Red Dwarf characters owned by Rob Grant and Doug Naylor and Blackadder characters by Richard Grant and Ben Elton. With thanks to Cmar for beta reading this for me! Also thanks to Sunrise of the tango factory, Cazflibs, Cmar and Radar-fox for the reviews so far! All very much appreciated! All reviews welcome!

Chapter Four – The Red Adder

Rimmer tottered down the steps of Starbug, his eyes ablaze with power! An officer! His eyes vaguely ran over the line of officers that were lining up either side of the Starbug.

"Good morning Admiral," said an officer with a moustache so long you could probably plait it. He held out a hand to shake Rimmer's.

Rimmer ignored it. "And you are?"

"Sorry sir, Commodore of the Fleet, Mornington, sir." He held out his hand again.

Rimmer ignored it again, his eyes glowing with power. What to say? Something suitably officerlike? "Put that hand away, we're not playing pat-a-cake." Brilliant! Subtle and witty and just brilliant!

"Sorry, your officerness."

Rimmer stalked majestically towards the main entranceway, ignoring the officers saluting him as he passed. A couple of people who looked vaguely familiar hid behind some of the officers.

"Excuse me, sir!" said the Commodore as he scampered behind him. "I know I should know and I feel guilty for not, but…"

Rimmer stopped and glared steely-eyed at him. "What is it, Borington?"

"I couldn't have your name, please, sir? Your eminence, I mean?"

"My name?" Rimmer's mind had been filled with reams of instructions. He would paint the entire fleet battleship grey as opposed to military grey. He would rename all the ships to RSCV (Rimmer Space Corp Vessel). He would… His name?

"Rimmer. Admiral Rimmer!"

"I thought I recognised that stately chin, sir…"

"What is it, Fornington?"

"We've got one of your brothers here, sir. Howard Rimmer. He's not done as well as you, sir, though. He is a mere test pilot, sir."

Seeing Howard as an Admiral! "Bring him to me."

"Certainly sir, certainly sir." Mornington gave a crisp salute and an about turn.

Sloppy salute. "Mornington?"

"Your worshipfulness?"

"Your salute is appalling! I've seen diseased lemmings give a better salute than that. As of now the Space Corp salute is as follows." Rimmer showed them the full double Rimmer salute. The one with both arms doing the five circles, paying homage to the five Space Corp sections. The full salute that takes five minutes to complete.

"I'm terribly sorry, sir, we did not learn that at Space Corp College."

Rimmer jabbed him in the chest with his finger. "You officers are all soft!"

"We've been through the Space Corp Survivorship week! We are not soft!"

"What was the survivorship week? Eating worms and living off haggis in Scotland?"

"Not quite, sir."

"What then?"

"We had to survive Henley Regatta, with just two changes of dinner jacket and just five hundred dollar-pounds between two of us." He shuddered. "It was horrendous - we ran out of champagne and caviar at 11:30 and we were reduced to drinking pims." He grabbed Rimmer by the lapels. "I still have the flashbacks!"

Rimmer pushed him back. "We need to toughen you up! Call all the officers to the deck now!"

Back in Starbug, Blackadder was anxiously looking at his watch. "What is that idiot up to? He should be making his way to stop Balders!"

He peered out of the window. He could see the Gelfs gnashing their teeth and struggling to escape their bars.

Soon Baldrick would, in a misguided attempt to help them, release the beasts.

Row upon row of officers peered up at him from the auditorium. This was power! This was it! The cream of the Space Corp hanging on every word he said. He could make a change now! He could! Himself on his own! Every word he said now would whisper through the ages. No, not whisper! Shout! His words would be used in every textbook from now to the next 10,000 years!

"Whibble, marzipan, heliotrope." Bugger! I've forgotten how to speak! "I mean ladies and gentlemen." He'd got their attention, excellent! Now what did my book on public speaking say?

Don't keep your hands in your pockets. Use hand gestures. Right!

"The Space Corp is decadent!" He gave a karate chop with this and hit the desk. "Ouch!" He gave a few non-officer-like swear words. "It is corrupt!" He waved his arms like a windmill. That's better, it has their attention. "Like the Tower of Babel, it is an edifice built on the dreams of men!"

An officer put his hand up at this. "Errr, excuse me sir?"

Rimmer pointed. "Balding, fat, sweaty man. Do you need the toilet?"

"Err, no sir, I…"

"I what? Speak up! Is that gum you're chewing?"

"No sir, I would…"

"Well, I hope you brought enough for everyone."

"I'm not chewing anything! You see…"

"What do you need advice on, your sweaty smelly problems? Have you tried bathing, deodorant or washing your clothes more than every millennium?"

"I'm not smelly! It's not that I need advice on, it's…"

"Your grey hair?"

"I'm not going grey, it's the way the light reflects off my hair."

"What's left of it. Is it your weight problem?"

"I'm not fat!"

"Bad dress sense? Halitosis? Bad teeth?"

"No, it's nothing like that!"

"Speak up then, I haven't got all day."

"How is the Space Corp like a biblical tower?"

"There's always one, isn't there? You see these lapels?" asked Rimmer, pointing to his Admiral's epaulettes.

"The ones with dandruff on?"

"Yes! I mean no - I mean yes!" He started jabbing at them. "What these mean is that I'm right and you're wrong!"

"Right, sir. Right. I still don't get it though, sir?"

Blackadder was listening intently to what was going on.

"What's he doing?" asked Lister.

"Talking."

"Oh god!"

"So he isn't saving the human race then?"

"Not as such, no."

"Bugger."

Rimmer fixed them with what he thought was a steely glare. Although to be honest, if his glare could be compared to metal it would rusting, slightly battered, and probably be wrapped round a Ford Escort with a bad paint job and the imprints of several lamp posts in the bonnet. In essence his glare wouldn't scare the winner of the Round Britain, being scared at the stupidest thing like a sponge, Mr Scared competition. Incidentally the last person to win that didn't make it to the podium since he had a heart attack when he saw the ribbon flutter in the breeze.

Giggling started up in the back of the auditorium. He was losing them! What to do? What to do? More gestures and more shouting, that was what was needed.

"We will fight them on the beaches, we will fight them on the streets!"

"Excuse me again, sir?"

Rimmer pointed again. "Tall thin man desperately hiding his bald head under an appallingly bad wig."

"Yes, that's me, sir."

"What? What?"

"Who are we fighting, sir?"

"Who are we fighting?" Rimmer shook his head at such naivety. "Who are we fighting? The gelfs! The gelfs! I've got to stop the GELFS!" Rimmer ran like an idiot (something he was supremely qualified for) towards the door. "I've got to save the Earth! I've got to save the Earth!"

A handsome man with foppish hair and an easy smile walked in front of the door. "Arnold, is that you?"

"My god! Howard Rimmer! You're… You're…"

"A test pilot, I know. I haven't heard from you in years." He looked Rimmer up and down, taking in the epaulettes, Admiral's hat and the slightly pop-eyed look of panic he had. "I didn't realise you were an Admiral! Last I heard, you were cleaning chicken soup machines on the Red Dwarf."

"Cleaning and filling!" said Rimmer, tapping himself on the chest with each word. "Big difference! Big difference!"

"They don't make you an Admiral for that, do they?"

A tiny voice inside his head told him to shut the smeg up, get in the lift and stop the past Baldrick from wiping out the Earth. He ignored it. This was far more important. He had to get one up on smug-grinned, git-faced brother Howard! "I was working undercover in the Space Corp. I wouldn't expect square-jawed chumps like you to understand."

"Why did you never tell me, or Father, or even Mother?" He swept his perfect hair back from his forehead. "We all had you down as a fearful idiot. I don't half feel a fool now, Arnie. What were you doing?"

This was a chance to lord over his brother. Years of feeling inferior to his masterful brother boiled to the surface. The chance to revenge himself for that time he hid Teddy from him for TWO HOURS! All he needed was a good excuse as to what he had been doing for the past ten years. "I was working undercover, digging out sloth and indolence in the catering cleaning section of Space Corp."

"For five years? You were working undercover as a chicken soup repairman for five years!"

"Well, ten years actually."

"And all the time you were an Admiral!"

"Well, yes."

"An Admiral cleaning out chicken soup machines?"

"Well, yes." Rimmer looked around him worriedly. Officers were starting to stare at him quizzically. He had to finish this conversation quickly!

"Doesn't that strike you as slightly…" Now Rimmer, it has to be said, had never actually hit anyone before. Not from any great sense of social justice or a noble moralistic code but because he was scared he would be hit back. However that punch he threw was a real belter. Howard went flying back into some chairs and was out cold. The other officers were looking at him in bewilderment.

"I won't tolerate insubordination, from anyone," he said. "Even from my own brother."

The officers started cheering him. "That's what the Space Corp needs, a strong Admiral!"

Rimmer looked at his watch. Smeg! He had less than ten minutes to save the Earth. He ran to the lift at the end of the corridor. Where the smeg was he to go from here?

He looked keenly at the buttons in the lift. Where was it? Where was it?

There it was! Gelf Research Floor!

His finger launched towards the button when a shapely hand blocked his finger.

"Get out of my way!"

"I'm sorry," came a husky feminine voice. He felt a hand touch his epauletted shoulder. "Admiral."

"Well I should think so, I…" The very air around him seemed electrified. His eyes took in her long legs, her slender body, her beautiful face framed by a big black beard you could lose a family of badgers in. "Eeeep!"

"Sorry, I had an accident in the genetics lab. Well, I say an accident; if I catch those two they will have an accident involving me, a spanner, and ten pounds of semtex! Have you seen them? One smelly with a furry hat, and the other dressed like a model. Anyway I need to go to hospital now!"

"Accident, what accident?"

"You don't notice anything wrong with me?" She pointed her fingers at her beard.

Previously unfound gentlemanly instincts fought their way to the front of his brain. Well, to be fair, they didn't exactly fight since the rest of his brain was gaping at her huge beard. "Not at all, not at all. I thought it was a fashion statement."

"What?"

"Your…" His fingers flailed ineffectually in front of him. He must not say beard! "Legs. They are very nice and leg like."

She looked at him curiously through a gap in her beard which seemed to be growing as he looked. "Legs? A fashion statement?"

"Yes." His smile was becoming so fixed you could put it in the Tate gallery. Although a picture of Rimmer in the Tate gallery would be put in the basement, behind a filing cabinet and in a room sealed with concrete and then dropped in the Thames and set on fire. Must change the subject! Anything apart from her beard! "So does big facial growth run in your family, then?"

Now, it was fortunate for Rimmer that she was not the daughter of Superman or any of the other 'pants on the outside' brigade with heat vision or ice vision or any of the other super powers. Incidentally, there are not enough stories written about such heroes such as Wallpaper Man (he can wallpaper a room in under four hours) and Kettle Man (he can put the kettle on a mere ten minutes after first thinking about it). Had she been one of the more major heroes, then her vision would have atomised Rimmer and probably created a hole the size of Everest through the Moon.

She grabbed him by one hand and lifted him off the floor. "It was an accident, and if I catch the person responsible I will punch him again! Get that into your thick Admiral's head!"

"Yes ma'am! Accident! Sorry ma'am! No mention will be made of your beard from now on ma'am!"

"I need to get to the hospital deck without being seen!"

"Yes ma'am!" He looked at his watch and eeped. Less than two minutes to go before the Gelfs escaped and destroyed the Earth! How to get out of here? He then thought: he was an Admiral for smegs sake!

"I order you to take me to the Gelf Research deck!"

Her jaw dropped. He was comparing her to a Gelf now! Was this the rudest most insensitive man ever? While her brain was still mulling over the list she carried of rude insensitive pigs, her fist didn't bother thinking and just hit Rimmer square on the chin.