Stars [Memesfor1]

Blame

Meme felt sick. Dead body? He absentmindedly followed his friends to the meeting table. Maybe someone fell or had an accident or something. Maybe it's a misunderstanding.

No one here would kill someone else...right?

He glanced at Socks and Blaza as if one of them would suddenly snap and murder him.

When the group arrived at the meeting table, they could see most of the group was already there. Now changed into their spacesuits, he could read their nametags.

One in a pinkish suit was surrounded by the rest of the crew, seeming to be questioned by them. Socks took a seat by Laff, who looked like he felt sick.

Once Meme sat down he could hear what Nadwe-he read on his nametag-was saying.

"I-I was just going to communications to do a task and... and Dino..." his voice broke. Poor kid, Meme thought sympathetically. He can't be more than fourteen.

Traumatized, his mind whispered. He shuddered.

"Where was he? What happened?" a crewmate demanded.

"I thought this ship was safe! Why is there already a death?" someone else said pointedly at Laff.

A crewmate in a black suit (Woolf, Meme read) silenced them with a glare. "Because it wasn't an 'accident.' someone killed Dino."

Another flurry of accusations and questions.

"How?" someone named Joocie asked.

Nadwe didn't respond, never taking his wide eyes off the floor. Woolf replied for him again.

"When we found him in communications, his head... was gone." he said with a grimace. It was clearly hard for him to think about it as well, though he was handling it much better than Nadwe was.

Meme felt sick. Nadwe let out a small whimper.

"If Dino is dead, the question now is who killed him." someone from the opposite side of the table spoke up. He wore a red suit that said Tbh on it.

"Because that's such an easy question to answer," Joocie responded sharply.

Tbh ignored him. "Laff, do you know anything?"

The crew leader looked surprised, as if he hadn't been listening. "Oh..." he paused. "I only know that there was... a glitch in the system. It sent a virus into one of the crewmembers, who was infected. The infected person wouldn't act like themselves once it took over. Like... they were no longer in control of themselves and an impostor had taken over."

"Then that should be easy," someone named Muffin reasoned. "Who isn't acting like themselves?"

"We hardly know each other! How can we tell if someone's acting different?"

This 'impostor' really knows what they're doing, Meme thought nervously. It could really be anyone.

Anyone... he looked over at Blaza and Socks.

They haven't been acting different, though. And I was with them the whole time, they couldn't have done it.

"Let's think this through," Tbh asserted. "Dino was found in communications?"

"Yes," Woolf said. "But there's a vent system through the entire ship for airflow. The impostor could have easily escaped through there and exited somewhere completely different."

"Who was together?"

"Me and Nadwe both had a task in communications, so we went together." Woolf said.

"I was with Muffin and TBVG," Joocie replied.

"Meme, Socks and I were in admin." Blaza said, snapping Meme out of his distracted state.

Laff nodded. "That leaves me and Tbh, and we were together as well."

Socks looked frustrated. "So the only one alone was Dino, and that's why he died." He winced while saying it. Meme saw what he was feeling as clearly as he saw what Laff was. He's dead. Gone. We were supposed to take care of the crew, their eyes said.

TBVG narrowed his eyes. "Meme, was Socks really with you and Blaza? The whole time?"

Meme nodded, confused. "Of course he was."

TBVG shook his head. "I saw Socks going off by himself by Medbay when we had just arrived."

Meme was about to respond and deny it, but then he realized the purple-suited crewmate was right.

Before they left for admin, they had all went to their sleeping rooms to change into the spacesuits. And while they were there, Socks had been alone. The whole time.

But he wasn't acting different. We would have known if he was... he was being just as annoying and stuck-up as he always is.

"You're lying." Meme snapped. He caught Socks's eye from across the table, and he saw the orange crewmate realize what he was doing. Socks was silent.

TBVG rolled his eyes. "Whatever you say. Maybe I saw someone else."

It is time to vote, the AI said. The others looked to Laff and Socks for explanation.

Socks was silent, still looking stunned about what happened. Laff was the one to respond.

"I think... I think we can vote someone off."

Blaza frowned. "Off?"

"Eject. Send off to space."

Meme froze. "But that would mean..." he trailed off. They all knew what it meant.

Laff nodded solemnly. "You all have screens to vote."

Sure enough, on the table in front of him there was a screen to vote. Every person's name and face were displayed on it, with a vote option next to them. There was another section at the bottom that said skip vote. Meme tapped that. He didn't want to be responsible for someone's death, and he didn't know who he would vote for anyway.

The results came in. Socks had two votes-probably TBVG and someone else-but everyone else had skipped. They were safe for now.

"You are dismissed." Laff said quietly. He immediately left, in the direction of medbay and the individual rooms.

Meme saw Socks giving him a questioning look, but he ignored it. I can't even explain to myself why I did that. I'm not going to try explaining it to him.

Blaza broke the silence, smiling weakly. "We should probably work on some of our tasks." He suggested. Meme nodded. "Yeah, we have to get those done."

They each only had a few left, so they walked around the ship doing them. Socks and Meme didn't say a word to each other the whole time, though Blaza made several attempts to strike up a conversation. He was starting to get worried-it was the first time they had gone this long without arguing.

Attention, the AI said suddenly. We have arrived at the planet Polus. Expect temperatures to drop significantly. Prepare to exit the Skeld shortly.

Despite all the time he had prepared for this, the nights he spent excited to go to Polus, Meme couldn't find a shred of excitement in him to go to the planet that had taken up his dreams for so long.

Only fear of what would happen once they arrived.

-0-

1124 words