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Purple lay their head against the cold metal of the oxygen tank as they sat on the floor, hugging their knees. The soft electrical hum of the room brought them comfort. It almost seemed to quiet their mind… to make them forget.
The occasional glug of a bubble brought them back to reality, though. Heracles was gone. Cyan was gone. Black and Yellow and Brown and nearly everyone else on the ship was gone. Purple didn’t even know most of them that well, they could practically count the number of days they spent together on one hand. Yet, Purple found themselves missing the other crewmates as though they had all been childhood friends.
Purple let out an airy laugh to themselves at the thought. They supposed, the trauma of it all just did that. It brought them together, no matter how twisted the circumstances were. They wondered what things would have been like if things hadn’t gone so awry.
Interrupting their wandering thoughts, a door slid open. “Heya, Purps,” Red peaked their head around the doorway, “I thought I’d find you here.”
“How’d you guess?” Purple replied. They didn’t look up. Instead, they picked at a bandage on their left arm.
“Hmm… Captain’s intuition?”
Purple rolled their eyes.
“I uh,” Red adjusted their cap nervously, “Thought you could use some company.” They shuffled through the room and took a seat next to Purple. “I know I could.”
Purple glanced at them. Red sat straight, legs crossed, and shoulders squared. They twiddled their fingers in their lap. “Yeah?”
A breath of silence.
“Yeah.” Red confirmed.
“Well, thanks.” Purple sighed and turned slightly to face Red. “Me, too.”
Red smiled. “That’s good to hear, I was worried you might’ve been wallowing all by yourself and thinking all sorts of things about me,” they said with a laugh. “Though, whatever you could’ve been thinking would have been totally justified, probably, so-”
“Red-”
“I wouldn’t blame you if you were having second thoughts, or if-”
“Red, please-”
“...you completely changed your mind and decided we couldn’t be fine and-”
Purple reached for Red’s shoulders to give them a gentle but firm shake. “Red! Chillax, please!”
Red blinked as they stopped in their tracks, straightening at Purple’s touch.
“It’s okay, dude,” Purple held Red and offered a gentle smile. “I’m not going to suddenly decide I hate you again. It’s okay. You’re still my-,” Purple bit their tongue as they nearly said friend. They remembered their discussion after the fight. They laid out boundaries, and while they meant what they said in that they don’t hate Red, they weren’t ready to fully commit to the friendship title without something more. They had barely even talked through what happened after the reactor meltdown before, and there was so much that has happened recently on top of that. “We’re still stuck together in this whole ordeal.”
Despite Purple’s efforts to recover from their near slip, Red seemed to catch it. They frowned slightly in disappointment.
Purple’s heart hurt at Red’s expression. “And,” they released their grip on Red’s shoulders, instead offering a hand to shake. “We can still work on that whole ‘being friends’ thing.”
Red seemed to shake off their disappointment as they took Purple’s hand, shaking firmly with a nod. “Deal.” They grinned widely.
“Okay, but don’t be all weird or pushy or anything,” Purple shifted themselves, readying to stand up.
“Wait, wait-” Red motioned before reaching into their uniform coat. From a pocket inside, they pulled out what Purple thought was a crumpled piece of paper. They realized, though, as Red held it out for them, that it was a poorly constructed origami fishmate. They took it in their hands and inspected it with a growing smile.
“Oh, Red,” Purple exclaimed, turning fishmate origami around, seeing what was clearly a page ripped from the Captain’s Manuel. They laughed as they saw crinkles in the paper from misplaced folds.
Red scratched the back of their head sheepishly. “I felt real bad about what I said, y’know, about Hercules’-”
“Heracles-”
“...Heracles’ long poops. I know what they meant to you, and I thought I could make you something to keep you company. Especially when you don’t want me arou-”
Purple interrupted Red with a tight hug. They leaned their head into Red’s shoulder and softly said, “Thank you, Red.”
Red, after a second of hesitation, returned the hug, holding Purple close. “It’s the least I could do, Purps,” they said.
Purple let go and stared at the fishmate again. Then, back at Red. “I think this is a good start.”
“You think?”
“Yeah,” Purple said. They leaned backwards into their hands, looking around the room. “Apologies are a good way to start over and make things right.”
Red stayed silent. They weren’t sure apologies were enough to make up for what they’d done.
“I’m sorry, too,” Purple sighed, “I was really harsh on you this whole trip.”
Red stared at Purple in shock. “What? Purps, I was the ass who threw you to the side for corporate bootlicking.”
Purple shook their head. “No, Red, that doesn’t make how I treated you okay. I didn’t even give you a chance to fix things at first… I just blamed you for everything that went wrong and ugh…” Purple rubbed their face in disgust at themselves. “I even said I wished you were dead.”
Red winced. Purple did say that. And admittedly, it had hurt.
“I’m glad you’re not dead, Redsie.”
“Me too,” Red chuckled at their dual-meaning response. Redsie. Purple had only used the old nickname during their fights, before. Purple’s warm tone brought Red back to their old internship days. “I know you didn’t mean it, you were just scared.”
“I was,” Purple admitted.
“I mean, even I,” Red started, mimicking their own Captain’s voice with a playful pretend flex, “the great Captain Red, was terrified.”
Purple continued, “I was scared. I think…” They avoided Red’s gaze. “I think I was scared it really was you.”
“That I was the imposter?”
“I spent so much time telling myself you had changed after the NDA,” Purple explained, now laying down, staring at the ceiling to avoid Red. “I wasn’t ready to admit the possibility you actually had.”
“Purps…”
“If you really had been the imposter, it would’ve been like losing you for real.”
Glug. The oxygen generator hummed.
“Despite it all, I had hoped the Red I knew was still under that Captain’s suit.”
“Is Red still there?” Red asked about themselves.
Purple thought to themselves for a second, twisting the paper fishmate in their hand outstretched above their head. “Redsie?”
“Yes, Purps?”
“Yeah.”
Red could feel their eyes start to well with Purple’s confirmation. Ever since their fight against Green ended, they felt such an immense dread for what Purple thought of them. After all, they had thought everything was Red’s fault before. Just because Red wasn’t the imposter didn’t mean they weren’t a bad Captain. It didn’t mean they weren’t a bad friend. It didn’t mean Purple didn’t hate them.
Red moved to lay with Purple, trying to hold back their tears. They stared at the lights above them as if they would help. They didn’t. The tears still ran, and their breathing still hitched. They sniffed, trying to keep their mess to themselves. “Thank you,” Red said through shaky breaths.
“I missed you,” Purple took their hat off and turned to face Red, obstruction free.
Red sniffed, turning to face them in return, resigning to their obvious sobs. “I missed you too.”
Purple pulled their sleeve over their hand and wiped away some of Red’s tears.
“Is it okay to miss your coworker?” Red tried a snotty smile.
Purple cringed at the title. Red wasn’t wrong.
“Maybe we could try… ‘half-way friends’?”
“Half friends?” Red was surprised to hear the upgrade. They were glad, though. “And half what else?”
Purple scooched closer to Red, gently pulling their hat off too. They pulled Red’s head into their chest, almost as if to tell them to stop worrying. “I dunno,” they said. “We can figure that out later.”
Red nodded into Purple’s chest, putting an arm around them to hold tightly. Purple was warm, and the embrace felt safe. The safest they had been in years.
Purple gently twist Red’s hair in their fingers as they lay together, unspeaking. They could feel themselves drifting off, and eventually, they found themselves sleeping the best they had in days. The exhaustion, the emotions, and everything faded away as the two slept.