[identity profile] kahvi.livejournal.com posting in [community profile] reddwarfslash
Title: Let The Dice Fall Where They May
Part: 1/2
Pairing: Rimmer/male, Rimmer/Lister (implied)
Rating: PG, for this part.
Disclaimer: I don't own Red Dwarf, and I don't make money from this.
Spoilers: Back In The Red.
Notes: This is getting quite long, so I've decided to post it in parts. Poke me with a spoon if I take too long in getting the next bit up. Written for [livejournal.com profile] fanfic100 challenge - my table is here.




“Anyway,” Rimmer said, lengthening his stride to keep up with Lister, who was nearly running to avoid him now, “he threw a three and a two, which meant that I was ahead again! And then I threw another double six followed by a double four and a double five. Can you believe it?” When Lister didn't reply, Rimmer sped up a little, poking Lister quite painfully in the shoulder. “I said, can you believe it?”

“Ouch! What'cha do that for?”

Rimmer looked vaguely offended. “Well, you didn't say anything. I just wanted to make certain you were paying attention.”

Lister rubbed his shoulder, slowing down. It was useless. Rimmer was in better shape than him anyway, at least as far as stamina went. He couldn't out-run him, and he certainly couldn't walk faster than those long, skinny legs. As if having Rimmer around again wasn't odd enough in itself, seeing him back to the way he was before the accident was enough to impose a near constant headache on Lister. It wasn't just mentally, not just personality-wise; it was physical too. Rimmer had never admitted to it, but he'd aged, even as a hologram. Lister had asked Holly about it, and she'd said it was a JMC regulation designed, among other things, to make holograms blend in more easily with the rest of the crew. “I heard. I just don't care.”

It wasn't just aging either. Lister wasn't sure if Rimmer had been aware of it, but his body had changed from those silly exercises he kept doing, slowly transforming him from the reed-like, pasty creature that was currently chasing Lister, to something rather more... well, no matter. The point was, he wasn't the same. Not at all. “What do you mean, you don't care?” Rimmer yelled, even though he was painfully close to Lister's ear.

“I mean I don't care, Rimmer! Why is that so smegging hard to understand? I didn't care the first time you told me that story, and if possible, I care even less now!”

Rimmer frowned. “What do you mean, the first time? I've never told you this before!”

Finally, the mess-hall came into view, and Lister dared to breathe a tentative sigh of relief. At least food would end the pointless flood of words from the smeghead's mouth. “Yeah, you have. The other you, I mean. I know all about it.”

There was a line, as usual, in front of the dispenser machines, and the two of them quickly fell into it. “Really?” said Rimmer, looking intolerably smug. “Is that true?”

“Yeah.” The everpresent yeast-like smell from the machines quickly made Lister lose all interest in food, but what else was there to do?

“I don't believe you. You're just saying that so you can get out of hearing the rest of it, aren't you?”

Lister sighed. “No.”

“Well, I'm sure you can tell me how it ended then.” Rimmer picked up a tray, and placed into a free machine. There was a glop-like sound, and something quite accurately glopped onto it. Rimmer withdrew the tray with a look of disgust.

“What?” Lister picked up a tray. “Of course I can't!”

“Hah! Then how can you possibly claim to have heard it before?”

“Rimmer,” Lister said with exasperation, withdrawing his glopped-on tray, “I said I'd heard it, not that I'd enjoyed hearing it. In one ear, out the other. I mean,” he maneuvered his way across the room to a moderately unoccupied table, “it's not sane, remembering things like that, man.” He sat down, looking miserably at his tray.

“Well,” Rimmer admitted, sitting down opposite him, “I don't have everything memorized. I get a little help from...”

“From yer RISK log-book. Yeah, I know. That doesn't really help, you know.” Lister poked at the so-called 'food' he had been provided with, until he caught the attention of the rather large looking man to his left.

“Are you gonna eat that?” the man grumbled. When Lister shrugged noncommittally, the tray was grabbed swiftly, and its contents consumed in an instant.

Rimmer, who had taken a bite out of his own food, seemed to regret it. “You know,” he sighed, “it's no use talking to you about this sort of thing. I don't know why I bother really.”

“Neither do I,” Lister mumbled.

“You know what hate the most about this sodding place?” Rimmer gestured with his fork. “That on top of everything else, I'm missing out on my weekly Love Celibacy group meetings.”

Lister rolled his eyes. “What, that bunch of twonkers? Yer not serious.”

“Call them what you like, Listy. They're above that sort of thing. They're intellectuals. A group of men dedicated to the pursuit of true happiness; a lifestyle entirely unhampered by so-called 'love'.” Rimmer grimaced a little at the word, as though it tasted like the food he was trying to consume.

“Yeah?” Lister crossed his arms over his chest, feeling a little crowded on the narrow bench. “Well, they wouldn't have you now anyway, would they? The way you was carrying on with all those women after guzzling that sexual magnetism virus – couldn't have escaped their attention, that.”

Rimmer sniffed haughtily. “They're love celibates, Lister. They're not denying that people have sexual urges that needs to be met. They just acknowledge the fact that sex has absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with any sort of vaguely defined emotion that women use as an excuse either not to have sex with us, or have us shower them with pointless gifts and attention before allowing us access to sex.”

Lister was about to reply when the man who had just finished devouring his food turned towards them, his massive head briefly obscuring the overhead lights. “Oi,” he grumbled, “did I just 'ear you talkin' about the Love Celibates?”

Swallowing, Rimmer seemed to consider his options. The room was too crowded for him to flee, which was the main reason, Lister guessed, that he nodded instead, squeaking a short “Yes.”

The man broke into a smile. Lister was pretty certain teeth weren't supposed to be that color. “It's good that, innit? Me and my mate Drongo go every Thursday. Ain't that right, Drongo?” There came an affirmative grunt from somewhere further down the bench. Lister wasn't sure he wanted to look.

Apparently sufficiently excited by this information to forget who he was talking to, Rimmer leaned across the table eagerly. “You mean there's a chapter here on Floor 13?”

“'Course there is!” The man shifted his grip on his fork, as if to demonstrate its potential alternative uses. “You calling me a liar?”

“Erm...” Very, very slowly, Rimmer leaned the other way again, trying to squirm up against the back his seat didn't have. “Of course not,” he forced out, along with one of his most insincere smiles. For several ominous moments, only the careful chewing sounds of people trying very hard to mind their own business could be heard. Then Rimmer cleared his throat, and said, as though to no one in particular, “so, Thursdays, then?”



Lister would have been surprised to hear it, but Rimmer did in fact have a voice of reason. Right now, it was eying the view in front of him with some disdain, and pointing out that the reason the Love Celibates were apparently so popular on Floor 13 was that nobody could get a date anyway, so anyone preaching that this was a good thing were bound to get some attention. After all, if you can't have something, it's much better to pretend you didn't want it in the first place. Rimmer rolled his eyes and shushed it, with irritation. What did it know?

Attendance certainly was impressive. Rimmer had been slightly disappointed to find that none of his friends from the regular chapter were here, but on reflection he realized that there was obviously no way they could have been. They were walking around free and happy, able to enjoy their love-free lifestyles without restraint. Meanwhile, here he was, involuntarily pressed up against a man with so many facial piercings Rimmer was surprised he didn't hurt himself just smiling. Maybe he liked that? Maybe that was why he was smiling? With a sigh, Rimmer looked around half-heartedly for a chair. He didn't have much hope of finding one, as almost every inch of the tiny room in which they were gathered was occupied by the various very large and intimidating parts of very large and intimidating people. The only exception to this norm as far as Rimmer could see was a thin, pale and rather nervous-looking man who kept looking at him. Rimmer spent a full minute trying to stare him down, until he realized he was looking at his own reflection in a grubby mirror.

“All right then,” a gruff voice announced, in an attempt to call the meeting to order. “You all know why we're here. We got some new members, as usual, and as usual,” he went on, before Rimmer could raise his hand, “we're not gonna bother with introducing them. Far too many, yeah?” There were widespread grunts of assent. Rimmer's heart sank. He'd had a speech prepared and everything. “So lets just get the arm-wrestling started. And this time, I don't want to see nobody cheating!”

“I ain't no cheat,” cried a voice from behind the speaker. Rimmer couldn't see either of them. He couldn't actually see much of anything from where he was standing. It was all a mess of lavender jumpsuits with bits of skin here and there, constantly moving and shoving and pushing at one another. The gruff-voiced first speaker told the second speaker to shut up, but it was hard to make out the details, because everyone seemed to have started speaking at the same time. Well. Thus far, this was shaping up to be a delightful evening.

Rimmer cleared his throat. “Erm... I don't suppose there's anyone here interested in a rousing game of RISK?” It was, admittedly, a long shot. People were settling down into smaller groups, and the noise-level was dropping somewhat. Even so, it was odd that Rimmer was able to hear the soft-spoken reply from somewhere behind him.

“I used to play RISK... once.”

Rimmer turned with a start, peering into the mass of people. The lights were dim, and the number of ridiculously tall bodies blocking what light there was didn't help. It was still just a jumble of misshapen people in jumpsuits, but one of them seemed slightly less misshapen than the rest. In fact, as Rimmer looked more closely, he saw a handsome, dark-featured man with a very sensible haircut and an impressively regal nose. He seemed oddly familiar. Slowly, the archives of his memory found the right file, and handed it to him. “Caldecott?”

The man smiled. “Rimmer. So it is you. I thought I recognized that side-parting.”

“Quite,” Rimmer mumbled, a little taken aback. “Erm... why are you here?”

Caldecott shrugged. “How does anyone end up in here?”

“I wish I knew,” Rimmer grumbled, “it just sort of seemed to happen. Through no fault of my own,” he added quickly. After all, he didn't want his old Cadet School training officer to get the wrong idea. It was uncanny, he thought, pushing himself forward a step or two to look more closely at the man. He didn't seem to have aged at all. Oh, there were some fine lines around his eyes, and the hair at his temples was shot through with grey, but apart from that, he looked just as he had the evening of that legendary game Rimmer had been telling Lister about just the other day. Unbelievable.

“Yes,” Caldecott nodded, “isn't that always the way?” He said nothing more on the subject, but took Rimmer gently by the arm, and guided him towards a miraculously quiet part of the room, where a handful of other normal-looking people were already seated. “This is Chalmers,” a blond, skinny man gave a quick nod, “Ahn,” a heavy-set man, his features hidden behind a book, said nothing. The book, however, bobbed up and down a little. “Ferrick,” a red-headed, mustachioed youngster smiled shyly, “and Reed.”

Rimmer took an instant dislike to the lean-faced, greasy-haired, smirking man. "Hello,” he mumbled, not looking directly at Reed. Rimmer didn't like people who smiled like that; it reminded him too much of when his brothers would keep secrets from him, and laugh about them behind his back. He had to keep fighting the urge to angrily ask what the joke was.

“The five of us... well, six now, I suppose, meet here every Thursday.” Caldecott smiled at Rimmer. His was a reassuring smile; a manly smile. A smile Rimmer had no problems trusting. “It's like a meeting within the meeting, if you will. These idiots,” he indicated the rest of the room with a throw of his head, “have no idea, really.”

That much was obvious. Most of the other members were now completely enthralled by an arm-wrestling match between two of the largest mounds of man-flesh in the room. There were cheers and boos and various rude gestures thrown about, and Rimmer had the sinking feeling a fight was brewing on the horizon. “That's putting it mildly.”

Caldecott chuckled. “Well then, Mister Rimmer? Can I take it you've an interest in joining us?”

Rimmer turned, about to reply, when Chalmers picked up a box from the table, and shook it at the others accusingly. “Are we going to stand about chatting all evening, or are we ruddy well going to get started painting these miniatures? I've got the new Alexander the Great set smuggled in and everything!”

Closing his eyes, Rimmer sighed deeply. Heaven. He was in heaven.

Date: 2007-06-06 04:57 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] roadstergal.livejournal.com
Oh, this is lovely!

I love that you have Rimmer back how he used to be, physically as well as git-wise.

his body had changed from those silly exercises he kept doing, slowly transforming him from the reed-like, pasty creature that was currently chasing Lister, to something rather more... well, no matter.

Oh my.

Rimmer grimaced a little at the word, as though it tasted like the food he was trying to consume.

Well done.

They just acknowledge the fact that sex has absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with any sort of vaguely defined emotion that women use as an excuse either not to have sex with us, or have us shower them with pointless gifts and attention before allowing us access to sex.

Perfect.

The man shifted his grip on his fork, as if to demonstrate its potential alternative uses.

Love.

After all, if you can't have something, it's much better to pretend you didn't want it in the first place.

He must spend a lot of time shushing it.

involuntarily pressed up against a man with so many facial piercings Rimmer was surprised he didn't hurt himself just smiling. Maybe he liked that? Maybe that was why he was smiling?

Hey, now, no bashing on the pierced! ;)

he saw a handsome, dark-featured man with a very sensible haircut and an impressively regal nose.

Oh dear.

Rimmer took an instant dislike to the lean-faced, greasy-haired, smirking man. "Hello,” he mumbled, not looking directly at Reed. Rimmer didn't like people who smiled like that; it reminded him too much of when his brothers would keep secrets from him, and laugh about them behind his back.

These two universes were made to cross over, I swear!

Are we going to stand about chatting all evening, or are we ruddy well going to get started painting these miniatures? I've got the new Alexander the Great set smuggled in and everything!

Perfect.

Your Rimmer is frighteningly good!

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