Welcoming Committee

In the drive-room the quartet congregated to develop a game-plan as they had no idea what really was in store for them. Holy had once mistaken one of Lister's unwashed socks for an unknown life-form. She could have just scanned across some other article of clothing that was dropped by Kryten on the way to doing the washing, afterall. They needed to make certain that this was not another false alarm.

"What do the sensors tell us, Kryten?" Rimmer asked the mechanoid while standing behind him and looking over his shoulder.

"The intruders are human," he replied in a bemused tone.

"Human?" Lister repeated with the same amazement that the android had displayed.

"Yes," Kryten affirmed. "Human teenagers according to the psy-scan. A male and a female to be more precise, Sirs."

"Did he just say, 'female?'" the Cat asked while running a hand over a mane of thick, black, elbow-length hair. "How do I look?"

"For crying-out-loud, Cat, this is not a blind date," Rimmer retorted. "We don't know what they're here for. They could be far more advanced than we are afterall. Perhaps they see us as vermin and have come here intent on exterminating us."

Lister rolled his eyes back and shook his head. "Rimmer, it's so like you to be so pessimistic," he groaned. "They could merely just be lost for all we know. Why do you have to turn everything negative?"

Rimmer shot him a dirty look. Before he could say anything, however, Kryten came to Lister's defence.

"They appear to be unarmed," he said pointedly. "I dare say that only minimal arms will be necessary in pursuing them, Sir."

"You see, Rimmer? There isn't a thing to worry about, is there?" Dave said almost gloatingly as he grabbed a bazookoid from the munitions cabinet and then left the drive-room with Kryten and the Cat in tow.

"Speak for yourself, you gerbil-faced maggot," the hologram said as to his bunkmate as he fell in step with the others.

----

"What's in there?" C.J. asked no-one in particular as he and his sister approached yet another doorway.

Katy Jo peered into it as an attempt to humour him. "It's some sort storage area," she said as she returned her gaze on him. "Nothing but shelves and crates."

C.J. looked through the door over his sibling's green-streaked locks. "There are windows in there, at least," he said fervently. "We can see what's outside. That'll help us figure-out where we are."

Katy Jo elbowed her brother in the ribs and then headed for the window. He rubbed at the sore spot as he yelled, "What was that for?"

She glanced back at him. "For being your nancy-ass self," she returned as she continued on her trek across the cargo-bay.

Shaking his head he caught up to her. "Why do I put up with this from you?' he grumbled. "I swear this is the last time I try to keep your punk, psycho-witch-self outta trouble."

Yeah, yeah," she said cynically. "Shut your goddamned hole and let me look already. Before I'm collecting my social security preferably."

C.J. shook his head again as they approached the window. "Honestly…" he began and then trailed-off; as he was distracted by the view he had caught.

Outside the port was a vast sea of stars upon a black background and nothing else. "There's nothing but stars out there!" he said through his teeth in frustration.

"Thank-you, Fransoir B. Faggoty, for your highly-observant commentary," Katy Jo told her brother sardonically. "Now what?"

He shot her a look of resentment. Ordinarily he would've been able to shrug off her out-right meanness, but given their current circumstances her anti-gay slurs were really getting under his skin. "No more comments from the peanut gallery, thanks," he told her sternly.

For a moment he thought that his eyes were playing tricks on him, for a look of genuine remorse enshrouded Katy Jo's face. What he couldn't see from the outside was that his scolding had brought into her perspective just how dire the situation really was.

"I'm sorry," she told him soberly.

This made C.J.'s heart stop. She had actually apologised to him. He would have stood there in his amazed stupor if not for the sound of approaching footsteps.

Katy Jo grabbed the collar of her brother's denim shirt and dragged him behind a crate.

"What're ya doing?!" he responded in a harsh whisper.

"Excuse me for wanting to keep you from trouble," she regurgitated his words back at him. "We're on a ship where we don't belong and if its inhabitants catch us, they'll skin us alive. Do you want that?"

C.J. shook his head as he protested, "If we told them how we got here, they might help us get back home."

"God, you're delusional!" Katy hissed while shaking her head from alcohol-induced paranoia. "You need to get out of Mister Rogers' land of make-believe and start realizing that it's not always a beautiful day in the neighbourhood."—She stopped nagging him long enough to glance over the crate behind her and see four men enter the cargo-hold and then she continued.—"They're armed with what looks like a flame-thrower. Can you say, 'toast?!'"

C.J. shook his head, not wanting to hear her. "I'm sure that's only there for if we give them trouble," he told her. "If we just surrender now, I'm sure that they won't even use it on us."

At that moment a man wearing a stained t-shirt, deer-stalker cap, dread-locks, and what looked like a flame-thrower approached the other side of their hiding-place. With his weapon pointed to the floor he peered over the crate that the two intruders were hiding behind. "Can I help you mates with somethin'?" he asked with what they both recognised as a Liverpoodlian accent.

Before C.J. could reply in a civil manner, Katy Jo jumped up and kicked the stranger in the teeth. After that, she grabbed the cuff of her sibling's shirt and led him to another hiding-place.

"KATY?" he protested. "HAVE YOU LOST YOUR SENSES? He wasn't even pointing his weapon at us and you're waging war with him. OPEN YOUR EYES FOR-HELL'S-SAKE!"

Sprawled on the floor, Lister listened to the boy's complaint as he rubbed his sore mouth. He noticed the metallic taste of blood begin to develop as his mates came to his aid.

"Are you alright, Mister David, Sir?" Kryten asked him as he took his hand and helped him to a sitting position.

As he tried to respond one of his top front teeth fell into his mouth. He spat it out.

"I'm fine," he lied.

"Oooh, Listy, Listy, Listy!" That girl's a menace, she is. What I'd give to see her in a ring with you. That I'd pay money—"

"Smeg-off, Rimmer! She's frightened," Dave replied curtly. "The boy who's with her is trying to talk some sense into her. I heard them arguing. They'll come out on their own. We just need to give them some space."

C.J. peered at the quartet of strangers between objects on a shelf as he listened to them. "Do you hear them?" he asked his sister calmly. "They have no intent on hurting us. We could just walk up to them now, and they won't use their weapon on us. Now will you please knock this nonsense off?"

"Go-to-Hell," she told him bluntly.

"Katy, we're in Hell. We have no idea where we are. We can't hide forever. If we do that it will prolong this ridiculous hiding-out chase. I don't think you want that… Do you?"

"Go-to-hell, you goddamned fairy!" With that, she slugged him in the stomach, knocking him into the shelf that he had been peering through.

Kryten, Rimmer, Lister and the Cat heard a crash. Lister's first response was to stand up and investigate, but Rimmer planted his image in front of him.

"Just where do you think you're going?" he asked.

Lister shot him an evil look. "It couldn't hurt to see if they're alright."

"Whatever happened to letting them have their space?"

"I think Mister Lister intends to do so, Sir," Kryten interjected. "But I don't think we should allow for them to knock things about when there is a risk of them hitting into explosives."

"I agree with that," the Cat concurred while running his fingers along his zebra-print top-coat. "I wouldn't want them to ruin my good suit."

Not finding cause to argue, the hologram gained a look of resentment and then stepped aside.

At the centre of the ruckus, C.J. stood up and withheld the tears that were trying to break loose. Katy Jo's attack on him was a reminder that she was still intoxicated and thus harder to reason with. He could talk until blue in the face and still accomplish nothing. The only thing he could do was act.

While hunched over only slightly from the pain C.J. began to walk away. Katy Jo tried to stop him by grabbing at his arm, but he saw that coming and managed to pull away.

"Where are you going?!" she hissed.

"I'm going to turn myself in, with or without you. I'm sure I'll receive far better treatment from them than what you're giving me."

Katy shook her head disdainfully as she watched her brother place himself in the hands of the approaching strangers. "I HOPE THEY FRY YOUR ASS!" she yelled vengefully.

"I love you too!" he returned as if she had paid him a compliment. Then he raised both his hands in the sign of surrender.

The boyz from the Dwarf halted as they saw the lad approach them. "We come in peace," be announced. Then he quickly nervously added, "Sorry about my sister's behaviour," as he looked at the man whom she assailed.

Lister was about responding, but Rimmer interrupted.

"Who are you and why are you here?" the hologram asked in his most intimidating voice.

The boy jumped back a few feet, as those who didn't actually know Rimmer could actually find him intimidating.

The unwashed one shot his bunkmate a dirty look and then he looked at the lad. "You can put your hands down," he told him in a far less stern tone. "You're not in any trouble."

The boy lowered his hands and gained a look of relief. As soon as he did Dave offered him his hand.

"My name is Dave Lister," he told him.

Not sure of what to think the boy hesitated for a moment and then shook hands with the unwashed one. After that Lister withdrew his hand and introduced his cohorts.

"These are my shipmates; Arnold Rimmer, Kryten and the Cat," he said as he looked at each of them. "And you are?"

"C.J.," the boy responded. "C.J. Lamont. And my knot-head sister over there,"—he looked in the direction from which he came—"she's Katy Jo."

As though she were en queue Katy picked up something from the shelf and then threw it at her brother. "GODDAMN TRAITOR!" she yelled as it landed squarely on the top of his head. Then she ran off.

Instinctively C.J. rubbed at his head.

"Is your sister usually this agreeable?" asked the one called Rimmer.

"Yeah. Pretty much," he responded frankly while still massaging his head.

"Is there a way to calm her down, Mister C.J., Sir?" asked the one with the oddly-shaped head. "It is paramount that we get her to stop throwing things as soon as possible."

The urgency in the mechanoid's voice made C.J.'s skin crawl. "Why is it so important?" he asked while only half successful in hiding his worry.

Lister removed the unlit cigarette he had stored behind his ear and stuck it between his lips absently. "We're on a mining ship," he explained as he looked in the lad's direction. "Some of the equipment in this room is meant for getting through extremely-hard rock."

"You mean like explosives?" the boy said while regaining his more-even tone.

"Yeah," confirmed the Cat. "Witch means if she hits some of them, you can kiss your colour-coordinated ass goodbye."

C.J. shook his head dismally at the thought of Katy Jo pummelling a crate of nitro-glycerine or something of the like. "We'll have to corner her or knock her out," he said calmly. "She got herself pretty trashed before we ended up here. She's difficult to reason with when sober. When high she's outright impossible."

Lister nodded and then placed his cigarette back behind his ear to be smoked later. Them he motioned for his cohorts and the young man to form a huddle. When they did so he formed a game-plan.

"C.J. was it?" he asked while looking at the boy.

C.J. nodded.

"If you were to go back to her, do you think she'd run?"

"Yeah, for the soul purpose of ploughing into me," he said fervently.

"Great," Lister replied. "We'll use you as a means for distraction then. On the opposite end of this cargo-hold is a three-isle intersection. Try and get her to run down that way,"—He pointed in the desired direction and then continued.—"As soon as you've entered it we'll close-off all exits and then force her to relent."

The young man gave a nervous nod as he realised that he would have to take more abuse.

"Great," Lister replied. "Let's split-up then."