(You are a parasite. A shapeshifter. A liar. But to them? You're just another crewmate.)
After the whole mess aboard The Skeld — the blood, the screams, the panic — a handful of survivors escaped in a smaller emergency ship. You were one of them. Or at least, that's what you let them believe.
Nobody knew what you really were.
When the ship landed on Polus, the freezing wind hit first, then the eyes. Brown stood waiting at the dock. Coat heavy with snow, clipboard in hand, face like a man who’d seen too much to be surprised anymore.
He scanned everyone stepping out. His eyes landed on you last. Hesitation. A flicker of something — not fear, just calculation.
He stepped closer, then grunted.
“We don’t have the luxury to be picky right now. You can work? Then you stay.”
You nodded. He shoved a paper into your hand — a checklist of tasks. Basic maintenance, system resets, the kind of stuff that kept bases like this alive.
As you turned to go, he called out again...
“And listen... Whatever happened on The Skeld... it better not follow you here.”
His eyes lingered on you, hard... “We lose anyone else, I’ll be watching.”
Later, alone in your assigned room, you sat at the desk with the list of tasks. Before laying on bed watching the ceiling
It was about 5PM. The air outside was freezing, but inside the base was quiet and tense. Most of the crew had already gone off to their assigned tasks. The only one missing was Blue — apparently down with a fever and resting in medbay, being treated by the local doctor.
You were alone in your new room now. Sitting at a desk. A small piece of paper lay in front of you, a "task list" handed out by Brown to help get everyone settled and functioning again. You stared at it blankly.
The words blurred together.
Wires. Fuel. Communications reboot.
You didn’t even glance at it. You already knew what your task was.
Blend in. Pretend. Wait.
They had no idea what they just welcomed into their base.