RED DWARF
Lister's List

This is an SOS distress call from Mining Ship Red Dwarf. The crew are dead, killed by a radiation leak. The only survivors are Dave Lister, who was in suspended animation during the disaster and his pregnant cat who was safely sealed in the hold. Revived three million years later Lister's only companions are a life form evolved from his cat and Arnold Rimmer a hologram simulation of one of the dead crew.

I am Holly the ships computer with an IQ of Six thousand, the same IQ as Six thousand PE teachers.

A grey skutter rolled down the hallway. It stopped when it had to choose between going left or right and glanced at each side. It then decided to go to the right, which appeared to be the right choice. It rolled on. There was a long rope trailing after him with tied onto the end a small, red, rubber ball.

The rubber ball was bouncing teasingly up and down as the skutter rolled past an open door. The Cat immidiately peeked around the doorframe and stared after it.

"What is that?" The Cat wondered out loud, and then grinned his fangs bare. "Whatever it is; I must catch it! Come here little bouncy thingy!" He quickly stalked after it.

At the same moment, Cat's owner, Dave Lister was in his room, lounging on his bed and eating a curry sandwich. He had the cat-bible on his lap. He was about to take the last bite of his chilli sandwich when he spilled a large chunk of it on the open pages of the book.

Lister stared for a moment at the large goop on the page. He quickly pushed the last part of his sandwich in his mouth and swallowed it without chewing. He then glanced around to see if Rimmer or Cat was around and then leaned forward to lick the goop off the book.

Of course the residental Hologram, Arnold Rimmer, took that precise moment to come in and see him leaning over it.

"Sniffing a book again, I see," he drawled.

"Nah, there's just something 'bout the book I don't get."

"And what is that? Knowledge?" Rimmer questioned with a raised brow.

"Don't be such a smeg-head," Lister wiped the dirtied page off on his shirt and then held it up.

"There's something in here about the radiation leak, but a page is missin'."

Rimmer came closer to him, but not too close. Even as a Hologram, he could sense the strong smell of curry from miles away.

"Here little bouncy thing!" they heard Cat yell in the hallway and a skutter came in with a rope tied all around it. It halted in front of Rimmer and hung its head in defeat.

Rimmer admonished the skutter, not noticing how it gave him the equivalent of a middle finger. "I see you didn't succeed in keeping him occupied. Should have known not to trust a skutter."

The Cat pranced in and swept with a hand at the loose, bouncing ball. It flew through the room and landed in Lister's fish bowl. One of the fish immidiately foated belly up towards the surface; Lister would have to smack it against the side of the table to start it up again.

"Hello Apes! The Cat has arrived!"

Rimmer glared at the eccentric and self-absorbed pet. "The Cat can go again."

"No, he can't!" Lister said and jumped off his bed. He held the cat-bible in front of the animal's nose. "Cat, where's this page?"

Cat blinked and glanced at it. He shrugged. "Don't have a clue. Now where did the bouncy thing go?"

"This is important Cat!"

"More important than my amusement? I think not!"

Rimmer watched them both with distaste, but still made a suggestion, knowing Lister wouldn't shut up about it. "Maybe the page is where the old cat lived."

"What has happened to its body anyway?" Lister wondered and turned to the screen where Holly's face was usually to be seen. "Holly! What happened to the Old Cat'?"

"Remember that dry meat you ate back then?"

Lister looked horrified up after a small moment of remeniscience. "Wait! What?" He gagged.

"It's only a joke." Holly said dryly. "He was spit out into space."

The decided to go down to the hold where Lister had first found the Old Cat. Lister kicked a golden sausage out of his way and then noticed something familiar glued onto the wall.

"Hey look! That's my favourite sock! I was wondering where I had left it." He took the moldy, murkish sock off the wall and put it on.

Rimmer looked with distaste at him. This was nothing unusual.

"You're disgusting." He stated, as usual, but Lister didn't pay him no mind.

They started to search around for the missing pages, but then Lister found something else. "Hey! It's one of me lists!" He exclaimed loudly.

Rimmer glanced over his shoulder. "Another laundry list?"

"Nay, a to-do list. I used to make 'em, so I didn't forget things. But I always forgot about them lists."

"Smart, Lister. Very smart."

Lister glanced around. "Guess those lists also ended up in the litterbox."

"So what's on it? Anything important?"

Lister read it out loud. "Tell Rimmer he's a smeg-head…" Lister looked up at Rimmer. "Rimmer, you're a smeg-head!"

He read on. "Inform Rimmer-oref?" He frowns. "What's oref?"

Rimmer glanced at the paper in his hands. "I think it says asap, you buffoon. As in 'as soon as possible'. You can't even read your own handwriting?"

"Tell Rimmer 'as soon as possible' that the drive plates needs to be mended."

Rimmer frowned and then glared outraged at Lister. "You KNEW! You KNEW that it was going to happen!"

"I forgot," Lister shrugged in apology.

"You killed me!"

"I'm sorry."

"I'm sorry doesn't account for it!"

"I'm very, very sorry?" Lister offered Rimmer a lopsided smile, but Rimmer kept staring angry at him.

"You will pay." He muttered as he headed out of hold.

Dave Lister did indeed pay. With 1000 kilo of Curry that was shot out into space by an enraged Hologram.

THE END

It's cold outside, there's no kind of atmosphere
I'm all alone, more or less
Let me fly far away from here
Fun, fun, fun in the sun, sun, sun

I want to lie shipwrecked and comatose
Drinking fresh mango juice
Goldfish shoals nibbling at my toes
Fun, fun, fun in the sun, sun, sun

Fun, fun, fun in the sun, sun, sun