Squint and you may see some slash, but this is not overly gay. I know, I know, I must be ill or something...
Drabble
Rimmer turned around as the pounding repetitious sound of running feet grew ever nearer and was most surprised to see Lister skidding past him, gripping with futility to the smooth grey walls of the corridor. Rimmer watched – unamused – as Lister picked himself up from the floor, panting desperately for oxygen and clutching his chest. "Soup…" he spluttered finally, hitting his ribcage as though it might help slow his heart.
"Soup?" Rimmer remarked, with all the contempt of a languid old dog watching immature puppies rolling about in the back garden. Then he eyed Lister cautiously for he seemed to be doing his best to keep his hat down over his eyes, speaking low and quickly. "Gazpacho soup," he repeated. "It's meant to be served cold."
"What are you drivelling on about? Soup is hot. Whoever heard of cold soup? It sounds like the title of an Oscar Wilde play."
"I knew you wouldn't believe me," Lister laughed, pushing a cookery book into Rimmer's arms, his face never lifting. Rimmer peered into the book and his lips murmured softly as he read a small passage about Gazpacho soup. "Fine, so cold soup exists. What of it?"
"Just remember it." Lister waited not for a reply and was dashing back down the hallway before Rimmer could offer the book back to him. He shrugged instead, shaking his head and muttering to himself about the coincidental idiocy that seemed a rampant disease amongst the people he knew. He read a little more of the book, finding it to be strangely interesting.
Lister meanwhile had rounded a corner, almost crashing headfirst into a wall, if not for the fact that he merely slipped straight through it, back into his own timeline.
"How'd it go?" said Holly.
We'll see when the timelines rearrange," said Lister, still breathless. He sighed to himself in a wistful fashion, nonetheless he was satisfied. His plan had really worked. It was genius, really.
Rimmer was convinced that several events in his life had made him the irrepressible wretch that he was to that day. So, it seemed to Lister that if he changed one of them, it could result in an entirely different and hopefully happier Rimmer.
The difficult part had been choosing the event. The only one Lister had access to was the 25th of November – forever known as 'Gazpacho Soup Day' in Rimmer's mental calendar. On that day, whilst dining at the Captain's table, he made the schoolboy error of not knowing that this particular dish was served cold, and had become the laughing stock of the higher ranks.
Lister therefore merely asked Holly to go back through his surveillance footage to that day and bring up an image of Rimmer that day before dinner.
All that was needed then was to treat the image with the mutated developing fluid Kryten had discovered the previous day.
Wonderfully simple.
Beautifully planned.
Sorrowfully executed.
Holly nodded to indicate that the timelines had shifted. Lister nodded back, knowing that all had worked out.
This now meant Rimmer had not made his original mistake. Lister smiled, picturing Rimmer at the table, possibly mentioning some inane facts about Gazpacho soup that he had read in the book Lister had given him. The officers would nod sincerely, amazed to find Rimmer was so learned.
Spurred on by the glee that he had avoided a terrible faux pas, and encouraged by the internal warmth produced by the fine wines he was offered, Rimmer would regale them further with amusing stories and late into the night they would all sup coffee and smoke cigars and discuss boring social politics.
By the following afternoon, Rimmer would have wriggled into the Captain's good books entirely. And within a few months a promotion would have been in full view.
Lister walked slowly back to his room. Sure enough, all his posters and crumbs were in the bottom bunk. The wardrobe was filled with his beer-stained clothes. There was no Sensodyne in a cup by the sink – only a twisted tube of strawberry-flavoured children's toothpaste lying on the soap.
He ran his finger along the windowsill where Rimmer's navigation books and diary had lived before. Now there was only dust and chewed fingernails. He smiled and tapped his boots on the floor. The sound was muffled by the filthy clothes strewn underneath. Socks, shirts, underpants: all his.
Lister left the room, feeling more than a little alone. He took the lift up to the drive room, hoping to find Kryten there. Evidently, everything else was still the same it seemed.
He had only mildly supposed that the entire timeline would change. The drive plate had still exploded – a twist of fate Lister couldn't escape from so long as history still told that he boarded the Red Dwarf, and that he brought a pregnant cat with him.
But that wasn't the point was it? he told himself, harshly reprimanding his ill feelings about the situation. It's Rimmer's life you wanted to change.
He left the elevator. He meandered slowly down the hall. He entered the drive room.
The Cat sauntered past him, stopping only to check on his reflection. Kryten beamed a smile at them, walking out also so that he could carry on with the day's laundry. Lister watched them go, his body feeling even heavier than before.
He then glanced up, his sixth sense feeling himself being watched.
"Skipper!"
He saw a casual smile, a shining uniform, a mess of wiry hair and a gleaming letter 'H' all positioned in their rightful places upon a familiar person. "Where've you been, Listy?"
"Oh, y'know," said Lister. "Here and there."