Disclaimer: I still don't own Red Dwarf or any of its characters.
Chapter Twenty-one
Rimmer led A.J. into an empty room. "Diane," he said to his collar, "we still have the regular flight-suit, right?"
"Yes, Ace."
"Transfer it up here."
"But Ace--"
"Just do it."
A moment later, the jumpsuit appeared in the corner. "All right, we don't have much time," he said to A.J. "Give me your clothes."
"What?! Why?"
"The Timlars are going to be monitoring me, and the only way I'll get off this ship is if I'm *not* me, get it?"
A.J. thought for a second. "No."
"I want you to pose as me so I can get off this ship and rescue Nirvana."
"You WHAT?"
"A.J., it's the only way! If I try to sneak off to the other ship, I'll have to focus on avoiding the Timlars rather than rescuing Nirvana. If they still think I'm on THIS ship, however, I'll be able to get away. They'll think I'm you and they won't bother sending someone."
"But Ace, I can't possibly pretend to be you!"
"You CAN." He tore off the wig and handed it to him, feeling the incredible deja vu of the moment. "A.J., I'm not really Ace. The actual Ace died some time ago. Since then, Rimmers from different dimension have taken his place. I was just the next person in line, just as you are."
A.J. still looked unconvinced. "But I don't know the first thing about being a hero. What do I do? Where do I start?"
"Don't worry, it'll all come to you eventually."
"If you say so."
"Think about it. The Timlars destroyed your house. They destroyed your work. They destroyed your sanctuary! Are you just going to sit there and let them get away with it?"
"No!" He twiddled his thumbs. "I just thought that you were going to take care of it."
"I don't have to. You are perfectly capable of taking care of them yourself. You just have to believe that it's possible."
"But--"
"You never became an officer, and although you did find success, you still feel like you let father down. Isn't that right?"
A.J. didn't answer. Rimmer continued.
"So, here's your chance to lay those demons to rest! The potential is inside you, I can see it. Do this for father, but most importantly, do this for yourself." He looked straight at him. "This is your destiny, A.J. I was just as skeptical as you are when I first heard about it, but somehow I managed to pull myself together and do rather well. Believe me, if a pathetic, scum-sucking lowlife like me can do it, you most certainly can."
For a moment, Rimmer thought A.J. was going to say no, but instead A.J. unfolded his arms and offered Rimmer his jacket. They put on their new clothes, and A.J. donned the wig. Both of them shuffled uncomfortably in their new garb.
"Now, go back to the others and explain what's going on. You have to get the Wildfire drive away from the Timlars. Oh, that reminds me." He pulled on the flight-suit's collar. "Diane, please tell me you're still there."
"Of course I am," she whispered, "and I heard the whole plan. Brilliant as always, Ace."
"Where are you?"
"I'm in the main docking bay on level four. We've got a small problem, Ace. Like I was going to tell you before, the teleporter is still working, but only with a very short range. I also believe there's only enough power left for one transfer, maybe two. Some Timlars have been messing with the controls. I tried to fight them off, but they disconnected me from most of my main functions so they could strip the Wildfire drive from the ship."
"And have they?"
"Are you kidding me? All they've managed to do is screw up some wires. They don't even know what they're looking for. It's safe for the moment. What do you want me to do?"
"Can you teleport me to the bridge of the Enlightenment?"
"No, it's beyond the range. I can get you to Starbug, however. It's not being guarded at the moment. All the Timlars are either working on the rift problem or concentrating on finding you."
"Good enough. Transmit."
"Ace?" A.J.'s face showed how nervous he was feeling. Rimmer smiled.
"You're Ace now. You'll do fine, trust me. If you need any help, Diane will be standing by." He stepped back. "Get the Wildfire drive. I'll contact you as soon as I can." He flashed out of sight. A.J. sighed and nervously walked back to the others to fill them in.
Rimmer found himself in front of Starbug. He looked around, but no one was there. Diane was right: it wasn't being guarded. He hit the button that opened up the docking bay shuttle doors, then ran up the stairs and into Starbug's cockpit.
He sat down and punched in the necessary calculations. "Here we go," he said to himself, and punched the start-up button. Or at least he tried to. His finger slid right through it. He tried again, and it went through again.
"Auto-pilot!" he called, and switched on his old uniform since A.J.'s clothes had fallen through his image.
"Auto-pilot engaged," said Holly's recorded voice.
"Begin lift-off procedure."
"Lift-off cannot proceed until Starbug has been activated."
"Well, activate it then!"
"Activation can only be done manually."
Rimmer pounded the console, his fist slipping right through it. "That's just great. How am I supposed to hit it when I can't touch it?" He thought of Nirvana lying completely helpless on the bridge, unaware of the danger she was in. Of all the times to return to soft-light, he thought bitterly, it had to be this moment. "What the smeg am I supposed to do now?"
He heard a dull clink!, and looked down. His light bee had hit the edge of the console. He suddenly remembered when Ace had reminded him that he could touch things as a soft-light hologram if he used his light bee. Now his point had just been proven. He moved over to the start up button, lined up his image with the button, and kneeled. His light bee hit its target and he heard the welcome sound of Starbug's engines firing up. He breathed a sigh of relief.
"NOW begin the lift-off procedure."
Lister looked around the corner to make sure it was all clear, then motioned for the others to follow him. They had managed to avoid guards so far, and with any luck, they would continue to avoid them.
Cat walked up to A.J., more confused than ever. "So now you're not goalpost-head either?"
"Nope."
"Will you guys please make up your minds? I can't take much more of this."
"Shh," said Lister. "We don't want to attract any--" Two guards came out of a room ahead of them. They caught sight of them and started running towards them, firing shots in between shouts. Lister turned around to tell the others to leg it, but they were already well ahead of him. He took off and tried to catch up with them.
They ducked into a room in the next corridor, watching as the guards ran past and out of sight. Kochanski sighed. "This is ridiculous. We're never going to get to the docking bay unless we get those guards off our backs. We need a distraction. Any volunteers?" She looked around but saw no hands in the air. "Cat, what about you?"
"No way, officer BB. I'm not wasting energy on these guys, especially when their uniforms clash with my shoes."
"Come on. Someone has to volunteer!"
A.J. looked up. "I'll do it."
"Are you sure?"
"Yes. They're looking for me--him--anyway. I'll keep them busy while you get the drive." He ran out the door before anyone could protest. Soon they saw a bunch of guards rush by, shouting and shooting as before. Lister decided the coast was clear and they all filed out of the room.
They reached the docking bay and waited for the doors to open. Lister turned to Kochanski.
"Just watch. The doors will open, and some guards will be standing there waiting for us."
"Lister, don't be so negative. It'll be fine."
The doors opened to reveal...nothing. No guards could be seen anywhere.
"See? Told you so." She ran ahead and led the group up to the Wildfire. Various parts were scattered all over the floor, while damaged wires sparked as they went by. Lister climbed the stairs up to the cockpit.
Diane's image reappeared on the monitor. "Oh thank God you're here--" She saw Lister. "Hey, you're not Ace."
"No I'm not, but I'm pretty fantastic myself. Name's Dave Lister. And you are?"
"Diane, ship's computer. So you're Lister, eh? Well it's nice to finally meet you at last."
"Umm, likewise, I think." He looked the ship up and down. "Is the drive still intact?"
"Intact, yes. In working order, no. The Timlars only managed to screw up the controls a bit instead of removing it."
"Can we fix it?"
"Yes, I'll talk you through it."
Lister jumped down and walked over to Kryten, who was standing in front of the drive. "Ok, go ahead."
All of a sudden a laser blast hit the floor right behind them. "Hands in the air and turn around slowly."
Lister and Kryten did as they were told. Lister couldn't help but shake his head in frustration.
"Oh smeg, not YOU again."
Jason smiled back from behind the gun. "Yes me again. You didn't really think we'd leave the Wildfire completely unprotected, did you?"
Lister shrugged. "No, but it would've been nice."
"Step away from the ship." When they didn't move right away, he fired another shot at their feet. They jumped and joined Cat and Kochanski in the corner.
"That's better. Now I can finish what I started before-after you tell me how the drive works, of course."
"But we can't, sir," said Kryten. "We don't know how it works."
"Please, there's no need to carry on like this. I don't have all day. Just tell me how it works so I can kill you and go back to my ship."
"But we really don't know," said Lister. "We have no idea how it smeggin' works."
Jason sighed. "No matter. We'll have Ace soon, and he can tell us then. I suppose I'll just kill you now."
"No!" Kochanski stepped forward. "We'll tell you what you want to know."
Cat, Lister, and Kryten snapped their heads towards hers. "What?!"
"Good," said Jason. "Cooperation at last. How nice."
"But first you have to do something for us."
He laughed. "A last request, how quaint. All right, tell me what you want. How we created the rift, I suppose."
"Well yes, actually."
"Just like in all those movies. Only this time, there's no one around to save you. I guess it won't do any harm." He cleared his throat. "It was a joint venture, actually. I stumbled across some Timlar scouts onboard the Enlightenment. They wanted to find Ace Rimmer, and I wanted him off the ship. So we made a deal. I would help them create a disruption and capture Ace if they would help me get a promotion."
"So what did you do?"
"I told them the frequency that scrambles the generator on our ship and helped them calibrate their weapons so it could be powerful enough. The ship would be put in danger, setting things up so that I could save it at the last minute."
"And have they followed through on their part of the deal?"
He paused for a moment. "Well no, not yet, I just assumed they'd wait until I killed you."
Now Lister walked forward. "You've been set up, man. They can't shut the frequency off and now both this ship and yours are being pulled into the rift."
Jason stood his ground. "You're lying."
"No I'm not."
"This is a trick," he aimed the gun, "and I'm not falling for it."
"You won't get away with this."
"Oh yeah? And who's going to stop me?"
Laser fire came from behind him, and Jason's image shut down. The light bee--or what was left of it--dropped to the floor. A.J. stood in the doorway and slowly lowered the gun.
"Well at least my aim's improving."
The others cheered as he ran up to them. A.J. smiled. He was beginning to like this.
"Come on, let's fix the drive."
Diane grinned, saying "You've got it--Ace." A few minutes later, the drive was in perfect working order. They sealed it back in place and stood back.
"There," said Kochanski. "Now we just have to wait for word from Nirvana and Rimmer and we can get going with part B of the plan."
"Um, I don't think so, Kris."
She turned to Lister. "What's wrong?" she asked, and followed his gaze. Twenty-some guards filled the entrance way, with Gambran standing at the front.
"I think you'll be coming with us now," he said.
Cat shook his head. "Man, we have to start looking behind us."