In Space, no one can hear you cha-cha (Red Dwarf)

[dorydandy]

Finally finished the first part of my story

Phew, that took long. I would've liked to post it sooner, but I've been pushing overtime at work all week

Anyways, I decided to write down a Red Dwarf story that I've been dreaming up for a few weeks now. (Literally. I have a very vivid imagination and I always make up stories before I go to bed. They play in my mind's eye like films. It's very entertaining. The only downside to that is that they're hard to translate into words. But I tried my best and I hope I can give you a sense of what the story is like when I see it. )

I decided to write down this particular story because for one: Red Dwarf X in two weeks! (ohmygodi'msoexcited!!) And because I didn't find a Red Dwarf story in this forum. Also, I recently watched all 8 seasons and Back to Earth in a row, so the characters are quite present in my mind. The only thing I have problems with is coming up with sufficient Rimmer insult-speeches. The ones I dreamt up originally were all crap.

There won't be a hell of a lot of sneezing in this, especially in the beginning, but I hope the story makes up for it. Just see it as icing on top of a chocolate cake

What else? Oh, yeah: English isn't my fist language so bear with me. There are probably a few typos and I have no idea of correct punctuation.

Hope you enjoy the story!

Tell me what you think.

Characters: Lister, Rimmer, Cat, Holly, Kryten

Setting: Between Series 8 and Back To Earth, after Kochansky left

(I wanted Rimmer to be hardlight and didn't want them cruising around in Starbug because that would've meant that Holly couldn't be in it. Also, I like Rimmer's uniform in Back To Earth XD)

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Three million years into deep space, the Jupiter Mining ship Red Dwarf was slowly floating along, on its course set to nowhere in particular.

POP WHACK FLOCK

It's majestic, crimson shape glistened in the light of a million, billion stars that spread their… erm… light across the universe.

POP WHACK FLOCK

White letters the size of appartment blocks adorned the side of the ship, declaring its name prou–

POP WHACK FLOCK

Second Technician Arnold Rimmer, resident Hologram of the Red Dwarf, threw his pencil down on his desk in frustration and snapped his diary shut. You couldn't get one minute's peace on this godforsaken crate. Not one minute without someone doing something mind-numbingly stupid, preferably involving ear-shattering noises and damage to ship's property.

He marched out of the room he usually shared with Lister and stomped along the corridors, following the strange sounds. He ended up in front of the flight deck. Bracing himself, he took a deep breath and barged into the room.

"What in the name of– " POP WHACK "–OW!"

"Smeggin' hell, sorry Rimmer!", came Lister's voice from the other side of the room. Rimmer hadn't even had the time to get a glance around the room before he'd been hit between the eyes by a flying projectile and had been sent hurltling to the floor. "Lister, you weevil-faced baboon!" he groaned, rubbing the sore spot on his forehead.

"Hey, man, take it easy! If you're gonna get a black eye, at least you could carry it off with that tone of blue! You already look like a walkin' bruise", said the Cat, pointing a finger at Rimmer's blue shimmering uniform.

"I'm a hologram, you goit. I don't get bruises."

"See? Nothing to worry about."

Rimmer sat up abruptly to give a retort, but instead pulled a face and rubbed his forehead. "It still smegging hurts!"

"I said I was sorry!" Lister replied in a defensive tone.

"What were you doing here anyway?" Rimmer snapped and got to his feet. There were only the Cat and Lister present in the room. Kryten was probably somewhere out in the ship, broom-spotting or whatever he did in his free time. The floor was covered in a big, wet yellowy puddle of something that smelled of alcohol. Various corks and a few half-emptied champaign bottles were lying around. On second glance he saw that Cat was holding another bottle and Lister was sporting a crowbar. He turned around toward the door, eyes wandering upward to meet with the cooling grill over his head. It was riddled with more corks, which had been jammed between the bars.

Rimmer turned back to his crewmates, with his trademark 'gotcha'-grin plastered all over his face. "You've been playing champaign-baseball again, haven't you?"

Lister grinned. "It's called 'pop-whack-flock' now."

"How original", Rimmer retorted sarcastically. He cocked his head and put his hands behind his back. "However Lister, might I remind you that such behaviour is absulutely intolerable onboard this ship and, as such, will be punished according to…"

Lister groaned. "Here we go again." the Cat and Lister exchanged glances. Lister nodded his head toward the champaign bottle the Cat was holding and got himself into position, crowbar raised over his head. The Feline grinned. They both looked at Rimmer who was already at full speed.

"… Furthermore: According to Space Core Directive 165.14865 B, any games and/or activities related to bottle-popping are prohibited, such as–"

POP WHACK FLOCK

This time, Rimmer was conscious enough to throw himself to the floor before the cork came whizzing by and buried itself in the cooler grill. The two others broke out in howling laughter.

Rimmer scowled at the two of them from the floor where he was lying in a puddle of first-class champagne. Though that fact didn't cheer him up much because it was mostly wet and uncomfortable. A twitch went through his face. Any second now… any second he would blow his top.

"You should've seen your face!" Lister giggled. "This is priceless!"

Rimmer grunted. "Oh, ha ha. Very funny." He got to his feet and pretended to dust himself off, which didn't do anything whatsoever. He was still as wet as before. That was the downside to being solid. "Are you done behaving like two primary school children on amphetamines or do I need to go away and call the teacher?"

The Cat jumped up. "Hell no! We're just getting started!" he shouted and struck a pose.

Lister was leaning on his crowbar again, grinning. "Don't take it personally. We're just having fun." he said, exaggeratedly polite.

"Fun?" Rimmer wrinkled his nose. "You call this fun? This game is idiotic. It's pointless. It's a waste of time. All it does is it makes a smegawful mess of everything and it empties our alcohol storage faster than it would take a horde of Englishmen to drink all the the world's supply of earl grey. I honestly don't understand how you can find pleasure in something so unbeleavibly stupid–"

Rimmer stopped abruptly as he felt an itching sensation flare up in the back of his nose. He'd felt it all morning: a constant, fine tickling, which he could usually make go away by sniffling or pinching the bridge of his nose. Now though, that only made it worse.

Lister noticed the other man's confused expression and asked: "Hey, man, are you all right?"

Rimmer blinked a few times and cautiously nodded. "Yes, I think… I… ah…" he pulled an irritated face as his breath started to hitch. "… I'm… heh… hah… h'kchmmph!" He managed to turn his head off and catch the sneeze in the crook of his elbow.

Lister, startled by Rimmer's action, turned to the Cat and asked: "Since when do holograms sneeze?"

The cat shrugged. "Don't ask me, bud."

They both looked at Rimmer, who was pinching the bridge of his nose again and seemed even more bewildered than they were. He noticed their stares and took the hand away from his face.

"What are you looking at me for? I don't know anything more than you two and I am a hologram", he snapped and added an irritated sniff.

It turned out to be the exact wrong thing to do, as the itching flared up again.

"Oh, no…", he groaned and and turned his back towards his crewmates, as he took a sharp breath. "hheh… heh… hk'h… heh'kchooo!… heh… h'–kngkh." Rimmer groaned, his arm still pressed against his face and commented the last sneeze with a muffled "Ow."

"Bless you", Lister said politely.

Rimmer put his arm down and sniffed again, now clearly unsettled. "What's happening to me?"

"Well if you want to hear my diagnosis, I think you're coming down with a cold", Lister answered smugly, leaning on his crowbar.

"Don't be silly. Have you ever seen a hologram with a cold? I certainly haven't! I mean, I'm composed entirely of light! How would that even work?" Rimmer sniffled again, frowning. He just couldn't seem to get rid of that incessant tickling.

"Maybe your light bee got frozen by my cool!" the Cat remarked and made one of his trademark dance moves, topped off with a pirouette "ooo yeah!"

"Would you mind?" Rimmer snapped, "This isn't about you!"

Suddenly, Lister flicked his fingers and grinned. "I got it! It's a computer virus."

"A… computer virus?" Rimmer didn't seem in the least bit impressed.

"Yeah, sure! You know how viruses can sometimes kind of… change into something else, like what happend with that umm… pig Flu thing in the twenty-first century."

"You mean Swine flu."

"Yeah, whatever. The point is, it came from pigs, didn't it? And then it suddenly went wild and started spreading to humans and killed a million people or something."

Rimmer gingerly pressed a finger against his lips in a thinking pose. "And your point is…?"

"Well, what if a computer virus could do that?"

"Come again?"

"You know, what if a computer virus could become airborne and infect other electronic things like holograms and toasters?"

Rimmer rolled his eyes. He put on one of his most sarcastic smiles and placed his arms behind his back. "Oh brilliant, Lister! Wonderful, Lister! Why didn't I think of that? What a revolutionizing idea! Unfortunately, a teeney-weeney thing slipped your attention: Computer viruses don't work like that! A computer virus is a program. A set of commands on a harddrive. A row of ones and zeros! A sequence of electric signals! Computer viruses don't suddenly sprout wings and decide to f-fly from one dev… device to an… ano… theh…" in mid-rant, Rimmer was overwhelmed by his itching nose again. His face scrunched up in agony, his breath hitching uncontrollably once more and he turned his head off, elbow ready. "gah… this… heh… this is starting to… to annoy me", he managed before he took one last gasp. "hhah… heh'kchmmph!… h'kgxh… h-heh… h'-kngkh."

A dutiful "bless you" came from Lister.

"Gah… too early." Rimmer commented, before he squeezed his eyes shut again, taking a deep breath. "heh… hhheh… h'kgxh-ah… h'kgxh! … hah … h'kheh… hheh… ah… Oh, god…"

"You know, if you keep sneezing that way, your head's gonna explode!" the Cat said, matter-of-factly.

"Oh, smeg off!" Rimmer growled.

"It's true! It's a scientific fact!"

"It isn't s… heh… scientific, nor is it a fact, you overgrown furbal– Ah-h'CKngxxh!"

Cat pointed an accusing finger at him. "See? that one came pretty damn close! I don't know about you, but I don't wanna get covered in a guy's brains. Especially not yours!"

"For the last smegging time: I am made of light! I do not have any organs to splatter!"

"How do you know?"

Rimmer was about to give the Cat a piece of his mind when he noticed Lister's bemused expression. He had watched the whole thing with a grin on his face.

"What are you smiling at?"

Lister shrugged, still grinning. "Oh, nothing."

"Then would you kindly stop looking so smug?"

"Nope."

Suddenly, a low rumble made its way shuddering through the ship and the floor gave an abrupt lurch, throwing all three crew members to the floor. The bottles that littered the floor din't just fall over, they were catapulted into the air and crashed back to the ground, each bursting into a thousand pieces of glittering shards. From one corner of the room, came the bang of an electrical discharge, accompanied by a bright flash, and for a moment the lights flickered.

Just as fast as it had started, the shipquake subsided again.

For a moment, there was no movement. Then, Lister slowly pushed himself up from the floor, hissing as shards cut into the palms of his hand. "Smeggin' hell", he breathed. Then he looked around and asked the room in general: "Anyone hurt?"

"Only the Cat's pride", Rimmer spoke up from somewhere behind a desk on the other side of the room. Sometimes Lister could swear that Rimmer had the ability for short-range teleport.

The cat kneeled on the floor staring down at his spoiled shirt.

Lister got to his feet, inspecting his hands with a frown. "So I'm guessing everyone's all right then?"

"All right?", the Cat cried, "Look at my shirt! You know how difficult it is to get these stains out of this fabric? It's impossible, that's how difficult it is!"

On the other side of the room, Rimmer's head popped up from behind the desk, ready to make a snotty remark. Unfortunately, the only thing he could manage was a loud "Heh-kchooo!" that made his head flick back under the table. "Not again!", he groaned, voice muffled. "heh… heh'kchmmpfh! h'kgxh!… hheh–h'CKngxh!"

"Bless you." Lister said dutifully.

The only reply he got was a groan, followed by a thudding sound and a loud "OW!"

Rimmer's face re-appeared. He pulled an annoyed expression, his mouth mimicking a silent 'o' while he was rubbing the top of his head.

Lister failed in an attempt to hold back his laughter and snorted, earning a poisonous stare from Rimmer, as a monitor switched itself on behind him.

The face of Holly, the ship's computer with an IQ of 6000, appeared on-screen.

"What's happenin' dudes?"

[SapphireSong]

WOW. This is .... Omgosh this is awesome!! I don't know this fandom, but this story's actually got me a little interested in the series now! Seriously, this is very well-done: the plot is fascinating, the sneezes are AWESOME, and I really like your writing style! Also, this is one of my favorite sorts of scenarios, actually - making a character who doesn't ever sneeze get sick

Oh and by the way, your English writing skills are amazing! I wouldn't have even been able to tell it wasn't your first language if you hadn't said so!

Great job! I hope you write more, I can't wait to see what happens!

[ellwren]

Smegging awesome!

You've got the tone and voices spot-on, and you write English like a native speak.

[Ciuty80]

this is WONDERFUL!!!

and welcome here

please more!

[count tiszula]

Wonderful! Not a lot of Dwarffics around, and the programme does have an odd concentration on Lister's sneezes. There are at least three, as I recall. Anyway, this is beautifully written, and Rimmer's rants are spot on!

I fear the blokish atmosphere is inimical to attractive sneezing for me; still there will soon be an alien virus along infecting a feminist passing ship, or a trip to Sneezeworld. Or a reappearance by Lady Frederick Windsor's character.....now that we know her half-sister to be such a gifted sneezer. I can't wait.....

And welcome to the forum.

[TheCakeIsAlive]

it empties our alcohol storage faster than it would take a horde of Englishmen to drink all the the world's supply of earl grey

This line made me smile a lot.

Funny story.

And your English is really rather excellent.