"No!" Lister yelled out in alarm. This wasn't happening. This wasn't smegging happening. Lister grabbed his Rimmer, staring at that not-there shoulder, where blue sparks cascaded prettily towards the ground, singeing the flight-suit. "You fucking bastard!" He tried to pull on Rimmer, wanting him the hell out of here; not thinking, just wanting him safe, whole, not dead.

The alternate Rimmer played with the weapon for a moment, then frowned, hitting it on the side. He pointed it at the pair again.

What the bloody smeg was Lister doing? Didn't he understand simple instructions? Well, obviously not. 'Wait in the cockpit,' had been a simple instruction, hadn't it? Rimmer pulled away, running to tackle his alternate. "I said run, you twonk," he spat. His running was hampered by the searing pain in his shoulder, to the point where it was more a lumber.

Lister froze, torn between actions. He had no weapons, and he wouldn't get back to the ship in time to see if there was anything there. Besides, he didn't trust that computer one bit. He couldn't just stand there and watch Arn get slowly shot to bits by this maniac, but if his hard-light drive was anything like his Rimmer's, Lister wouldn't be able to overpower him easily, either. He watched both men, helplessly.

Rimmer's alternate finally got the little black weapon working again, and removed a lot of one of Rimmer's legs with another blue bolt. Rimmer dropped like a vended Crunchy Bar, his consciousness taking a small holiday.

There was no time to hesitate anymore. There was no time to think. All that existed was action and feeling, as Lister charged at the alternate Rimmer, screaming. The alternate pointed the black thingy at Lister. Nothing happened. He sighed and whacked it again. Lister, crazed with anger, reached to knock it out of his hand. Rimmer's alternate looked on in annoyance as it flew out of his hand and landed in a corner. "Damn it, that was my only gun," he said, his voice peevish. "Stupid smegging Martian tech."

Lister grabbed him and tried to push him up against the wall, spitting as he yelled. "You bastard! You smegging, fucking bastard!" It was like trying to uproot the Eiffel Tower. There was no give at all. It felt nothing like Rimmer's human-feel hard-light drive. Lister kicked at him, tried to bite, tried to hit; tried anything that might hurt. He wanted to hurt him like he'd hurt Arn. He wanted to tear his smegging limbs off and see how he liked it. He wanted to make him hurt like Lister was hurting. He cried in frustration as nothing he did had any effect.

Rimmer's alternate sighed as he watched Lister impotently try to kill him. "So sorry. Did I hurt your boyfriend?" He picked Lister up with one hand, tossing him across the filthy table. Lister looked up at the alternate with the most seething expression possible. How could he have thought he looked like Arn? There was nothing in that face reminding him of his Rimmer.

The alternate Rimmer paid no attention. He walked over to where Rimmer lay on the floor, noting with interest the way his blood disappeared with a faint blue glow as it dribbled off of the raw edges of his blown-off shoulder and leg. He turned Rimmer over, raising an eyebrow as the wig fell off. He looked up at Lister, who had clambered down from the table and was trying to kick. "He's a hologram."

"Sod you, yes!" Lister looked down at Rimmer, worried sick through anger. Was Arn dead? He looked dead. He looked gone. Gone. Lister's mind couldn't process it.

Rimmer's alternate poked at the undamaged skin on Rimmer's face. Rimmer moaned quietly, his eyes still closed. "Not like me..."

"Leave him the hell alone!"

The alternate Rimmer suddenly jumped to his feet and grabbed Lister by the throat, a wild look in his eyes. Lister spluttered. "Does he feel human?" the alternate spat. "Can he feel?"

"He is human!" Lister yelled back, feeling tears in his eyes. "Damn you, he's human!" Why could no Rimmers ever see this?

The alternate Rimmer tossed Lister aside. Lister cried out as he hit the wall, annoyed at the pain which was keeping him from getting to Arn, from doing something.

The alternate Rimmer started to whack the table, hard, over and over. The box danced around on the table with the impacts, scattering its grotty contents to join in the frenzied dance of thud-thud. "Smeg it, that should have been me!!" he screamed, hitting the table again and again.

Lister lay against wall, trying to clear his head. He had to get to Arn. Had to do something. Had to get closer. Ignore the pain. Slowly, too slowly, he managed to drag himself across the floor, turning his head to see the edges of Arn's wounds slowly filling in and drawing together neatly, lines of neon-blue lightning playing across the now unbroken surface. Healing. Arn was healing! Lister cried out in relief, wanting to reach out and cover him with his body. He'd always known he'd need to protect Rimmer from himself, but never quite like this.

Some part of Rimmer heard the noise near his ear, and he raised his head. His eyes would not focus. His arm and leg were screaming agony at him. He dropped his head again, unable to think or move.

"I thought..." Lister panted, tears running down his face.

Rimmer's alternate's tantrum had ebbed, and he walked over, grabbing Lister by the scruff of his neck and hauling him to his feet. "Does he have a light bee?" he shrieked.

Lister gave him a hard look, and said nothing.

"Tell me, you stupid grotty curry-breathed cig-sucking wet ponce..." the alternate Rimmer continued, shaking.

As calmly as possible, considering the circumstances, Lister replied, "No, go on, really insult me." He was not afraid anymore.

The alternate was breathing heavily, his eyes wild, his mouth working. Slowly, some coherence came to his eyes. Lister met his gaze steadily. A slow, evil grin spread over the alternate's face. "I can try to cut it out and see if one's there."

"Right. And if I tell you he's got one, you won't?" After years of bunking with Rimmer, Lister had sarcasm down.

"You tell me, and you don't have to watch."

"If yer gonna do it anyway, why ask me?"

The alternate Rimmer's lip quivered. Madness returned to his eyes, but it seemed, somehow, to be a different flavor; more desperate. Lister tried to see how Rimmer was doing out the corner of his eye, but the alternate pulled him close, filling his vision with this face - which was Rimmer, and yet not. "I need his light bee! You don't know what it's like. I can't feel anything!" Lister was shocked to see that tears were starting to stream down the alternate's face. "I killed Lister... by accident... I didn't know how hard I could hit!" He tightened his grip on Lister's collar. He shifted out of sadness as quickly as he had gone into it. "Cat and Kryten tried to put me down. I put them smegging down." He sounded almost proud.

"You killed them all," Lister said, quietly. He had suspected this for some time, he realized.

"I killed Lister!" the alternate shrieked, the madness quickly flitting through grief to desperation. He shook Lister. "I need that smegging light bee. I need a real body. I need to feel. I feel fucking dead!"

There was no need for anger here. Had he thought this wasn't Arn? It was. The way his eyes had blazed when he'd said he'd killed Lister... Lister met the alternate's gaze through his dizzyness.

"I don't even know how to get my own bee out!" the alternate half-screamed, half-sobbed.

"You didn't mean to do it." It was not a question. It had been an accident. Lister knew how he would feel if he'd killed Arn by accident. It was bad enough thinking he might be dead by someone else's hand. By his own? He wouldn't be as calm and composed as the person now shaking him, that was for sure.

Rimmer's alternate shook him harder. "Of course I didn't smegging mean to do it, you stupid gay smegging bumtard!"

Lister was not handling the shaking well, but all that was left in him was pity. "I'm sorry." He tried to keep eye-contact, tried to keep the alternate occupied. Maybe Arn would recover fast enough to help him.

Rimmer's consciousness was returning in a rather wary fashion. It was not an enjoyable time to be conscious. He was not wholly repaired; large chunks were still missing from his shoulder and leg. But he was together enough for motion, and Lister was probably off somewhere doing something stupid... He staggered to his feet, grabbing his alternate around the throat with his intact elbow.

Seeing Arn up and about this soon gave Lister only a few seconds' worth of joy before giving way to dread and fear of what might happen to him. He could still very well die. The alternate Rimmer let go of Lister, who fell to the ground, landing on his arse.

Rimmer tried to pull the other Rimmer down, but had only moderate success at unbalancing the hologram at all. His hard-light drive was very hard indeed. The alternate sighed in exasperation, then stumbled backwards, making Rimmer the brakes between him and a wall. Rimmer shook with the impact, but seeing Lister sitting there, he did not let go. He couldn't look like a twit in front of Lister, some part of him said. He'd never live it down.

Lister yelled out in alarm, but at pretty much the same instant a thought occurred. The gun! He'd knocked the gun off into... somewhere. There were plenty of dark, grungy corners for it to have rolled into, but where?

Rimmer's alternate slammed Rimmer against the wall a few more times. Rimmer saw stars dancing in sexy constellations, and barely noticed that he let go, falling to a seated position. After a few seconds, his vision cleared enough for him to see his alternate, standing back slightly and sighing. "Can your ship only take you to the freak nancy costume party you came from?" he said, when he saw that Rimmer was looking up at him. Rimmer heard the sounds, but they did not resolve into words. His shoulder and leg were still burning, and the back of his head felt like the gent's toilet at an airport. When Rimmer did not answer, his alternate shrugged. "Well, better there than here." He stepped back and looked around, walking to a chair with an air of resignation and picking it up.

Lister finally found the weapon, off in a particularly nasty corner, where oil and something he did not want to think about were choked with dirt into a sort of noxious sludge. He swore under his breath, and tried to calculate if he could get to it before that psychotic maniac saw him.

Rimmer struggled to stand, but this scummy Starbug was tilting and whirling sickeningly around him, and he could not figure out which way was up. He tried to stagger to his feet, and found himself flopping to the side. He touched the wall and used it to orient himself back to a sitting position, then tried to push himself up with his arms, asking his legs very politely to please get underneath him.

Rimmer's alternate carried the chair over and hit Rimmer solidly on the head with it. Rimmer dropped back to a sitting position, his vision exploding in white sparks.

The alternate bent down, looking intently at Rimmer.

Fast-healing Arn might be, but that had to hurt. Lister tired to tell himself that Arn's brain was in his chest, not his head, but it didn't help. Seeing the not-his-Rimmer leaning down like that, a look of absolutely nothing in his eyes, Lister made his decision, and ran.

Rimmer's alternate poked at Rimmer's cheek, trying to determine if he was unconscious. Rimmer moaned through reflex, his brain inoperative. The alternate Rimmer sighed and picked up the chair again, with the air of a hassled parent delivering well-merited discipline.

Lister pulled the gun out of the pile of whatnot, his hands shaking. Once he was holding it, two features resolved into what he hoped were a trigger and a muzzle. He turned to the psycho, who had raised his chair, presenting a back shot that would be harder to miss than the side of a barn. A back shot. He couldn't, could he? He was crazy, but he was a human being too; scared and lost and... trying to kill Arn. Dammit.

He took it. The bolt took a crater out of the alternate Rimmer's back that sputtered dusky orange sparks. The alternate dropped the chair, turning to Lister. Hardly realizing he was screaming, Lister fired again and again; after the third shot, it jammed, glowing reddish with heat, but Lister didn't notice for a while, clutching at the trigger hoping more shots would go out and finish this. When his hands started protesting he swore and dropped it, trying not to think about what he'd just done.

Rimmer's alternate staggered for a few steps, the one fleshless hole in the back and two in front still spitting dull orange sparks. Lister ran over, pushing him away, and he fell, looking very, very surprised.

Lister bent over Rimmer. Blood was leaking from Rimmer's hair and trickling to the end of his rather impressive nose, where it disappeared in a blue glow as it dripped off the end. Lister did not know what to do with his hands, and ended up running them through his own hair. "Arn..." he said, helplessly. He was a chicken soup technician, too; he knew less about advanced holography than Rimmer did about astronavigation. He couldn't tell dead from alive.

Rimmer's consciousness was dancing in and out, like his head was a loo and it desperately needed to pee. He shook his head, slowly, inviting it back in. His head throbbed, and his shoulder and leg were still in agony. "Whu?" he asked, slurred.

All Lister could do was laugh, and breathe, finally. Arn would be all right, so he was all right. Everything else was tangential.

"Whasho smegging funny?" Rimmer groaned, feeling miffed.

Sensing his irritation, Lister nonetheless found himself unable to resist caressing Rimmer's cheek. Just a light, loving touch, just to see that he really was still there. Something nagged at the back of Lister's mind, though, and he turned around. The other Rimmer as gone. A broken light bee lay on the floor, larger and cruder than Rimmer's. Lister watched it silently, his remorse slowly fading into dullness. Well. That Rimmer had wanted to get away. He'd wanted this to end. And now it had. He'd felt dead. Maybe he had been, and this was just a delayed reaction. Even so - Lister had killed him. And there was his heart, cut out for everyone to see. A life for a life. Was that really so much better than what he had tried to do to Arn? Arn, who also lived inside such a small, metal orb.

Rimmer saw the direction of Lister's look. He pushed himself to his feet, leaning his hands on his thighs while waiting for the angry messages from his injured leg to subside. He limped over to where the light bee lay. Him. Alternate-him.

Rimmer seemed fine already, Lister noted, marveling at his speed of recovery. He stood aside, still absurdly apprehensive about letting Rimmer get close even to the remnants of the person who had tried to kill him.

Rimmer picked the bee up, brusquely, and put it into the pocket that still existed. Half of the jacket was blasted to nothing. He noted that Lister was looking at the bee in his pocket with alarm. No, he thought; I am not going to just leave him here. He's me, Listy; I'm him. Bastards-in-arms. "I think that's what I was supposed to deal with," he muttered.

Lister smiled warmly. "What, before or after he shot and killed you?" He could not make his voice angry or snarky. It was already filled with too much relief that Rimmer did survive.

Oh, smiles and happiness and isn't it great that it all worked out so lovely? Rimmer took a deep breath and started to rant. "You could have died! I'm going to kill you!" He paused. That didn't really work. "Er." Nothing smegging worked around Lister. Caution and reason fell off of him like water off of a greasy poppadum. He would just keep grinning his way through the universe until something killed him. Rimmer turned and stomped lopsidedly down the corridor, wishing both of his legs were in a state for a really good stomp. He limped his way to the ship. Lister followed him, very light on his feet, feeling almost euphoric. They were alive. They were both alive!

"Get in, you meddling space-bum," Rimmer snarled, pointing at the DJ ship's open hatch.

Lister stopped Rimmer, and turned him around, looking into his eyes. He'd acted like a goit, and Rimmer's anger was probably not completely out of order. Still, if he hadn't come along, Rimmer might not have... well. He tried to construct an apology which took into account the fact that he wasn't actually sorry he came along. This proved rather a challenge. "I'm sorry I didn't stay behind. But I'm glad you're alive," he said finally, his eyes glistening.

Anger was a safe emotion, and a number of unsafe ones were swirling around in his head. Rimmer took the anger and embraced it as an ally. "You never will, though, will you. You'll always come along. I could have lost you, you..." Rimmer choked on the words that were coming flooding out. There were more, so many more. He could rant for hours if they would only line up in some sort of order, but they all wanted to pile out at once.

"And I could have lost you! If it was me, what would you do?"

"If I were you? I'd pick my partners better," Rimmer barked.

Lister smiled slightly. There was no one else. Odd how that had come to pass, that all of a sudden he just couldn't imagine being with anyone else.

"Look... get in. Please, once, just once, smegging do what I ask!" Rimmer was yelling, hoping, maybe, that sheer volume would work where nothing else had.

He'd pushed Rimmer too far. Understandable. Lister gave him a steady look, tinted with love. He nodded and got in, clambering back to the cot. Right now he'd do anything Rimmer said, just to make him happy.

Rimmer followed, tight-lipped. Pointless, all of this ranting. Nothing got through to the man. Nothing.

The Computer was disappointed, but not completely surprised, by the return of not-Ace. Lister threw all her equations off. Well, nothing for it but to acquire more data on him, and soldier on. "Ace - are you all right?" she asked, projecting caring and consideration. Relays snapped as he answered her in that not-Ace voice that she so hated. "Fine, computer." He closed the hatch and strapped in. She noted stress in every vital sign and every movement, but could not trace its source. "What was the issue, Ace?" she asked, feeling a simulated emotion that was rare for her - uncertainty.

Rimmer did not answer. He took the controls and lifted the ship out of Starbug very gently and smoothly. His anger was ebbing, and frustration and worry were taking its place. He held onto the anger, desperately, while he took the ship out to Jump range. He knew he would be of no use once it was gone.

Lister's brain felt overloaded, almost pleasantly drunk. He sat on the cot, just enjoying the fact that Rimmer was alive. That was more than enough, for now.

"Just take us back to our other dimension, old girl." The voice cracked and wavered.

Lister sniggered at that voice, which evoked the memory of the first time Rimmer had tried to imitate Ace, back on the old Starbug. He guessed he wasn't the only one whose mind had gone kaput through exhaustion.

The Computer noted the change. Time was running short. "Yes, Ace," she said, in a voice like honey. "I'm so happy you're back, love."

"Transferring controls to you, Computer," Rimmer cracked; the transfer that would untie him from the ship annoyed him with its repetitiveness. He undid the straps that held him into the pilot's chair, and walked back to the cot, sitting next to Lister.

He's alive, thought Lister, following Rimmer with his eyes. He couldn't help staring lovingly at the man, like a teenager with a crush. He must think I look a right git, Lister thought.

Rimmer's mind was filled with static. He tried to tune into some halfway sane frequency, but nothing was coming in. He could not speak. He grabbed Lister, pulling him in tight, uncomfortably so, rocking him.

The embrace was unexpected, but so wanted, so needed. Lister laughed and choked, tearing up. "I thought you were going to die..."

Rimmer pulled back slightly and started kissing Lister desperately, his body shaking. Lister kissed him back, just as desperately, overwhelmed by this display of emotions which rarely even bobbed above the surface of Arn's tightly controlled facade. He drank it up, wanting to savor as much of it as he could before it went away again.

The kissing was bringing on horniness, and Rimmer found that terribly unwelcome. Just as abruptly, he stopped kissing, pulling Lister tight again. "Smeg, I can't do this." When he spoke, his voice was muffled by Lister's hair, but he could not pull away. Was this the only time he would ever feel like he had - any hold on Lister, at all? Any control? When he had the other man grasped too tightly to move? That posed certain practical difficulties.

"I love you," Lister choked into Rimmer's neck. "I just love you. I'm sorry I came after ya, but I couldn't not." He wouldn't understand, Lister knew, but he had to say so nonetheless.

"That's why I can't do this," Rimmer sighed. "I can't ask you to stay behind. I can't bring you with me. It'd kill me if you died because of some goddam Ace adventure. You don't want to be a smegging hologram. I don't want you to be one."

Rimmer pulled back, and Lister just looked at him. "I just... I just couldn't let him kill ya. Hurt ya."

Rimmer dropped his hands, looking down at them. A realization had hit him like a winch. Why he had delayed, why he had talked, why he had given his other self an opening, given him every opening to prove he wasn't utterly nutters. Pushed things to the point where Lister had been forced to kill him. "I thought I could pass it on. Smeg, I wanted to pass it on."

"But..." Lister gave a deep, shuddering sigh, "I don't want to hold you back from this." Oh, but he did, he did, so intensely! He wanted Rimmer back on Starbug, being his nasty old self, bickering with him, loving him, staying with him and not risking his life in some other sodding dimension! But it had to be Rimmer's choice, not his. He wasn't about to make that mistake again.

Rimmer drew himself to sit up straight, casting his mind back to the old Rimmer. Revision timetables. Up the ziggurat. The rational, uncaring man he used to be. "It's not an option, really. I can't stay away. I can't make you do this, either. Ergo, I have to pass it on. QED." He glanced at the silent Computer. He could not imagine that she did not have thoughts on this. Why was she so quiet?

"You can't stay away?" He couldn't read the damned man! He could never be certain. All he could do was love him, and hope something came through in return.

Rimmer looked back down at his hands. "From you," he muttered. Somewhere in the back of his mind, he could feel the man he used to be flare his nostrils and snigger. Oh, yes, for love of Lister. Toenail-biter. Mold-grower. Bum extraordinaire.

"Arn..." Lister said, his heart bursting.

"Don't do that," Rimmer muttered at his hands. "I can't take that."

"Shit, ya think I can?" Lister laughed and cried, caught up in a confusing mix of emotions. He needed sleep, rest... something.

Rimmer frowned, still looking down. He shook himself out of his shredded half-jacket, which was just dangling stupidly. He looked at the pocket before dropping it. Yes, me, a fine mess we get ourselves into, don't we? Every time? "He's me, you know. I... understood him."

Lister nodded. "Must have been hell."

Have been? Still is, you goit! Then Rimmer realized. He was talking about the drive. The smegging drive. "A lot like being soft-light. Maybe he never was." Soft-light made you hyper-aware of your body, or else you would walk through furniture or lean into it, instead of against it, or slowly sink into whatever you were sitting or lying on. You had to enhance your attention to sight to make up for the other lost senses. But that was just a form; you can always adapt to a form. Being Rimmer - that was a beyond-life sentence with no parole.

Lister looked at him. "Being soft-light was like that?" He hardly remembered their short-lived body exchange, although at the time he thought he'd never forget it. It hadn't seemed all that bad.

"Well, you couldn't accidentally kill anyone," Rimmer replied, his mouth a hard line. "Couldn't do sod-all."

"Made of light..." He thought of Rimmer forming when they downloaded him, back after all that time in deep sleep when they were chasing Red Dwarf. The holoship, glittering in the darkness of space. Rimmer's high form, when he'd... Lister stopped thinking.

Rimmer snorted. "It sounds a lot more romantic than it is."

"What, like being Ace, then?" It sounded like a potential joke, but Lister only partly meant it to be one.

Rimmer frowned more deeply. "Like being Ace."

"Approaching Starbug," the Computer announced, her voice slightly clipped.

Rimmer ran his hands through his hair. Spare wigs, spare suits; he had them, but he had utterly no desire to put them on. He felt like a mannequin in a store window, just a form to hang Ace on. He was smegging tired of smegging Ace. "Smeg," he groused.

Lister wrapped his arms around Rimmer protectively. "Hey. It'll be OK."

"Y... es," Rimmer replied, with zero enthusiasm. He was in control of nothing. Not himself, not his alternate selves, not this enigmatic Computer, not this enigmatic man who had burrowed his way into Rimmer's heart, and then commenced to attach a leash to it and jerk it around like a paddle-toy.

Lister's smile slowly widened into a grin. "I won't let it not be OK!"

"Lord knows, I won't be able to stop you..." Rimmer muttered. A thought struck him. Maybe he could get out of one aspect of this craziness. "Maybe it's the middle of the night right now."

"I wouldn't mind going straight to bed," Lister deadpanned. He'd suddenly thought of the one thing he probably needed the most right now.

"I can sneak off to your room and tell everyone they dreamed it in the morning." Rimmer did not take Lister up on the innuendo.

Listed kissed his cheek. "We'll think of something." He was positive they would.

"Are we going to orbit all evening?" asked the Computer, sweetly, as if it were a completely reasonable plan of action.

"Think fast," Rimmer said to Lister.

"Well, what time is it there?" Lister directed this question to no one in particular, but the Computer seemed to think he was addressing her. He was fine with that.

"Communicating with ship's computer," the Computer announced. "Half-past two in the morning."

"Even Kryters will be re-charging then," Lister said enthusiastically, turning to Rimmer. Wasn't going half-bad, this!

"Yippe." Rimmer sat in the pilot's chair, strapping in. Lister shook his head and chuckled. Rimmer did not even try to put on Ace's voice as he said, "Transferring to manual," and landed the ship. Something else had been added to his To Worry About list. The Computer had spoken to Lister. She never spoke to anyone other than him. Even when nubile young things had asked for the time, he had always had to repeat the question for the Computer himself. But she had spoken to Lister. Rimmer landed with an ungentle thump.

"Yeees - home safe!" Lister yipped.

Rimmer popped the hatch, not as thrilled. He unstrapped himself and started to clamber out. He stopped, halfway, closed his eyes, and put on the Ace voice. "'Night, Computer!" he said as he left. Lister followed, gingerly, and said, as an afterthought, "Yeah, night and tha'," meaning nothing but the very words he said. It might be a bit love-struck, but there was probably nothing seriously wrong with it. The Computer, silent after Rimmer's greeting, hummed gently at him. He shrugged and closed the hatch, then followed Rimmer out of the docking bay.

Rimmer trotted to Lister's room, nervously. He did not want to meet anyone and answer any questions, at all.

Nervousness was one of the things you could easily read on Rimmer, if only because it so often manifested itself. For some reason, Lister felt oddly turned on by it; it was just so very Arn. Rimmer dashed inside the room, sighing the sigh of the relieved. Lister followed, looking Rimmer up and down. He wanted to consume the man; it was a desire fueled by something other than just physical attraction. He needed Arn. It was strange to finally understand what that meant.

Rimmer looked down to match Lister's eyeline, noting his shredded and charred uniform. He started to pick off the tatters of shirt that dangled on him, tossing them in the waste bin.

Lister gave an ingenuous smile. "Need some help with that?"

Lister's smile was, as ever, contagious, and Rimmer, despite his nerves and anger and annoyance, found his own mouth straightening and preparing to move upwards. But the light showed a darker print on Lister's dark neck, and his mouth dropped back down again. He started to yank at Lister's collar, looking at the skin underneath.

"What?"

"Did he... I... hurt you?" Rimmer asked, feeling the anger surging back in him.

"Wha.. No! I mean... Yes, but... I'm fine!" What on Earth did that have to do with anything?

Rimmer saw that the bruises were, indeed, quite superficial. He dropped his hands and stepped back, feeling the energy sap out of him along with the anger.

Lister took off his jacket and overall tops and opened his long johns, as if to illustrate. "See!" He wasn't really aware of the implications of what he was doing until he stood there, well on the way to being undressed, with Rimmer's eyes on him.

Rimmer looked at the neck and chest that were exposed by this. Horniness started to return, and it mixed with the anger and frustration still simmering in him to make a bilious stew. He walked back to the bunk and sat down on it, letting it all flow through him. "I need a better view," he said, quietly.

All right, Lister thought, shrugging his arms out of his long johns. A grin was now permanently etched onto his face, but all in all this made him feel rather silly. He was not used to being on display, or rather, being aware of being on display. This was all so... deliberate. He was a man of impulses, not careful consideration and planning. And the way Rimmer was looking at him...

Rimmer stretched his legs out and crossed them. He steepled his forefingers, resting his chin on them, and noted Lister's nervousness. Lister? Nervous? This demanded investigation.

There was another aspect of this, and it haunted Lister's mind as he undid his belt. Rimmer had always made it pretty clear he didn't find Lister physically attractive, and while that was fine when all they'd wanted to do was drag each other through the mud and induce as much irritation as possible, it was a different story now. At least, Lister noted, with some satisfaction, Rimmer could not call him fat. With the belt gone, his long johns and overalls sagged a little. He had not been eating well these last few months; if anything, he was a little too much on the skinny side for his type.

Rimmer frowned slightly. He had not truly looked at Lister since his return. The bum was skinny. Nervous, clean, and skinny? Was the universe about to end? "You need to eat less sloppily. It looks like you've been missing your mouth."

There was a strange note in Rimmer's voice, but by now, anticipation had pushed any hesitance firmly away, and was urging lust to come back into the driver's seat. Lister pulled the bottoms of both garments down at the same time, exposing muscle tone him that wasn't there back when he used to bunk with Rimmer. His boxers bravely tried to keep from bursting as he stepped out of his boots and garments in two practiced steps. He rarely wasted time getting out of his clothes, whenever he had to.

Rimmer raised his eyebrows at that. He leaned forward, trying to conceal the beginnings of an erection that his ripped and burnt trousers were in no state to cover.

Lister took a few steps forward, resting his hands on his hips. Maybe I'm not too shabby, at that, he thought. "Better?"

Rimmer grabbed Lister by the waistband, pulling him gently, wondering if he would come, go, or disappear entirely. He could not predict, anymore. He felt stupidly thrilled when Lister moved towards him. "Better."

Lister moaned and shivered as the breath from that word hit where it counted. Oh god, yes; touch, closeness! Hands, back on him; he might need to get them permanently attached to his body, because any moment with them not there was going to be nothing but agony.

Rimmer was amazed that the man was still there. Words were nothing; no protestation Lister could give could match the finality of him simply being there. Rimmer nuzzled his boxers gently, running his hands all over Lister's legs, feeling the muscle and skin.

Lister leaned against the bunk on the top, and Rimmer's touch on the bottom, useless for anything but absorbing sensory impressions.

Their prior sex acts had been frantic, hurried, a desperate need to grasp Lister, lie atop him, hold him down. Rimmer made himself slow, not grab and hold and try to overwhelm. He had eaten too quickly before; he would savor this meal. If it disappeared at the stroke of some interdimensional midnight, or turned into a pumpkin, so be it. He felt Lister with his hands, up and down his legs, taking deep breaths so that he could blow them into Lister's boxers. He made himself smell the musk of sweat and crotch and cigarette; it was not a smell he would tolerate in any other context, but here, it was right.

Those hands... on him... Lister sighed. He made noises he didn't even understand himself.

Rimmer kicked off his boots, reached up, and pulled gently on the small of Lister's back, still nuzzling.

Lister's knees were weak. He was off in some other place where gorgeous people were doing amazing things to his groin. Wait - that was here.

Rimmer swung his legs so that he was lying face-up on the bunk, still pulling Lister, feeling incredibly awkward. Fortunately, Lister followed his pull. Rimmer tried to make this end up with Lister on top of him, and miraculously, it did. Lister came to rest on top of Rimmer, kissing him ferociously.

So much for savoring. The ferocity brought out something very basic in him, and he moved from slow to frantic, kissing, feeling, rubbing his erection against Lister's thigh. He grabbed Lister's buttocks, pulling him in hard.

Lister cried out as he ran his hands from Rimmer's shoulders to his sides and back up again, pressing up against Rimmer, thrusting against him; wanting, more than anything to just get closer.

Rimmer found himself already approaching orgasm as he rubbed and kissed. He paused to mutter in Lister's ear, "Hell... can never do this slowly... just.. often."

Now there was an idea. A wicked grin came to Lister's face. "Slow, eh?" He started licking Rimmer's lips very, very slowly. "I can do slow..." He could, at that. Slow, fast, double speed, on his head; anything. Anything.

"Thashnotnice," Rimmer tried to say around Lister's tongue, rubbing the other man's back firmly.

"Really?" Lister asked, licking Rimmer's chin, taking his time doing so. It took quite some time for him to move down to the neck, which, at first, he just breathed on carefully. Then, with the greatest care, Lister began to lick it all the way up and down with slow, deliberate lashes of his tongue.

It was firmer than a tickle, and twice as bad. Rimmer moaned, a drawn-out moan, with a whimper at the end.

"After all..." Lister mumbled, between licks, "I've been bad today. Have to make up for it... somehow."

They agreed on something. "Yes. Yes. Yes, you have. Yes." What were they talking about? Rimmer ground against Lister, who responded by going even slower.

After a while - which, to Rimmer, seemed very long indeed - Lister reached Rimmer's chest, his hands resting somewhere just above Rimmer's buttocks. He knew exactly where they were, and he could feel Rimmer twisting, consciously or unconsciously trying to force them further down, but Lister pressed them hard against Rimmer's lower back and sides, refusing to move.

Rimmer stroked Lister's hair, trying to remember exactly why he was upset with the man. It was important. Very important.

Lister licked across Rimmer's chest, moving down towards his stomach, his speed somewhat increased now. He paused abruptly as something got caught in his teeth; it was one of the tattered remains of the flight-suit. He laughed hoarsely as he threw it away.

Rimmer noted the gold shred fluttering away. "Oops."

The sound went straight through Lister's ear and out the other side, because he had just realized he was now hovering near Rimmer's erection. Oh, the possibilities. He rose up just a little, looking down, licking his lips, enjoying the anticipation. Rimmer watched, bracing himself as Lister moved down just a little, and licked the tip of the head, very quickly.

Rimmer sighed and leaned his head back, frustrated, as Lister did so again. And again. And again. He stayed a little longer each time, licking a little more elaborately. Finally, he grabbed the base of the penis with one hand, and grabbed Rimmer's buttock with the other. Wetting his lips, he placed both of them on the top of the head, and started moving up and down.

"Dave," Rimmer said, stroking his hair.

Lister licked around the base of the head, coming up for air for a moment. "I'm sorry," he said, ducking down again, then came back up for, "I scared ya back there." He couldn't stay away for long, going straight back down there the moment the words left his mouth. He didn't want words in there; they took up precious room.

"If this is your form of apology," Rimmer wheezed, "I'm in a difficult spot." Lister certainly had reason enough to apologize, reasons Rimmer did not care to see replicated. But this form of apology was almost worth it.

Lister removed his hand from the base of the erection, swallowing it whole, relishing the feel of Rimmer's cock inside his mouth, trembling, stiff - a part of the man he loved. "Smeg!" Rimmer barked, grasping Lister's hair, hard. Lister moved all of the way up, licking the head again. Rimmer shivered as he tried not to thrust back in; he knew the dangers of thrusting when the fellater was not expecting it, in the form of a brunette from Falathan with rather solid teeth. That was not a mistake that you made twice.

But Lister wanted Rimmer to thrust. He swallowed the erection again, pulling on Rimmer's buttocks, forcing his member further into his mouth, licking it as it moved inside.

Rimmer did so, and as he expected, came with a strangled gasp.

Lister did not choke now, as the rapid climax was expected. Instead, he gave Rimmer's penis a few experimental licks, as the other man's gasps and pants brought him through the final spasms. Tuning into them, feeling almost like they were his own, Lister kept licking, his own erection forgotten.

"Listy," Rimmer sighed, as he became erect again.

Delirious, Lister grinned more widely than ever. "God, I love that."

"You have a way of making me feel like one of those malfunctioning vending machines that gives two bags of crisps when you've only paid for one," Rimmer groused.

"I love those," Lister mumbled through his licks.

"Not carnally, I hope!" Rimmer rubbed Lister's face, ears, hair, neck, all gently.

"I could," Lister licked slowly around the base of the head, "do this," up and across it, tasting the remnants of come, "all night."

"I think you could," Rimmer replied, faintly.

The rather intrusive pain Lister's groin belied his words. He tried to pretend it wasn't there, but his body did not work that way. He ground against Rimmer's leg, trying to go slowly, but his penis had a mind of its own, and damn well wanted to have its say.

Rimmer felt the grinding, and wrapped the non-humped leg around Lister, stroking his back up and down with it.

Lister cried out from the combination of lust, stimulation, and sensory input. His licks grew erratic. He felt like he was losing control.

Rimmer pulled gently on the head of Lister's that, he assumed, was not doing the thinking at this point. The one with the braids. Lister gasped, following the pull, and Rimmer kissed him deeply when he was in range, wrapping one hand around Lister's penis, the other around the back of his neck.

The kiss that was returned to Rimmer was laden with surprising tenderness. Lister gasped into Rimmer's mouth as his penis was touched, finally. "Oh... Yes..."

Rimmer stroked him firmly but gently, pushing the foreskin back, running his index finger through the precome to lube it as he stroked the head. He palmed it firmly as he did so, running his thumb up and down the underside of the shaft.

"Hands like... angels..." Lister rambled, incoherent.

"You are so sappy sometimes..." Rimmer grumbled into Lister's mouth, licking his lips.

Lister panted heavily, thrusting into Rimmer's hand. "Tr...th..."

Rimmer stroked him more firmly, more rapidly, opening his mouth wider to kiss him more deeply. He ran his hand from the back of Lister's neck down to the small of his back and back up again, stroking to match the strokes on Lister's penis.

Lister was overcome, and teetered on the brink of climax for a moment before plunging over, choking on "Arn.." as he came.

Rimmer felt orgasm shudder through Lister, and was overcome with possessiveness, "My Dave," he mumbled into Lister's mouth.

"Yes..."

Rimmer pulled at his back tightly, still stroking his cock. "My Dave..." he croaked. His Dave. His smegging Dave. Nobody else's. Nobody's.

"Yes..." Lister repeated, quietly, tearing up.

Rimmer kissed him deeply, hard.

"Don't die," Lister whispered, in a voice that was at once pleading and forlorn. "Not for a long, long time."

"Er... I'll try not to do it again," Rimmer mumbled, startled by this turn of conversation.

"Please."

Him? He wasn't the one to worry about! "Don't do it the first time. It's no fun."

"Holiday. Germans." Lister mumbled.

"A whole pack of German tourists. I kid you not," Rimmer replied, thinking about dying. "The sunburt kind."

"Try not to," Lister said, pressing against him.

"Good." Rimmer closed his eyes, letting his own erection subside, holding Lister with one hand on the small of his back and one on his buttock.

Through the post-coital fog, something clicked. He wasn't being himself at all, Lister's conscience chided him. This was a job left unfinished. "If... need me... I'm... you can... whatever," he mumbled.

Rimmer patted him somewhat awkwardly. What was he going to do? Snore Rimmer to orgasm? "Go to sleep."

"Sleep... Good."

"Yes."

But Lister couldn't sleep. Not yet. Rimmer felt the tension, and started to stroke his back, feeling somewhat awkward. Lister tried to gain control of his voice, struggling, for a number of reasons, to get out what was preying on his mind. "I know yuh must've... lots of girls."

Oh, was this bothering Lister? Like Lister hadn't had his own share of women. "Do you want to compare notes?" he asked, sharply.

Lister shook his head drunkenly. "Just... hope... enough for you. J's me."

Rimmer sighed. What a concept. "Lister, you are far too much for any one halfway sane hologram."

Lister finally relaxed at this. "Gfhnfg..." he half-snored.

Rimmer let his hands rest. He had learned to go to sleep with Lister snoring in a bunk above like a pack of very sick hippos. He wondered if he could learn to sleep with that same sound right next to his ear. He gave it a try.

Lister snuggled closer in his sleep.


The Computer activated her connection to Starbug's security cameras, and watched Kryten unplug himself from his recharge socket. She did not like the idea of putting something so necessary in the hands of the sanitation droid, but at the moment, he was mobile and she was not. In any case, it was a can't-lose proposition for her. If he succeeded, well and good. If he did not, she had an alternate plan.

"Kryten..." she said, softly.

Kryten looked around, startled, pausing in his re-wrapping of the recharge cable. He finally turned to face the speaker. "Yes, Miss Computer, ma'am?"

"I need your help, Kryten. My plan did not work as I hoped. The alternate Arnold Rimmer did not wish to become Ace. I can find another - there are an infinite number, after all - but I fear that this one might become too attached before I can take him out to recruit another replacement."

Kryten's eyes widened in shock as the implications filtered through his processors. "He'll take Mister Lister with him! I'll be all alone again!" He was almost sobbing. He started to re-wrap the recharge cable, matching fold-lengths exactly.

"It doesn't need to be that way, Kryten. But that's why I need your help," the Computer replied, balancing urgency and reassurance in her tone. "Just make Ace... uncomfortable with Lister. Make him more eager to leave. If Ace does not become attached, and I take him to recruit his successor, both of our purposes are served."

"Of course. A superlative idea, ma'am," replied Kryten, tying the recharge cable into an immaculate double bow. "I'll think of something..."

"I have an idea or two already, Kryten," purred the Computer. "Let me know what you think..."


For some reason Kristine did want to think about all that much - living with this gang had made her rather prone to migraine headaches - this Starbug was much larger than the one in the Red Dwarf in her dimension had been. Halfway down the ridiculously long corridor she was in, she paused for a moment, reviewing that sentence. She sighed. Even her mental grammar was slipping. She'd been here too long.

Increased size or not, the ship was not exactly swarming with resources. The main difference between this and the standard model was the cargo holds; they were enormous on this Starbug, which would have come in handy if they'd only had something to store in there. Beyond that, there was a decently equipped medi-bay, a very basic personnel quarter section - very very basic, if anyone would care to ask her, which they wouldn't, because the designers were all dead anyway - a small AR suite, the cockpit, a kitchen area, some sort of pathetic lounge-type arrangement in the mid-section, and tons and tons of these bloody corridors! Frankly, she had no idea where to begin looking for what she needed to find.

Something had clicked in her mind the moment she'd seen the ceiling. No one whitewashes spaceship ceilings, she'd thought, so why did the idea seem so oddly familiar to her? Finally, she'd remembered; some article she'd read in cyber-school about early model CRAP prototypes. Some of the models, particularly the ones intended for domestic use, it had stated, could suffer from a very specialized form of computer senility dubbed "droid rage". She remembered she'd thought the name to be rather misleading, as it was clearly more of a mania than a rage. Certain CRAP brains would, under stress, develop attachments to specific members of the laboratory staff. This infatuation eventually gave way to jealousy, and finally homicidal mania at any attempt to separate them from their object of affection. Because violent and harmful behavior towards humans went directly against their programming, the CRAP-brains would try to compensate by over-focusing on their primary task. Auto-chefs would produce seven-course meals for every meal, five or six times a day; mining-bots would run white-hot drilling themselves into disrepair; and sanitation mechanoids... would whitewash ceilings.

The article had been somewhat unclear on details, partly because it had suffered through the merciless censorship of her school computer - it was a cyber-school, after all. It did not do to suggest to the students that they might wake up one morning tied to their bed by their virtual geography professor. Nevertheless, it couldn't be a coincidence. She had to know. Had to be certain.

The corridor finally ended in a small-ish closet type space, where several empty crates of a nondescript nature had been stashed by someone - who, she had no idea. But back on her Starbug, it had been around this area that Kryten had kept his spare parts, in a disused locker. If she could find it, with any luck his manual would be in there. She scanned the doors on either side, looking for clues. There were precious few, and she sighed, at precisely the same moment that an insistent scent of pine hit her square in the nose. She did not have time to turn around before the syringe-gun shot into her neck, and the blasted corridor blurred into obscurity. She never thought she'd be upset to see it go.


The gun was hot in his hands, but Lister kept holding it, kept firing, and it didn't jam, it didn't stop. He kept firing into that Day-glo orange back, into the Rimmer who wasn't his, kept firing, orange sparks flying, until there was nothing left except a charred, sparking mess, which somehow kept on moving.

And he ran, because Arn was there, on the ground, behind that reddish-yellow monster, who was also Arn, but not his - there had to be a difference. And then he was looking into Arn's face, but it wasn't there; there was only blood and broken bones, and light blue embers, dying. They were dying because Arn was dead, he knew. Arn was dead, and soon he would be just a small, sad, cold, metal ball on the floor, for someone to pick up and put in their pocket.

Lister tried to put the light-bee in his pocket, but he didn't know which one was Arn. Because Arn was dead, he was lying there on the floor, and in his pocket, at the same time; cold, dead - orange and blue sparks mixing, and suddenly there was a face in front of him, eyes too brown, face too sad, telling him Arn was going to die and he could watch, he could watch!

And then there was the knife, cutting into Arn's flesh that wasn't flesh, but blood was coming out; blood, and he was human, sod you, he was human, and he was dying, and Lister had killed, oh God, he had killed, and the walls were closing in; someone had shut the light off, and he was lying somewhere that was...

...Warm. Warm and safe, smelling of ghastly after-shave.

Lister blinked at the metal mesh of the bunk above him, just feeling Rimmer's arm around him, allowing normality and real life to resolve around him. He breathed. This seemed to help, too.

The red glow of the alarm-clock blinked 04:00 in a slow, heart-beat like pulse which was supposed to be soothing, but was, in actual fact, intensely annoying, and couldn't be turned off. Far too early, but the images still imprinted on the back of his eyelids did not invite going to sleep again just yet. Part of him wanted to wake Rimmer, but then again, the idea of waking Rimmer in order to get emotional support was probably not a good one. The man had plenty of emotions, just not a lot of support. Not enough for himself, let alone anyone else.

As bodies tended to do, Lister's had decided to take stock of its wants and needs, seeing as how it was clearly going to be awake for a while. It was not a long list, but it was there, and chief among the items on it was thirst. The kind of deep-seated thirst that comes from having drunk only alcohol all day, which, Lister realized, he had done. Years of this kind of behavior had made him more or less immune to dehydration headaches, but the thirst was nonetheless of the kind that should not be ignored. Experience from those same years had taught him that.

Sneaking out of bed with Rimmer holding him like that, seeming comfortable for once, was dissatisfying, to say the least, but he couldn't ignore his body. That, he realized, sighing, as he slithered beneath Rimmer's arm and tried to leap across the rest of his body without actually touching him, was more or less the story of his life. Impulse was followed by action. Simple as breathing.

The corridor felt cold and empty, and Lister realized he'd never been out there this late. Or rather, he hadn't been out here this late all alone and sober. Not both at the same time. It was not a comfortable feeling, and he found himself skulking forward, casting cautious glances from side to side. It was silly; what could happen?

Chuckling slightly to himself, he took the right turn necessary to reach the mid-section, and never noticed the hand reaching out to grab him from behind until the cold metal of a syringe-gun muzzle pressed against his neck. There was an odd sort of smell he almost remembered before consciousness gave up completely.