Blue Midget Launch Bay
"Kill Rimmer?!" Lister gasped. "Hey! He may be a total smeghead -"
"Even I know he is," Holly quipped.
"- but that does not mean I wanna kill 'im! C'mon, Hol," he appealed, "he's a sentient AI, like you! If you have a right to exist, so does he! However annoying he is!"
"I won't argue that," Holly countered mildly. "I can't argue that. Not without being a hypocrite. But he can't exist on any ship where the Space Corps Directives apply."
"Could I hide 'im in me pocket or somethin'? His light bee, I mean?"
"Better make sure it doesn't have a hole in it," she said wryly, remembering the view she'd had (or rather, the view he'd had, since it was before the sex change) of the huge Liquorice Allsort covered in fluff. Or, worse, the tropical rain forest, a.k.a. Lister's armpit. Worst of all, the Killer Gooseberries. "And the penalty for smuggling an illegal hologram is severe...to wit, stasis aboard your registered vessel. In this case, Red Dwarf."
"And if I'm in stasis..." he understood.
"...then everything happens as it's 'supposed' to," Holly nodded. "Leaving aside the fact that there'll suddenly be two of you." The Pauli Exclusion Principle notwithstanding, she thought, knowing as she now did that it applied when it came to time travel.
"No, there won't," he remembered, "not if I get the timing right. I was out a few hours on that day doin' a survey of the far side of Titan, where the Space Corps was gonna build a new colony. Got called into the captain's office when I got back."
"You? A Third Class Technician? A chicken soup machine repairman?" Holly doubted. "What were you doing?"
He looked sheepish. "Repairing Starbug 2's chicken soup machine," he confessed, "it'd been acting up last trip out." He snorted. "I bet it was dispensin' edible chicken soup, an' it was such a shock they thought it was goin' wonky!" Then he sobered. "Better get Blue Midget ready."
"You'll need your spacesuit," Holly pointed out.
"Why?"
She didn't quite roll her eyes. "Think about it, you gooseberry," she chided, "you can't land without permission from then-Holly. If he knows you're there when you're supposed to be - and will be - on Starbug 2, he'll inform the Captain and you'll land in all sorts o' grief, so you'll need to spacewalk to Red Dwarf. Tryin' to do that with no suit will win you the award for Exploded Diagram Of The Human Body à la Jackson Pollock, or Most Stupid Smegger To Die In Space, though you'll be too dead to appreciate it."
Nodding slowly, Lister said, "Nice thinkin', Hol."
"Not just a pretty face," she said smugly, then looked sheepish. "Which I freely admit means more than it used to."
Chuckling, Lister agreed, "Too right."
Science Lab
Same time
"Holly, I want you to engage multitask mode," Rimmer ordered.
"Okay. What?"
"Are you still obliged to obey my orders?"
She looked stern. "Arnold, I cannot go against Lister's order." Wouldn't if I could.
Rimmer held up a placating hand. "Not expecting you to. I mean, can I give you orders?"
She shrugged. "Depends on the order. I can dance a jig if you order me to. I can. -"
He sighed. "Not what I meant," he swallowed the intended insult (it was vital that he not smeg her off) and went on, "Holly. I mean, say I gave you an order to switch me off and then hide my light bee in the pocket of Lister's spacesuit. Could you do it?"
With her enhanced IQ it wasn't difficult to extrapolate from this. Hell, she could've done it before the boost. "You mean, place yourself as a spy aboard Blue Midget, travelling back with him, doubtless to sabotage his efforts. I could - but I won't."
At that Rimmer said very quietly, "Holly, he will, in effect, murder me if he succeeds. I am fighting for my life here. Well, my existence."
"You'll never have existed," she shrugged.
"Memories maketh the man, yes?" he tried.
"I'd accept that as an axiom," she nodded.
"And if you recall, when I smegged up with the Tension Sheet and put things back the way they were, somehow some minor change occurred which meant I never died, true?" She nodded again. "So what if, somehow, he fails but still alters things slightly? Alters them in such a way that I no longer exist? This is my order, Holly: I order you to consider the possibility. Is it possible?"
The AI was silent for 5.8 seconds. Then she sighed. "Yes. It's possible. History is as delicate as it is complex, and we're dealing with chaos theory here. So yes, it might happen."
"Thus surely," he went on, not dwelling on his feeling of triumph, "it would be prudent to have me along as an observer. Just an observer," he lied.
Though she couldn't help but feel there was more to it than that, she could see the logic. "Makes sense. Except McIntyre will already be there. Oh, hold on - a Hard Light hologram uses less CPU time because most of the body's pixels exist continuously, taken care of by very low-profile interrupt-based subroutines, so even the me back then will be able to sustain both."
"Right, then. His suit is in Blue Midget, yes?"
"Mmm-hmm. Well, it will be," she corrected, "he'll need it to board Red Dwarf." As Rimmer had deduced (another feat of mental legerdemain of which he shouldn't have been - and normally wouldn't have been - capable).
"In that case, I want you to place my light bee inside the pocket before he sets off."
"He won't like that," she warned.
"Which is why I don't want you to tell him."
She looked torn. "I should..."
At this point Rimmer could have used an override code; he knew them as well as Lister did, having been present at the time. But if he did, it would be a red flag to Holly and she would warn Lister. So Rimmer did something she found to be completely unexpected, but which he had in fact rehearsed - on the lower cargo deck, where Holly couldn't see him. He looked pleading, and said very quietly, "Please, Holly. It's my life he's risking."
This simple plea moved her far more than it should have. But Rimmer had almost never said 'please' before. So she sighed. "Okay."
A mere nod sufficed. He showed nothing of the utter triumph he felt. Faking sincerity had been more work than it would've taken to move Hollister's fat arse, but it'd been worth it. "Let me know in good time, Holly."
Holly assented.
His argument had taken a great deal of careful thought to construct - not Rimmer's forté, to put it mildly, but he'd found that the prospect of ceasing to exist had concentrated his mind to an unprecedented degree. And by Geldof, it had worked!
Science Lab
"So," the mechanoid said in a low tone, "you're going through with it?"
"Yeah," Lister nodded. "Any objection?"
"Sir," Kryten said slowly, "by rights I must stop you. What you are proposing will mean my being stranded and catering to three ex-women who collectively have less meat on them than a soypro sandwich. Yet I am bound to obey you. For the first time in my life, I...I am...uncertain."
"Kryten, man, d'you think I didn't 'ave second thoughts?" Lister cried. "I know what it means! But for one thing it looks like my best shot at puttin' my life right for once, and for another...once it 'appens," he soothed, "you'll never know things were any different. Things will never have been any different - all the smeg in my life will never 'appen!"
"You're sure?" Kryten inquired uncertainly.
"Holly is," Lister nodded.
So did Holly. "It's true, Kryten. Anyone not at the centre of the change will be affected by the change."
"Holly, you are aware, I trust, that that is pure sophistry," Kryten pointed out.
"Yeah. Still true, though."
"Oh. I see. Well. In that case, sir, I must engage Sheepish Mode." He did. There was no outward change, of course.
"Get outa town, man, you weren't to know," Lister chuckled. "Hey, what's sophistry? Never heard that word before. It's not Esperanto."
Kryten explained.
"Got it," Lister nodded. He did, too, for once.
"Then...sir, all my knowledge of human literature leads me to think that if Lady Luck does exist, she is a...well...the only appropriate phrase is 'a fickle bitch'. Oh - Shame Overload for swearing, sir! Nevertheless...I wish you the very best of luck...Dave."
Lister was touched beyond measure. Kryten never used his first name. He clapped the mechanoid's shoulder. "Cheers, Kryts." Then he winced. "Ow. Shouldn't have done that."
Both smiled.
"Right," Lister said determinedly, "I'm off." He couldn't help quipping, "Smoke me a kipper!"
"With the greatest of respect, sir," Kryten reproved, "Ace Rimmer you are not."
"Near as you're gonna get," Lister grinned jauntily, and went to fetch his spacesuit from his quarters.
Near the Science Lab
"Arnold," Holly said suddenly, "you wanted me to let you know when Lister was setting off?"
"Yes?"
"Volcano day," she said quietly
Right!
Blue Midget Launch Bay
Arriving at the Launch Bay, carrying his suit, Lister was accosted by Rimmer, who raised a hand in a 'Halt' gesture. "Halt, miladdo!"
"Oh, for smeg's sake," Lister groaned. "Rimmer, we have been through this. Move."
Rimmer warned, "Lister, I urge you one final time to consider what you're about to do."
Lister shrugged. "Already have. I'm gonna put my life to rights. Outa my way, smeghead."
The hologram's voice rose. "You're putting an end to me!"
But Lister retaliated with what to him was a brand new word, courtesy of Kryten. "Sophistry, Rimmer. You'll never have existed in the first place, so I won't lose any sleep over it. Move!"
"No!"
"Hol," Lister snapped, "can you override Rimmer and switch him back to his Soft Light form for a couple o' secs?"
Seeing Lister's plan, Rimmer cried, "No! Holly -!"
"Can."
"Do!"
Did.
He walked through Rimmer as if he wasn't there - which, in a sense, he wasn't. His light bee automatically used its collision avoidance system to dart aside, out of his path (though it was still projecting Rimmer as a Soft Light hologram in the same place). Once he'd passed by, it darted back and the Hard Light hologram reformed.
"Git!" Rimmer scowled; he hadn't thought of that (and how the smeg did he know the word 'sophistry'? Actually, what the smeg did it mean?). But he wasn't beaten yet. "Now," he ordered quietly.
Rimmer vanished. His light bee flew up to the ceiling, far ahead of Lister and round a corner, so he wouldn't see it. It made its way to Blue Midget and waited near the ceiling. When Lister arrived, he put the suit down briefly and started Blue Midget's engine, which dutifully fired up. Then he returned to the suit.
(Unseen in the few seconds he took to fire up the engine, the light bee swiftly darted into the open pocket.)
He checked out the suit, noticing the pocket was open. Even a Third Technician like him had been thoroughly drilled in suit safety (by Todhunter, who conscientiously refused to clear anyone if they proved unable to cope with a suit); one thing an astronaut should do, he knew, was to ensure all pockets were closed in case of anything straying out and floating away, possibly out of reach (in fact the early astronauts and cosmonauts could've benefited from such training). True, the pocket was empty, but Lister closed it anyway out of habit.
Which was exactly what Rimmer had counted on.