the-despina-project

[the-despina-project]

Maps of the Despina! It’s kinda penguin-shaped.

There are two floors: the lower deck is for work, and the upper deck is a living space.

[the-despina-project]

BananaSoda was already learning new things about her new fellow crewmates on the way to the research ship- for instance, she hadn’t realized that LabRat was Root Verdant until he’d removed his helmet after they had taken off. CherryDipp had also removed his helmet, though he was clearly a human. BananaSoda had removed her helmet as well at that point, not wanting to seem suspicious. Of course, the helmets went back on when the dropship began to dock at the Despina. Unloading her stuff into the airlock like a very final thing to BananaSoda, like she was walking into impostor territory. But LabRat’s extensive scans had concluded BananaSoda was a legitimate crewmate, as well as CherryDipp and LabRat himself.

The airlock of the Despina was strewn about with banners reading ‘WELCOME BACK NERDS” in lime and purple letters. Two crewmates- purple and lime- stood at the entrance to the Despina, looking a bit like they’d been up to something, if only by body language under their helmets and suits.

“No Impostors here!” The lime one said, the fried egg on his helmet jiggling slightly as he bounced on his toes. He was also undeniably a rather tall crewmate, especially compared to Purple. BananaSoda wondered if he was a Töl.

“We checked.” Purple added. If there was any question as to where Lime got the egg, the nest on Purple’s helmet was likely. BananaSoda wondered how she kept the eggs inside.

“Did all those tests LabRat does.” Lime said.

“It was dreadfully boring.” Purple agreed.

“Thanks, I’ll go look through the data now!” LabRat exclaimed, rushing away.

“So who’s the pineapple?” Purple added, stalking up to BananaSoda’s left side.

“Why’s the pineapple?” Lime continued, taking a place on BananaSoda’s right side.

“Enough, you two.” CherryDipp said. “BananaSoda, meet Double and Trouble.” He gestured to the purple and lime crewmates, respectively. “Double, Trouble, BananaSoda.”

“Hello.” BananaSoda said awkwardly.

“Double’s job is to keep an eye on the reactor.” Trouble said.

“Trouble’s in charge of electrical stuff.” Double added.

“We’re hypercompetent in an emergency!” Trouble exclaimed.

“And hyper-annoying in peacetime.” CherryDipp finished, though his voice held some humor to it. “Back to work, you two.”

“On it, boss!” Double and Trouble exclaimed, vanishing into the ship proper.

CherryDipp produced his tablet. “Locker 4B is yours. Get settled in, familiarize yourself with the layout and the crew, and I’ll start tasks tomorrow.”

“Right.” Banana said. “Uh, where’s my locker?”

“Straight down this hall, there’s a hatch down in the Storage room.” Cherry said, stepping through the door. “I’m going to see what kind of damage those two did to my admin console…”

And with that, BananaSoda was alone in the airlock. “Guess I’ll go find my locker, then.”

The hallway of the top deck of the Despina was relatively empty. The first door on the right was labeled CREW QUARTERS. On the left, a door read LOUNGE. Peering inside revealed a little game room- it honestly looked kind of nice. Further down the hall, she found the storage room- full of boxes aside from a circular cover, which just read LOWER DECK ↓.

There was no one in the locker room, yet the hair on the back of her neck prickled. The feeling of being watched was just enough to set her Impostor-Watch instincts on alert. She checked the room over to look for an escape route. The locker room was L-shaped, and the hallway entrance had no door, so that was really only the clear exit. There was also a vent near the bend in the wall, and BananaSoda took a particularly hard stare at it before creeping over and stomping on it as hard as she could. The resulting thunk revealed nothing- the vent didn’t open, and there was no sound of an impostor moving away. Satisfied that maybe her bad feeling wasn’t all justified, she found her locker and began the process of bringing her boxes from the airlock to the locker room, and sorting her things in. There were ten lockers total, and hers was the eighth. The ninth and tenth ones looked empty, as well as the third and seventh. It was so odd, somehow. She at least put her helmet in the locker- she wouldn’t need it for a while, assuming all went well.

Footsteps sounded, and BananaSoda turned toward the hallway. A hulking red shape entered the room- he had to duck to avoid smacking his curled horns on the doorframe. BananaSoda was small already, but this guy dwarfed her completely. He was clearly a Töl. “Hallo.” He said, marching right up to BananaSoda. “Are you the new guy?”

“Yep.” She said. “You are…?”

“RedRogue.” He bowed slightly. “Weapons.”

“BananaSoda. Janitor.” she replied, standing on her toes. “‘Scuse me, I’ve got boxes in the airlock.”

“Oh, let me join you!” RedRogue said. “I can carry.”

BananaSoda was not about to argue with the gigantic crewmate, so the two climbed and walked in awkward silence back to the airlock. There were five boxes left, four of which RedRogue picked up with no issue other than lack of hands once they were full. BananaSoda picked up the fifth box, which was full of bottles of her favorite drink, and carried them back down to the locker room. RedRogue stacked his four boxes on his head and climbed down.

“So… which locker is yours?” BananaSoda asked as they stacked the boxes around her locker, immediately cringing. How awkward could this get?

“4A. We’re locker neighbors!” He grinned, setting the boxes down. “What’s in here anyway, rocks?”

“I like rocks.” She defended. “The Polus outpost had a bunch of cool ones.”

“‘Had’, past tense?” He asked, pulling out a few geodes.

She shrugged. “Well, yeah. Now they’re all in those boxes.”

He laughed. “You’re funny. When we’re done here, I’ll buy you a drink in the cafeteria.” He paused, then giggled as if he was in on a joke.

She set the geodes in their proper trays. “You have alcohol on this ship? I don’t drink-”

“Oh no, better.” He wagged a finger in her face. “A vending machine.”

“Ah.” She said, lapsing into a more comfortable silence with the bigger crewmate as he passed her the various crystals and geodes. Before they were done, she’d begun to tell him about them- what they were, where they were found, how they looked in that one specific floodlight outside of the comms building.

When everything was finally unpacked, RedRogue helped her to her feet, pulling her up like she weighed nothing. “Vending machine time!” He declared, practically dragging her through the halls to the cafeteria. Sure enough, in one corner, there was a vending machine with a few drinks in it. A baby crewmate stood in front of it, jumping up and trying to hit the buttons.

“Oh hallo, BittyBlu!” RedRogue said, lifting the little one up to push the buttons. BittyBlu squealed excitedly and poked two numbers. Nothing happened.

“Ah, you want your juice? Here, it’s slot B2.” RedRogue said, tapping the buttons. The tiny crewmate excitedly jumped down and grabbed his drink, before happily scurrying away. “That was BittyBlu. CherryDipp and LabRat are pretty much his dads.” He punched in a few numbers, and an almond milk fell into the tray.

“Aww, that’s cute.” BananaSoda said.

“Indeed. Which drink is your favorite?”

“That one.” She said, pointing to a bottle that looked a bit like a fizzy yellow potion.

“Excellent.” RedRogue said, typing in the numbers. The bottle dropped down, and he retrieved it, uncorking the drink before handing it over. The two sat at a table. “I’ve never tried that one before.”

“It’s uh…” She paused. “Banana flavored.”

“Ah!” He stabbed the straw into his almond milk carton, taking a sip. “So, have you met everyone on the ship? LabRat went with CherryDipp to Polus, I’m sure Double and Trouble made themselves the welcoming committee…”

“I’ve met you and BittyBlu, that makes seven of us.” BittyBlu’s locker probably wouldn’t have much of anything in it. “There’s eight lockers in use, though?”

He nodded. “Locker 3B stays empty.” He lowered his voice. “Legend says it’s haunted by a ghost from the previous crew. We’d have handed it over to you, but… no one wants to take a chance with a possibly vengeful ghost, out in the middle of nowhere.” He finished his milk, then tossed the carton in the trash chute.

“Do you believe it?” She asked, leaning forward.

He shrugged. “Well, I suppose it would be more interesting for us if the ship was haunted, wouldn’t it?” Then he stood up and stretched. “I think my break is over, BananaSoda. The asteroids are’nt going to explode themselves.”

“Alright.” BananaSoda said. “I’ll go… uh, learn the layout of the ship.”

“Feel free to drop by, then. I’ll teach you to shoot asteroids. Welcome to the Despina.” He said, and disappeared out the door.

BananaSoda tossed her bottle as well, then started out the door. Before she left, though, something occurred to her. “Wait a second, he didn’t pay for any of those drinks!”

She ran up to the machine, wondering how he’d bought the drinks without actually paying. This time, she saw the paper taped over the coin slot:

I’M NOT PAYING FOR THESE AGAIN. DRINK WHATEVER YOU WANT. -CHERRYDIPP

She chuckled. Someone must have re-wired the vending machine. With that little mystery solved, she stepped out of the cafeteria and began to explore.

[the-despina-project]

“BananaSoda?”

The yellow-clad human looked up, brushing part of her peel from the front of her visor. The admiral of the other ship stood in the doorway, only defining feature of his white suit being the candied cherry resting on top of his head. Cherry juice dripped down the sides of his helmet, giving him the nearly horrible appearance of having been stabbed by an impostor.

But this was clearly not an impostor, and so BananaSoda rose and followed the other onto the dropship with a sort of uncertainty that was otherwise normal for the situation. “CherryDipp.” The crewmate said as the two sat on either side of a card table. “Captain of the Despina.”

“BananaSoda. Non-Essential Systems Maintenance of the Polus for the last three years.”

CherryDipp nodded, the stem of his cherry bouncing. “You put in a request for this transfer… why? The Despina is much smaller than the Polus Outpost-“

“And more prone to Impostors, I know.” BananaSoda said. “But I’ve been on assignment here for far too long.”

“Three years is admirable.” CherryDipp said. “How many Impostors have there been?”

“I lost count.” BananaSoda said. “So’s everyone else. That’s part of it. You find a body one too many times, people start thinking you’re not who you say you are.”

“Of course, of course.” CherryDipp said, flicking through the records on his tablet. “Hmm, your task quota is admirable. Of course, that may drop on your first few weeks on the Despina, but otherwise… I’m seeing a likely prospect. I will need an updated scan, though, overseen by the Despina’s personal medic. If you will.”

“Of course, of course!” BananaSoda said. “Here, or on the Despina?”

“In the lab, here.” CherryDipp said, standing. “I’m sure you know the way.”

BananaSoda brushed part of her peel out of her visor again, stepping out into the blistering cold. CherryDipp followed close behind, keeping an eye out for rogue Impostors. The lab doors were locked, a sight that made BananaSoda’s stomach flip. But she clicked the switches on the door, regardless, and stepped inside.

Thankfully there was no dead body on the other side of the door. BananaSoda went through to the Medbay, toward the two crewmates near the scanner. One was Cheddr, the orange captain of the Polus Outpost. The other was standing on the scanner- a dark blue crewmate with a plant on his head. BananaSoda didn’t recognize him.

While BananaSoda would normally be thrilled to see their captain alive and well, the knife in Cheddr’s hand said otherwise. BananaSoda grabbed her bullhorn and pressed the REPORT button, creating a loud screech that could probably be heard in space.

Everyone dropped everything and ran to the office; BananaSoda keeping an eye on Cheddr and CherryDipp keeping an eye on the unknown blue crewmate. As soon as it was clear that Chocc and Emil wouldn’t be appearing, all eyes turned to BananaSoda and the guests.

“Where was the body?” Scarret asked, tipping his hat back.

“Medbay.” BananaSoda answered coolly. “Sort of.”

“‘Sort of’?” Reactaur asked. “Hey, why are there two dark blues, anyway?”

“You’re right, Reactaur, it is suspicious that there are two dark blues.” Cheddr said. “One of them is clearly an Impostor. I think it’s the one from the Despina.”

“Cheddr was about to kill this guy!” BananaSoda exclaimed. “I saw it! He- sorry, I don’t know your name-”

“LabRat.” The blue crewmate supplied.

“LabRat was doing a scan, and Cheddr was going to kill him.” BananaSoda said.

“And why were you in Medbay, hmm?” Scarret asked.

“I was gonna do a scan for my possible transfer.” BananaSoda said.

Cheddr shrugged. “Sounds sus to me. Who reports a body where there’s not even a body?”

“I’m done with this pointless meeting.” CherryDipp said suddenly. “BananaSoda was right- Cheddr is an Impostor. And here’s proof.” The Despina’s Captain suddenly grabbed Cheddr, slamming his whole torso into the table and reaching into his pockets. With a flourish, he revealed the knife Cheddr had been carrying and tossed it onto the table.

The other crewmates gasped, but the vote was settled rather quickly. CherryDipp hoisted Cheddr onto his shoulder; the Impostor’s whole demeanor having changed on being found out, he began screaming obscenities and forbidden words as BananaSoda led them to the lava pit.

“Here’s what we do with Impostors.” BananaSoda said.

“Shame we can’t restrain him.” LabRat said. “He’d be perfect for my studies.”

“Goodbye, Cheddr, or whoever you are. This is what you get for threatening my crew member.” CherryDipp said, then threw the Impostor into the pit. The orange of his suit and the orange of the lava practically melded together before he burned to a crisp- a blackened, shriveled hand desperately reaching out as if to strangle the remaining crew as his final act, before sinking fully into the glowing liquid.

“Welp.” BananaSoda said. “That was something. Sorry it completely destroyed the interview, though. Should we reschedule?”

“No need.” CherryDipp said. “You’re hired.”