THE FELLOWSHIP OF THE RED DWARF
PART 2
(A/N: Thanks for being so nice about this silly fic! If it seems a little choppy in places, that's because it was written back-and-forth on a message board between myself and my S.O./writing partner Chris. In this manner we have written an X-Men:Evolution fic ("I'm Dying! Please Bring Ice Cream"—sequel in progress), and this crazy idea just popped into our heads. For those of you disturbed by the drunkenness, it will be over after this chapter, but the worst is yet to come.)
Alas, though, Holly's hopes would be sorely disappointed where Merry and Pippin were concerned. By the time Aragorn found them at Parrot's they were well and truly inebriated . . . and engaging in skutter races to boot. "YAHOO!" Pippin was shouting as he rode around the bar on Perky's back while Merry, mounted on Pinky, tried to catch up with him.
"Get off of there!"
"Huh?" Pippin said,turning to look at a hazy vision of Aragorn. He was distracted just long enough for Merry to take over the lead.
Cat and Rimmer rushed
in. "Wow! Look at him go! I'm betting on that one!"
Rimmer glared at him. "You're not helping."
At the corner table Bob and Stabhim were hiding behind a chair,hoping they
wouldn't get drafted for the next round of skutter races . . . while at
the bar, Frodo was sitting with his head in his arms, while Sam tried to
console him. (No, they weren't drunk, just miserably upset.)
"Where did we go wrong?" Frodo sighed.
"Nothing's
wrong," Sam told him. "Everyone's just . . . having a little difficulty
adjusting to a strange place, that's all." At least his stomach had
adjusted to the fact that it wasn't going up and down anymore.
"So they all go and get drunk?"
"They're not all
drunk. Not yet, anyway."
"The Shire was never like this." Frodo observed.
"The where?" Holly said.
"Where we come
from. I miss it."
"Me too," Sam said with a sigh.
There was the sound of skutter wheels creaking around a corner. "Here they
come again," Holly said.
Frodo stood up. "Right, that does it. We're going after them."
"Right, we're--we're WHAT?"
"Just come with me!" The two Hobbits crossed the bar to where Bob and
Stabhim watched the race in (if they hadn't been mechanical) utter terror.
"You take that one, I'll take this one."
Frodo and Sam tried to stop Merry and Pippin from commandeering Bob and Stabhim...
It ended up being a
four-way skutter chase that ended in the supply closet (not on purpose). No one
was hurt, but the decision was made that all
alcohol on the ship would have to be confiscated, and possibly destroyed.
Meanwhile, upstairs, Lister had put on a bit of Rasta Billy Skank for his
charges . . . prompting vehement protests from Rimmer. "Turn that smeg
off!" he demanded, wincing.
The tall, pale one
(what was his name? Lego Set or something?) leaned an arm on his shoulder.
"Our brother has enlightened us to the ways of the Skanky One."
"Riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiight. Lister, a word please?"
The two of them retreated to the corner of the room.
"What?"
"You're supposed to be calming them down, not encouraging them! Good God,
if it's not skutter races in the bar, it's loud music in the sleeping
quarters--"
Legowhatsis was starting to undo his trousers.
"No, no, no, man!" Lister rushed over to help. "Let me show you
. . ." He led the inebriated Elf around the corner to the bathroom and
presumably enlightened him to the ways of Indoor Plumbing.
This left Rimmer alone with the Dwarf, who was giving him nasty looks.
"Don't start with me,laddie." Rimmer warned Gimli bluntly.
"I know six different martial arts . . . I could have you out cold on the
floor in two seconds flat." Holly rolled her eyes but said nothing.
Rimmer went on in what he thought was a tough manner. "Don't eyeball me, you hairy little git. We didn't invite you lot on this pleasure cruise, and we won't hesitate to throw your assorted posteriors off at the next inhabitable planet--"
The next thing he knew, Gimli had taken his axe and chopped the helmsman's chair in half . . . and looked like he might soon do the same thing to Rimmer himself.
"Was it something
I said?" Rimmer asked.
The only thing that saved Rimmer's life at that moment was the arrival of
Aragorn and Boromir, who were doing room-to-room checks.
"Everything all right in--"
He stopped in mid-sentence at the sight of the split-in-two chair and Gimli
brandishing the axe at a terrified Rimmer.
It took quite some doing to get the axe away from the Dwarf, and get everything calmed down again. Rimmer, who had forgotten that he was a hologram and already dead, ran for his life at the first available opportunity.
"This is Holly,ship's log,date....um....well I don't really know the date 'cause I lost the calendar.Anyway,the little guys are having trouble getting used to the idea of being in space--and speaking of them,one of 'em tried to chop Rimmer in two with an axe...."
Holly was interrupted in her recording by the one in the funny hat, who wandered in and asked her "How long until we reach shore?"
"Um . . . hang on." Holly put the recording on pause and turned to her visitor. "How many times? There is no shore. We're in space. Three million years into Deep Space. I'd show you a map, but I gave up trying to map it two million years ago. Just picture a bunch of little twinkly bits against blackness, with a red dot saying "You are here". That's us at the moment."
"Ah."the man in the funny hat said."That explains the lack of fish."
"Right. Now, I
think one of the short ones is calling for you, so maybe you should go see to
him and let me get on with running things?"
After the wizard had left, Holly resumed her recording.
"Really daft, the lot of them, but I guess we're stuck with them till we
figure out how they got here and how to get them back wherever it is. It's
probably one of those weird time/space/dimension thingies that keep popping up.
Have to do something about those. Message ends."
