Fic: Made For Action - R/L (imp) - PG

[kahvi.livejournal.com]

Title: Made For Action
Pairing: Rimmer/Lister (implied)
Rating: PG
Disclaimer: To my knowledge, I don't own any fandom at all, nor do I make money from any of them. Pity.
Spoilers: Legion
Notes: Just a quickie with some innuendo-ish implications. Inspired by an aside from roadstergal, the quote blatantly stolen and used here without her permission. I beg forgiveness.



Turning the lights on with the kind of enthusiasm Lister could only guess was due to his not yet having gotten over the novelty of corporeality, Rimmer swirled around, and beamed. "So what did you think?"

Lister shrugged. "Dunno. It's Star Trek. Just like any of the Star Trek shows, you know? It was better than that one with the lady with the scary hair, but not as good as the one with that hot chick with that thing on her nose." He pointed to the bridge of his nose to illustrate. There had been less spandex, and very few hot alien women in this one. Two points heavily in its disfavor, to Lister's mind.

Rimmer snorted. "Women. That's all you ever care about."

"Yeah, well, what else is there?" Lister got up, yawning.

"What..." Rimmer huffed in indignation. "Adventure! Exploration! Brave men going where no other men have gone before!"

Taking the quickest route to the kitchen - Rimmer having refused him to drink more than half a sixpack during the screening - Lister shook his head. "Not my thing."

"I should say not indeed," Rimmer snapped, hot on his heels. He did seem very excited about this, Lister mused. Well, he got excited about the oddest things. Wars, strategy games, haircuts... "I wouldn't expect you for a moment to understand this sort of thing."

"Then why'd ye show it to me?"

"Who else is there? Cat runs away the moment he hears the viewer charging up, and Kryten keeps going on about not having enough heads left to risk." Rimmer leaned heavily against a cabinet, his lip twisting in displeasure. "I dunno," he added, as Lister fished out a can of lager from the fridge and popped it open, "maybe I keep thinking you'll learn something."

The beer gushed soothingly down his throat, and Lister instantly felt much better. "Like what?"

"Like the importance of a good haircut, for example."

Nearly choking on his next mouthfull of lager, Lister spluttered, "haircut?"

"Yes!" There was nothing but earnest seriousness in Rimmer's expression. "Sensibly short hair, practically styled. A good quality side-parting can make or break a military man. They need haircuts made for action."

Clearly, one beer would not be enough to get through this conversation. "Yer not serious."

"All of the great commanders of the past had left parts, miladdio! Look at Captain Archer. The first man to captain a human space ship on an intergalactic mission; obviously a brilliant commander," Rimmer pointed to the side of Lister's head, as if to indicate what wasn't there, "left side parting!"

Swallowing the rest of the can in one go, Lister hugged himself protectively. This was getting a little too weird, even for Rimmer. "Why left?"

"To air out the important part of the brain; the logical, rational, analytical part of it. That's on the left, you know." Rimmer pointed to his own head, which did not, of course, have an actual brain within it. His brain was in what appeared to be his gut, hidden inside the self-contained projection unit that was his light bee. Lister did not think, however, that this was a good time to make that particular point.

"Whatever you say." Lister tried to push past him, but Rimmer stopped him with by planting a palm straight on his chest. This was not good; Rimmer was not usually the touching kind. "Eh?"

Rimmer looked down on him with a look so imploring and helpless that Lister almost felt sick. "Just... stay for another episode, would you?" He blinked, as if trying to draw in oxygen (which he didn't need anyway) in through his eyelids. Realizing he was just a beat short of saying 'please', Lister spared him the agony.

"All right. It wasn't that bad. I quite enjoyed the bit with where the Captain had to share his oxygen with that plummy-mouthed Brit."

Instantly relaxing, Rimmer clicked his tongue in disapproval. "Reed is the only qualified officer that outfit has got! I certainly hope Archer apreciates him."

"Rimmer, they're fictional characters," Lister protested, sneaking out another sixpack in behind his back. Settling back into his seat, he did his best to look bored out of his skull, but as soon as the lights were off, he took a deep pull on his drink to hide his smile.

Comments

[iris-summers.livejournal.com]

Man... And poor Reed's sex life is gone... just like that. ROTFL.

[roadstergal.livejournal.com]

You think he actually had sex with the girls he wanted to write to in Shuttlepod One, or was he just waiting for one of the women in Engineering to get hit on the head with a winch?

[iris-summers.livejournal.com]

Well... I'm not sure either. But man, I'd totally hit that if it was available, so I'm thinking that he *probably* managed to get at least *one* of them. Even if it turned out to be impossibly awkward and messy and he just felt kinda relieved when it was all over. *lol*

[kahvi.livejournal.com]

Are you giving me plot bunnies? You'd better not be giving me plot bunnies; have you seen the height of my WIP pile? ;)

[roadstergal.livejournal.com]

I can help!

Er, I can help make the pile bigger. :) Toss me that Trip/Reed in whatever state you have it in, and I'll work on it...

[kahvi.livejournal.com]

*digs into pile* Oh, the things in here...

[iris-summers.livejournal.com]

Them plot bunnies sure are evil critters. *nods solemnly*

[roadstergal.livejournal.com]

Remember the bit in Future Tense when he talked about all of those "awkward first dates?" I just said - uh-huh, I bet. Of course, I'd hit it, too, but still - I have a sense that you'd leave a first date with Reed thinking, "Why are you dating women?"

[kahvi.livejournal.com]

This, for some reason, made me consider what a date with Rimmer might be like. That wouldn't be the only thing you'd be asking yourself then, I'd bet...

[roadstergal.livejournal.com]

POV of the girl in the back of the car that he refers to in Marooned. Telling the story of the date to a friend of hers later?

"I just got this sense that he'd rather have had sex with the car."

[kahvi.livejournal.com]

"I'm telling ya Doris, 'e was all over it! Undressing it with his eyes, like. Well, I wasn't wearing any knickers or anything; you know, I was looking for a nice time, but we he interested? Was 'e bleeding hell!"

(I just like the idea of the very class concious Rimmer going out with a girl who spoke like that.)

[roadstergal.livejournal.com]

Oh, yes. Because she's all he can get. But he'll try to get her to act classier at the time, and talking about what a marvelous lady she was when he told the story afterwards.

[kahvi.livejournal.com]

Do you remember how old he was? Because this is just getting to be far, far too adorable in my mind.

[roadstergal.livejournal.com]

Older than twelve... ;)

The truth? Not much to tell, really. I've always been a bit of a fish out of water when it comes to women. Never know what to say. I wasn't very highly sexed, to be honest with you. I think it was all that school cabbage I was forced to eat as a boy. Still, the first time ... the first time was this girl I met at Cadet College. Sandra, she was called. We did it in the back of my brother's car.

Early twenties? I assumed he was lying about Cadet College. I can't imagine that was on the way to being a chicken soup technician. Unless he flunked out.

You know that the girl just wasn't as classy as Frank's girlfriends...

[roadstergal.livejournal.com]

I do wonder if Rimmer worries a little bit about Reed's hair. A man's man like that (snort) should have a manlier hairstyle.

Maybe he assumes that's the only reason Reed isn't the captain.

[kahvi.livejournal.com]

Well, he would have had to have gone to Cadet College; otherwise where would he have met Caldecott? *eyes WIP nervously*

For some reason "19" came to my mind and wouldn't let go, so I checked "Better Than Life" - he was 19, according to the book-verse. I like that. Guh. 19 year old Rimmer. Is it wrong for me to find that appealing?

Now I want to make the girl Listerine. For some reason, Rimmer always keeps falling for the wrong type of person...

[(Anonymous)]

While I think it would be awesome if you wrote (and posted) the fic you seem to be developing here, you do know it would be sorta AU, right? You probably know this, but I'm pointing it out because it's such good Rimmer characterization... There was no girl when he was 19. It says, I think in BTL, that he actually lost his virginity at 30 or 31 with McGruder, and invented this mystery woman for his 19-year-old self because he thought it sounded like a more respectable age. So yeah. Big lie, and he focused on the car in a pathetic attempt to hide his sexual ignorance. But like I said, you probably knew that and I'm being silly.

[roadstergal.livejournal.com]

Ja, we know from Thanks For The Memory that he only ever had sex with one woman (McGrueder). It would be perfectly in keeping with canon if he had a date in that car and was more obsessed with the car than the girl, though, and didn't get laid - and I think that's what kahvi was planning on writing.

[kahvi.livejournal.com]

Holy freaky same-time posting, Batman!

[roadstergal.livejournal.com]

Oh dear.

[kahvi.livejournal.com]

Actually, I looked up that passage in BTL for this, and you are slightly incorrect. :)

He lost his virginity to McGruder at 31, yes, but he didn't make up this woman (Sandra, BTL states her name as being). He met this Sandra at Cadet College, and just barely got to first base with her. When Lister asks, Rimmer figures he could exaggerate the encounter and present it as his first time having sex. ;)

[(Anonymous)]

I stand corrected.

[kahvi.livejournal.com]

And my utter RD-geekiness is revealed. I really shouldn't know these things...

[iris-summers.livejournal.com]

Heh. It'd probably be "Why are you even dating at all?" But then he'd do or say something that's just so incredibly woobie-ish, and you'd be all "Oh yeah... that's why." Well... that and I think Chris Barrie is just so utterly shaggable, especially in the first few seasons. XD

[roadstergal.livejournal.com]

We have similar taste in shaggable men.