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reddwarfslashRed Dwarf Fanfic: Last Humans
Chapter 21: Twenty Third Century Hologram
Summary(flashback): Rimmer makes the wrong choice.
Warnings: Language, sexual situations, slash, Dave/Rimmer, slight Bexley/Kochanski
Beta: Rack
Chapter Rating: M(16+)
(ooo)
Twenty Third Century Hologram
(ooo)
The kitten at the crook of Bexley’s elbow gave a plaintive meow. He glanced at it—it was a bit of charcoal grey fluff. He’d found it just outside a service tunnel exit when he’d done some unauthorized poking about during his tour of Red Dwarf. Bexley tucked it back in his jumper and leaned against the gantry railing protecting him from the drop below. Directly ahead was a three story view port.
Through the glass he could see Ganymede—a dark speck against Jupiter‘s stripy belly. He flicked ash below. Feeling displaced. Feeling bitter.
He didn’t like himself when he was bitter. Not at all. The last fourteen years had changed him. He’d stopped responding to the name Dave for one. The rest of it… He wasn’t optimistic anymore. He was harder. Tougher. More disciplined. And bitter. In bits.
He didn’t like the changes. Well, he accepted them. But sometimes he wished he could go back to the time when there was just one Dave Lister. To a time when he could loose himself in his lack of ambition. A time before he felt robbed.
He was on indefinite hiatus from the UPSC. When he’d first stepped out of the clone-pod the brass’d told him, been honest about it from the very start. He’d been in shock and lived in a haze for a couple years. They’d kept him on a short leash. He had no citizenship, no birth certificates. No where to go. So he’d stayed. A few years later the cold reality was impossible to ignore and he’d stayed because of all that stuff they said about humanity reaching for the stars and helping others fulfil dreams of space-exploration—others that were right in front of him, patting him on the back. And because he was good, really good, at what he did. Good at understanding the PIE technology as well as piloting it. Something the original Dave Lister wasn’t so good at. And that was definitely a smeggy little bit of satisfaction.
He didn’t want to resent Dave, but he did. He wanted to hate the UPSC, but they always managed to balance on that thin line between despicable and justified. So he just resented them.
Bexley leaned his forehead against the railing. It was times like these he realized how little he’d been given of what he needed.
“Hi.”
A woman’s voice—nasal and superior. It was the nasally part that made him glance up. “Hey,” he said and smiled. The woman was fit. A small girl, about half a head shorter then him—she had a certain brittleness.
“Wait. I know you. You’re—”
“I’m not.” Bexley said quickly, straightening. “I’m Bexley Lister. Bexley Dave Lister.”
“Oh.” She said and deflated a bit. “You got me excited there for a second…”
Bexley shook his head, turned around and half sat on the railing. He couldn’t tell if the woman was being intentionally insulting or was a bit thick. “What’s yer name?”
“Oh?” She held out her hand. “My name is Kristine Kochanski.”
That made him freeze. She didn’t look much like the Kris he knew.
Kochanski cleared her throat.
Bexley realized he’d left her waiting, hand out. He took it and gave it a squeeze. “Want a smoke?” He offered his pack.
“Yeah, actually.” She said, pulling one out of his proffered pack. He gave her a light and watched her draw in a few unpractised puffs.
“Yeh’ve started recently?”
She nodded, looking like she wasn’t really paying attention.
“I knew yer mum.” Lister offered.
This made Kochanski take notice. “Really?”
“Don’t know for sure.” Bexley replied, stepping off the railing and turning around to look back at the view. “She worked on this ship, a while back.”
“That was her then.” Kochanski’s voice was eager. “My mum worked on Red Dwarf. Same name as me too.”
“So yer the Junior?” He’d bumped into Kris Senior a long time back on the Ganymede station. She’d been talking with the UPSC about outfitting the ship she captained with a PIE engine so they could work the Startransit™ lanes. They’d caught up. But he’d still been in his stunned phase so they hadn’t really connected. “Aren’t you a bit over-qualified for mining?”
Kochanski laughed. It sounded metallic. “Oh yes. Very much so.”
“Then why are yeh on Red Dwarf?” The Dwarf hadn’t changed much since Bexley remembered being on it. Still dingy, still grey. Still stifling. Still having an issue with quarantine. Bexley grinned at the thought of the kitten.
“Why are you?” Kochanski countered.
Bexley shrugged. “I’ll tell yeh mine, if yeh tell me yers.” He stubbed out his smoke on the rail, let the butt drop over the edge and grinned at her snarky expression. “I’m here because I want to remember somethin‘. I worked on Red Dwarf a long time ago.”
“Yes.” Kochanski nodded sagely. Then spilled hot ash onto her hand. She yelped, inhaled too hard and started coughing.
Bexley hit her on the back to get things going again. She put her hands up for him to stop. “It’s okay.” She straightened, her eyes red and watery. “Eh. Did you find what you came back for?”
Bexley didn‘t answer for a moment. He turned back to the view port and folded his arms over his chest. “I loved someone here.”
“Oh.” Her voice held an uncertain note. “My mum?”
Bexley coughed. “Maybe, a little.”
“But the person you’re talking about isn’t her?”
“Yeah.” Bexley lifted his cap and scratched his head, “Doesn’t matter. Person I loved isn’t mine. I woke up and there was a whole relationship that I lost out on.” He took a drag. “Maybe for the best, yeah?”
Kochanski nodded, “I have a friend… like you. Stasis pod accident was it? It’s hard being time-impaired.” She blushed suddenly, looking stricken. “Or do you prefer time-displaced?”
Bexley shrugged, laughing. The motion unsettled the kitten in his jumper. It meowed.
“What’s that?” Kochanski glanced at him. “Contraband?”
“Maybe.” Bexley reached inside his jumper to bring out the little cat.
“Oh, no. I’ll have to take that from you.” Kochanski reached for the kitten. He let her have it. She tsked over it. “You know this ship is completely over-run with cats. They got into the cargo decks. Holly doesn’t have any sensors on those floors. Too expensive. And most of those decks are completely automated, almost impossible to access. They have the run of the place.”
Bexley sniggered. “I suppose yer worried they’re going to bite through a few wires and the Dwarf’ll be flyin’ backwards.”
“Actually I’m more worried about what they’re eating. Rats? Mice?” Kochanski shuddered then absently scratched the kitten behind its ears. “It seems like almost every vessel has an infestation of something, though.” She brought the kitten up to look it in the eyes. “Part of the problem is that they’re too cute. Three quarters of the staff won‘t even report them when they find them.”
Bexley grinned at her. She looked cute.
She glanced back to find him staring at her. She bit her lip, “You look an awful lot like—”
“I know.”
“Are you twins?”
He lit another smoke. “Tell me why yeh came back.”
“Oh, I…” She closed her eyes. “I wanted to be closer to my mother and father, I think. They worked aboard Red Dwarf.”
“Really?”
She nodded. “I wasn’t raised by them. I was raised in virtual reality.“ She flicked her hair, stubbing out her cigarette. “Most people don’t understand what it’s like to come out of a pod.”
Bexley grinned, shaking his head at her. She was superior and vulnerable all at once. “Yeh’d be surprised.”
(ooo)
"Do you think this will work? Or will your idiot son turn me into hologrammatic confetti?" Rimmer snarked as Jim plugged Rimmer's projection unit into his workstation.
"The Voxels will give you the same body you had when your personality algorithm was recorded," Jim assured Rimmer, and adjusted his goggles.
Lister patted his son's head.
Jim pushed at Lister's hands. "Dad!" Just like a tetchy fourteen-year-old. Lister smiled. Jim flicked the switch.
Rimmer's image fluttered, then stabilized. Jim unplugged Rimmer's projection unit and closed his work station.
"That's it?" Rimmer asked.
"That's it." Jim nodded.
Rimmer passed his hologrammatic hand through a table. "That's it. You got me all excited over nothing."
"It will take awhile for the voxels to replicate and fill out your form. A few days, maybe less," Jim replied. "Then you'll be able to touch, feel, eat, just like a normal human." Jim pulled his goggles off. "Congratulations."
"Oh smeg off. I won't believe it till I'm able to see it with my own eyes."
Jim shrugged. Rimmer stalked off to the attic.
Lister rolled his eyes at Rimmer.
"That's amazing. What yeh created, Jim. Yer a real genius, yeh know that? I'm proud of yeh."
Jim looked down at his hands. "Who's my mum, dad?" he asked.
Lister started. "What?"
"I've been thinking about it. I don't know my mum." Jim pressed his hands together. "Who's my mum?"
Lister leaned against the kitchen counter. "Look Jim… that's a long story."
"I want to know."
"I didn't think—" Lister bit his lip. He hadn't thought Jim would ever ask. Why hadn't he thought that? He felt stupid. "Ask me later, okay? I promise to tell yeh."
(ooo)
Lister woke up.
Something had crashed in the kitchen.
He rubbed his eyes and had to force himself to his feet. He'd spent the whole night trying to figure out how to tell Jim who he was. Somehow he figured the boy would just never ask the obvious. Jim wouldn't take it as well as Bexley, he knew that. He doubted Bexley really took it that well. But Bexley hadn't ever confided in Lister. Probably just wanted to make a clean break of it and keep his life as separate from Lister’s as he could.
But Jim? Sensitive, intuitive, caring Jim? It terrified Lister. He almost wished that pompous CAO from the Ganymede station was there to break the news for him.
Lister wandered into the kitchen. He yawned and picked up a bit of broken crockery. "Vlaad! Yer redecoratin' leaves a lot teh be desired!"
Lister felt eyes on him. He turned. Vlaad was sitting on top of the fridge, tail swishing in irritation. "Why’re you up there?"
"I can feel!"
Arms wrapped around Lister from behind, a warm face was shoved into the crook of Lister's neck.
"Arn?" Lister grunted and turned around in the man's arms.
Rimmer looked frantic with pleasure--slick with sweat and completely naked.
Lister backed up a step, his breath catching. Naked. He'd seen Rimmer naked over the last few years, more then once—but it'd never seemed real. Not like this slick, glistening mad-man who looked like an apparition, but was as real as a gun-shot.
"Smeg," Lister whispered.
"It worked," Rimmer grinned into Lister's face. His pupils were dilated till the yellow-brown had been eaten away by black. He looked drugged. Insane.
"Come on, let's get you back to bed." Lister caught Rimmer's wrist and pulled him.
Rimmer gasped and refused to let himself be pulled.
He looked down at his hand. "You're touching me."
"So I am." Lister replied. "You should rest."
Rimmer grinned, manic.
Lister tried to pull him. He stayed rooted. Lister pulled harder.
Rimmer stepped forward quickly and Lister had to catch the kitchen counter to keep from falling. "Tch. What's this game—"
Without warning Rimmer was pressing into him, his hands running over Lister's neck and face, catching his jaw. And then he was kissing Lister.
He tasted human. Lister couldn't believe it. Rimmer tasted like grape jelly jam and maple syrup and under that, the pungent tang of unwashed mouth. Human. Like he'd never died.
Lister had to pull back to breath. Rimmer cupped the small of Lister’s back and bodily lifted him and lowered him to the ground. The strength of the motion made Lister shiver. Rimmer felt like warm, pliant skin over six-ton hydraulics. It was inhuman.
"Arn—" Lister tried to protest. "We shouldn't. Not here. Jim could—"
Rimmer's weight pressed against Lister's chest. Lister couldn’t talk any more and—as Rimmer's hand moved down his chest, over his hip, pinning him even more solidly to the floor as Rimmer's hips ground against him—silence became golden.
Lister nuzzled Rimmer's jaw. It was rough with stubble. He'd have to get used to shaving again.
"I love you," he whispered. Rimmer didn't reply. But he was hard and moving against Lister like an engine piston.
Lister tried to make space between them so he could pull of his sweat pants. Rimmer didn't seem to get it until Lister kicked his hips away.
Naked, Lister held Rimmer, friction-fed heat till it felt like they would meld together. Lister didn't think that was a bad idea, but Rimmer started to sputter and choke.
"What's wrong—"
"This!" The muscles of his arms flexed and shivered, as if he wanted to pull away and forward at the same time. But his hips continued to grind against Lister, moving them both towards the inevitable.
Just as Rimmer seemed fit to burst, he won—or lost—some internal battle and he stood, turning away from Lister and pressing his hands down on the kitchen counter.
Lister watched as Rimmer's whole body tensed, as he muttered something through clenched lips.
Lister stood, not sure if he should pull his pants back on. "What's wrong?" He slipped his hand over Rimmer's back.
Rimmer jerked out of Lister's grip, groaning. "Go away." His face was still screwed tight. "This is some sort of joke to you isn't it?"
"What? No." Lister stepped towards Rimmer, sliding his fingers against the man's arm. "I—"
"I've gone mad." Rimmer curled against the kitchen counter.
"I'm so tired of this." Lister rolled his eyes heavenward. "Can't you just—can't you just…" Lister couldn't finish the sentence. He stepped forward. "What's so smegging wrong?"
"Please. Stop." Rimmer hit his head against the counter. Over and over.
Lister bit his lip and caught Rimmer's shoulders. "Come on. Go to bed."
"Don't touch me!"
"Let's go."
"Don't touch me."
Lister pulled Rimmer up and walked him to the couch. It would be good enough for the night.
"Gay hippy scum." Rimmer muttered as Lister pushed him down and picked up a blanket.
Lister felt sick of Rimmer. "Get over it, yeh vicious bastard."
(ooo)
Jangles snorted and sidled sideways.
"Whoa!" Lister clutched his saddle horn to stay on. "Shh…" He patted his gelding's neck. Jangles never startled. Much, anyway.
Lister urged Jangles into a trot, rounding the copse of trees towards his drive-way. The sound hit him as soon as Jangles clip-clopped past the trees. Whirring, muffled sirens.
Jangles sidestepped again. Lister tightened up the reign. Then he gave it slack and tapped Jangles' side with his heels. The gelding broke into a canter, bringing Lister's house quickly into view.
Two police transports edged into view. Lister stood in the stirrups, watching over Jangle's ears as four men in cobalt-blue uniforms escorted Rimmer out of his house. "Arnold!"
The police didn't stop. One held Rimmer's head down as he helped the hologram into the transport.
"What are you doing? Arn!"
Jangles jerked to a stop. Lister dismounted into a run. He caught the nearest policeman, pulling him around. "What's going on?"
"United Planets Property Services." The man barked, looking down at Lister. "Your hologram here… legally he belongs to his next of kin. His mum."
"Arn!" Lister pushed through the police, catching Rimmer before the transport door had closed. "What have yeh done?"
Rimmer didn't look up at him. "I don‘t need your projection unit anymore." Rimmer looked out the opposite side of the transport. "Mum's going to take me in."
"What?"
"I don't want to be here." Rimmer replied, his voice even.
"Why?" Lister grabbed for the transport, trying to keep himself upright.
"You have no right to me."
"I—"
"Look, we don't have all day." One of the police officers muscled in between Lister and Rimmer. "You have a problem with this? Take it up with the UPPS."
"I can't believe…" Lister was forced to step back. A police officer stood in front of him as two others stepped into Rimmer's transport and closed their doors. "I can't…"
Jangles stepped over to Lister, his chin a hair above Lister's shoulder. Absently, Lister caught Jangles' bridle and stroked his warm nose.
Rimmer's transport turned its force field buffeting up handfuls of gravel. Lister watched it bump over his rough driveway. He could still see Rimmer slumped in the back seat.
Lister pulled Jangles forward, shoving his foot in the stirrup and throwing his body up and over the saddle. He urged Jangles into a canter after the transport. Lister kissed and Jangles leapt into a gallop. Jangles cornered better then the transport and managed to catch up as it revved to full speed on the road.
"Arnold!"
Lister saw Rimmer through the transport window. He looked exhausted. Desperate. "Arnold!"
The man looked up. His eyes met Lister's. Resignation. That's what Lister saw. Tired, empty resignation. Like a man at the end of a futile and long-fought battle. A losing battle.
As the transport switched gears, Jangles fell behind and put on a burst of speed.
Lister pulled him up—galloping any further was too dangerous on the asphalt—and watched Rimmer's transport disappear over the curve of the hill.
(ooo)
"Is there any reason for this hologram to remain in your custody?" Lister's lawyer a small, thin man with nervous hands—John had recommended him—eyed Lister meaningfully.
Lister glanced up. Rimmer sat, head bowed, beside his mum. She was wearing a smart dress-suit and a pill box hat with a cute bit of lace fringe. And when she wasn't flirting with her lawyer, she'd been looking at Lister like he was a villain in the fifth act of a Shakespearean play.
"Your honour… Arnold and I—"
Rimmer winced, slumping even further into himself.
"He and I…" Lister trailed off. His lawyer nodded his head to encourage him. "When we were alive, I mean…"
Lister's lawyer cleared his throat.
"I mean…"
"Do you have anything at all to add to these proceedings, Mister Lister?" The Judge—head haloed by the traditional headdress, stacks of thick white curls—stared down at him.
Lister glanced back at Rimmer. Rimmer's face was in his hands. He was shaking.
"No. I…"
Lister's lawyer stepped up and filled in quickly. "Isn't it true that you and Arnold Rimmer engaged in a sexual relationship for two years prior to your departure from the Red Dwarf?"
Lister glanced back at Rimmer. His head had dropped down till it rested against the desk.
"Yes." Lister said finally.
"So, as Arnold's partner—"
"Your honour I won't be party to these slanderous accusations against my son." Rimmer's mum stood and pointed at Lister. Her features were as still and tight as stone. "This man wants to tear my family's good name to shr—"
"Sit down, Mrs. Rimmer." The Judge commanded.
"Your honor, I won't hear—"
"Sit—"
"This slander has to—"
"Sit down, Mrs. Rimmer. Don't try my patience."
Mrs. Rimmer's eyes narrowed; her only concession to emotion. "Yes, your honour." She sat down. Slowly.
"Continue, council." The Judge gestured to Lister's lawyer.
"Under the common-law act of—"
"They were roommates, your honour. Please!" Mrs. Rimmer had jumped to her feet again.
"Not if they were engaged in a sexual relationship, Mrs. Rimmer." Lister's lawyer half turned to address her.
The Judge slammed his gravel. "Council, you will direct your attention to the witness. Mrs. Rimmer, no more outbursts."
Lister's lawyer adjusted his jacket and continued. "Now. As Mister Rimmer's one, and only, romantic partner in his entire life—"
A low keening wail filled the court room. Lister's lawyer stopped. The Judge glanced around.
Lister closed his eyes.
"Is there something wrong, Mister Rimmer?" The Judge.
"Rimmer!" Rimmer's mum. "Be a bit more stoic!"
Lister opened his eyes. He watched Mrs. Rimmer swat her son with her purse. The keening stopped. She cocked an eyebrow at the Judge.
"Continue, council." The Judge motioned to Lister’s lawyer.
"As Mister Rimmer's only romantic partner, the man he lived with in a sexual relationship for two years, you feel you qualify for sole custody of Mister Rimmer's post-mortem hologram."
"Yeah." Lister whispered.
"Please speak up, Mister Lister."
"Yes! Yes to all of it!"
"That is all, your honour." Lister's lawyer rebuttoned his jacket as he sat back down, a small smile on his lips.
Lister stared at his hands.
"Mrs. Rimmer? Your council?"
A pair of footsteps approached the bench. Lister glanced up. Mrs. Rimmer's fat, white bearded lawyer stared down his nose—and the long arc of his double-breasted pearl grey suit—at Lister. On his lapel was a pin. A golden clock-work spring.
"Mister Lister." He began, wheezing a bit at the edges. "As you know, Hopist Io does not recognize common-law relationships between men. The only reason this case wasn't dismissed as a spurious bit of nonsense is because it fell under Jupiterian law due to a technicality—"
"Council, relevance?"
"My apologies your honour. I was overcome, for a moment, with colonistic fervour." Mrs. Rimmer's lawyer chuckled then bowed to the Judge and turned to face Lister. "Is it not true that you have no record of your relationship? No gifts or letters exchanged? No witnesses among your friends or relatives? Anyone at all who was aware of it as it was happening?"
"That's not true!" Lister turned to the Judge. "I wrote him every week for five years. It'd be in his personal effects, all of it! He said he kept them in a safe deposit box."
The lawyer emanated smugness. "You mean the personal effects Mrs. Rimmer inherited from her late son?"
Lister turned and stared at Mrs. Rimmer. She shook her head at him, a hint of a smile on her dark-red lips.
"Mrs. Rimmer has stated that no such letters exist."
"She's lyin'! They do! I wrote him all the time! Every smeggin' week!" Lister charged to his feet, tears blurred his vision. "I loved him! I wanted him with me so bad—I thought I was havin' a heart attack some days… nothin' made that go away. Nothin'. For five years I waited for him. And finally he decided to come see me! He had his reservations and everythin'. He’d finally chosen!" Lister fell back into his seat, sobbing. "It's not fair! It's not!"
Mrs. Rimmer‘s lawyer ploughed on. "Mister Lister—"
"Give him a moment, council."
Lister rubbed his watering eyes and nose on his sleeve, trying to control his heaving. "It's not…"
"Mister Lister… There is no evidence at all that you had any sort of relationship with Arnold Rimmer. Much less a—" The lawyer's lip curled, "Much less a romantic one that could, by any stretch of the imagination, qualify as equivalent to marriage. So tell me, why should I, or anyone, believe you? You call the exquisite, god-fearing Mrs. Rimmer—" The lawyer exaggerated the syllables in 'exquisite', savouring each one. "A liar, yet the only liar I see in here is you."
"I'm not." Lister's voice was almost inaudible.
"Are you done, council?" The judge sounded less then pleased.
"Yes, your honour."
"Take your seat Mister Lister. Mister Rimmer, please approach the bench."
Lister left the witness box, moving listlessly towards his lawyer and his seat.
"Alright, Arnold Rimmer, I want you to answer one question." The Judge turned to look at Rimmer. "I know that you have no memory of the alleged relationship between you and Dave Lister due to Red Dwarf's rather archaic archive protocol, but please tell me if there is anything… anything at all, in his behaviour or yours that would suggest such a relationship existed?"
Lister watched Rimmer. He refused to look up or look at anything aside from his hands. Every molecule of Lister's being tensed for his answer.
"Your honour." Rimmer looked up at the judge. Even from fifteen feet away, Lister could see tears in his eyes. Rimmer glanced at his mother. Then at Lister. Another look of desperate confusion, longing and then resignation. Lister's stomach fell.
"No, your honour." Rimmer glanced back at his hands.
The Judge leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes. When he opened them again, he looked like he'd aged. He leaned onto the front of his podium. "Approach the bench, Mister Lister."
Lister stood and walked over. He couldn't look at Rimmer. But he felt the man's presence against his skin like a electric guitar solo on a hypersonic frequency.
"I know there is more here then meets the eye. I'd lay odds—" He nodded at Lister, "that he's telling the truth. Unfortunately, I have to take into account the viability of the relationship today." He stared at Rimmer. "For whatever reason you seem unable to accept a relationship with this man, past, present or future. As a Ganymite I believe that love—any love—is too precious to be squandered. But that is your own decision and I have to respect it." The judge pointed his gravel at Mrs. Rimmer, "I’m granting custody of Mr. Rimmer to Mrs. Rimmer."
Mrs. Rimmer offered up a thin smile.
The turned to Lister. "As for you. I am truly sorry, but you can't pump water out of a dry well. It's best you stop trying."
(ooo)
Lister leaned up against the wall under the Jupiter court system crest. After a moment he felt a hand against his shoulder. He looked up. John.
"I watched the proceedings." He squeezed Lister's shoulder. "I'm sorry."
"I didn't notice you were there." Lister kicked at the institution grey carpet.
"You were pre-occupied."
"What do I do now?" Lister asked. "What?"
John's hand slipped off his shoulder.
"John!" High-heels clacked towards them.
Lister looked up. Mrs. Rimmer was trotting towards them. She stopped short in front of John. "What do you think you're doing?"
"Mother?" John said, stunned. "What? How—"
"Your wife told me to look out for you." Mrs. Rimmer pursed her lips. "She said you recommended a lawyer to him." She flicked her gloved hand at Lister. "How could you? Assist a man who wants to drag the Rimmer family name into the mud out of professional jealousy?"
"Professional jealousy?" John grabbed Lister's upper arm "What? Dave?"
"He's not happy simply stealing the test pilot position you worked so hard for—imagine!"
"Look, mother, I happen to believe Dave. I would have testified for him if his lawyer hadn't told me it was useless."
"What nonsense." Mrs. Rimmer dismissed it all with a wave of her hand. "This is all absurd silliness." She scoffed. "You boys never had a clue."
"Really?" John said, his grip tightened on Lister's arm.
Ignoring his tone, Mrs. Rimmer pulled gum from her purse, unwrapped a piece and popped it in her mouth. After a beat she offered a piece to John and Lister. Lister shook his head; John looked like he'd been slapped. "You should go back to your wife, John." She said. "People are talking."
"So? Let them talk. I've done my duty."
"She's your wife." Mrs. Rimmer's eyes narrowed. "Your duty to her does not end."
"To be a high flier, to buy her a big house, to pay for her lifestyle and to dote on her every minute of the day? No wonder she needed two men. Three if you count the pool boy."
Mrs. Rimmer scoffed. "Nonsense. No Mrs. Rimmer has ever cheated."
John looked fit to spit. Instead he took a deep breath. "Mother. My wife and I have our agreements. You can tell your friends whatever you like, but it's none of your business or theirs."
"Agreements? The nerve. I've told you to go back to your wife, and go back you will." Mrs. Rimmer leaned her head back, looking down her nose at the both of them.
Lister backed up a bit. John and his mother were staring each other down. They looked like a mongoose and a cobra, locked in a silent, unflinching contest of wills. John's cheek twitched. Mrs. Rimmer's eyebrow lifted.
Just as Lister felt John beginning to back down, the man exploded towards him, grabbed him up and, like something out of a noir drama, leaned him over and kissed him. He had nothing to do with his hands so he held onto John's shoulders.
"John Tobias Rimmer. Stop your silly stunting and go back to your wife." Mrs. Rimmer flicked her head and turned on her heel, unimpressed.
John leaned his head into Lister's shoulder. After a moment he exploded. "Gah! That woman."
(ooo)
Bexley leaned Kris Kochanski-Lister back and kissed her on the steps of the Ganymite Gnostarian Temple. The assembled crowd, black tuxedos paired with a confetti of different hued dresses—that was the wedding's colour scheme, black and whatever-looks-good-on-you—cheered, threw handfuls of bird-safe organic grice and parted as the bride and groom descended the stairs to the stretch ship-to-surface transport.
Lister clapped, watching his clone-son, the ever elusive Bexley and his son's wife, daughter of Kris Kochanski, the girl he once thought he'd marry. He'd always thought her daughter was a bit on the stick-up-her-butt side, too humourless for his taste, but he trusted Bexley. And the girl was fit, that was sure.
Kris Junior turned back to the crowd, pushed the little bits of curled hair by her temples behind her ears and threw the bouquet of GELF-rosanthimums.
Lister lost sight of them both in the ensuing riot over the bouquet, he shrugged, turned back up the stairs and walked to the top landing. From there he could see their transport depart for the nearest launch window. He saluted them and entered the Temple.
Custodial staff ran silent vacuums over the hard wood floor, picking up for the next scheduled ceremony. The vicar spoke to the organist, handing her music, his vestments rippling in the breeze from an open window.
"Hi, Dave."
A woman's voice. Lister turned. It was Kris Senior. The girl with the pin-ball smile. She offered him a smile. Not that one, though. "Hi." Lister smiled back at her. She’d married Todhunter, of all things. And then Todhunter’s ship had disappeared after taking a ride on one of the new StarTransit™ routes.
"I just thought I'd pop in to see if I could help." She smiled again. The weight of sad companionship settled on them both. She was a widow. And Lister… well, Lister had lost out too.
"Naw. Everythin's under control." Lister nodded at the janitors.
"How have you been, Dave?" Kris senior asked. There was real concern there.
Lister shrugged. For various political reasons, the Rimmer custody trial had been quite public. "Could be better. Getting by." He wasn't going to lie to her.
"Bexley is wonderful," Kris said. "I know he'll make my daughter happy."
"He is," Lister agreed. Bexley was wonderful. It was like seeing himself perfected. Everything fitting, everything working right, firing on all cylinders. Tough and disciplined and using all his smarts. "I had such a crush on you on Red Dwarf," Lister offered.
"Me too."
"On yerself?"
"No. You know what I mean." She chuckled, chucking his shoulder.
"What have you been up too?"
"I’m doing well, still captaining one of the Pluto routes. Looks like Bexley's work is going to put me out of a job."
"Really? I didn't realize—"
"Oh no!" Kris giggled. She was messing with him. "I’m moving up to an Andromeda transit route. I'll be captaining a deep space vessel."
"That will be amazing for you," Lister promised. "It changes yeh… deep space."
“I’ve heard.” Kris leaned forward to kiss Lister's cheek. "I’ve got to go. Keep in touch?" She turned to leave.
“Yeah.“ Lister watched her go, touching his cheek. If things hadn't gone the way they had…
He shook his head, trying to shake off the what-ifs…
"Dad?"
Lister started, then glanced over to Jim. He'd managed to sneak up without being heard. "Yeah?"
Jim looked at him—they were the same height now—a pained expression on his face.
Lister cut him off before he could say anything. "Let's go home, yeah?"
They walked together towards the Temple's parking lot.
"I wanted to tell you that I developed another technology."
Lister looked over at his son, distracted. "Yeah?"
"It's an… enhancement to the personality algorithm system. Actually, I like to think of it as a fear-vaccine." Jim grinned. "I've been working with a psychiatrist on it. I never thought voxels or the PIE engine could come together to cure people with phobic disorders." Jim paused, looking down at his hands. "I was thinking maybe it could help you."
"Help me… what?"
"Well, it takes away fear. Maybe it could help Arnold get over… his problem."
Lister grimaced. "Stop it."
"What?"
"Just. Stop it." He stared at Jim. "Not now."
"I just thought—" Jim stopped, glaring at the ground and sniffing.
Lister stared at him. Do I look like that when I'm upset? Lister's throat closed off, he felt like he was choking. "Please. Stop it."
"I made a real mess of things, didn't I dad?" Jim laughed. Tears were falling.
Just as soppy as me. "No. It's not…" Lister tried to reach for his son… clone… but he couldn't move through the shame. And then it felt like his lips were moving of their own accord. "Yer me clone, Jim. I made the mess."
(ooo)
Bexley watched Jim—James now. His fellow clone sat behind an desk that reeked ’executive’, a monster slab of cherry wood inset with tabs of glossy wood. It had been years since they’d seen each other. And James had changed. Still quiet. Still insular. But hard.
James finished tapping at his computer input screen. “I have personal stock available. You want one vial?”
Bexley nodded.
James looked up. “What’s your story?”
Bexley half sat against the edge of James’ desk. He could give grit for grit. “Tell me yers first.”
James tilted his head. “There’s nothing you can do.”
“I didn’t expect there was.”
“What’s to say? Mortality and fear are the two… human frailties mankind has always wanted to overcome. Voxels and the fear vaccine, are two of the greatest inventions ever. Endless, fearless life. Or a very close approximation thereof.” James didn’t smile. He didn’t look satisfied or excited. He looked… sad and tired.
Bexley waved away James‘ words. “When did stop talking to yer father?”
“You mean our original?” James corrected.
“He disappeared off a Transit lane a year ago.” Bexley said. “Don’t know where he went.”
“Ask the PIE. It talks to you two in a way it never did me.” James looked churlish for a moment before his mask snapped shut.
“I did. Nothin’ to say. Well. Nothin’ worth saying.” Some awful nonsense about pulling together a ship from the threads of time. And camphor wood chests. It’d been rather insistent on that last point. Bexley’d got the sense the PIE had a bit of a fixation on camphor wood chests.
“Do you want information about our original or do you want the vial?”
Bexley closed his eyes. “The vial.”
“You aren’t with the Space Corps anymore.”
“I got into an accident. A… navi-comp blew up in me face.”
“Can’t lay track with a hologrammatic body? You could still work the existing lanes.”
Bexley swallowed. “I resigned.” The UPSC had crossed the line as soon as they got clout. Holograms were property—personality algorithms were property, the genetic code of your employees, property. They’d resurrected him as soon as he died—he was too valuable to keep dead. And then they’d just gone on with their cloning operation, getting more efficient with each generation. Using his genetics and his memories. Bexley’s hands curled into fists.
“A hologram? Resign?” James scoffed. “That’s not possible.” He leaned forward, a smile quirking his lips. “So you’re asking for more then the vaccine. You’re asking for amnesty. Don‘t worry. My lawyers can wrap the UPSC in legal red tape so thick they‘ll—”
Bexley glanced up. “I don’t care about that.”
“Bex.” James sighed. “What do you care about then?”
“Kris’s mum vanished off a Transit route a while back. She was shattered.” Bexley glanced up.
“Go on.”
“She disappeared. I tracked her to Mimas.” Every word raked against his throat as he spoke it. “She’s… she’s in Better then Life. She’s a game-head.”
“Ah. My competitors.” James nodded. “Couldn’t handle reality. There’s a lot in her generation like that. Came out of virtual reality and want back in. Good market.”
Bile rose in Bexley’s throat. He let none of it show on his face.
James continued. “And you think the vaccine will get help her out? It could.” James chuckled. “So you weren’t enough for Kris? I suppose you being a indentured-hologram didn‘t help. She would have got that awful Notice of Deceasement. Told she should break all contact and just forget you.”
Bexley stared at the edge of James’ desk. He didn’t dare move. He thought he should feel an extra measure of pissed off hearing cruelty coming out of his own face, but he’d long since stopped seeing James’ face as his own.
“I wouldn’t be so upset. None of us are, you know.” James laughed again. “None of us are enough for each other. That’s why voxels and fear-vaccines and game-heads exist.”
Chapter 21: Twenty Third Century Hologram
Summary(flashback): Rimmer makes the wrong choice.
Warnings: Language, sexual situations, slash, Dave/Rimmer, slight Bexley/Kochanski
Beta: Rack
Chapter Rating: M(16+)
(ooo)
Twenty Third Century Hologram
(ooo)
The kitten at the crook of Bexley’s elbow gave a plaintive meow. He glanced at it—it was a bit of charcoal grey fluff. He’d found it just outside a service tunnel exit when he’d done some unauthorized poking about during his tour of Red Dwarf. Bexley tucked it back in his jumper and leaned against the gantry railing protecting him from the drop below. Directly ahead was a three story view port.
Through the glass he could see Ganymede—a dark speck against Jupiter‘s stripy belly. He flicked ash below. Feeling displaced. Feeling bitter.
He didn’t like himself when he was bitter. Not at all. The last fourteen years had changed him. He’d stopped responding to the name Dave for one. The rest of it… He wasn’t optimistic anymore. He was harder. Tougher. More disciplined. And bitter. In bits.
He didn’t like the changes. Well, he accepted them. But sometimes he wished he could go back to the time when there was just one Dave Lister. To a time when he could loose himself in his lack of ambition. A time before he felt robbed.
He was on indefinite hiatus from the UPSC. When he’d first stepped out of the clone-pod the brass’d told him, been honest about it from the very start. He’d been in shock and lived in a haze for a couple years. They’d kept him on a short leash. He had no citizenship, no birth certificates. No where to go. So he’d stayed. A few years later the cold reality was impossible to ignore and he’d stayed because of all that stuff they said about humanity reaching for the stars and helping others fulfil dreams of space-exploration—others that were right in front of him, patting him on the back. And because he was good, really good, at what he did. Good at understanding the PIE technology as well as piloting it. Something the original Dave Lister wasn’t so good at. And that was definitely a smeggy little bit of satisfaction.
He didn’t want to resent Dave, but he did. He wanted to hate the UPSC, but they always managed to balance on that thin line between despicable and justified. So he just resented them.
Bexley leaned his forehead against the railing. It was times like these he realized how little he’d been given of what he needed.
“Hi.”
A woman’s voice—nasal and superior. It was the nasally part that made him glance up. “Hey,” he said and smiled. The woman was fit. A small girl, about half a head shorter then him—she had a certain brittleness.
“Wait. I know you. You’re—”
“I’m not.” Bexley said quickly, straightening. “I’m Bexley Lister. Bexley Dave Lister.”
“Oh.” She said and deflated a bit. “You got me excited there for a second…”
Bexley shook his head, turned around and half sat on the railing. He couldn’t tell if the woman was being intentionally insulting or was a bit thick. “What’s yer name?”
“Oh?” She held out her hand. “My name is Kristine Kochanski.”
That made him freeze. She didn’t look much like the Kris he knew.
Kochanski cleared her throat.
Bexley realized he’d left her waiting, hand out. He took it and gave it a squeeze. “Want a smoke?” He offered his pack.
“Yeah, actually.” She said, pulling one out of his proffered pack. He gave her a light and watched her draw in a few unpractised puffs.
“Yeh’ve started recently?”
She nodded, looking like she wasn’t really paying attention.
“I knew yer mum.” Lister offered.
This made Kochanski take notice. “Really?”
“Don’t know for sure.” Bexley replied, stepping off the railing and turning around to look back at the view. “She worked on this ship, a while back.”
“That was her then.” Kochanski’s voice was eager. “My mum worked on Red Dwarf. Same name as me too.”
“So yer the Junior?” He’d bumped into Kris Senior a long time back on the Ganymede station. She’d been talking with the UPSC about outfitting the ship she captained with a PIE engine so they could work the Startransit™ lanes. They’d caught up. But he’d still been in his stunned phase so they hadn’t really connected. “Aren’t you a bit over-qualified for mining?”
Kochanski laughed. It sounded metallic. “Oh yes. Very much so.”
“Then why are yeh on Red Dwarf?” The Dwarf hadn’t changed much since Bexley remembered being on it. Still dingy, still grey. Still stifling. Still having an issue with quarantine. Bexley grinned at the thought of the kitten.
“Why are you?” Kochanski countered.
Bexley shrugged. “I’ll tell yeh mine, if yeh tell me yers.” He stubbed out his smoke on the rail, let the butt drop over the edge and grinned at her snarky expression. “I’m here because I want to remember somethin‘. I worked on Red Dwarf a long time ago.”
“Yes.” Kochanski nodded sagely. Then spilled hot ash onto her hand. She yelped, inhaled too hard and started coughing.
Bexley hit her on the back to get things going again. She put her hands up for him to stop. “It’s okay.” She straightened, her eyes red and watery. “Eh. Did you find what you came back for?”
Bexley didn‘t answer for a moment. He turned back to the view port and folded his arms over his chest. “I loved someone here.”
“Oh.” Her voice held an uncertain note. “My mum?”
Bexley coughed. “Maybe, a little.”
“But the person you’re talking about isn’t her?”
“Yeah.” Bexley lifted his cap and scratched his head, “Doesn’t matter. Person I loved isn’t mine. I woke up and there was a whole relationship that I lost out on.” He took a drag. “Maybe for the best, yeah?”
Kochanski nodded, “I have a friend… like you. Stasis pod accident was it? It’s hard being time-impaired.” She blushed suddenly, looking stricken. “Or do you prefer time-displaced?”
Bexley shrugged, laughing. The motion unsettled the kitten in his jumper. It meowed.
“What’s that?” Kochanski glanced at him. “Contraband?”
“Maybe.” Bexley reached inside his jumper to bring out the little cat.
“Oh, no. I’ll have to take that from you.” Kochanski reached for the kitten. He let her have it. She tsked over it. “You know this ship is completely over-run with cats. They got into the cargo decks. Holly doesn’t have any sensors on those floors. Too expensive. And most of those decks are completely automated, almost impossible to access. They have the run of the place.”
Bexley sniggered. “I suppose yer worried they’re going to bite through a few wires and the Dwarf’ll be flyin’ backwards.”
“Actually I’m more worried about what they’re eating. Rats? Mice?” Kochanski shuddered then absently scratched the kitten behind its ears. “It seems like almost every vessel has an infestation of something, though.” She brought the kitten up to look it in the eyes. “Part of the problem is that they’re too cute. Three quarters of the staff won‘t even report them when they find them.”
Bexley grinned at her. She looked cute.
She glanced back to find him staring at her. She bit her lip, “You look an awful lot like—”
“I know.”
“Are you twins?”
He lit another smoke. “Tell me why yeh came back.”
“Oh, I…” She closed her eyes. “I wanted to be closer to my mother and father, I think. They worked aboard Red Dwarf.”
“Really?”
She nodded. “I wasn’t raised by them. I was raised in virtual reality.“ She flicked her hair, stubbing out her cigarette. “Most people don’t understand what it’s like to come out of a pod.”
Bexley grinned, shaking his head at her. She was superior and vulnerable all at once. “Yeh’d be surprised.”
(ooo)
"Do you think this will work? Or will your idiot son turn me into hologrammatic confetti?" Rimmer snarked as Jim plugged Rimmer's projection unit into his workstation.
"The Voxels will give you the same body you had when your personality algorithm was recorded," Jim assured Rimmer, and adjusted his goggles.
Lister patted his son's head.
Jim pushed at Lister's hands. "Dad!" Just like a tetchy fourteen-year-old. Lister smiled. Jim flicked the switch.
Rimmer's image fluttered, then stabilized. Jim unplugged Rimmer's projection unit and closed his work station.
"That's it?" Rimmer asked.
"That's it." Jim nodded.
Rimmer passed his hologrammatic hand through a table. "That's it. You got me all excited over nothing."
"It will take awhile for the voxels to replicate and fill out your form. A few days, maybe less," Jim replied. "Then you'll be able to touch, feel, eat, just like a normal human." Jim pulled his goggles off. "Congratulations."
"Oh smeg off. I won't believe it till I'm able to see it with my own eyes."
Jim shrugged. Rimmer stalked off to the attic.
Lister rolled his eyes at Rimmer.
"That's amazing. What yeh created, Jim. Yer a real genius, yeh know that? I'm proud of yeh."
Jim looked down at his hands. "Who's my mum, dad?" he asked.
Lister started. "What?"
"I've been thinking about it. I don't know my mum." Jim pressed his hands together. "Who's my mum?"
Lister leaned against the kitchen counter. "Look Jim… that's a long story."
"I want to know."
"I didn't think—" Lister bit his lip. He hadn't thought Jim would ever ask. Why hadn't he thought that? He felt stupid. "Ask me later, okay? I promise to tell yeh."
(ooo)
Lister woke up.
Something had crashed in the kitchen.
He rubbed his eyes and had to force himself to his feet. He'd spent the whole night trying to figure out how to tell Jim who he was. Somehow he figured the boy would just never ask the obvious. Jim wouldn't take it as well as Bexley, he knew that. He doubted Bexley really took it that well. But Bexley hadn't ever confided in Lister. Probably just wanted to make a clean break of it and keep his life as separate from Lister’s as he could.
But Jim? Sensitive, intuitive, caring Jim? It terrified Lister. He almost wished that pompous CAO from the Ganymede station was there to break the news for him.
Lister wandered into the kitchen. He yawned and picked up a bit of broken crockery. "Vlaad! Yer redecoratin' leaves a lot teh be desired!"
Lister felt eyes on him. He turned. Vlaad was sitting on top of the fridge, tail swishing in irritation. "Why’re you up there?"
"I can feel!"
Arms wrapped around Lister from behind, a warm face was shoved into the crook of Lister's neck.
"Arn?" Lister grunted and turned around in the man's arms.
Rimmer looked frantic with pleasure--slick with sweat and completely naked.
Lister backed up a step, his breath catching. Naked. He'd seen Rimmer naked over the last few years, more then once—but it'd never seemed real. Not like this slick, glistening mad-man who looked like an apparition, but was as real as a gun-shot.
"Smeg," Lister whispered.
"It worked," Rimmer grinned into Lister's face. His pupils were dilated till the yellow-brown had been eaten away by black. He looked drugged. Insane.
"Come on, let's get you back to bed." Lister caught Rimmer's wrist and pulled him.
Rimmer gasped and refused to let himself be pulled.
He looked down at his hand. "You're touching me."
"So I am." Lister replied. "You should rest."
Rimmer grinned, manic.
Lister tried to pull him. He stayed rooted. Lister pulled harder.
Rimmer stepped forward quickly and Lister had to catch the kitchen counter to keep from falling. "Tch. What's this game—"
Without warning Rimmer was pressing into him, his hands running over Lister's neck and face, catching his jaw. And then he was kissing Lister.
He tasted human. Lister couldn't believe it. Rimmer tasted like grape jelly jam and maple syrup and under that, the pungent tang of unwashed mouth. Human. Like he'd never died.
Lister had to pull back to breath. Rimmer cupped the small of Lister’s back and bodily lifted him and lowered him to the ground. The strength of the motion made Lister shiver. Rimmer felt like warm, pliant skin over six-ton hydraulics. It was inhuman.
"Arn—" Lister tried to protest. "We shouldn't. Not here. Jim could—"
Rimmer's weight pressed against Lister's chest. Lister couldn’t talk any more and—as Rimmer's hand moved down his chest, over his hip, pinning him even more solidly to the floor as Rimmer's hips ground against him—silence became golden.
Lister nuzzled Rimmer's jaw. It was rough with stubble. He'd have to get used to shaving again.
"I love you," he whispered. Rimmer didn't reply. But he was hard and moving against Lister like an engine piston.
Lister tried to make space between them so he could pull of his sweat pants. Rimmer didn't seem to get it until Lister kicked his hips away.
Naked, Lister held Rimmer, friction-fed heat till it felt like they would meld together. Lister didn't think that was a bad idea, but Rimmer started to sputter and choke.
"What's wrong—"
"This!" The muscles of his arms flexed and shivered, as if he wanted to pull away and forward at the same time. But his hips continued to grind against Lister, moving them both towards the inevitable.
Just as Rimmer seemed fit to burst, he won—or lost—some internal battle and he stood, turning away from Lister and pressing his hands down on the kitchen counter.
Lister watched as Rimmer's whole body tensed, as he muttered something through clenched lips.
Lister stood, not sure if he should pull his pants back on. "What's wrong?" He slipped his hand over Rimmer's back.
Rimmer jerked out of Lister's grip, groaning. "Go away." His face was still screwed tight. "This is some sort of joke to you isn't it?"
"What? No." Lister stepped towards Rimmer, sliding his fingers against the man's arm. "I—"
"I've gone mad." Rimmer curled against the kitchen counter.
"I'm so tired of this." Lister rolled his eyes heavenward. "Can't you just—can't you just…" Lister couldn't finish the sentence. He stepped forward. "What's so smegging wrong?"
"Please. Stop." Rimmer hit his head against the counter. Over and over.
Lister bit his lip and caught Rimmer's shoulders. "Come on. Go to bed."
"Don't touch me!"
"Let's go."
"Don't touch me."
Lister pulled Rimmer up and walked him to the couch. It would be good enough for the night.
"Gay hippy scum." Rimmer muttered as Lister pushed him down and picked up a blanket.
Lister felt sick of Rimmer. "Get over it, yeh vicious bastard."
(ooo)
Jangles snorted and sidled sideways.
"Whoa!" Lister clutched his saddle horn to stay on. "Shh…" He patted his gelding's neck. Jangles never startled. Much, anyway.
Lister urged Jangles into a trot, rounding the copse of trees towards his drive-way. The sound hit him as soon as Jangles clip-clopped past the trees. Whirring, muffled sirens.
Jangles sidestepped again. Lister tightened up the reign. Then he gave it slack and tapped Jangles' side with his heels. The gelding broke into a canter, bringing Lister's house quickly into view.
Two police transports edged into view. Lister stood in the stirrups, watching over Jangle's ears as four men in cobalt-blue uniforms escorted Rimmer out of his house. "Arnold!"
The police didn't stop. One held Rimmer's head down as he helped the hologram into the transport.
"What are you doing? Arn!"
Jangles jerked to a stop. Lister dismounted into a run. He caught the nearest policeman, pulling him around. "What's going on?"
"United Planets Property Services." The man barked, looking down at Lister. "Your hologram here… legally he belongs to his next of kin. His mum."
"Arn!" Lister pushed through the police, catching Rimmer before the transport door had closed. "What have yeh done?"
Rimmer didn't look up at him. "I don‘t need your projection unit anymore." Rimmer looked out the opposite side of the transport. "Mum's going to take me in."
"What?"
"I don't want to be here." Rimmer replied, his voice even.
"Why?" Lister grabbed for the transport, trying to keep himself upright.
"You have no right to me."
"I—"
"Look, we don't have all day." One of the police officers muscled in between Lister and Rimmer. "You have a problem with this? Take it up with the UPPS."
"I can't believe…" Lister was forced to step back. A police officer stood in front of him as two others stepped into Rimmer's transport and closed their doors. "I can't…"
Jangles stepped over to Lister, his chin a hair above Lister's shoulder. Absently, Lister caught Jangles' bridle and stroked his warm nose.
Rimmer's transport turned its force field buffeting up handfuls of gravel. Lister watched it bump over his rough driveway. He could still see Rimmer slumped in the back seat.
Lister pulled Jangles forward, shoving his foot in the stirrup and throwing his body up and over the saddle. He urged Jangles into a canter after the transport. Lister kissed and Jangles leapt into a gallop. Jangles cornered better then the transport and managed to catch up as it revved to full speed on the road.
"Arnold!"
Lister saw Rimmer through the transport window. He looked exhausted. Desperate. "Arnold!"
The man looked up. His eyes met Lister's. Resignation. That's what Lister saw. Tired, empty resignation. Like a man at the end of a futile and long-fought battle. A losing battle.
As the transport switched gears, Jangles fell behind and put on a burst of speed.
Lister pulled him up—galloping any further was too dangerous on the asphalt—and watched Rimmer's transport disappear over the curve of the hill.
(ooo)
"Is there any reason for this hologram to remain in your custody?" Lister's lawyer a small, thin man with nervous hands—John had recommended him—eyed Lister meaningfully.
Lister glanced up. Rimmer sat, head bowed, beside his mum. She was wearing a smart dress-suit and a pill box hat with a cute bit of lace fringe. And when she wasn't flirting with her lawyer, she'd been looking at Lister like he was a villain in the fifth act of a Shakespearean play.
"Your honour… Arnold and I—"
Rimmer winced, slumping even further into himself.
"He and I…" Lister trailed off. His lawyer nodded his head to encourage him. "When we were alive, I mean…"
Lister's lawyer cleared his throat.
"I mean…"
"Do you have anything at all to add to these proceedings, Mister Lister?" The Judge—head haloed by the traditional headdress, stacks of thick white curls—stared down at him.
Lister glanced back at Rimmer. Rimmer's face was in his hands. He was shaking.
"No. I…"
Lister's lawyer stepped up and filled in quickly. "Isn't it true that you and Arnold Rimmer engaged in a sexual relationship for two years prior to your departure from the Red Dwarf?"
Lister glanced back at Rimmer. His head had dropped down till it rested against the desk.
"Yes." Lister said finally.
"So, as Arnold's partner—"
"Your honour I won't be party to these slanderous accusations against my son." Rimmer's mum stood and pointed at Lister. Her features were as still and tight as stone. "This man wants to tear my family's good name to shr—"
"Sit down, Mrs. Rimmer." The Judge commanded.
"Your honor, I won't hear—"
"Sit—"
"This slander has to—"
"Sit down, Mrs. Rimmer. Don't try my patience."
Mrs. Rimmer's eyes narrowed; her only concession to emotion. "Yes, your honour." She sat down. Slowly.
"Continue, council." The Judge gestured to Lister's lawyer.
"Under the common-law act of—"
"They were roommates, your honour. Please!" Mrs. Rimmer had jumped to her feet again.
"Not if they were engaged in a sexual relationship, Mrs. Rimmer." Lister's lawyer half turned to address her.
The Judge slammed his gravel. "Council, you will direct your attention to the witness. Mrs. Rimmer, no more outbursts."
Lister's lawyer adjusted his jacket and continued. "Now. As Mister Rimmer's one, and only, romantic partner in his entire life—"
A low keening wail filled the court room. Lister's lawyer stopped. The Judge glanced around.
Lister closed his eyes.
"Is there something wrong, Mister Rimmer?" The Judge.
"Rimmer!" Rimmer's mum. "Be a bit more stoic!"
Lister opened his eyes. He watched Mrs. Rimmer swat her son with her purse. The keening stopped. She cocked an eyebrow at the Judge.
"Continue, council." The Judge motioned to Lister’s lawyer.
"As Mister Rimmer's only romantic partner, the man he lived with in a sexual relationship for two years, you feel you qualify for sole custody of Mister Rimmer's post-mortem hologram."
"Yeah." Lister whispered.
"Please speak up, Mister Lister."
"Yes! Yes to all of it!"
"That is all, your honour." Lister's lawyer rebuttoned his jacket as he sat back down, a small smile on his lips.
Lister stared at his hands.
"Mrs. Rimmer? Your council?"
A pair of footsteps approached the bench. Lister glanced up. Mrs. Rimmer's fat, white bearded lawyer stared down his nose—and the long arc of his double-breasted pearl grey suit—at Lister. On his lapel was a pin. A golden clock-work spring.
"Mister Lister." He began, wheezing a bit at the edges. "As you know, Hopist Io does not recognize common-law relationships between men. The only reason this case wasn't dismissed as a spurious bit of nonsense is because it fell under Jupiterian law due to a technicality—"
"Council, relevance?"
"My apologies your honour. I was overcome, for a moment, with colonistic fervour." Mrs. Rimmer's lawyer chuckled then bowed to the Judge and turned to face Lister. "Is it not true that you have no record of your relationship? No gifts or letters exchanged? No witnesses among your friends or relatives? Anyone at all who was aware of it as it was happening?"
"That's not true!" Lister turned to the Judge. "I wrote him every week for five years. It'd be in his personal effects, all of it! He said he kept them in a safe deposit box."
The lawyer emanated smugness. "You mean the personal effects Mrs. Rimmer inherited from her late son?"
Lister turned and stared at Mrs. Rimmer. She shook her head at him, a hint of a smile on her dark-red lips.
"Mrs. Rimmer has stated that no such letters exist."
"She's lyin'! They do! I wrote him all the time! Every smeggin' week!" Lister charged to his feet, tears blurred his vision. "I loved him! I wanted him with me so bad—I thought I was havin' a heart attack some days… nothin' made that go away. Nothin'. For five years I waited for him. And finally he decided to come see me! He had his reservations and everythin'. He’d finally chosen!" Lister fell back into his seat, sobbing. "It's not fair! It's not!"
Mrs. Rimmer‘s lawyer ploughed on. "Mister Lister—"
"Give him a moment, council."
Lister rubbed his watering eyes and nose on his sleeve, trying to control his heaving. "It's not…"
"Mister Lister… There is no evidence at all that you had any sort of relationship with Arnold Rimmer. Much less a—" The lawyer's lip curled, "Much less a romantic one that could, by any stretch of the imagination, qualify as equivalent to marriage. So tell me, why should I, or anyone, believe you? You call the exquisite, god-fearing Mrs. Rimmer—" The lawyer exaggerated the syllables in 'exquisite', savouring each one. "A liar, yet the only liar I see in here is you."
"I'm not." Lister's voice was almost inaudible.
"Are you done, council?" The judge sounded less then pleased.
"Yes, your honour."
"Take your seat Mister Lister. Mister Rimmer, please approach the bench."
Lister left the witness box, moving listlessly towards his lawyer and his seat.
"Alright, Arnold Rimmer, I want you to answer one question." The Judge turned to look at Rimmer. "I know that you have no memory of the alleged relationship between you and Dave Lister due to Red Dwarf's rather archaic archive protocol, but please tell me if there is anything… anything at all, in his behaviour or yours that would suggest such a relationship existed?"
Lister watched Rimmer. He refused to look up or look at anything aside from his hands. Every molecule of Lister's being tensed for his answer.
"Your honour." Rimmer looked up at the judge. Even from fifteen feet away, Lister could see tears in his eyes. Rimmer glanced at his mother. Then at Lister. Another look of desperate confusion, longing and then resignation. Lister's stomach fell.
"No, your honour." Rimmer glanced back at his hands.
The Judge leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes. When he opened them again, he looked like he'd aged. He leaned onto the front of his podium. "Approach the bench, Mister Lister."
Lister stood and walked over. He couldn't look at Rimmer. But he felt the man's presence against his skin like a electric guitar solo on a hypersonic frequency.
"I know there is more here then meets the eye. I'd lay odds—" He nodded at Lister, "that he's telling the truth. Unfortunately, I have to take into account the viability of the relationship today." He stared at Rimmer. "For whatever reason you seem unable to accept a relationship with this man, past, present or future. As a Ganymite I believe that love—any love—is too precious to be squandered. But that is your own decision and I have to respect it." The judge pointed his gravel at Mrs. Rimmer, "I’m granting custody of Mr. Rimmer to Mrs. Rimmer."
Mrs. Rimmer offered up a thin smile.
The turned to Lister. "As for you. I am truly sorry, but you can't pump water out of a dry well. It's best you stop trying."
(ooo)
Lister leaned up against the wall under the Jupiter court system crest. After a moment he felt a hand against his shoulder. He looked up. John.
"I watched the proceedings." He squeezed Lister's shoulder. "I'm sorry."
"I didn't notice you were there." Lister kicked at the institution grey carpet.
"You were pre-occupied."
"What do I do now?" Lister asked. "What?"
John's hand slipped off his shoulder.
"John!" High-heels clacked towards them.
Lister looked up. Mrs. Rimmer was trotting towards them. She stopped short in front of John. "What do you think you're doing?"
"Mother?" John said, stunned. "What? How—"
"Your wife told me to look out for you." Mrs. Rimmer pursed her lips. "She said you recommended a lawyer to him." She flicked her gloved hand at Lister. "How could you? Assist a man who wants to drag the Rimmer family name into the mud out of professional jealousy?"
"Professional jealousy?" John grabbed Lister's upper arm "What? Dave?"
"He's not happy simply stealing the test pilot position you worked so hard for—imagine!"
"Look, mother, I happen to believe Dave. I would have testified for him if his lawyer hadn't told me it was useless."
"What nonsense." Mrs. Rimmer dismissed it all with a wave of her hand. "This is all absurd silliness." She scoffed. "You boys never had a clue."
"Really?" John said, his grip tightened on Lister's arm.
Ignoring his tone, Mrs. Rimmer pulled gum from her purse, unwrapped a piece and popped it in her mouth. After a beat she offered a piece to John and Lister. Lister shook his head; John looked like he'd been slapped. "You should go back to your wife, John." She said. "People are talking."
"So? Let them talk. I've done my duty."
"She's your wife." Mrs. Rimmer's eyes narrowed. "Your duty to her does not end."
"To be a high flier, to buy her a big house, to pay for her lifestyle and to dote on her every minute of the day? No wonder she needed two men. Three if you count the pool boy."
Mrs. Rimmer scoffed. "Nonsense. No Mrs. Rimmer has ever cheated."
John looked fit to spit. Instead he took a deep breath. "Mother. My wife and I have our agreements. You can tell your friends whatever you like, but it's none of your business or theirs."
"Agreements? The nerve. I've told you to go back to your wife, and go back you will." Mrs. Rimmer leaned her head back, looking down her nose at the both of them.
Lister backed up a bit. John and his mother were staring each other down. They looked like a mongoose and a cobra, locked in a silent, unflinching contest of wills. John's cheek twitched. Mrs. Rimmer's eyebrow lifted.
Just as Lister felt John beginning to back down, the man exploded towards him, grabbed him up and, like something out of a noir drama, leaned him over and kissed him. He had nothing to do with his hands so he held onto John's shoulders.
"John Tobias Rimmer. Stop your silly stunting and go back to your wife." Mrs. Rimmer flicked her head and turned on her heel, unimpressed.
John leaned his head into Lister's shoulder. After a moment he exploded. "Gah! That woman."
(ooo)
Bexley leaned Kris Kochanski-Lister back and kissed her on the steps of the Ganymite Gnostarian Temple. The assembled crowd, black tuxedos paired with a confetti of different hued dresses—that was the wedding's colour scheme, black and whatever-looks-good-on-you—cheered, threw handfuls of bird-safe organic grice and parted as the bride and groom descended the stairs to the stretch ship-to-surface transport.
Lister clapped, watching his clone-son, the ever elusive Bexley and his son's wife, daughter of Kris Kochanski, the girl he once thought he'd marry. He'd always thought her daughter was a bit on the stick-up-her-butt side, too humourless for his taste, but he trusted Bexley. And the girl was fit, that was sure.
Kris Junior turned back to the crowd, pushed the little bits of curled hair by her temples behind her ears and threw the bouquet of GELF-rosanthimums.
Lister lost sight of them both in the ensuing riot over the bouquet, he shrugged, turned back up the stairs and walked to the top landing. From there he could see their transport depart for the nearest launch window. He saluted them and entered the Temple.
Custodial staff ran silent vacuums over the hard wood floor, picking up for the next scheduled ceremony. The vicar spoke to the organist, handing her music, his vestments rippling in the breeze from an open window.
"Hi, Dave."
A woman's voice. Lister turned. It was Kris Senior. The girl with the pin-ball smile. She offered him a smile. Not that one, though. "Hi." Lister smiled back at her. She’d married Todhunter, of all things. And then Todhunter’s ship had disappeared after taking a ride on one of the new StarTransit™ routes.
"I just thought I'd pop in to see if I could help." She smiled again. The weight of sad companionship settled on them both. She was a widow. And Lister… well, Lister had lost out too.
"Naw. Everythin's under control." Lister nodded at the janitors.
"How have you been, Dave?" Kris senior asked. There was real concern there.
Lister shrugged. For various political reasons, the Rimmer custody trial had been quite public. "Could be better. Getting by." He wasn't going to lie to her.
"Bexley is wonderful," Kris said. "I know he'll make my daughter happy."
"He is," Lister agreed. Bexley was wonderful. It was like seeing himself perfected. Everything fitting, everything working right, firing on all cylinders. Tough and disciplined and using all his smarts. "I had such a crush on you on Red Dwarf," Lister offered.
"Me too."
"On yerself?"
"No. You know what I mean." She chuckled, chucking his shoulder.
"What have you been up too?"
"I’m doing well, still captaining one of the Pluto routes. Looks like Bexley's work is going to put me out of a job."
"Really? I didn't realize—"
"Oh no!" Kris giggled. She was messing with him. "I’m moving up to an Andromeda transit route. I'll be captaining a deep space vessel."
"That will be amazing for you," Lister promised. "It changes yeh… deep space."
“I’ve heard.” Kris leaned forward to kiss Lister's cheek. "I’ve got to go. Keep in touch?" She turned to leave.
“Yeah.“ Lister watched her go, touching his cheek. If things hadn't gone the way they had…
He shook his head, trying to shake off the what-ifs…
"Dad?"
Lister started, then glanced over to Jim. He'd managed to sneak up without being heard. "Yeah?"
Jim looked at him—they were the same height now—a pained expression on his face.
Lister cut him off before he could say anything. "Let's go home, yeah?"
They walked together towards the Temple's parking lot.
"I wanted to tell you that I developed another technology."
Lister looked over at his son, distracted. "Yeah?"
"It's an… enhancement to the personality algorithm system. Actually, I like to think of it as a fear-vaccine." Jim grinned. "I've been working with a psychiatrist on it. I never thought voxels or the PIE engine could come together to cure people with phobic disorders." Jim paused, looking down at his hands. "I was thinking maybe it could help you."
"Help me… what?"
"Well, it takes away fear. Maybe it could help Arnold get over… his problem."
Lister grimaced. "Stop it."
"What?"
"Just. Stop it." He stared at Jim. "Not now."
"I just thought—" Jim stopped, glaring at the ground and sniffing.
Lister stared at him. Do I look like that when I'm upset? Lister's throat closed off, he felt like he was choking. "Please. Stop it."
"I made a real mess of things, didn't I dad?" Jim laughed. Tears were falling.
Just as soppy as me. "No. It's not…" Lister tried to reach for his son… clone… but he couldn't move through the shame. And then it felt like his lips were moving of their own accord. "Yer me clone, Jim. I made the mess."
(ooo)
Bexley watched Jim—James now. His fellow clone sat behind an desk that reeked ’executive’, a monster slab of cherry wood inset with tabs of glossy wood. It had been years since they’d seen each other. And James had changed. Still quiet. Still insular. But hard.
James finished tapping at his computer input screen. “I have personal stock available. You want one vial?”
Bexley nodded.
James looked up. “What’s your story?”
Bexley half sat against the edge of James’ desk. He could give grit for grit. “Tell me yers first.”
James tilted his head. “There’s nothing you can do.”
“I didn’t expect there was.”
“What’s to say? Mortality and fear are the two… human frailties mankind has always wanted to overcome. Voxels and the fear vaccine, are two of the greatest inventions ever. Endless, fearless life. Or a very close approximation thereof.” James didn’t smile. He didn’t look satisfied or excited. He looked… sad and tired.
Bexley waved away James‘ words. “When did stop talking to yer father?”
“You mean our original?” James corrected.
“He disappeared off a Transit lane a year ago.” Bexley said. “Don’t know where he went.”
“Ask the PIE. It talks to you two in a way it never did me.” James looked churlish for a moment before his mask snapped shut.
“I did. Nothin’ to say. Well. Nothin’ worth saying.” Some awful nonsense about pulling together a ship from the threads of time. And camphor wood chests. It’d been rather insistent on that last point. Bexley’d got the sense the PIE had a bit of a fixation on camphor wood chests.
“Do you want information about our original or do you want the vial?”
Bexley closed his eyes. “The vial.”
“You aren’t with the Space Corps anymore.”
“I got into an accident. A… navi-comp blew up in me face.”
“Can’t lay track with a hologrammatic body? You could still work the existing lanes.”
Bexley swallowed. “I resigned.” The UPSC had crossed the line as soon as they got clout. Holograms were property—personality algorithms were property, the genetic code of your employees, property. They’d resurrected him as soon as he died—he was too valuable to keep dead. And then they’d just gone on with their cloning operation, getting more efficient with each generation. Using his genetics and his memories. Bexley’s hands curled into fists.
“A hologram? Resign?” James scoffed. “That’s not possible.” He leaned forward, a smile quirking his lips. “So you’re asking for more then the vaccine. You’re asking for amnesty. Don‘t worry. My lawyers can wrap the UPSC in legal red tape so thick they‘ll—”
Bexley glanced up. “I don’t care about that.”
“Bex.” James sighed. “What do you care about then?”
“Kris’s mum vanished off a Transit route a while back. She was shattered.” Bexley glanced up.
“Go on.”
“She disappeared. I tracked her to Mimas.” Every word raked against his throat as he spoke it. “She’s… she’s in Better then Life. She’s a game-head.”
“Ah. My competitors.” James nodded. “Couldn’t handle reality. There’s a lot in her generation like that. Came out of virtual reality and want back in. Good market.”
Bile rose in Bexley’s throat. He let none of it show on his face.
James continued. “And you think the vaccine will get help her out? It could.” James chuckled. “So you weren’t enough for Kris? I suppose you being a indentured-hologram didn‘t help. She would have got that awful Notice of Deceasement. Told she should break all contact and just forget you.”
Bexley stared at the edge of James’ desk. He didn’t dare move. He thought he should feel an extra measure of pissed off hearing cruelty coming out of his own face, but he’d long since stopped seeing James’ face as his own.
“I wouldn’t be so upset. None of us are, you know.” James laughed again. “None of us are enough for each other. That’s why voxels and fear-vaccines and game-heads exist.”
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Date: 2008-01-19 12:57 am (UTC)BTW, I like the name Jangles for a horse.
Hey
Date: 2008-01-20 11:44 pm (UTC)Jangles is named after the song "Mr. BoJangles" by Nitty Gritty Dirt Band. About a tap-dancing man who lived a nomadic lifestyle with his dog. But his dog died and it sent him into a depression. He grieved for 20 years; probably his whole life. I like the song. It says a lot about life and how loss connects us all.
Some horses are named Beau Jangles. Which is adorable.