Chapter 9: Blue


After reading Arlene the riot act, Terrence found himself looking for his female counterpart. When several glances around the roof left his searches to come up short, he frowned. Where had she gone? He marched over to Deb, Dave and Arnold while Arlene was left over in the seat she'd been sitting in while he was lecturing her.

'Hey,' he asked. 'Where's Teresa?'

'Why not ask smeg for brains over 'ere?' Dave asked, pointing to his version of Rimmer.

'She stormed off in the huff somewhere,' Arnold rolled his eyes. 'Who knows what goes on in women's heads.'

'Probably questions like why is Rimmer such an intolerable smeghead?' Dave remarked. 'Captain Misogyny decided while you and 'er were offering to smack down with his female counterpart for making him feel uncomfortable that he was going to call her incapable and small,' he sounded almost angry. 'You still haven't learned, have you? Arlene is exactly like you. She treats men the way you treat women and if you ever want 'Resa to like you you've got to learn to treat her with respect. I would say all women with respect but I've not bothered on account of her being the last one left alive.'

'I'm surprised she didn't say to you what I said to Arlene then,' Terrence said. 'There's a good reason nothing ever amounted between us, Rimmer. You're a smeg head. You're quite possibly the only person worse than Todhunter.'

Terrence spun on his heel and then marched off out of the disco, off to comfort his female self. Unlike him, who had been able to give the ultimate boy power speech and walk off with his head held high, Teresa had been left in the lurch, left embarrassed and upset. Seems even when in the same universe, they still lived on two different sides of the coin.

Deb nodded at male Lister and Rimmer before heading over to female Rimmer. She slouched down in the chair with a mug of lager. Deb had decided since it was her Rimmer causing all the problems, at least on the surface anyway, it was her responsibility to talk some sense into the offending party.

'How are you getting on, then?' she asked.

'Well, put it this way, there'll be two pairs of shoes under the bed tonight,' Arlene replied. She made a pumping gesture. 'Wallop!'

'What?' Deb asked. 'You think you're getting laid after that speech from Terrence and how terrified Rimmer is of you? You're deluded.'

'Oh, he doesn't want me to think he's the ship bike, but I'm getting the signs. He crossed his legs, and made pretty damn sure I saw that he was wearing sock suspenders. And Terrence is just having a little tantie because he's jealous. He kissed me in my bunk once, did I tell you? Oh yes, he was all over me. He'll come around,' Arlene replied.

'Rimmer, he's not interested,' Deb said frankly.

'Maybe not now but wait till I hit him with the wormdo line,' said Arlene.


I lay back on Terrence's temporary bed, the same one in the same quarters I'd been given when I was first awoken from stasis, same one that I'd never bothered to move out from when the rest of the ship had been decontaminated.

How had my life ended up like this? I honestly think I'd be less miserable if I'd have snuffed it in the radiation leak with the rest of the crew. If instead of going into stasis I'd busted out of the flight deck and into space. I'd maybe never have seen Lister again but at least I'd be somewhere else. Maybe I would have seen Lister again, maybe I could have warned the JMC and they would have launched a rescue mission for him. Maybe they'd have cleared the radiation and stripped the Dwarf down for parts like it was due to have done to her when we had completed this mission. Maybe they wouldn't have. Maybe they'd have buried him, sent the ship off someplace far away where no one would find them, the darkest depths of the universe and named Red Dwarf's missing status as a great was an uncomfortable thought.

'Holly,' I called. Two faces flashed up on screen, our Holly's face covered in lipstick.

'Alright Teresa?' Holly greeted fondly.

'Bloody hell Hol, no wonder it's going to take 17 hours to repair,' I laughed. 'I take it you two are getting along well then.'

'You could say that,' Hilly smiled affectionately at me. She must have a soft spot for Terrence like Holly did me.

'What can I do for you today Teresa? You want me to switch Arnold off for a while?' Holly asked.

'You heard about that, huh?' I asked. He nodded. Hilly nodded. They both nodded. I sat up and sighed, carding my fingers through my hair. 'When the radiation leak happened and you sealed me in the shuttle bay, what did you do next?'

'I tried to slow the radiation down long enough for someone to do something or for some people to escape,' Holly replied. 'Unfortunately the Captain saw fit that this time could be best served yelling at Rimmer. Which I imagine you can understand that desire, I think most of us would wanna give that a go right about now.'

'No but, when Lister and I were frozen and Frankenstein was in the hold, did you try contact home?' I asked. Holly looked away awkwardly. 'Did JMC leave us to die? Did they bury us? Did they make it all look like some unknown tragedy and abandon us?'

'Teresa,' Holly frowned. I had my answer.

'So they had a chance, we had a chance to be saved and the Jupiter Mining Corp decided to let us burn,' I crossed my arms over my chest. 'Great, how could this day get any worse?'

'Cheer up 'Resa, we'll be able to get home soon,' Holly soothed. 'Then you can duct-tape Arnold's light be to the ceiling or something.'

'Thanks Hol, that'll be all,' I told him softly before slumping back down again.


Dave and Deb found themselves having a drinking contest by the bar while the pets enjoyed themselves having dance offs and Arnold spent his time hiding from Arlene. The table was stacked with pint glasses as they chugged quickly down on the liquid. They each dropped their glass down onto the table with a clank as they gasped for air.

'Aw, it was a dead heat,' said Dave, resting the glass on his head.

'Again. That's eight dead heats on the run,' said Deb, amused. It was at this point that Arnold scuttled up to the table, coming out from hiding. He crouched by Dave.

'Listy, I want to speak to Holly,' Arnold said.

'Sure,' Dave crossed his watch arm over so Rimmer could see him.

'Holly, how long before the Hop Drive's fixed? When can we get out of here?' Arnold asked, sounding desperate.

'We're busy fixing it right now. Aren't we, Hilly?' Holly said, lipstick marks on his cheek.

'Yes, we are, Holly. Very busy fixing it right now. That's exactly what we're doing,' Hilly confirmed.

'What's that mark on your face, Hol?' asked Dave, spying the lipstick.

'What face?' asked Holly, looking around.

'The lipstick mark,' replied Dave, not buying it.

'That's not a lipstick mark. That's a computer rash,' explained Hilly.

'Holly, just get the Hop Drive fixed and get me out of here!' demanded Arnold.

'What's the matter? Aren't you having a good time?' asked Deb.

'A good time!? Lister, I'm going to bed now, by myself, on my own, alone. If she comes back, tell her I've got a headache or something,' Rimmer explained.

'Why, where's she gone?' asked Dave.

'She's gone to get some sexy videos. She seems to think seeing two men together might turn me on,' Arnold told him.

'Where are you sleeping?' said Dave.

'I'm not telling you. It's too risky,' replied Arnold.

'C'mon, what are you, a man or a munchkin?' asked Dave.

'"I'm off to see the wizard, the wonderful wizard of Oz!"' sung Arnold. He scurried off, while Dave was left shaking his head. He turned back to Deb where a very serious drinking contest was happening.

'Ho, you ready then? OK, after three. Three!' Dave challenged, sneakingly tossing his larger over his shoulder while Deb was distracted drinking. 'Hah! Beat you!' Dave cheered. His win was short lived though as Deb spat the mouthful of lager she still had on his face.


After sulking in Terrence's room for a while I found myself exploring the other decks, going through people I knew in my universe's rooms. Raking through their stuff. Found some weird drugs I didn't recognise like Plan A and prescription Michael John. Found out that this universe's version of Petrovich was dealing better than life games and headsets. Which probably meant mine was too. I went and found some nice shirts in some of the now female mech's quarters that wouldn't have fit well before we universe hopped. I looked at myself, here I was, 3 million years into the future and I was looting.

Wandering through the science decks I started combing through the papers everyone was scribbling down, curious as to what they were studying. No one had much of consequence, or at least to me who didn't understand the scribble and ramblings, that's what it looked like. There was one person though, someone I'm pretty sure had been rumoured to be George MacIntyer's secret affair, had been experimenting with the technology behind holograms. They had alternate designs to light bees, research on something called hard light. Didn't make much sense to me but I gathered it all up. I could read this back in my room while I waited for Holly to fix the drive. I couldn't take it, not if it would be important to Terrence in this universe if he found it. No, I'd have to find it again in mine.

I headed back down to the more populated decks, stopping by the disco again Dave mentioned something about Terrence looking for me and Rimmer off hiding. He then went back to drunkenly stumbling with Deb. I smiled at the two, at least someone was having a good time. I left the research on the table beside a pint glass and went over to where Dog and Cat were still arguing over who's dance moves were better and decided to join in, trying each party's moves. I have to say Dog's were easier and similar to those of ravers from the early 21st century while Cat's more complicated and flashy. He did however yowl whenever I did something correct and the way he liked it. I glanced over at Lister who was smiling at me, happy I was happy. I missed when this ship had people, when he had his friends around, when I wasn't at throats with the only other technically human on this ship.

'Hey Teresa,' Terrence greeted as my hair swung around me, he started dancing beside me as I bobbed to the music.

'Hey Terrence, how are you feeling after the argument with Arlene?' I asked.

'I could ask the same about Arnold,' he replied.

'I guess I just don't understand it,' I shrugged, jumping up and down still. 'How can he switch like that? The cute, adoring guy that I saw back then, to this.. this prick. I'm starting to think the cute, adoring guy was the result of being over medicated and nothing more.'

'Speaking of being overly medicated, want to see what I found in Petrovich's quarters easier today?' Terrence held out a bag of clear capsules filled with white powder.

'Is that...?' I asked.

'His special ship made MDMA?' Terrence finished. 'Yep, he's as bad as Rimmer is for obnoxious OCD. Everything was organised by type and labeled. This stuff was meant to have a bit of extra kick to it, let's hope the radiation hasn't nullified it.'

'Let's hope the radiation hasn't mutated it,' I replied. He slipped me one of the pills and I knocked it back with what was left of my skittle bomb. A drink Lister often referred to as the rich man's Jäger bomb as it used the more expensive Cointreau and Redbull instead of Jägermeister and Redbull. Only reason I drank it was because it tasted better and it kept you awake.

Not 30 minutes later and it had kicked in and we were dancing around like we were on fire. Suddenly everything was hilarious and fun as we danced around like no one was watching. Dave did notice my mood had picked up but seemed to think it was exposure to my male counterpart and being far away from Rimmer. Well, I supposed that was a little true. I was sweating all over from the dancing and the alcohol but I didn't care. I hadn't had a disco like this since before I'd even boarded this voyage on the Dwarf. I was on shore leave celebrating with the other console operators that I'd dumped my longterm boyfriend who was honestly a bit of a jerk.

I went behind the bar, searching for a lemon so we could do shots when I spotted some of those red soda cups you always saw in movies. I moved them onto the bar out of the way of my search with a chuckle and managed to find a few lemons eventually. I sliced it up and poured a round of shots. Cat, Dog, Deb and Dave all joined in with Terrence and I.

Time was skipping for me as I drifted in and out of being black out drunk with the others. Usually the memory loss came the morning after, but I guess that was what happens when you ingest radioactive drugs. Because it wasn't long before I was staggering around in front of Arlene, very sloppy and trying to steal her light bee. She seemed mildly amused, rather than annoyed which I would have expected from Arnold. Maybe she was also drunk. Eventually, I apparently prevailed because the next memory I had was of me standing on top of Terrence's swaying shoulders as I taped a red plastic cup from earlier to the ceiling with Arlene's light bee inside. Suddenly she was less amused.

The two Listers, the pets, they'd gone. Eventually it was just an incredibly pissed off Arlene, myself and Terrence still at the disco. I can't remember who suggested it, but Terrence and I eventually stumbled down the corridors to his room. There were two bunks and having a kip right now sounded great.

I tripped over my bootlaces which had at some point become untied and caught myself by grabbing at the wall of the corridor. I leaned against it a moment as Terrence and I giggled to ourselves, that was a close one. He grinned down at me as I leaned against the wall and I paused, staring into his green-grey eyes. I shifted uncomfortably. MDMA had this one unfortunate side effect that usually I was able to control. Mutated, nuclear, super MDMA wasn't as easy to fight against. I rubbed my thighs together. Terrence bit his lip.

Fuck it. I thought, reaching forward and grabbing just as he leaned down and pressed me against the wall. We kissed roughly, more desperately than we had when we were sober. He held my hips and I used his grip to steady me as I leapt up to wrap my legs around his waist. I was able to lean down to kiss him now with much greater ease. Frantically we grasped at each other's clothes. He tugged my shirt up my chest and I grabbed at the button and zipper on his trousers. He undid my fasteners and I thrust myself down onto him. I couldn't believe I was doing this, I knew it was wrong but I was too out of my mind to care.


Dave found himself mumbling semi quietly to himself with his thumb in his mouth. He rubbed his face, now he was conscious he had the world's worst banging headache. He pulled his thumb out of his mouth and opened his eyes.

'Oh, did I get drunk or did I get drunk?' He asked himself before he realised what he was looking at. Right in front of his face were two sock covered ankles followed by boots. Smeg. 'Oh, no.'

Meanwhile, at the other end of the bed. Deb was waking up similarly to the way he just had.

'Oh, did I get drunk or did I get drunk?' she groaned. She looked down the bed at Dave.

'Listen, did we, ehm...?' Dave mumbled, looking down the bed at her.

'I can't remember,' she replied, looking just as confused and hungover as he was.

'I remember betting you I could climb the disco wall using only me lips. And then... Oh, god, I juggled the goldfish, didn't I?' Dave recalled, bringing a hand to his aching head.

'Blindfold,' Deb agreed.

'And then... Oh, hey, we did, didn't we?' Dave realised, hand still on his head.

The two holograms enter, looking rather smug. The squeaking of boots on the corridor floor could be heard behind them as Teresa and Terrence stumbled out of the room next to Rimmer and Lister's.

'You pieces of filth. How could you commit an act of carnal knowledge?' Arnold asked as he marched into the room and stood tall.

'In my bunk? On my sheets, using my springs. What could possibly have made you contemplate making love to yourself?' Arlene asked, getting closer to them with each step.

'Well, why break a habit of a lifetime?' Arnold remarked.

Teresa and Terrence entered their room, looking confused and generally unkempt. Terrence's 5 o'clock shadow was getting longer and darker by the second and Teresa's hair was bushy and sticking out in every direction. They each had dark circles and morning breath, not that either of the two Listers would have noticed.

'Leave it out, I was gonzo. I was out of me mind,' Deb said sitting up. Teresa ran a hand through the front of her hair. An argument this early in the morning? There was no god.

'Oh, ey, what's that's supposed to mean?' asked Dave.

'Well, I wouldn't have slept with you if I'd known what I was doing,' Deb replied sending a sharp jab through Dave's heart.

'Oh, hey, thanks a bunch,' Dave said, clearly hurt.

'I hope you get pregnant,' Arlene said as she inspected herself in the room's mirror.

'No offence, but you're not exactly Mr. Difficult-to-pull, are you? Talk about a pushover!' Deb bragged.

'Oh that's rich coming from Miss Yo-yo nickers,' he replied, getting agitated. Arlene turned around and leaned in towards Dave.

'I hope you get pregnant, you cheap little tart!' she mocked.

'You what?' said Dave.

'Him? How can he get pregnant?' asked Rimmer. Meanwhile, it was dawning on Teresa just what being in a parallel universe meant.

'Well, If they didn't use precautions, he could be up the spout,' explained Arlene.

'But it's women who get pregnant!' said Dave, looking amused.

'Since when?' Deb cried out, unable to fathom the stupidity.

'Since always! Me mother was a woman!' argued Dave.

'Oh, Listy! Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear, oh dear. If I'm understanding correctly, it appears that, in their universe, it's the men who give birth to the babies. And as we are in their universe, you could very well be possibly up the duff, laddie!' Arnold said not sounding the least bit sympathetic.

'C'mon, I'm not buying this! This is a wind-up!' said Dave.

'He's right, in our universe it's us who get pregnant,' Terrence told him.

'On the bright side, at least I feel a lot better,' Teresa said, looking a little happier about the blank spots in her memories from last night.

'You what?' asked Dave, turning to her, clearly annoying.

'Don't get emotional, not in your condition!' Arnold soothed and mocked at the same time.

'Teresa and I got absolutely blitzed last night and found Petrovich's special mix of molly and the radiation has mutated it slightly over the years,' Terrence explained, sitting down at the table.

'What, I always said he was a drug dealer!' Arnold said looking like all his christmases had come at once.

'Yeah but when you said it you'd just made it up,' Dave said.

'Anyway, regular E makes you rather horny and well, apparently it's evolved into something much stronger,' Teresa explained. 'I have a vague memory of duct taping Arlene to the ceiling and then nothing until Terrence and I were doing the corkscrew in the corridor.

'IN THE CORRIDOR!' Rimmer yelled. 'You filthy, how could you put your hands on her when you could see she was out of her mind. I bet you gave her the drugs too.' Teresa rolled her eyes.

'Oh will you shut up, he's me you moron. Also in this universe, I'm the one who took advantage of him. Also, yeah we did do it in the corridor, right outside your room too. Not that it's any of your business, Rimmer. You're a complete fucking smeghead and it's still got nothing to do with you.' Teresa yelled, going over to sit in between Dave and Deb.

'But, it's impossible! I haven't got the, the... equipment, have I?' Dave said, pulling them back on topic.

'Of course you have. You're in our universe. Our physical law applies,' Arlene explained. Teresa patted Dave on the knee sympathetically, not that it helped much.

'Shut up. Holly, tell me this isn't true,' Dave called out. Holly popped up on screen completely covered in lipstick marks.

'I'm afraid it is, Mum,' he said.

'How could you do this to me?' Dave demanded, turning to Deb.

'Do what?' Deb asked.

'Fertilise me. Take advantage of me. Knowing that I was drunk and didn't have precautions,' Dave said.

'Listen, I assumed you'd taken care of that side of things. It's the man's responsibility. It's the man who gets pregnant. It's the man who has to suffer the agony of childbirth,' Deb explained.

'Agony! This gets better and better!' Arnold grinned.

'Oh just hang on a minute there Fabio,' Teresa turned sharply to Deb. 'It comes out of you, it's your responsibility too, not just his. You're both doing it.'

'Well, what do you want me to do? I'm sorry, okay?' Deb says.

'Sorry? That's it? Sorry? Wham, bang, thank you mister?' says Dave, getting more agitated.

'Well, there's no point standing around arguing about it. If it's happened, it's happened,' says Hilly.

'Yeah, we'd better get back. I've fixed the Hop drive,' Holly said.

'No, we can't go now, Hol. She could be the father of my child,' Dave said.

'If we don't go now, we may never get back at all,' Holly shrugged. If computers could shrug, that is.

'Listen, just because it's possible for you to get pregnant, it doesn't mean you necessarily are. You might get lucky!' Deb said patting him on the back. Teresa frowned, sliding off the bottom bunk and kneeling in front of him. Just as she opened her mouth to speak the skutters wheeled in, followed by three babies and a fourth in the father's mouth.

'But then again, you might not. We'll find out when we get back, won't we, Listy?' Arnold cheered. Teresa scowled at him before turning back to Lister.

'We'll get through this,' Teresa assured him. 'You have options.'


After gathering our stuff we rendezvous back at the airlock to get onboard the blue midget. Rimmer was insistent that in Lister's condition he shouldn't drive. It never ceases to surprise me how little Rimmer actually knew about the world, women, and how they both worked. Or how sexist he was. I no longer understand what I saw in him.

There was definitely something wrong with the ship, but it was a much smoother ride with myself piloting her. Not long after we'd docked back at our own ship, depressurised, and gathered back in the drive room with the stupid red box of trouble. I glared at the thing as Holly did the count down. Lister slapped his hand on the button and sent us back into what was hopefully and doubtfully our own universe.

'What'd'ya mean before, when you said I had options?' Lister asked me once the Cat and Rimmer had left. I sighed softly and sat in one of the console operator's chairs and he sat beside me. 'In case you hadn't noticed, kid, we're three million years into the future without a doctor.'

'Yeah, and we can rule out adoption,' I joked. 'I know it's just you and me and we're the last hope that we know of for the human race, but kids, you're young Dave. Even if you weren't, if you're not ready or you never want them, you don't have to have this baby.'

'I don't know about you, but if I am pregnant I don't exactly see a way out of this,' he told me.

'I found these,' I said, pulling out the Plan A and prescription Michael John that I'd found and pinched from the other ship. 'This is their version of Plan B. It should work on you because it's from their universe. We have our own but I'm not sure about it, because it's designed to work on women. But this was formulated for you. It's there. And if for some reason it doesn't work, we'll turn Rimmer off and find the ship's doctor's hologram.'

'Could we start with turning Rimmer off?' Lister sighed, too stressed to even laugh at his own joke.

'Come on,' I took his hand. 'Whatever happens, I'm with you. You're me best mate.'

'This wasn't in the plan,' he told me and I nodded.

'No, but usually the best things aren't planned, they just sort of happen. Let's see where this takes us,' I smiled reassuringly. 'Now come on, let's go grab a bite to eat.'

'Shouldn't I go and get tested?' he asked and I shook my head.

'Takes up to five days from sex to get the sperm to the egg. From there you won't show anything for 2 weeks. You can take then plan B now, never know one way or the other or wait three weeks, do the test and find out. If you are, you can decide then if you aren't, no harm no foul.'

'You're really calm about all this. How can you be so calm about all of this?' he asked, still holding my hand as we walked along to the cafeteria.

'I had a scare of my own a few years back,' I shrugged. 'It's no secret my sister and I didn't really get on much so I dealt with it all on my own. But I wouldn't do that to you, not me best mate. Not when I know what it's like.'

'Kid, if I'd have known,' he said.

'I know.'


Hopped up on one of the benchtops in the Science Lab, I swung my legs, waiting for the timer to go off and say Lister's test was done processing. Lister himself, was pacing up and down the room in front of me, going through about fifty different shades of white in his stress. The Cat was on the other side of a workbench with Rimmer who stood anxiously chewing on his fist. Anxious though, not because he had an ounce of concern for his roommate and friend, rather that he was tremendously excited Lister's already kinda sad life was taking a downwards turn.

'I don't know why we're going through with this. It's just not possible!' Lister said, rubbing the back of his head. I was secretly hoping that since we'd jumped back into our universe, assuming this was our universe, that our physical law would apply again, sparring him.

'Why is it not possible? Male baboons have given birth - they were doing that as far back as the twentieth century. Cesarean, naturally,' he said and then started acting out the procedure in charades. 'Slice! Oof! Bumf! Still, Lister, you'll be in good hands, and the skutters will be able to handle a simple..'

'Skutters! I wouldn't let them open a can of..' Lister exclaimed and I sighed.

'You're thinking too negative! Think of all the glorious, beautiful,wonderous things about having children!' the Cat soothed, but there was still a smugness floating in the air thanks to Rimmer.

'Like?' Lister prodded, leaning in after walking over to stand by him.

'Like when they grow up and leave,' Cat said and I snorted. I know my parents certainly thought so. They'd only planned on having the one kid, and then surprise! I came along.

'What colour is it supposed to turn?' Rimmer asked and I shook my head again in disgust. He knew fine, he was just building the tension like the slimy little git he was.

'Blue for not pregnant. Which is the colour it is going to,' Lister told him and I nodded agreeingly. This ship was certainly not suitable for raising children even if we were the last people alive and it was the expectation.

'And red for pregnant?' Rimmer asked.

'Yeah,' Lister answered and I rolled my shoulders. This had to have been the longest two and a half minutes of my life.

'Come on you reds!' Rimmer cheered, pulling his fists back towards himself. I chewed the inside of my gum. I wasn't going to start a fight with him, not right now when I was supposed to be supporting my friend. But I sure did want to.

'What colour is it now?' Lister asked, crossing his arms over his chest. I noticed then they were still quite muscled even though for the last three years he'd been doing no manual labour, laying around in bed between adventure and eating absolute shite. That was life as a young man I guess. The Cat leaned over the table the test was sitting on.

'Er, it's still white,' he replied and I sighed. I checked my wristwatch. Maybe it was taking longer because it was three million years old?

'Do you think it'll still work?' I asked and Dave shot me a look. I sent a sheepish one back in return. 'Sorry.'

'It doesn't matter how old it is, it's gonna work and it's gonna come out blue for not pregnant,' he said and I nodded in agreement.

'Oy. I've just had a thought. Remember when we broke the light barrier and saw those echoes from the future?' Holly said. Yet another adventure I'd missed out on. I raised an eyebrow.

'Yeah,' Lister nodded in agreement.

'And we saw your future self with twin boys,' Holly continued.

'Right. And I said, "How is it possible to get two babies without a woman on board." And you said, "I don't know, but it's going to be a lot of fun finding out." How right you were, Listy!' Rimmer gloated and I shot him a sharp look. One he completely ignored. I'm assuming because if you'd been receiving them for a lifetime, what's one more?

'Twins? No way, Rimmer, not twins!' Lister said waving his hands out in front of him in a no way gesture.

'Oh yes, big bonny strapping bouncing boys they were, huge heads,' Rimmer said and paused to look at the test which had just started changing colour. Excitedly he bent down for a closer look alongside the Cat. 'Oh, it's changing colour!'

'What colour?' Lister demanded and I reached over to take his hand. I squeezed it from where it rested on the bench.

'Yes, it is! It's changing colour!' Rimmer said with rather genuine excitement this time rather than the smugness he'd exhibited earlier.

'Yeah but what colour?' Lister said, raising his voice.

'Yes, it's changing colour!' Rimmer said. The Cat had begun bouncing up and down excitedly behind him as they both watched on like it was the season finale of a tv show.

'WHAT COLOUR?!' Lister screamed.

'It's blue for not pregnant, right?' Rimmer said excitedly. He knew that. We told him earlier. I frowned. I knew what it was going to say. I pushed up on my hands, leaning over the benches to see what it said before sitting back down on my perch.

'Yes!' Lister yelled. I looked on softly at him, he had a big decision ahead of him now.

'Oh, good news, excellent news, Listy!' Rimmer grinned up at him excitedly.

'Oh, thank god!' Lister sighed in false relief.

'I'm going to be an uncle,' Rimmer said rather jovially and I have never wanted to hit an individual so badly.