Chapter Text
"What do you mean 'unoptimal'?! That kill was clean!"
"I'm criticizing the fact that you did it at all."
Green paced around the comms room as Orange stood unfazed. Being Orange's office, comms was one of the only places they could drop their facade to argue like this.
Though, if Green's patience grew any thinner, the office would be up for grabs.
"How could I not? It was perfect!" Green began counting fingers. "There were no witnesses, I had a good alibi of cleaning up storage, I triggered a delayed decapitation so that when I got back to the party, nobody suspected me!"
"Not yet." Orange corrected.
Green grabbed Orange's jacket as they looked them dead in the visor.
"Hell you mean 'not yet'?"
Orange shrugged. "It's only a matter of time before they start suspecting murder."
The intern shoved Orange into a swivel chair. "I'm not sloppy. They won't know it was me."
"Exactly. They'll suspect someone. And it'll snowball from there~!" The HR worker spun in the chair, chirping in a sing-songy tone.
"I'm not playing your stupid games, Orange."
Green turned around to leave, when a pink tentacle shot past them and splatted against the door.
"Let me be direct then!" Orange spoke, voice cheery as ever.
"You killed White, what's next?" They retracted the tentacle.
"I—"
"And don't say 'kill everyone else'."
"…"
Orange's shit-eating grin grew by the second.
And Green hated it.
"Do you remember what our real mission is?" Orange chirped, manifesting a clipboard and pen out of nowhere.
"To deliver the eggs." Green groaned at their own reminder.
"Correct! Not 'kill everyone', but 'deliver the eggs'!" The HR rep started scribbling on the clipboard.
"But less crewmates on the ship means less potential threat to the eggs!"
"On the contrary, less crewmates on the ship means more responsibility for us to carry!"
Orange presented the clipboard, featuring a doodle of them and Green crushed under the weight of Ore+. The word 'LIABILITY' encircled with arrows pointing towards the drawing.
Green's visor narrowed as they pushed down the clipboard.
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"Well, my infectious little intern, let me introduce you to the world of long-term planning!" Orange cheered with enough enthusiasm to make Green's brain pop.
The HR worker pulled down a cloth to reveal a whiteboard, covered in miscellaneous doodles.
Green could only stare at them in confusion. "Did you prepare this beforeha—"
"Irrelevant!" Orange put a finger over where Green's mouth would be.
"To preface, there's only so much work we can take on with just the two of us." they knocked on the whiteboard with a ruler. "And here at MIRA, teamwork makes the dream work!"
Green narrowed their visor. "What are you suggesting?"
"This is ridiculous."
Green stares at the bright red button. The one that the captain would use to call emergency meetings.
Orange narrowed their visor as they leaned over to the button. "I went over the whole thing twice, Green."
The intern grabbed Orange's hand before it could reach the button.
"We could still pick them off one-by-one."
"Section 1B."
"They'll think we're crazy."
"Section 3E."
"What if they throw us and the cargo out into space?"
"Contingency twelve."
Green groaned, rubbing their brow as they recalled every segment Orange just cited.
"Fine, fine. Whatever." They let go of the other's hand.
Orange flipped the glass cover off the button, but not before turning to Green.
"I want you to do it."
Green's visor went wide. "What? Why me?"
"To show that you trust me."
"Well, I don't." They crossed their arms.
"…That's fair."
Green's gaze slowly shifted from Orange to the button.
"…I trust that you put more thought into this than I did."
Orange nodded, as though that answer was enough.
…
Green slapped the button.
"Okay, who pressed the button?!" Red tiredly adjusted their captain's hat as they made their way to the center table. "I'm the captain, and that button is reserved for captains only."
"Wait, you didn't call this?" Purple turned from their seat, brow raised.
"I did." Green blurted out.
All visors landed on the intern.
Green briefly reconsidered the whole 'existing' thing.
"What's up, intern?" Yellow asked, unaware of the knowledge bomb that was about to be dropped.
Orange put a hand on Green's back in reassurance.
"Yes, me and Green have something very important information to announce to all of you! Take it away Green!"
Green blinked.
Orange stepped back, only for Green to backpedal along.
"What the hell? I thought you were supposed to handle this part—"
"I already did the planning part—"
"And now you do the speaking part too—"
"That's hardly a fair spread of effort—"
Their whispers overlapped as the crew watched the two run around each other like a game of musical chairs.
Eventually, the pair stopped running to face each other.
"Okay, rock-paper-scissors." Green proposed.
"You're on."
They spoke in tandem. "Rock, paper, scissors, shoot!"
…
Green grumbled as they stepped up front.
"Sooooo…" They tapped their foot anxiously.
"Me and Orange have been turned into aliens by the Ore+ which is actually alien eggs and we hope you all could help hide us from MIRA."
"…"
"…"
The room went silent as everyone processed that sentence at their own pace.
…
"What."
"WHAT?!"
Green flicked sweat off their brow.
"Now, I know it sounds bad—"
A figure leaped over the table and the next thing Green knew, they were on the floor.
"YOU'RE ALIENS?!" Purple all but screamed in Green's face, winding up a punch.
"I told you we should've killed them all!" Green shouted towards Orange, trying to wrestle themselves free from Purple's grip.
"You were going to kill us?!" Purple shouted before being yanked by the tie.
Green growled. "I'm still considering it!"
"No! No murder!" Orange ran towards the fight to break it up.
Green traded blow after blow with the security guard.
A burning sensation grew in their gut until—
RIIIPP!
Their abdomen split open in the form of an alien maw, clamping down on Purple's side.
Purple screamed.
It took some pulling from Red and Orange for both sides to finally relent.
Green was knocked to the ground, feeling sore in places they didn't know they had.
Putting a hand to their shattered visor, Green took a good look around the room.
Yellow and Brown shuffled closer together in their seats, the former shakily gripping a pizza cutter in defense.
Cyan held Black as they sat on the furthest side of the table, as Lime peeked out from the safety of the vent.
Purple clutched their side, a hand wrapped around Red for support as Blue rushed over to inspect their wounds.
There were probably worse first impressions.