#What? I’m a NGE of course I had to vote for them

[i-cant-fucking-draw-send-help]

The Yaoi poll wars on twitter is the most tumble thing to happen on that site

[nightseeye]

Breathe (If You Still Can Hope To)

ao3 link

Their vision was wavering, darkness creeping in around the edges. What little they could see was blurred, everything gleaming red as - they could've sworn those were closer - distant alarms blared. Faintly, they could hear something struggling for air. Someone walked towards them. Red? Orange? Maybe Yellow? It was hard to tell exactly, but it certainly was a warmly colored suit, considering how it blended in with the lights. They tried to get up, only their fingers twitching for their effort, but still they tried.

The person came closer, closer, and closer 'till all they could make out were the boots in front of their face. They still couldn't make out a color. The person apparently decided to roll them over, because now they could see the ceiling - blurry, of course - and the little plant sticking out the other's helmet.

Orange, then. Red would never take off her beloved tophat, and Yellow wasn’t ever fun enough to put on a hat, no matter how hard the crew all tried to convince him. Something wheezed quietly. Their fingers once again twitched feebly as they tried to move, to get up, to do anything except lay on the floor. No dice.

"-alive?"

It seemed Orange was saying something. But it was hard to listen when they were so tired. 

"-didn't know it'd be like this---lert on my tablet”

Orange was rambling about something, like vey always did when vey were excited. Or nervous. They had no idea what vey could be excited about, and it was hard to wonder why when the darkness in their vision started creeping in again.

"-to decide how to do it! I've never done th-"

Orange started picking them up, slinging their limp arm over veir shoulders. Their stomach churned ominously as vey stood, the sudden change in perspective nauseating. The quiet little gasps of something fighting to breathe continued, making them wonder if there was anything they could do to help. Or at least to make it stop.

"-anyone, I really, really couldn't. So Oxygen seemed-"

Their head lolled off of Orange's shoulders as the two of them - well, just Orange, really. They couldn't manage more than the twitch of their fingers - moved. Where? They had no clue. They could barely see anything anymore, Orange's voice the only thing keeping them awake. Even then, it was a close battle they were starting to lose. Even the desperate breathing noises started to quiet down.

It was getting harder to think. They blinked slowly and-

"-an ok level by myself. I don't think---hoping you'll be ok."

Gentle hands tugged off their helmet and pulled a mask over their face. The darkness receded, if only by a little bit, but enough to give them back some semblance of awareness. They felt themself being buckled into a seat.

" 'nge-?" They slurred, looking their crewmate in the face. Visor. Orange still had veir helmet on. 

Vey looked startled to hear them, pausing veir careful patdown to look at them.

"-ake? I'm glad. Thank goodness the dropship---gen supply."

Thoughts growing clearer with each passing breath, they jolt, remembering what happened. The trip had been going fine despite the announcement of an imposter on board, had seemed to be going fine. Then, things had started going strangely, doors slamming shut and lights going off, but no one died so they didn't worry too much about it. They had thought at was just someone playing a prank, - Blue, probably. He was a hell of a prankster when he got up to it, - a little something to liven up the monotony of space travel. Honestly, they had welcomed it! Even a game of cards had gotten boring after awhile.

Then, systems started failing.

Oxygen was first. They remembered rushing to admin, inputting in the code to fix it. They had made it in time. They remember voting off Green for standing idly in navigation, or so Purple had yelled, slamming her hand on the table. He wasn't the Imposter. They remember voting out Purple, afterwards. She wasn't, either.

They remember Orange skipping both votes. 

They didn't think much of it. Orange was always friendly, always kind to everyone in the crew. They knew it must've hurt vem to see friends thrown out into the merciless grasp of space.

Next was the Reactor, and they remembered the pulsing thing that powered the ship glow threateningly as they stood in the room, a hand pressed on the scanner as they prayed for someone to reach the other one in time. They remember seeing crewmates scramble into the room, they even remember Orange tripping over one of the lights in veir hurry. It wasn’t funny at the time, but they laughed about it later. They remember screaming at Yellow during that meeting for… something. They don't remember for what, but no one got shoved out the airlock.

After that it became a pattern. Oxygen went off, then Reactor, then Oxygen again. It became normal, a routine event, even. The crew relaxed. They became complacent. There was always someone to fix it, afterall. 

One day, they heard the alarms for Oxygen sound out. It should've been Reactor, they remember idly thinking. They remember ignoring the alarms; they knew someone else would get it, and security's wires were so, annoyingly tangled.

They remember wondering why the alarms hadn't quieted yet, as they worked on unknotting a particularly stubborn ball of wires. They remember wondering why the world had started to sway, why their fingers started fumbling over a task they've done a thousand times before.

They remember wondering… why couldn’t they breathe.

"There."

All this time, as they remembered, Orange had been moving, pressing buttons and entering something into the dropship's software. Now vey stood, brushing nonexistent dust off their pants, and stepping back out into the Wester. They still couldn't move much, but they manged to follow veir movements. Orange caught their eye, and gave them a half hearted shrug, fidgeting with veir gloves.

"I…" Vey laughed, with a voice full of tears, "I'll be fine. I don't really need oxygen like you all do."

With that, the liar shut the door and walked away. Minutes later, they felt the dropship rumble as it detached from the Wester, and sped away. Though the darkness mostly receded from their vision, they were exhausted, and the quiet dark between the stars soon lulled them to sleep.

---

Orange watched the dropship disappear into deep space, and sighed as vey turned back to the ship. [OXYGEN levels: 1%] blared in the corner of veir visor, an alert long since turned beyond useless. Vey wandered the halls a ghost, the bright red of the alarm lights washing away veir suit's color. Orange became nothing more than blank canvas that the bodies vey found, and collected, popped out against. It took several trips before vey found them all.

Orange named, and counted: Black and Brown, Yellow and Red, White and Blue. Six different people out of ten the crew. Six different people of the nine vey once knew.

Six similar corpses, bodies starved by the very air they needed to live.

Even if Orange hadn't strangled each one vemself, it had certainly felt like it when vey had watched White and Red drop dead on the cameras. Had heard Black wheezing for air when vey passed by Electric. Had seen Yellow frantically attempt to punch in numbers until he too, collapsed, while vey watched from the entrance to Admin. It certainly felt like it.

Now the crew all sat, propped against the table, as Orange stared at their bodies. A 'ping' from veir tablet, discarded on the floor, startled vem.

'VICTORY'

laid in bright blue, cheerful letters across the screen.

Orange couldn't help but remember the look that Lime had given vem as vey shattered veir tablet across the floor. Vey couldn’t help but remember the question in their eyes Vey hadn't quite lied. The fact that vey could still stand despite the [OXYGEN levels: .01%] stamped across their visor was quite proof enough of that.

But Orange shuddered, voice thick with grief as vey quietly told the truth that no one was left to hear: "No… You wouldn't want to ride with a murderer."