A/N sorry about the delay in writing this chapter. I've been trying to write this since just after I posted the last one but I had so many ideas it was hard to know what to put down. And I thought the last chapter was a bugger to write. Well I hope this chapter is good, but if it isn't I can blame it on the fact I have watched both Tomb Raider films as well as all three parts of Back to Earth today, which are arguably crap. I have actually had a bad few days, yesterday and today I had to work and yesterday I got punched in the stomach by a 5 year old who said she wanted to "blow me up" (I'm NOT kidding) at the museum where I work. A big thank you to LIttleBritainFanatic for reviewing, and who made my day when I checked for reviews on Saturday shortly after getting beaten up by a Beaver scout! Also for anyone interested in engines/vehicles some of the marvellous Mr Barrie's shows are on YouTube. Others have been blocked by channel 5 (F you) for copyright breach but you can see the bit where he confesses his love for motorbikes and pretends his biker name is Ace ;)
Disclaimer- I do not own Red Dwarf. This is unfortunately truth. If I did Holly would still be in it, series 11 would be showing now, series 12 would be on the way and Lister and Rimmer would have kissed 5 series ago. All I own is a wish that they'll sack Jeremy Clarkson and replace him with Chris Barrie on Top Gear.
The first thing Cat or Lister knew about Ace's visit was when Kryten had used the red alert system to summon them to the drive room. Lister, his nerves shot to hell ran all the way there, breathing raggedly through the panic attack that threatened to claim him. Cat on the other hand was less concerned, attempting to finish ironing his crimson tartan suit before being frogmarched along by two scutters each dragging him by the sleeves using their claw. The Cat of course let out a stream of colourful epithets good enough to make even the hardest of sailor GELFs, a type renowned for hereditary Tourette's, blush and cover their ears but the scutters were being the Duke and didn't listen.
When they got there they each had very different reactions. Lister usually so pleased to see Ace was apoplectically angry, launching straight into "what the SMEG are you doing here?" despite still being out of breath. The space hero smirked before replying in his own cultured tones "nice to see you as well, Skipper". Lister liked the test pilot but right now he thought Ace should go to hell. Just seeing any Rimmer that wasn't his alive and kicking (at least figuratively) made him cringe. Why his Rimmer? Besides if Lister's personal theory about the cause of Rimmer's behaviour was true then it was that little bit of Ace within him that got him killed and Lister did not want to see that bit again. Lastly he was angry and upset because he didn't think seeing Ace, knowing that it wasn't annoying his Rimmer, would be as exciting. At least the snide remarks in the background about weddings and games of 'spot the submarine' had provided him with something to laugh at before, even if it had been snorts of derision.
When Cat entered the drive room he was happy. The scutters finally let him go and he hissed at them, arching his back unconsciously in an echo of his ancestors as he did so. Still oblivious to anything else in the room, he brushed down the creases in his suit jacket and finally looked up to face the others, a toothy grin plastered on his face. It only widened when he saw the space hero leaning against the navicomp. "Ace, good to see ya bud. Do ya like my suit! I made it myself!" Ace smiled back, hiding the sarcastic smirk he wanted to show and not completely masking a bit of confusion "very nice Cat, how do you keep producing such masterpieces?" This Ace hadn't mastered being nice, or tried, but he had mastered pretending to be sincere.
Ace continued to look confused, focusing on the doorway opposite him. "Where's Arnie boy Kryters?" He asked, hoping the deep macho voice wouldn't show his worry that this wasn't his chance to retire. Kryten had the presence of mind to look guilty that he hadn't explained the situation as both Cat and Lister glared at him. "Well, Mr Ace sir, I'm afraid that's why we called, I thought your computer would've told you. Mr Rimmer's dead sir." Ace's heart sunk, 'no replacement in this dimension then' he thought. Out loud he exclaimed "what!" Unfortunately it was in his own voice and not Ace's and he hoped no one noticed. From the way they stared he was guessing that his hopes were dashed. "Hey Ace you sounded just like Goalpost Head for a moment, do it again!" Catt said at the same time Ace tried to cover his own back "sorry just had a bit of a cold, voice keeps breaking and all that".
Kryten started to speak again, looking directly into his hazel eyes with his own electric blue ones. "Sir I called you in to see if you could help us out, Mr Lister's depressed and I was hoping you could do something". Internally the part of him that was still Arnold Judas Rimmer wanted to say 'like smegging bog-bot from hell' while Ace said "what can I do to help Kryters?" But that of course was the question they all wanted to ask.
Lister had stopped listening soon after he had seen Ace, the familiar angular features, even softened by the blond wig too much for him. The moment he could, he left still feeling pretty low. It seemed that for him to be his usual optimistic self, he needed to be belittled and annoyed by Rimmer. Talk about masochism or what! Once he felt he could escape, he did it instantly, ducking out the door quickly and walking back to his quarters. If he couldn't feel good, he reasoned, he might as well feel comfortable.
Reaching the dingy quarters that still, despite washing, smelled of burning he let out a deep sigh. Before entering the room, he stopped at the dispenser opposite and picked up several six packs and a couple of curries. He intended to go into full bender mode, and did not want to have to get up again during it.
Back in the room, he avoided looking at the bottom bunk or the lockers, which though stripped of any trace of the man including the "no smoking" signs and the "Arnie does it best" headlines reminded him of Rimmer. Instead he threw the beer and curries onto one end of the bunk and climbed onto his bed. He set the music player to Rasta Billy Skank "the skankiest skank around" and shouted "lock", sealing himself from the rest of the ship, just wanting peace.
Cracking a can of lager open, he remembered a time just after Rimmer had become hard light when he'd dared him to chug a can. Somehow the smeghead had managed to down the entire thing in a few seconds, beating Lister by a moment. Thinking of how hungover the hologram was the next morning, not used to it, made him snort his beer all over his Mugs Murphy t-shirt "Crap!" he yelled, feeling the warm liquid soaking through the thin cotton. Noticing the toilet had swung out, obviously taking the expletive as a prompt, he yelled "not you!" and went right back to swilling down the god awful Special Brew.
Meanwhile, still in the drive room Kryten, Cat, Ace and a couple of scutters positioned themselves at a table, trying to come up with a plan to help Lister. The scutters both had a pad in front of them, writing down notes since no one on the ship with the exception of the scouser could speak scutter. Cat with his brain the size of a pea, thought about making the human a new suit, Ace stroked his chin and thought about what his Lister would do, and Kryten trawled his etiquette chip to see if there was anything that could help. Spare Head Three rested on the table, spewing nonsense in a Yorkshire accent because unfortunately Kryten had taken Ace's remark that "two heads are better than one" in a rather literal manner. The method in his madness being that since spare head three was the head used aboard the Nova 5, having gone mad with guilt since, knew the most about grieving having done so himself.
Thirty minutes and much arguing, threatening and insulting later, all they had decided on was that both Spare Head Three and Cat should both shut up. Simply because the matter was serious and should be dealt with by those with brains larger than a raisin. They had also decided that Holly should sit in, and the computer was mostly scribing the conversation and only making comments to clarify his notes. It seemed that the senile computer was having a quiet binary conversation with the spare head and keeping him occupied but other than that wasn't doing a whole lot.
Another hour went by, giving an agreement that they should come up with step one, enact it and then proceed with a meeting to make further plans based on the outcome of that step. Basically, they had decided to try step one, and if it cocked up spectacularly, try another tack. But first of course they had to come up with a step one, and they just couldn't seem to agree on what it should be. Ace also thought they should at some point they should try to resurrect the hologram" (secretly thinking a hologram would be a suitable replacement), but Kryten disagreed saying that they had no more light bees. Even if they did, Kryten argued, Rimmer would be resurrected as a soft light hologram and he'd said that it was "a fate worse than death".
It took a further two hours and three rounds of tea and bourbon biscuits before they eventually agreed on what step one would be. "We have to have a funeral" Ace said "we have to give him a chance to say goodbye and move on." Ace too wanted to move on, preferably to a dimension where he could recruit a suitable replacement, and so wanted to fix this soon. For once Kryten agreed "what an excellent suggestion that is sir, maybe it will stop Mr Lister pretending he's still alive." And so they decided on step one of their plan.
They decided planning was the best way of ensuring success and Ace and Kryten started planning the funeral with an anal retentive's eye for detail, both possessing that particular trait. Ace suggested a space graveyard he knew, in orbit around a planetoid, saying "it's where a lot of heroes are laid to rest" and showed Kryten a homing beacon to take the bee to it. Kryten himself was planning the wake, whilst Cat had been dispatched with finding a good location for the ceremony. Soon though, the group hit a snag. For a funeral, they needed the light bee, and Lister had that in the inside breast pocket of his leather jacket, which he was presumably was still wearing. It seemed like step one was actually going to be 'acquire the light bee by any means necessary '. While they were hitting the snag, Ace was working on his own plan. Looking it over it certainly looked simple enough, planning had always been his strong point-
hold of light bee
disc from light bee if not use backup in hologram projection suite
funeral for light bee shell, sending it to coffin belt around planetoid
hologram using homemade hard light bee and convince it to replace me
myself in hologram's position
the others of resurrection
goodbye to replacement
the life I only took because I was horny and cadge a lift back to home dimension
It was a good plan. It was a simple plan. It was a plan he was absolutely sure would work perfectly. Looking back over it he realised point six was unnecessary since if he was going back to his home dimension he wouldn't need to convince the others we was their Rimmer. He crossed it out, a slight frown flashing across his face, worrying that his perfect theoretical planning skills were slipping. Nevermind, he thought, everything will be fine again in a few days. The only part he foresaw in his plan was making his own light bee. He was a skilled engineer but had never made his own, preferring instead to repair hard light bees. He learnt just after becoming Ace that his was a dimension where hard light had been discovered relatively early. In most other dimensions, hologrammatic technology was just crawling out of the metaphoric primordial ooze as it were. 'This' Ace thought 'was definitely one of them'. Since there were no hard light bees, or light bees full stop, around he would have to try and make his own.
A/N- Don't forget to review! If you think it was good tell me! if you think I can do better tell me how! flames will be used to smoke many kippers as part of my plan to lure Ace into my room. if you are my English teacher, I know you won't think it's good enough, so smeg off and don't leave a review.
P.S quick game for you guys- look through my authors notes and guess which RD man I'm obsessed with. leave the answer in a PM or a review and the first person to get it right gets to give me any prompt and I have to write it.