The Imposter Among Us

Chapter 1: Short of Breath

William's Point of View

Alarm sirens blare and red lights flair as a voice comes over the intercom

"Alert severe malfunction in oxygen systems, please report for emergency maintenance"

I sprint down the hallway, towards O2 as fast as my legs can carry me. My fear grows greater, almost in sync with the growing rate of my heartbeat with every passing second. Fear that if O2 goes down then all of us will be doomed. As I pass through the Cafeteria, I see other crew coming from admin and storage. I pass through weapons and take a sharp turn when I am forced to stop. In O2 Red is there working on trying to fix it as all of us look on. Suddenly he lifts his hand and points towards admin.

"Sean, run over to admin and get the software rebooting," Kelli yells.

As he goes running off towards admin the fear grows as the crew is running short of breath. Suddenly a voice comes over the radio, it is Sean.

"We need someone to divert power to here and O2."

"Quick, William run down to electrical and deal with that." Stated Kelly

Without a moment's hesitation, I go running to electrical. I sprint with every bit of strength I have in hopes to save my crew. As I turn the corner into electrical I open the panel and divert as much power to admin and O2 as possible. Then there is a flash of light and a bang, the system blew out, and I need to reset it. I run through the procedure. Adjusting switches I feel my head spinning, adjusting calibrators I feel like I'm about to pass out, I adjust the final power diverter and my vision goes black.

Suddenly a wave of relief washes over me as I take a massive breath. I take a minute to compose myself, stand up, and make my way to Cafeteria. When I get there everyone else is already there. Then I felt an arm around my shoulder.

"Good job out there," Lilac complimented me.

"Thanks," I say back.

"No thank you, We would have been toast without you!"

Just then Red walks by.

"Hey Red, good job out there."

They ignored me and kept walking. There was a moment of silence after Lilac spoke up.

"Don't feel bad, he never talks to anyone, or takes his helmet off, or does anything other than his job, actually come to think of I don't think I have ever seen him eat, actu-"

"Alright, that is enough, and while I didn't see his, I have seen him eat ok, so stop with your little conspiracy theories okay."

"Fine."

"Good, why don't we go get some lunch?"

"Sounds great!"

As I walked toward the kitchen I almost bumped into Moon and V.

"Watch where you going, Moron" Moon snarls.

"Jeez, sorry!"

"Hey guys, how are you doing," Lilac pops in to defuse the situation.

"Doing good."

"Yeah, better now that we can breathe again," V adds on.

"Okay, we'll catch you later," Lilac says in her usual cheery voice.

We continue in, and grab our food from the vending machine using our credits; we get a certain amount of credits at mealtime, and any you don't use goes into your allowance. I always try to buy small ones in case I need them later. As we sit down to eat I look over at red who seems to be holding a rose in his hand like it is a wine glass, How very odd.