"Dave," announced Holly. The simulated face of the computer that ran the JMC's mining ship Red Dwarf popped up on the overhead screen of the canteen where the last human being alive was practising with his guitar.

The caterwauling result had even the computer muting audio input from the compartment. Since Lister didn't look up, he repeated himself but more loudly. "Dave! You've got an email!"

No response.

"DAVE!"

"Wut?" Breaking off from what could charitably be described as a riff, the dreadlocked Dave Lister looked up and finally spotted Holly. "Hi Hol'. What's up?"

With a repressed sigh, Holly read the man's lips and opened up the audio sensors. No 'music'. Good. "You've got email, Dave."

"Email?"

"That's right."

"Well if it's from Earth it's six million years late. Can't be urgent enough to interrupt my practise."

"It was sent this morning."

Lister's brow furrowed in thought. "Who'd send me an email? It's not Rimmer is it? Has he stopped talking to me again?"

"It's not from Arnold, Dave."

"Well who else would send me an email? This isn't some kind of April Fool's joke again is it?"

"No, no it's a real email."

Perplexed, Lister put down his guitar and adjusted the cap that sat at what he fondly imagined was a jaunty angle on his head. The six months or so since he'd awoken from stasis and found himself millions of years displaced in time from his own era hadn't exactly been replete with human - or even alien - contact. "It's not from the Cat is it?" He hadn't even known that the creature that had evolved from his pet cat could read English, let along type an email.

"I don't think so, Dave. It is addressed to Cloister the Stupid though."

"Oookay." Finding out that he appeared in the holy texts of the Cat's people hadn't exactly been the most uplifting of experiences for Lister. It wasn't the most flattering of portrayals. He shifted around chairs, sat in one and propped up his booted feet on another. "Read it out to me, Hol'." Reaching back behind his ear the Third Technican produced the stub of a cigarette and started rummaging for his lighter.

Holly cleared his throat. "From: Divine Resources( ). To: Cloister the Stupid ( 169 )."

"Divine Resources?"

"'S what it says."

"Go on."

"Subject: Dereliction of Duty."

"Dear Cloister."

"A review of our records indicate a continued failure to report for basic orientation, remedial training or to your office. Further enquiry has confirmed that your supervisor has not received a single status report over the last five hundred thousand years."

"We must rmeind you that all deities must report grade-three catastrophes and above to their supervisor and in this case two incidents (religious conflict between your worshipers and the later demise of approximately half of said worshippers, a death toll exceeding one million sentient beings) are considered mandatory to report."

"Due to this dereliction it has been determined by a tribunal of your peers that you be placed on indefinite suspension without pay and your access to Yggdrasil for the purposes of miracles is hereby limited to emergency uses only."

"Your case has been referred to to Internal Affairs and appeals are to be made to that office. You may expect a case officer to arrive within the next seven working days plus travel time, all travel costs of whom will be assessed as punitive fines against your accumulated wages."

"Yours respectfully, Squiggle."

Dave sniffed his cigarette. It smelt like good, honest tobacco not anything hallucinogenic. "Okay. Funny joke."

"I'm not having a laugh, Dave."

"So this isn't another Norweb Federation thing?"

"Not by me, anyway."

"So who's squiggle?"

"No idea, either their handwriting's terrible or they need a new scanner."

"And what do they mean miracles?"

"Well we haven't strangled you for your guitar playing yet."

"Hey, I'm like the second coming of Hendrix! You lot are just philistines!"