Rimmer was having a chat with one of the dispensing machines. It was having difficulties fulfilling his order. All he had wanted was a chicken sandwich and tea, but it dropped a pair of fishing waders in its receptacle instead. He pulled them out disdainfully.
"Your word recognition software is on the blink," he informed it.
"Why, thank you, sir!" it replied.
"Look, just a chicken sandwich with mayo and a mug of tea. That's all I want from you."
"Couldn't be simpler!"
It dispensed a flaming bunt cake on his foot, and he stomped it out furiously.
"Wonderful," he said, dripping with sarcasm. "I'll have to get the old tool kit out. Three million years into deep space, and I'm still mending vending machines."
He was just on his way down the corridor when he heard an explosion that rocked the ship. Startled, he ran down the corridor towards a stairwell, almost slipping because of the bunt cake remnants on his boot, and after scraping it off on one of the steps, he continued on his way. He got directions from a skutter and hurried to the Drive Room.
When he got there, he found the whole room in one piece, but Kochanski appeared to be in a state of shock, hugging herself and breathing heavily.
"What happened? What was that explosion?" he asked. "Was it another future echo?"
Kochanski could only nod, looking very shaken.
Rimmer realized he would have to proceed carefully. "What was it? Can you tell me?"
It took her a few moments, but eventually, she seemed to find her voice. "… It was Dave…"
"… Lister? Lister was in a future echo? Are you sure it was him?"
"His back was to me, but I recognized his clothes… He had the dreadlocks and everything…"
"… Okay… What was he doing in the future echo?"
"He was fiddling around with the Navicomp, and it blew up and took him with it…"
Rimmer stared. This didn't make any sense. He turned to the giant monitor that took up the fourth wall. "Holly? Lister isn't hiding somewhere on board this ship anywhere, is he?"
Holly appeared on the monitor, bemused by the question. "Arnold, I can confirm that you, Kochanski and the Cat are the only life forms on board this ship," he replied.
"So how come I just saw a future echo where he was killed in an explosion?" Kochasnki snapped angrily.
Holly tilted his head in a shrug. "I dunno. It hasn't happened yet. There's nothing we can do about it."
Rimmer couldn't refute the computer's logic. If it was going to happen, it was clearly going to happen on Red Dwarf. They would be aware of it. "Just figures that git would reenter my life at some point," he grumbled. "Just can't get short of him…"
Kochanski stared at him, aghast. "I just saw him die!"
Rimmer sneered. "Silver lining, then."
"… You don't care? The man you shared a room with died horribly, possibly twice, and you don't care?"
"Why not? He never cared two bits for me!"
Instinctively, Kochanski went to kick him in the shin, but her foot passed right through him. This just infuriated her even more, and she tried to strangle him out of rage, but her hands merely closed around his neck and clasped together.
Nevertheless, he jumped away, also instinctively, clearly taken aback by her intent. "What was that for?!" he cried.
"Why the hell are you such a heartless bastard?" she snapped.
"Lister was always screwing me over! He was always taking the piss out of me! I was his superior technician, and he never showed me any respect! Why the hell should I feel sorry he's dead?"
"He was a human being, Rimmer, and a good one, too. I can't believe how unfeeling you can be!"
"What, you think I don't have feelings?" Rimmer snapped. "You think I don't care that I'm alone in this universe with only you for company?"
"Right, yes, sorry – clearly, you have feelings. You only care about what happens to you. You don't care that over a thousand people died horribly for no reason. You don't care that the human race is dead. You don't care that your family and friends are all gone."
"Of course, I don't!" Rimmer yelled. "I hated them! They hated me! It's no skin off my nose! Why the hell should I care what happened to any of them?!"
Kochanski was just about to give a really clever comeback when she realized what he was implying. "… Wait… You hated your family? They hated you? What…?"
Rimmer realized just what he had said and turned away from her, stalking towards the nearest exit. "I'm going into stasis tomorrow morning, ma'am. See you in three million years," he said coldly.
Kochanski was left in complete silence. So many things had just happened in the last few hours that she couldn't comprehend them all at once. Cursing to herself, she retreated to her quarters to prepare herself. Whatever was going to happen in the future, she would have to wait for it. For now, she was going to be switched off, and now there was a chance Rimmer wouldn't turn her back on out of spite.
During the night, she was awoken to the sound of an alarm claxon going off. She sat with her hologrammtic hair frizzed out in a great big cloud of brunette.
"Emergency. Emergency. There's an emergency going on."
"What's going on?" she called out.
"It's the Navicomp. It can't cope with the influx of data at light speed," Holly's voice explained. "We've got to hook it up to the Drive computer and make a bypass. If we don't, the ship will explode in fifteen point three nine six minutes."
"Smeg…," she cursed, getting out of bed. "What the hell am I supposed to do? I'm a hologram! I can't do that myself!"
"I've already alerted Rimmer. He's on his way."
Kochanski blinked. "You're going to get him to do it? The most inept screw-up in all of time and space?"
"He's our only choice. The Cat doesn't care enough to do anything about it. Now come on. Let's go."
Irritated at having been woken up, Kochanski walked out of her room and walked to the lift that took her to the Navicomp Chamber.
When she got there, she saw Rimmer in his pajamas, bathrobe and slippers, bleary-eyed and carrying a large bypass unit that was strapped to the wall for emergencies, like this one. His eyes were watering from the large amounts of acrid smoke pouring from the melting fizzling wires. Their eyes locked as they stood on opposite sides of the corridor.
Realizing he wasn't about to move, she stormed over to him. "Look, Rimmer, I know this is a frightening situation, and we're not exactly on good terms right now, but we need to sort this out right now, or else the ship will blow. Can we work together?"
Rimmer was still staring at her, but there was no contempt in his watery eyes. In fact, he looked downright embarrassed. "Miss Kochanski…," he said slowly. "You're, uh… out of uniform."
Kochanski's eyes widened as she looked down and saw she was only in a slip that left little to the imagination. "Uniform, Holly – NOW!" she shouted. She flickered momentarily and reemerged in her khaki uniform. "Now let's get in there!" she snapped, pointing into the smoking chamber.
Rimmer looked into the Navicomp Chamber just in time to see a long thick cable break and swing to the floor, spraying sparks everywhere. Swallowing, he knew that hiding under a table wasn't going to solve everything, so he followed her into the room. They crossed the glass-covered floor and found themselves before the main computer.
Following her instructions, Rimmer proceeded to hook up the bypass to the computer. Opening the flap, he found twelve switches with little red lights next to them.
"Start with the one numbered twelve!" Kochanski instructed him. "Leave a one second gap between each switch!"
Rimmer nodded and flicked the twelfth switch. The light turned green.
The screech of the computer raised an octave.
It continued like that all the way through the next few switches. Eleventh, tenth, ninth, eighth, seventh – it all seemed to be going well. He didn't dare look at Kochanski lest she yell at him for doing it wrong. A monitor over his head suddenly exploded and vomited shards of glass down on him, but he shielded himself with his arm and flipped the fifth switch.
The light didn't turn green. It was red.
"Switch it off! Switch it off!" Kochanski shrieked.
Rimmer quickly did so. He waited two seconds, and then he flipped it again. It was green. He proceeded through the rest, listening to the screaming computer become a soprano.
Finally, they were on the last one. Rimmer closed his eyes, put one finger in his ear and flicked the switch with the other.
It was red. Then it was green. Then red. Then green. It stayed green.
The scream of the computer died away.
Rimmer and Kochanski unplugged their fingers. They looked at each other, stunned into silence. It was over. They were okay.
They couldn't help but laugh with relief.