I apologise once more for the insane angst .......

Kryten stared at the monitor shaking his head, "The files are dense" he motioned for Lister to come and take a look, "The only way I can place them in a sequence that makes any sense in on a grid but this way we can work our way backwards and hopefully undo the little bugger".

"Kryten is that what I think it is?" Lister grinned suddenly feeling a lot calmer and a lot more in control of the situation.

"Correct sir, Mr Rimmer's virus laid out in a Sudoku like formulation, all we need to do is mix up the numbers and then hopefully it will eradicate itself"

"This is great; I have always been amazing at Sudoku. Rimmer used to sit over the same puzzle for hours on end growing more and more frustrated, he never did have a head for numbers. I hope he wasn't doing one of these when he almost wiped himself it would explain a lot though. Okay let me take a whack at it?" Lister took the chair from Kryten and lit up a cigarette, this was going to be his finest puzzle yet.

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Kryten left Lister humming happily and headed down to find Cat in the cock pit. Cat was sat with his feet up running a comb through his hair, Kryten glared at him and grabbed the reports sheets from the left of him.

"I wouldn't let Miss Paige see you doing that" he growled, "You know she would be very upset if she thought you weren't helping cure Mr Rimmer"

"Mr Rimmer" Cat mocked, "I've already done it,iIt is right there in front of you and if a man cant fix his hair after a good twenty minute search then what has society come to?" Cat hissed and turned back to his mirror. "I don't want to be the one to tell her" he added, flipping his comb in the air and pushing it back into his jacket pocket.

Kryten frowned as he sped read the reports, the virus had come from the ship they had found her on and Rimmer could only have been infected whilst he went back to search for her things. Kryten's guilt chip overloaded as he realised he should have been the one to go back to the ship not Rimmer. He stood drumming his fingers against his chest and quickly decided to offline himself for a week the minute Mr Rimmer was back up and about.

"Don't look like that" Cat ordered, "You were operating on her at the time, it was goalpost heads choice, and he didn't have to go back! Look why don't we just keep this bit of information to ourselves for now huh? I don't think she cares where it came from, so long as we get him back. Now where is Lister?"

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Rimmer lay immobile he could feel Paige against him and was aware that she had drifted off to sleep, he could feel her hand wrapped around his but no matter how hard he tried he couldn't move his own in order to show her he was here. This strange sensation wasn't painful exactly just very disconcerting, he could feel something wriggling around in his chest, he prayed it wasn't his light bee because he had never physically felt that before and if it was malfunctioning he certainly didn't want Paige on top of him when it blew. It was just typical that the minute he met a woman he cared about he would go and contract the hologramatic equivalent of death. He should have known something would go wrong. How do you catch death anyway? He hadn't felt anything until it was too late. What if he did die now? Just internally explode? They wouldn't even notice! What if it blew externally and his last image was Paige splatting against a wall, Lister would laugh for weeks recounting the tale of the first woman that ever showed an interest in Rimmer – then Rimmer went and exploded and killed her. Fan-smegging-tastic. He felt Paige stir and watched her lift her head, she stared down at him and smiled kissed him quickly and ran out of the room.

It had occurred to him an hour or so before that this could be the end of him and he couldn't even scream and hide, he was completely locked. Frozen and mute just waiting for the inevitable and the worst bit was that he was now completely alone, alone and waiting to die. How could she just leave him like that! The git, if he pulled through this she was officially on his revenge list. It seemed pointless to think what Napoleon would have done in this situation as he didn't recall reading a diary entry entitled 'Locked in own body waiting to die' in the many books he had read about the man. No there was nothing to do now but wait and dwell sadly on all the things he never got a chance to do, all the parts of Paige he never got round to kissing, wait for the end and pray to the god that had failed him on everything else that it didn't hurt as much as he dreaded.

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"Lister, Lister, Lister!" Paige cried running down to the labs, half swinging around the door she coughed on his smoke and ran over to the screen he was working on. "Its working, he's not completely back but he has more colours, he looks stronger!"

"Really?" Lister swung round to face her, "I've only decoded 3 of these, I have 6 left and then we should have an antidote but if what you are saying is true – it could be wiping itself out as I solve this … interesting."

"Do you really think so?" Paige cried, "He could be back? This could work?"

"I don't see any reason why not." Lister smiled, "Aw man he is going to owe be bigtime for this. Big big big time. In fact I am looking forward to telling him old gerbil features saved his big butt"

"Thank you" Paige cried, she pulled Lister into a hug and kissed his cheek, "I am going to go watch him okay, if anything change I will let you know."

Paige ran as fast as she could to tell Rimmer the news, she was deliriously happy at the thought of him coming back and knew once he was better they would be so happy. As she ran down the corridor she stopped dead in her tracks and stared up at the ceiling, the lights were slowly dimming on and off she stared around the darkened ship and began to tremble. "No" she whispered and picked up her pace towards the Medi bay, she was almost knocked off her feet as Kryten and Cat ran past her at full speed towards the labs and half considered running with them to find out what the hell was going on but she knew in her heart it was something to do with Rimmer. She ignored her fear and ran the rest of the way to him, to her surprise he was sitting up looking dazed. "Rimmer!" she half wept as she ran to his arms, "What happened?"

Rimmer smiled and hugged her close to him breathing in her scent; she kissed his neck and cheek and finally his lips. He kissed her back tenderly, he had no idea what had just happened only that he could move again.

"Hush" he comforted her stroking her hair, "Its going to be okay P, Look I am fine, Im up and walking and everything" he kissed her head and pulled her up to look at her.

He felt a cold shiver take over him as he saw her reaction, it spelt out his doom he could see it on her face, "Rimmer?" she whispered a single tear falling down her face, "You are fading again" she wept, "What is happening?" she stood and watching him fade to near invisible then back to full colour almost as if he was beating slowly and surely.

Rimmer stared down at her puzzled, then looked at his own body and watched it vanish then return, he was confused and a serious pain was starting to hack at his chest. Suddenly he realised what was about to happen and he panicked but knew what he had to do. Paige screamed as he shoved her with the last of his energy as far away from him as he could, he gripped his chest trying to stop the tightening pain that was gripping him, he tried to run for the door in order to put as much distance between himself and her but he felt a burning sensation ripple up from his feet and lost control of his legs, he hit the floor with a sickening thud, the pain continued to rise and he felt hotter and hotter, this was the end he knew it. He shrieked in pain as he felt a tear rip through his insides and watched the room spin and light up, the last thing he saw was Paige screaming in terror then he felt nothing.