaring of the button’s wail.

The shock seemed enough to quiet everyone. A few stray sniffles and whimpers still whispered out like unbused table scraps. The decorations, the pizza, the every crewmate, were leftover scraps in the wake of nuclear shutdown. And scraps were eager for order. No objections sounded as the crewmates shuffled to seats. Purple had become an image of authority in the time since slamming the button.

“Hey—hey now!” Red declared, first to break the silent trance. On better thought, they hopped off the seat they’d taken a moment ago and approached Purple. “You’re doing captain duties. That’s stepping on my captainly duties.”

“Then you call the emergency meeting,” Purple said.

“What emergency?! There’s no emergency yet! White might be fine!” Red gestured emphatically to the two halves of White’s corpse.

“White was decapitated,” Purple answered. “White is dead.”

“Are we sure? White was very rich.”

“Things do work differently for people who are rich,” Green agreed.

“Not DECAPITATION.” Purple pressed their palms tight to their visor. They were experiencing a headache entirely unique to the ordeal of having one stupid conversation too many over the corpse of a crewmate. “We’re getting distracted,” they said, and thrusted a pointed finger out in punctuation. “Green did it, and I can prove it. We need to vote them out.”

“What?!” Green’s visor went so reflectively wide, Purple almost could have believed their surprise. Instead a million memories of Green’s fawning and faultless behavior flashed through Purple’s mind and congealed a hatred like rot in their gut. “You think I did it?!”

“I don’t think. I know.”

Gazes followed like a flood to Green. It came with a weight, a pressure Purple could almost feel as Green held up their hands in a show of innocence, head shaking. They’d become displaced from their seat, and they backed away until they occupied a sphere of isolation directly opposite Purple.

“I didn’t, though! I didn’t! White was my friend!”

“Wait, wait wait, stop right there, Purple. We can’t take a crewmate vote without everyone present. It’s against MIRA policy,” Orange cut in sharply.

Purple hesitated, a little sick in the gut from too many cases of absent crewmates meaning absent corpses. “Who’s missing?”

When the doors banged open once again, Purple felt stupid all over for forgetting the order of things. Blue hustled the gurney in, and whatever authoritative pull Purple had established quickly sponged its way to Blue.

“I’m here,” Blue declared, and it was a statement almost deserving of applause. Not that Blue would have noticed any applause as they made quick work of hoisting White’s bifurcated body onto the gurney.

“Finally, someone who actually knows how to take charge,” Red said, with pointed offense to Purple. Then hastily they added, “And me. Also me. I take charge.” Red covered half the distance to Blue, shedding their party hat and snapping the captain’s hat in its place. Red turned to face the table again, hands spread. “Here’s what’s going to happen. I’m going with Blue to understand what strange and potentially non-lethal events took place to make White’s body do that. Everyone else, get back to your tasks. Meeting adjourned.”

“I told you I can prove it was Green,” Purple jabbed back, almost frantic, an elbow shoved into a closing door. “You don’t get to call off my meeting.”

“Purple is right. Meetings cannot be called off by the captain,” Orange added.

Red glared at Orange, pointed in their silence. Reluctantly, their focus fixed back on Purple.

“Then prove it,” Red challenged. “Otherwise—”

“The thing that’s killing crewmates can’t touch salt. If Green can provethey can touch salt without exploding into a million droplets of goo, then I’ll drop the charge. Yellow—”

“The flakey salt’s gone,” Yellow said. And the words spun friction across Purple’s brain.

“What?”

“Weirdest thing. The saltshakers too. The canisters. All gone.”

Purple’s heartrate ticked up a fraction. This day’s events, replaying in sequence, with no one else the wiser to the time loop—Purple had taken for granted they were so very alone in this all. It was an invasive, trickling, penetrating realization of cold sweat and cold nerves that… maybe… Purple was not actually doing this alone.

Purple’s visor settled on Green, who stared back with an almost gluttonous pleading to their wet expression, hinging on the verge of tears.

The act was pissing Purple off. Green’s face was not going to give away anything about what sleight of hand they’d pulled to dump the salt.  

“Cyan,” Purple blurted out. “You’ve got salt—”

“Cyan’s salt is gone too. Trust us. First person we asked once we realized the kitchen salt was missing,” Yellow said.

“This is ruinous to the sauce,” Brown added, nodding.

“This isn’t… about the pizza,” Purple insisted, feeling insane all over. “We’re being sabotaged. And Green is doing it.”

Green’s head shook emphatically. “I have no idea what you’re talking about. I know I haven’t proven myself to you as a crewmate and an intern yet, but I’ve done nothing to the salt, a-and I could never kill! I liked White! They were my first friend on the ship.”

“And why are you so insistent it was Green?” Yellow asked, narrowed gaze to Purple. “Maybe it was you?”

“I didn’t kill White!” Purple argued back. “I was in here when they walked in.”

“So was Green,” Yellow said.

Cyan buried their face in their hands. “This is just awful. White’s blood isn’t even dry yet and we’re already pointing fingers at each other.”

“Cyan makes an excellent point,” Red said, loud and abrasive as they stepped forward. “We all need to calm down, focus, and find someone to clean up White’s blood before it dries.” Red stuck a contemplative finger beneath their chin. “Should be the intern… Green, if you survive your execution trial, clean up White’s blood.”

Tears rolled thick down Green’s visor as they raised a shaking hand in salute. “Aye aye, Captain,” they whimpered.

“Mopping up White’s blood won’t matter when we’re mopping up everyone’s blood, Red. We need to eliminate Green now.”

“You’ll have to mark me down as abstaining,” Blue cut in, one hand firm on the gurney holding both halves of Whites body. “I’m sorry if this seems like an abdication of my responsibilities. But my true responsibilities are to the mortuary sciences. I will figure out what happened to White’s body. I only hope you can trust me enough to not carry out a rash execution of misguided justice in my absence. We are all crewmates.”

Blue gave one nod before pushing the gurney into the hall, leaving in their wake a lash of shame in Purple’s heart, and a notable easing of the tension in the room.

“Blue’s right,” Orange said. “A rash execution of a fellow crewmate will leave this mission understaffed. And while MIRA applauds cost-cutting measures, Green is unpaid, so losing them to the vacuum of space will be a detriment to our productivity.”

“I’m abstaining,” Brown said.

Purple let out a strangled noise of irritation, eating the pain of losing two votes in rapid succession—notably, without Orange throwing away their vote quite yet. Purple cursed themselves for almost forgetting that Orange was an object of their hatred too. “Of course you’re telling everyone—” Purple started, attention to Orange, and then thought better of yet another proof-less jab at an imposter.

Proof existed. But Purple didn’t have it. The salt was missing. And time loops weren’t believable.

Blue’s scans would prove it… They’d show no bone, and that would be enough for Purple to explain the imposters. But the time wasn’t enough. Blue’s scans took too long. Green was too opportunistic a killer. Blue would be next to die. Blue would especially be next if the imposters were playing smarter.

What was there to do? Guard Blue? Even if Purple stood vigilant beside Blue the whole time, an imposter in the vents was a deft killing machine. What would happen when a few tentacles cleaved Blue in half, and Blue’s body was discovered alongside Purple…?

Disquieted murmurs usurped the floor from Purple. Brown had stood, perhaps to leave, and whispered in Yellow’s ear, perhaps to convince them to leave as well. The chance to act was dying on the vine. Purple pressed their hands tight against their head and felt teeth closing in.

So then what? How did you outplay the imposters without salt? Pile more witnesses around Blue? Gather an audience to prove what an alien tearing off a face looked like? Sacrifice Blue to prove a point…?

No, sacrificing Blue wasn’t an option…

There was only one option in fact. And that was Green’s execution.

Purple slammed both hands down on the table.

“I’m sorry! I know I seem rash, but we need this vote to go through. I know it was Green.”

That would be their proof. Once the vacuum of space wormed its way inside Green’s body and exploded them into so much wet pink emulsified goo, then Purple would be able to explain everything.

Purple just needed to be the aggressor first.

“You keep saying you know,” Black said, arms folded. “How do you know?”

And it meant Purple needed to give them something.

“I can’t explain how… but I already know everything that’s supposed to happen today. I’ve been through the version of this where Green confessed to my face that they killed White.” Purple’s attention roved across the room, reading faces. “As well as most of you, after this.”

“’Psychic precognition’ is not a recognized defense for employee misconduct under MIRA policy.”

“I’m not performing misconduct. I’m telling you we have a killer among us, and I know who it is. I get that it sounds impossible, but if we don’t act, Green will kill all of us.”

“I’m sorry! I’ve been trying to wait my turn to speak, but I wanted to say that’s preposterous! I really really really did not kill White or anyone! I’d be willing to take the fall if this was standard new intern hazing, but execution in the vacuum of space is just too much! I don’t even know how to kill! I-I don’t even have clearance to use the MIRA-issued lethal weapons! Please!”

“It’s true,” Orange affirmed. “Interns are expressly forbidden from handling any and all MIRA-branded lethal weapons.”

“You keep defending them,” Purple said. “We shouldn’t trust Orange either.”

“So is anyone who disagrees with you a murderer then?” Yellow challenged. “You going to say I did it too? Pizza cutter to the trust fund baby’s throat, why not?”

“No!” Purple said. “Just Green and Orange.”

“Okay okay, Purple’s little witch hunt has gone on long enough,” Red cut in. “We have no evidence, against anyone, of ANY KIND, so with no votes I’m calling an end to—”

“I vote Green!” Purple announced, hand high in the air, so high it shook with the strain. They stared daggers into Red, who looked back with surprise. “This is an official MIRA vote. You can’t call it off.”

“Purple’s… still right about that,” Orange said. “MIRA crewmate excommunication votes are part of operating policy and cannot be overridden. All crewmates must vote or explicitly abstain, and once all votes are counted, the option with the most votes wins. If that option was a crewmate, then that crewmate is ejected into space.” Orange’s visor narrowed. “With that explained—I vote Purple.”

“That’s—ah—that’s one to one? So it’s a tie right now? What happens if it’s a tie?” Green asked, voice tight.

“A tie results in no launching of any crewmate into space,” Orange answered.

“There we have it, then,” Red said. “We’re tied. I abstain. As your captain I order everyone else to abstain so we can—”

“Captain cannot force votes,” Orange said.

“What’s even the point of my hat then?! Just to look cool and sexy?”

“I um… I vote Green.”

Silence weighed like a blanket as each attending crewmate’s gaze fell to Cyan, hunched almost apologetically, hand raised meekly.

“Why?” Black asked.

“I think Purple’s telling the truth. There’s something... awash with their aura. They’re unanchored. Their soul is like…” Cyan fell silent, contemplative, “…an armpit stain through more fabrics of reality than just our own.”

“Yes,” Purple said, leaping almost, and accepting in their excitement that they were agreeing to the armpit analogy. “I’ve been through this reality already. Cyan, you get it?”

Cyan nodded.

There was hope here. Three abstaining, two against Green, one against Purple. If Purple could convince just a few others to vote out Green--

“Aaaand how are you getting that, exactly?” Black asked. “By ‘vibes’?!”

“No it’s… more sinister,” Cyan whispered. “There is something evil happening here. It feels… occult.”

And at this, Black straightened.

“BAH. No one on this ship would know ‘occult’ if it sang from the microplastics in your body,” Lime declared.

“Excuse me,” Black said.

“If there’s occult magic happening here, then we’re wasting our time yapping. I’m out,” Lime declared with a definitive clatter-close of the cafeteria vent.

“Lime! You can’t leave without declaring a vote!” Orange called down the vent.

“Green,” Lime’s voice echoed up. “They went mad over the steering wheel,” Lime concluded, and then the scurry-clatter of their body pattered off down the vent.

“O-or abstain, I meant! If that wasn’t clear!” Orange called with a noticeable wobble in their voice.

“Three votes against Green then, right?” Purple said. And, Purple did not speak it out loud, but their gut tightened at the internal thought, “And one against me.”

“And two against you, now,” Yellow said, hand raised, like an echoed correction of Purple’s thoughts. “I’m not buying the psychic act. You want that worm farmer dead, and something just doesn’t feel right about that. I vote you, Purple.”

“I vote Purple then, too!” Green said, hand stretched high. “That… that ties it again, right? Can we end it here? No one dies?”

Three votes and three votes and three votes... A perfect three-way tie across Purple, Green, and abstaining all together. The only remaining vote was--

“I vote Green.”

Just like with Cyan, Black’s declaration drew the whole room’s attention like moths to a porchlight, but this time with a long and low and wounded whimper from Green.

“But I didn’t…” There was a barely repressed sob shaking Green’s voice.

“That’s the final vote then?” Purple said, feeling almost sick to their stomach with victory. “Four votes against Green. It’s Green.”

“It’s Green…” Orange confirmed, and there was a resignation in their tone. “The airlock in storage is damaged. All we have is the garbage chute.”

“No. No no no no. Please. I didn’t do it. I can’t kill. I move the wet worms off the sidewalk when it rains so they don’t die. I don’t kill.” Green backed up a step. “I wanted to help the crew. I wanted to start my career. I wanted to be captain.” Tears overflowed from their visor. “Please don’t do it. Everyone back home will be so disappointed in me.”

“It’s MIRA policy, Green,” Orange said, and they took Green’s shaking hand, and with a dead man’s stride and shaking legs, Green followed them to the garbage chute.

“Wait. Wait…” Red said. There was a surprise, an urgency, to their voice, as though they were coming back to reality. Their attention shot between Purple and Green. Confusion knitted uncertainty into their brow. “Green is part of my crew and I decide what happens to my crew. Green, get away from the garbage chute and go mop up White’s blood.”

“You don’t get to say what happens to the crew, Captain. Not when it comes down to a crew vote.” Orange’s acid glare shot to Purple, and just like with Green, Purple could almost believe there was true emotion in that murderous monster glare.

“That’s my intern.”

“They’re space’s intern now.” Orange pulled open the garbage chute. “Sorry, Green…”

Green had no more words to offer. They made only noises, blubbering and wet. They shook their head. They pulled at their own sweatshirt. They shook their head again. They broke out in full blown sobs as they put their first leg into the chute.

It still hurt, somehow—knocked against the bone in Purple’s chest to hear Green clank and fall to the bottom of the chute. Purple did not watch as Orange hit the button. Purple watched the window instead, ready, organs twisting.

“Once Green’s body goes by, you’ll get it,” Purple said.

Emblazoned in the lights pouring outward from the ship, a parade of trash debris lumbered through space. Napkins stained red. Paper plates translucent with grease. Pizza crusts and pizza crusts. A lone party hat wiggled its chin-strap worm-like through the icy nothing.

And then Green spun into view. Their arms hugged their body. They watched the ship, and tumbled, and tumbled.

Ice crystals grew like spiderwebs along the edge of their visor. Green’s tears were flash-freezing first. The crawl of ice spread like mycelium growth, took their visor, took their face, their head, their hands clinging tight to the sweatshirt that gave itself to the rigidity of frost as well.

Frozen stiff, Green’s body drifted away.

“So what exactly are we supposed to get?” Yellow asked.

But Purple wasn’t listening. They were all too sick in the stomach watching Green’s body.

This was... a variation, in the loop. Like the imposters hiding the salt, they were also hiding their body composition. That had to be it, right? Everything was the same; White’s death was the same; Green’s hand in it was the same.

They were leaving Purple without the evidence to prove their case. Or maybe—maybe it had always been like this. Purple had no proof that all imposters exploded the same. Orange had, but maybe Green didn’t. Clearly, Green didn’t.

Maybe Green…

Maybe Green…

They looked so sad, right to the end.

“Great, we’re down an intern,” Red declared, iced-over anger palpable against Purple’s ears. “Get back to your tasks, everyone. Orange and I are going to find the doctor.”

The tension was poisonous as the group broke, and glares to kill found Purple from almost every side—Red, Orange, Yellow, Brown…

All too late now, with the edges of adrenaline starting to ebb and allow sober thoughts to sink into Purple’s shaky mind, Purple realized something: Had Green been confused…?

If Green had voted to abstain, it would have ticked the abstaining vote count to four. It would have saved Green no matter what. An alien, new to the MIRA ship, maybe didn’t know this, but the imposter using Green had been aggressively smart.

(A worm-farmer, new to the ship, maybe didn’t know--)

Purple snapped back to their own awareness at the shift of bodies in their peripheral vision. They whipped their head away from the window to find Yellow and Brown gone, and Orange and Red already halfway to the door.

Purple’s legs slipped twice, all pins and needles and vestigial adrenaline, as they jogged to catch Red before they disappeared through the cafeteria door.

“Hey, Red. Red,” Purple caught up, grabbing Red lightly by the hand. The stiffness of Red’s palm, the cold refusal to face them, left Purple wondering if Red would ignore them entirely.

Red did turn to face them. Purple seized their chance and pulled Red in closer. Purple dropped their voice to a conspiratorial whisper as they said, “Whatever you do, don’t leave Blue alone with Orange, okay? You need to keep an eye on Orange.”

“I don’t need to do anything,” Red snapped as they yanked their hand away. “You do not give me orders. I give you orders.” Red’s visor drifted to the puddle of White’s blood. “And your orders are to clean up White’s blood.”

Purple shook their head. “You need me on security cams. There’s still another ki—”

“I need my crew to listen to my orders, Purple.” Red’s hands gripped tight at the empty air in front of them. They leaned in. “I didn’t bring you on board to undermine me. I think you’re forgetting I’m the captain.”

With that, Red spun on heel and fell back into pace with Orange. The cafeteria door slid quietly shut behind them.

Purple felt the trust of the whole ship slipping away wetter and slipperier than White’s blood.

Purple exhaled. They pressed their hands to their visor. They fell to a hunch, and breathed, and thought. This was fine. Purple could be hated. Red could hate them. It was an okay trade-off if it meant keeping every still-living crewmate alive. Being hated didn’t matter. The only thing that mattered was finding enough proof to be trusted.

And if Red wasn’t going to be their ally…

“Hey… Hey Cyan, Black, wait a second.”

Cyan and Black paused, leaning over opposite shoulders to watch Purple approach.

“Thanks for… having my back there,” Purple said, falling in line with the last two mates in the cafeteria. “I have another favor to ask, if you don’t mind. Blue is going to take everyone’s scans, and when that happens, could you try to make sure we never leave Blue alone with Orange?”