Chapter Two- Arrival
Hey! Hope you enjoy this one! I refer to the woman as an 'it' because they're not that sure it is a woman etc. Read and review please!
When Rimmer caught up with the others he almost collided into the Cat. He managed to stop himself just in time, he skidded to a halt and looked around sheepishly. He decided that no one had seen that. Then he realised none of them had noticed he was even in the smegging room. They were all facing the opposite way! He scoffed inwardly, that was just typical.
He cleared his throat first thinking that they'd at least throw a comment or an insult over their shoulder. Nothing, absolutely nothing. Not even a smegging twitch. The three of them were forming a line, Lister was at the front with Kryten and the Cat stood slightly behind him. They just all kept staring.
"So then" the hologram started, "where are we going to start searching, hmm?"
Still nothing. He exhaled and contemplated calling Holly up to see what the hell was going on. Maybe there was a brain sucking slug on the loose? Then again there aren't any brains on this ship as it is, Rimmer thought snidely in his head.
He hesitantly walked around to the side of the group. He was eyeing them cautiously expecting to spring to life at any second with the intent of killing him. He took another step closer. They continued to gaup, their mouth's just hanging open like dogs waiting for a bone. Even Kryten had succumbed to whatever it was. He stepped backwards and wondering what they were staring at.
He turned around slowly choosing to keep one eye on his comatose crewmates. They had been and were continuing to stare at the doorway to the corridor that led to the sleeping quarters and the rest of Star Bug. Then he saw it.
The figure was stood there. It was looking critically at all of them in turn. Its eyebrows were almost touching. It looked around sceptically while fidgeting with its winter gloves. He thought it was trying to take them off.
"Aliens…" he whispered.
The being looked over at him. It was pale, ghostly pale. It looked a little ill, maybe a tad anaemic, he thought bizarrely. He felt slightly uncomfortable under its gaze. Its mouth twitched into a slight smirk like it was in on a secret joke.
Lister shook his head and replied in an equally low voice, "That's not an alien Rimmeh, that's a woman…"
Now that he thought about it. It did look astonishingly like a woman. Its features were feminine. High cheek bones, cherry coloured lips and a straight nose made up the main part of its face. But its eyes drew most of his attention. They were narrowed and the grey colouring gave them an intense stare. The rest of its face was covered by a thick sweeping fringe which was the only part of its hair that he could see. The rest of its crimson locks were covered by a grey beret. Its neck was wrapped up in a scarf and a thick winter coat covered nearly all of its torso, their were gloves on the end of its arms. He could see that it's lower half were covered by a pair of jeans that clung closely to the skin and disappeared into a pair of grey ankle boots.
"What's it doing here?" he hissed sideways to Lister. He saw that there were a few plastic bags near its feet.
"I dunno, I'll ask her" he started in a whisper then progressed to normal speaking volume and addressed it, "Hey, erm...Look we're umm" Lister struggled for words, "we're erm"
"Hurry up then Sparky..." it coined impatiently. Its voice was definitely female. Not that there was anything remarkable about it, it sounded like it was from Scotland.
"Whaaa?" Lister shook his head, "Me name's Lister not Sparky"
It rolled its eyes and took a deep breath, "look just get on with it"
"Huh" the Scouser considered and eyed it warily, "How'd ya get 'ere?"
"Umm" it thought for a moment. Sarcasm was an important part of this thing's vocabulary, "let's see...I-"
Rimmer cut it off, "Don't you think you should treat my crew with more respect?"
It laughed brazenly, "Ha! Why should I? It's not like any of this is even real, Captain Kirk"
The others snapped out of the trance and looked around.
"Not real?" The Cat questioned and premed his hair, "I better be real or all this work has been for nothing" then retaliated, "Of course this is real or at least more so than your hair colour, Missy. I can see your roots from here!"
It gasped in anger and disbelief, it gritted its teeth and hissed at him, "you...you...Git!"
Kryten leaned in closer to Lister and Rimmer and spoke out of the side of his mouth, "Sirs, I believe that however the young miss got here it must've given her mild amnesia"
"And you, the thing that looks like an ice-cube" it pointed at Kryten, "I'm not deaf and I have certainly not got amnesia"
They all decided to ignore it for the time being. It was irrational and would probably become dangerous it got any angrier.
"Hol" Lister called. He turned to face the black monitor just as the computer appeared.
"Yes Dave?" he answered.
"Can ya get the medi lab ready for her? You and Kryte's make sure she's okay? Get her a bed made up and stuff?" he asked and Holly looked over to where the snarky figure was standing.
"Sure dude" He disappeared back off of the screen.
It had calmed down considerably. It had lost the gloves and was now stood against the wall with its arms folded.
Kryten approached it cautiously, "it you would come with me Ma'am, and I'll take you to the medical bay where we can make sure you're alright"
"Sure thing R2-D2" it sighed, "lead the way..."
The rest of the crew watched them leave.
"What?" Rimmer exploded when they were out of sight, "We don't even know if it's human! It could all be an act! Yet you're just going to make it all nice and comfortable! It could be a GELF or a fancy simulant or…or…or an- "
"Alien?" the other man coined.
"Precisely" He stated, "my point is that thing could be anything and did you hear how it spoke to me? Absolutely no respect whatsoever"
The Scouser laughed, "Haha, Captain...maybe she just knew you were a smeghead"
"I had to say something" he defended, "and that proves it isn't a woman! No normal woman would speak to me like that! It's an alien...or something"
"Oh yeah?" Lister turned to him, "what would you do then? Like if you were Captain"
He stood proud with his hands clasped behind his back, "place it in quarantine and run a multitude of tests, it's all set out in protocol 1631. 'Never allow an unidentified being aboard the ship until its identity has been proven'"
"You're such a smeghead Rimmeh" he told him as he went back into the control room, "anyway, I identified her as a woman"
He followed and said merrily, "Well don't come crying to me when it takes over the ship and turns you all into little jelly cubes"
"Oh give it a rest goal-post head!" The Cat snapped at him from the door, "I know that women may be an alien species to you bud but to me they are a very desirable and rare creation that I am going to make the most of!"
He yowled in excitement before disappearing from sight. Presumably either for a nap or to get ready for trying to seduce the new arrival.
Lister sighed and wondered how long it would take them to get back to Red Dwarf. He eyed the dark screen next to him. It showed the path that they were taking to get back to the JMC ship. Not that it showed much. Just a red dot and a green dot with a dotted line in between them. He sat down with a thump and took it off auto-pilot. He partially wondered how his clothes were doing orbiting that moon...