THE FELLOWSHIP OF THE RED DWARF

PART 5

Rimmer and Kryten motioned the hobbits and Gandalf to a holographic display screen.

"Ooh," they chorused.

"Yes,I thought you'd be impressed."Rimmer said smugly.

As the demonstration continued, Krissie kept her eyes on the guy in the second row. Look back, she silently urged him.
And then, finally . . . he did.
She almost squealed again, but remembering the reaction last time, did her squealing with her eyes.
She smiled at him.
He smiled back.
Yes!
Lister, meanwhile, was watching all this with some amusement. "She's flirtin' with him," he whispered to Kryten. "She's flirtin' with a character in a book!"
"He was in the movie too, sir," Kryten pointed out.

The skutters, of course, had more immediate concerns--namely, avoiding getting into any more skutter races.

"As you can see," Krissie said, "star maps aren't like ordinary maps, because they have to be three-dimensional. So we get this cool hologram thingie."
"Thingie? Is that a technical term?" her dream guy asked with a smile.
"Sort of," she said. "And the best part about this particular star map is, it's touch-responsive. Who wants to touch a hologram?"
"I thought you couldn't touch holograms," Sam pointed out.
"You can," Krissie said, her eyes on Mr. Wonderful again, "if you know how. Go on, put your finger right here."

Rimmer eagerly scrutinized Lister's face for some sign of jealousy,but found none.

Down in the cargo decks, the portal opened again . .
and a hideous creature emerged. "My precious knows not this place, yes." it said. "But it also knows it finds the ring here."

The Hobbit tentatively reached out to the spot Kochanski indicated. As he made contact, the star field shifted and expanded.

"Amazing."

"This is where we are right now, at this moment. If you were to look directly out the front of the ship, this is what you'd see. Incidentally, we have a lovely observation deck that's accessible through the--"
The lights dimmed for a moment, and a klaxon sounded. "Sorry to interrupt," Holly said, "but something's happening down the cargo decks. I'm getting some very weird readings . . ."
Everyone jumped up and rushed out of the room. When they arrived at the spot where Holly insisted she'd picked up life signs, they found nothing but some rotted old leaves.
"They must have blown in through the portal," Aragorn noted. "That means it's still open."
"No, it's just closed up," Holly said. "After that weird thing happened, the energy spiked up and then vanished."
"So we can't go home again," Frodo sighed. He sat on a box and felt like crying. Never to see home again? It was worse than a death sentence.
"We can do it," Kochanski insisted. "Holly, I'll need all the data you have on the portal. Kryten, you're with me."
"But, Ms. Kochanski, ma'am, I have ironing to do, and there's the Botanical Gardens to keep up . . ."
At the mention of Botanical Gardens, Sam's ears pricked up. At least there was something around here he could do.
He found one of the skutters, who started to back away from him in terror.
"No, it's okay, I don't want to ride you. I wondered if you could show me where the Botanical Gardens are?"
The skutter nodded its tri-clawed head and led him off down the corridor.
The power struggle between Kryten and Kochanski continued.
"You're the only one here who knows anything about quantum phenomena!"
"Yes, but I'm also the only one who knows where we keep the washing detergent! No one will have clean laundry without me!"

In one of the waste disposal bins, Stabhim continued to hide from the hobbits and was about to try and make his way to the cinema when he noticed a strange creature gibbering to itself in the corridor . . . .

"Look, how 'bout we do this?" Lister suggested. "We'll divide up the cleaning chores so you can work on gettin' the portal open again. Lessee . . . laundry. Any volunteers?"

Stabhim sped off to warn the others that there was something odd in the cargo decks. In his haste, he had forgotten why he had been in the cargo decks in the first place.
"Gotcha!" Little hands reached out and grasped the skutter by the neck.

HELP! Stabhim tapped out in Morse code to Bob.
"Time for more skutter rides!" Merry shouted, climbing on the skutter's back.

"Right, I think we've got it all sorted out," Lister said.
Kryten was sulking. "None of you know how to get creases out properly. Little Miss Bossy has no right to take me away from you!"
"Hey!" Kochanski exclaimed. "I'm not bossing you around, I'm trying to put the best people on the job."
"Oh yeah?" said Cat. "Look who you've got doing the laundry! The midget patrol! Say, where are those guys, anyway?"

"I hope it's not anywhere near Parrot's." Lister said.

Suddenly a skutter wheeled by, with a rope around its neck. And attached to the rope was a Hobbit on roller skates.
Rimmer turned several interesting shades of crimson.

"LET GO OF THAT SMEGGING SKUTTER THIS SECOND!!!"

It was some time before everything was sorted out.

In the meantime, the creature had scuttled into one of the turbolifts and was now wandering about the ship. It came to Peterson's old quarters and glanced experimentally through the doorway. "Perhaps my precious finds the ring here, yes?" It said, rummaging through Peterson's things and generally making a mess of his cabin.
It was in the midst of its search for the ring that it found a strange bottle inside the icebox. HANSEN'S SUPER WICKED STRENGTH LAGER, the label read. "Hmmm . . . my precious never tastes this before." Cautiously, the creature opened the bottle, sniffed, drank a mouthful of the lager . . . .