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The Airship. Everyone treated it like it was the big place in the space community. The place where all the important people are. Where they do important things and get massive rewards from it.
Jelqer was definite proof that that wasn’t the case.
He worked long hours. Slept little. Ate the bare minimum. Just to appease some boss who paid him peanuts. His ribcage was starting to become visible from his chest, for Christ’s sake. But Nos had no reason to care. To him, it didn’t matter. If you were getting your work done and making him some money, he didn’t give a shit what depths you would sink to. That’s not even getting into what happened to his parents when he was a kid.
But that would soon change. Well, the respect thing, at least. Not the dead parents thing, obviously. Because Jel had a lead. A Pink crewmate often spent time wandering around aimlessly, like she was looking for people. She never seemed fully invested in anyone at any given moment. Her eyes had the look of someone who could snap at any moment. Perhaps she was the impostor. And perhaps if he could catch her in the middle of a crime, Nos would up his pay.
March 29th. The previous day, he had devised a plan to get her ejected. He followed her traces, making sure that she wouldn’t see him following her. He had requested that Warchief not accompany him for this one. He didn’t hate him, by any means. Quite the opposite. It sometimes felt like he was his only friend. But he had a certain way of finding perps that might’ve risked his way. Besides, he might get the credit instead, and leave him raiseless. He brought his gun, just in case.
Finally, Pink entered Electrical, where a figure waited for her. Much bigger than any other crewmate or impostor Jelqer had seen before. He hid behind the doors, eavesdropping on their conversation.
(Maybe they are teammates. In that case, I could eject two impostors instead.)
“... You mind explaining why none of those crewmates are dead?”
“I’m trying my best, Black. They never give me any opportunities.”
“Try better, then. If I were you, I wouldn’t risk losing to that filth again.”
“SHUT UP! I said I was trying!”
“... You dare to raise your voice against me?”
“W-Wait, Black, I’m sorry-!”
All that he heard next was the sounds of screaming and, at least what sounded like, crying. When whoever was attacking her finished, the light went off.
“You are a disgrace. Mitchell was right in leaving.”
The lights turned back on, the figure nowhere to be heard. All that filled the room was the sounds of Pink trying not to let herself cry anymore.
(... Most definitely not teammates.)
Jelqer slowly walked through the Electrical door, trying not to startle the poor girl. Pink was facing away, tucked into a fetal position.
He called out to her. “Excuse me?”
Pink turned around, panicking. Her knife was on the ground next to her, her impostor mouth was visible, he overheard her talking about killing. He could report her right now and get that raise.
But he didn’t.
Once Pink realized it was just a crewmate, she frowned, turning away again. “Leave me alone.”
He didn’t listen. “Are you okay, miss?”
“Sure, never better,” she growled. “Why?”
Upon closer inspection, the mysterious impostor had some severe bruises and cuts on her face, neck, and limbs. Of particular note were her legs, covered with hundreds of tiny slashes, which she seemed to be hiding with black socks that she was in the middle of putting on. “Well, that is a lie. I can tell when someone is hurt. And you are most likely hurt.”
“So, what if I am?” Pink tried to stand up in protest but fell back in pain. “Stop pretending you care about me. You’re a crewmate, none of you do. So go ahead. Just throw me out already. At least then I can’t hurt anyone else.” She had tears in her eyes, though she tried to wipe them away.
Jelqer rolled his eyes, walking closer to her. Upon even closer inspection, she seemed quite young. “How old are you?”
She tried to count on her fingers but gave up halfway through. “Don’t know. Too high for me to count.”
“Interesting.” Despite her answer, or more accurately, her lack of one, she looked to be a mid-teenager at the very highest.
He tried to help her up, but as you may have guessed, not eating much does wonders against your strength. He looked around, grabbing a loose metal rod that was coming off from one of the Electrical boxes, handing it to her. “Use this as a cane. You need medical help, ASAP.”
Pink looked at him, genuinely confused. “You’re not going to eject me?”
“To be honest, I most likely was not going to use that money anyway.”
A FEW MINUTES LATER...
Of course, when Warchief met him in Medbay, he had only one idea.
“No, Warchief. We are not adopting her.”
“Well, why not!?” he asked, disappointed.
“We do not have the proper tools to take care of her. We are not ready. And for all we know, her parents could be waiting for her to return home. How would we know otherwise?”
“We could always ask her!”
Jelqer turned to Pink, who was sitting on one of the beds, pouting. Her wounds were wrapped with bandages so that they wouldn’t cause any more damage in the long run. It was certainly worth a shot.
“So, Pink. Where are your parents?”
“Dead.”
Jelqer was taken aback by this blunt answer. “What do you mean, dead?”
“My dad was killed before I was even born. And the other was ejected. Black’s the only person who wanted to take care of me.”
Warchief took notes on his clipboard, horrified face growing by the second. Jelqer nodded to himself. “In that case, what does Black look like?”
“Tall, dark, brooding, hat kind of like this one, but redder.” She pointed to the pink traffic cone on her head.
Jel thought to himself. This “Black” sounded awfully familiar. “Does he have any strange substances on him? Any sort of goo, or something similar?”
Pink thought about it. “Well... He does have this purple stuff on him. ‘Corruption,’ if I remember correctly.”
That cinched it. This Black... Is the same one who killed his parents.
Jel grabbed her by the shoulders, dead serious. “You should not listen to him. He is merely a psychotic killer who ruins lives. Like mine. And yours. You do not deserve what has happened to you.”
Pink laughed it off, shaking out of his admittedly very weak grasp. “What makes you say that? It’s my own fault that I can’t be better. That’s why he does all those things. That’s why he died. Because I just wasn’t good enough.”
She tried to get up from the bed. “Look, I really appreciate the help here, but I should be getting back to Black. He’s gonna be very mad when he finds out what I’ve been doing...”
Due to her condition, Pick stumbled and fell over upon getting off the bed, instead of making a smooth landing. The cone fell off her head, revealing a heart above her head, a crack in it seeping dark purple goo onto her head. Not just any goo. This was the “Corruption.”
She looked back at Warchief and Jelqer, who were looking at her with horrified and pitied expressions respectively. “... What?” When Pink noticed the hat fell off, she tried to cover the heart to no avail, only getting goop all over her hands. “O-Oh, that? Don’t worry about it, I’m fine! Now, if you’ll excuse me...”
Jelqer turned away, angry. Not at her, of course. He blocked her way out. “You are not going anywhere, Pink. Not until we heal you. Not until we make sure that Black cannot hurt you ever again.”
Warchief looked through one of the cabinets, finding a spare bandaid. “If you put this over the crack, that’ll probably fix it right up!”
Jelqer took it, applying it to Pink’s heart. It immediately stopped dripping, indeed fixing it right up. “There we go. Does that not feel much better?”
Pink was silent for a little bit, before smiling the first genuine smile she had shown ever since they found her. “Yes, I... Guess it does.”
He turned to Warchief. “You are the strongest one here. Make sure she gets to the showers safely without anyone attacking her.”
“But wouldn’t that be kinda... Invading her privacy?”
“It is better than having her taken by Black. You can look away while she is washing if you need to.”
“But-”
She pushed them both out of the way, now able to walk normally without her legs hurting like hell. “You know, I can defend myself.”
“Are you sure? You did not seem capable of fighting back when Black attacked you.”
She looked away, ashamed. “That was... Different. Look, Black usually leaves me alone after something like that. I can deal with it.”
Jelqer sighed, nodding in response as she left. “Alright, but be careful. Your legs are still trying to heal. They can’t deal with much more damage.”
Before Pink left, she stopped to hug him. “... Thank you...”
Even as she exited, Jelqer was dumbfounded by this sudden affection towards him. No one had ever thanked him... For anything. Well, apart from Warchief, but he thanked everybody.
He turned to Warchief’s pleading eyes, slightly annoyed about what he was about to say. “... Alright, fine. We can adopt her.”
Warchief was elated.