("RED DWARF" THEME)
Gentlemen,
thank you for attending the meeting.
Now, let me begin by saying that it
can't have escaped anyone's attention
that things have been getting
rather strained round here of late.
It's no secret that morale is on the floor.
We've lost all trace of Red Dwarf,
tempers are strained and supplies are low.
So, I've decided, if it's alright with you,
to appoint myself morale officer...
..and set myself the task of raising the spirits
and improving the atmosphere all round.
Now, to kick off, I thought it would
be productive if we all met once a week
to have a coffee or a beer,
whatever's your poison,
and get any problems
we may have off our chests.
- Any objections?
- No, it sounds like a very good idea, sir. Excellent.
Well, as it's week one, why don't I start?
You know what it is about Lister
that really makes me want to puke?
That really makes me want to stab him
in both eyes with an ice pick?
Everything, that's what.
Especially his godawful,
chirpy, gerbil-faced optimism.
And as for the Cat, what an unbelievable git.
And Kryten, if he doesn't change pronto,
I swear, I'll attach jump leads to his nipple nuts
and fry him like Cajun catfish.
Well, I think that's cleared the air.
I don't know about you but I certainly feel better,
and thank you for your contributions, gentlemen.
See you at next week's morale meeting.
Marvellous.
- Good meeting.
- What's eating him?
Well, I'm no psychologist, sir, but maybe
the bleak, lonely, pointless emptiness
of our hopeless, futile predicament is beginning to getting to him.
You can always tell when he's tense. The way he
scrunches up cups and throws them in the bin.
And we're not talking styrofoam, here.
We're talking enamel.
- I told you, didn't I? That he attacked me with that fridge?
- What happened?
He just wrenched it off the
wall and tried to insert it in me.
What did you do to upset him?
Absolutely nothing. I was just
sitting there, minding my own business,
plucking out my lengthier nostril
hairs with a pair of cooking tongs.
- Extraordinary. It's so unprovoked.
- The guy's so touchy.
If I tried to force feed you a refrigerator every time you
did something gross, you'd have to go on a fridge-free diet.
You know what the problem is? Every day's the
same old slog through deep space. No Variety.
- Take Christmas. What did we do Christmas Day?
- If you remember, sir, Christmas Day we were attacked
by that pan-dimensional liquid beast
from the Mogidon Cluster.
Maybe that wasn't such a great example.
I'm trying to say our lives are dull, repetitive.
We never take time out to smell the roses.
We never celebrate anything.
- We got nothing to celebrate with, bud.
- Oh, not true, sir.
There's a whole case of that wine I brewed
out of urine recyc just lying there, practically untouched.
Look, call me pretentious, but, for me, a truly great wine should not leave you
with a foam moustache
that you can only remove with turps.
- (SIREN)
- Autopilot alert.
- Storm front ahead. Switching to manual.
- It's a big one. Too late to go round! It's right on us.
Stellar fog, tightly-packed particles
from an exploded supernova.
Our scanners won't be able to
penetrate more than a few metres.
Slowing to minimum.
Gentleman, absolute concentration
till we're through the squall.
- There could be anything lurking out there.
- Don't worry, bud. If there's anything out there, we'll spot it.
(BOOM)
- Anybody hurt?
- Well, my pride sure needs mouth-to-mouth.
Mr Lister! Sir!
- He's out cold!
- All stop. Let's get him up to the obs room.
- (RIMMER) How is he?
- Not good, sir. Perhaps you better look away.
- I know you can't stand the sight of blood.
- Don't worry, Kryten. It's OK when it's Lister's.
- Impossible!
- (CAT) What?
Look! Mr Lister is a droid!
- He's a what?!
- There's no doubt about it.
He's entirely mechanical.
A 3000 Series. Made in Taiwan.
Look, he has a 24-hour emergency call-out number.
I'm sorry, I'm not buying this.
I mean, who'd create him and why?
What's his mission?
To rid the universe of chicken vindaloo?
This doesn't tie up. If he wasn't
human, I'd've known by his scent.
The X-rays confirm it.
This is so strange.
Mr Lister's always been an icon of mine.
Now I find he's an earlier model
and technically, I outrank him!
An earlier model? Then how come he looks
so much more sophisticated than you?
Sir, just because I have a head shaped
like a freak formation of mashed potato
does not mean I am unsophisticated.
Alright then, why does he look
more realistically human?
Humans have always found
exact duplicates rather disturbing, sir.
The 3000 Series was notoriously unpopular.
Most of them were recalled. A few slipped the net
and went undercover to make new lives in society.
- Do you think he knows?
- Unlikely.
He probably reprogrammed his
own memory to escape detection.
This is going to crack him up, devastate him.
Who's going to tell him?
I'll write you into my will if you let it be me.
I suggest you leave this to me, sirs.
I'll have a talk with him, droid to droid.
OK. we'll get going, try and get out of this
damn fog before it drains our solar batteries.
(GROANS)
- What happened? What hit us?
- Something in the stellar fog, sir.
It didn't show up on the scans.
Sir, do you remember who your parents were?
No, you know I don't. I was
found under a pool table in a box.
Hmm. Did anyone ever tell you
what was written on that box?
Were the words "kit" or "paint
before assembing" ever mentioned?
It's just while you were under, we discovered
something rather disturbing about you.
It's that tattoo on my inner thigh, isn't it?
Look, I don't really love Petersen. He just got
me so drunk, I didn't know what I was doing.
It's not the tattoo, sir.
There's no way of breaking this gently.
I'm afraid, sir, you are not human.
You're a droid.
- I'm a what?
- You're a mechanical, 3000 Series.
- Technically subordinate to me.
- What does this all mean?
In broad terms, I get the front seat in the cockpit
and you're in charge of the laundry!
And I want to see creases!
Kryten, have a heart, man. I'm in major
stress-related shock here. Gobsmack overload.
You're a droid. You don't have real emotions.
It's just synthi-shock.
Now stop thinking like a
human, and go about your duties.
- Kryten, why are you being so heartless?
- I looked up to you.
You encouraged me to break my
programming and ape human behaviour.
Now I find you're no better than I!
But worst of all, the most bitter pill to swallow...
for four long years, I had to hand-scrub
the gussets of your longjohns!
Now, unless you want to wallow
in the eternal fires of Silicon Hell,
I suggest you bring a tray of
refreshments up to the cockpit, pronto!
What was the jolt?
It's a mystery, bud. Nothing on
the scanners. Nothing on visual.
It was like we through some kind of energy pocket. Still, looks like we're out of it now.
Better run a cross-check, see if this
phenomena is mentioned in any of our databases.
Tea up! Sorry I was so long, I
didn't know where anything was.
Let me see that tray, please.
- Why?
- That's, "Why, Mr Kryten, sir?"
You call those triangular sandwiches?
Did you use a set square? I think not!
And the chocolate finger display is laughable.
Don't just pile them higgledy-piggledy onto the plate.
Make them into an attractive interlaced,
log cabin structure or something.
This just will not do. Now, kindly return to the galley and start again.
OK... sir. This doesn't feel right.
Not right at all.
What a charlatan. All these years...
- Any ideas what hit us yet?
- Wait. Wait, here's something.
Reports of artificial stellar fogs
which contain reality minefields.
- Reality what?
- Bubbles or pockets of unreality,
which when encountered create false realities
designed to disorient and drive off potential looters.
- From what?
- It's a defence device fitted to Space Corps test ships,
which are fitted with prototype drives so awesome in
their power that they have to be safeguarded at all costs.
So we just crashed through an unreality pocket?
Which created a false reality,
making us believe Mr Lister was... Oh, my.
- You mean he's not a...?
- No.
- Tea up, sirs.
- Sir, I, er...
What do you think of the picket fence?
- I'm not happy with it, meself. I'll go away and do it again.
- Sir, may I see your arm?
Smeg! It looks normal, human!
Someone else tell him.
I've got gussets to scrub.
I wondered if you felt
like a nice cold beer, sir?
Oh, sir, how many times can I apologise?
I have offered to mince myself.
What more can I do?
Don't worry, I'll think of something,
probably involving a bowl of water, a poker,
a recharge socket
and 4,000 volts of direct current.
This fog's getting worse. I say reverse out now before it's too late.
Well, I hate to agree with old Laundry-Chute Nostrils,
but he has got a point.
The scanners are out,
and my smell range is practically zero.
Starbug is small. We can probably pick our way through
without hitting any more unreality bubbles.
Someone's gone to plenty big trouble
to keep spacecraft out of here.
- It's gotta be worth finding out why.
- But how can we guarantee we're-?
- (CAT) We hit one!
- (LISTER) We hit one.
- That's what I said.
- Where's the Cat?
- (CAT) I'm here.
- It's taken the Cat, he's gone!
I'm not gone! I'm here!
- They must've just erased him from existence.
- Then how come we still remember him?
- Remember, who?
- I don't remember.
Hey, buds, don't do this to me!
You can't forget me! I'm unforgettable
I don't get this! We're passing through an
unreality pocket, and everything's normal!
What do you mean "everything's
normal"? I've been invisibled!
It doesn't make any sense. All systems
check. The three of us are here as normal.
The four of us! There's four of us! Look! I'm here.
Can't you see me? Can't you feel me?
We're getting some buffeting!
About to pass back into normal space.
What are you doing?!
- Can you see me?
- Of course I can see you.
You all forgot who I was. Don't you remember?
It's too weird in here. Let's quit while we can.
All we gotta do is keep our heads.
Boy! This is worse than triple-strength catnip!
The pockets are getting denser
and closer together. We're never going to...
make it.
I can't take
much more of this.
Just ignore it. All these unreality pockets are designed
to make you feel absurd and disoriented.
He's right. Let's just keep going
and we'll get out the other side.
All ahead stop. We have got to talk.
Kryten, how far would you say it is to the epicentre?
Current speeds, about another three days, sir.
- OK, you win. Let's get outta here.
- Perhaps there is one possibility.
That's it. I've installed a temporary
stasis seal on both deep sleep units.
So, in theory at least, time will be frozen, and neither reality
nor unreality will be able to penetrate.
See you in three days.
- Where are we, did we make it?
- We successfully penetrated the minefield, sir.
- We're through to the epicentre.
- But what was it protecting?
A derelict. According to the computer,
it's from the 28th century
and it's capable of time travel?!
- Crew?
- All dead. This was the maiden voyage.
They contracted an influenza virus
on an excursion to the 20th century.
Before they died, they programmed
the autopilot through deep space.
and generated the minefield to prevent the
machine from falling into the wrong hands.
Does this mean what I think it means?
We board her, strip out the drive and...
Bingo! We've got ourselves a time machine!
Let's see if the sucker works.
Sirs, choose a year.
Since we can't guarantee this time
drive is going to function properly,
I suggest we select a neutral time period for our first jaunt.
He's got a point. Let's go for somewhere
nice and safe and dull. How about 1422?
- How about 1421?
- What's the difference?
No difference. I just wanted it make
it look like I was paying attention.
Load 1421, Kryten.
1421 loaded, sir. August the 17th.
Engaging the time drive.
- Hey, we did it!
- Indeed we did.
All ship chronometers indicate this is August
16th in the year 1421 - just one day out.
- Give us visual, let's see what it's like out there.
- OK, punching it up.
I don't get it. We're still where we were.
Of course. We're still in deep space, sir, only
now we're in deep space in the 15th century!
Isn't it wonderful?
So we're still three million years away from Earth?
Well, yes.
- Taking her back to the present.
- Keyed in. Engaged.
So, forgive me if I'm being thicker
than the offspring
of a village idiot and a TV weathergirl,
but what exactly
was the point of that little exercise?
Fun though it was drinking in the heady
medieval atmosphere of pre-Renaissance deep space,
the drive is next to useless, yes?
For the moment, yes, but should we ever
acquire a faster-than-light drive,
we will have the combination
to travel anywhere and anywhen.
- Picking up a craft.
- He's right. Some kind of craft, small. Here it comes.
It's a Jupiter Mining Corporation call sign.
Some kind of transport vehicle. Colour: green,
Life-forms: four... Craft name: "Starbug"?
Call me crazy,
but that all sounds weirdly familiar.
It's us, man. Us from the future.
Hey, incoming SOS message!
- Don't punch it up! Close comms!
- Why?
If that vessel is this vessel, sir. Almost
certainly it contains our future selves.
The implications of making
contact could be devastating.
The human brain is not designed
to cope with knowing its own future.
Yeah, but Kryten, obviously we're in some kind of
major trouble, otherwise we wouldn't've shown up.
No, Kryten's got a point. It's
too dangerous to make contact.
What if we discover
that one of us is dead?
- Who could handle that?
- We all could if it was you.
They're trying us again. Come on, they're in
trouble, we can't just hang them out to dry!
Well, in that case, sir. Suggest that I am left alone to make contact.
I can give them whatever assistance they require
then erase my memory of the entire event.
Opening comms. Present Starbug calling
future Starbug. We are ready to communicate.
Well, how did it go? Everything OK?
Mr Lister, sir...
I love you!
You know that, don't you? I'd hate you
to... go anywhere not knowing that, sir.
So what's the SP, Kryts?
Can you tell us anything?
A little, sir. They are indeed our
future selves from 15 years hence.
(SOBS) What a senseless waste!
Listen, if something happens to me, I want to know!
All I'm allowed to divulge is that their time drive has developed a fault, and they can only travel forwards.
They jumped to a period where they knew we would be, in order to copy some components from our own drive.
So am I actually going to get to meet me?
My knees have turned to jelly!
Nobody will be meeting anybody. You must be sealed in
the upper deck before they set a space boot on board.
- So, when are they coming?
- Immediately.
I'll serve your supper in the ops room.
I thought I'd whip you up a nice little curry
with jam roly-poly
and a big jug of chilled margarita.
- They're all my favourites!
- (SOBS) I know!
How can we have margeritas? I thought we were out of tequila?
I put a little miniature bottle aside, sir, for...
no particular reason.
And I thought since today had... no special
significance, it would be appropriate to...
- Oh, just go, Kryten!
- Thank you, sir.
(KRYTEN SOBS HYSTERICALLY)
His favourite bowl.
His little cup.
The tin opener he used
to pick his ears clean with.
- Everything OK?
- Oh, yep, yep.
Those darn onions get you every time!
- What onions?
- Er, the onions I'm about to peel.
I always get a little emotional when
I have to deprive an onion of its skin.
Hey, don't Nixon me, man! Tell me the truth.
I die, don't I? I mean, I'm
dead aren't I? I don't make it.
All I'm at liberty to disclose sir, is that all four
members of the Starbug crew will be boarding this vessel.
- Yeah, but I'm not amongst them, right?
- One of their number is called Dave Lister.
Now, you'll have to excuse me. I've already said too much.
Hang on a minute, I'm really
confused now. Are you saying I survive?
I can say no more. Please,
let us not squabble on this of all days.
Careful with them chillies, Kryten. The rate
you're going, there'll be none left for tomorrow.
Look, whatever it is, there's
nothing you can do about it. It's fate.
I just don't get it. Am I dead or am I alive?
If I'm dead, how can I come on-board?
- What precisely are you doing, bud?
- I'm hacking into the security cameras.
Kryten's turned off all the monitors, so I'm rigging it up to the mediscan.
When those johnnies come on board, I wanna see 'em.
Docking complete. Opening airlock 4.
Gentlemen, welcome aboard.
Ah, Mr Rimmer, sir. Come in, come in.
Did we actually used to live like this?
What a godawful, depressing little hole.
We're used to the good things in life now, bud.
- Kryten! Are you really me?!
- Would you take a look at him?
Did I really used to look that goofy?
What is that you've got on your head?
I hope you have a quarantine license for it.
We're time travellers now, and a lot of our
business involves going back in history.
I have to look incognito. Frankly, I can't afford going around
looking like I've swapped heads
with a damaged crash dummy.
I think we're overstepping
the bounds of agreed conversation, here...
Is, um...? Mr Lister, did you bring him?
Sir, you look terrific.
I was expecting something much worse.
Don't worry about me, Kryts, I'm fine.
Absolutely dandy.
Well, blow me! You've hardly changed at all.
If I hadn't been told about the accident,
I don't think I'd even have noticed.
Yo! We're in.
Oh, my God! Look at Rimmer!
- I can't have changed much. I'm a hologram.
- Wrong.
You're two meals away from being a sumo wrestler.
- Let me see!
- Am I there?
- Oh, yes.
- What do I look like?
I can't actually see quite clearly... The light
is reflecting off the top of your head.
What are you talking about?
(LAUGHS) You're as bald as a plucked chicken, man!
- Let me see!
- Wait, wait. I want to see if I'm there.
I don't seem to be there.
It's just you two, Kryten...
- Oh, my God...
- What? What is it?
Ooooh, dear!
What? Is he fat?
Far from it.
He's lost a bit of weight, actually.
Actually, he's lost quite a little bit of everything.
- What do I do to end up like that?
- That is tragic.
That is the saddest thing
I've ever seen in my life.
What happened to my butt? Buddy,
you could park a plane in that crease.
So what? You're fat and bald. That's what happens
when you get older. Look at me, I'm just a brain in a jar!
Self, self, self, self, self!
- We've gotta find out what's going on?
- (KRYTEN) This is our only bottle of real wine.
We've been saving it for a special occasion.
And what could be more special than this?
- To the future.
- To the past.
- This is poison, bud!
- Haven't you anything better than this hogwash?
- We're used to the best!
- Kryten, we're epicures now.
We travel through history
enjoying the very best time has to offer.
Dolphin sweetmeats, roast suckling elephant,
baby seal hearts stuffed with dove pate.
Food fit for emperors!
(LISTER'S BRAIN) We've socialised with all the greatest figures
in history - the Habsburgs, the Borgias...
Why, only last week, Louis XVI
threw a banquet especially in our honour.
The man is a complete delight -
urbane, witty, charming...
He was an idiotic despot who lived in the most obscene luxury
while the working classes starved in abject poverty.
- Well, we certainly didn't see any of that when we were there.
- And his wife's an absolute cutie.
I think they're our favourite hosts.
If you don't count the Hitlers.
The who?!
Providing you avoid talking
politics, they're an absolute hoot.
- You're good friends with the Hitlers?!
- It's just a social thing.
We don't talk about his work.
We just have a few laughs, play Canasta
and enjoy the odd game of
mixed doubles with the Goerings.
- I don't believe what I'm hearing!
- Look, you have to understand,
we travel back and forth
throughout the whole of history.
And naturally, we want to
sample the best of everything.
It's just a bit unfortunate that the finest things tend
to be in the possession of people judged to be a bit dodgy.
Hermann Goering is "a bit dodgy"?!
What has become of you all? You've abandoned your
morals, been seduced by power and wealth.
All you're interested in now
is indulging your carnal desires.
And could we tell you some stories about that!
I don't recognise any of you.
You're just amoral self-serving scum,
freeloading your way through history!
Good grief! I can't believe I used
to be such a stuck-up, pompous prig.
(EXPLOSION)
OK. That's it.
You've got two minutes to get off this ship.
I don't know how we became you, but I sure as hell don't
intend to help you carry on doing what you're doing.
But we need to examine the calibration on
your time drive's mass compactor.
That's one minute forty...
Shooting us, will be like killing
himself in the future. He won't do it.
- What have I got to lose? My jar?
- Gentlemen, let's meander back, why don't we?
But without the calibration data, we'll be
stranded out here in the middle of nowhere.
- Fifty seconds.
- (CAT) Come on, let's go!
You'll change your mind
when you've thought it through.
You are destined to become us,
and there's nothing you can do about it.
In the end, you'll help us.
Twenty seconds. Into the airlock. In, git.
I knew it would be a
mistake to see the future.
Now our whole lives will be coloured by the fact
that we're gonna end up becoming people we despise.
Threat warning. Vessel off the stern. They've got a missile lock on us.
- Our future selves are attacking us!
- They're nuts!
- Direct hit. The gyroscope's out!
- They're trying to disable us!
- Another lock!
- Incoming message!
Gentlemen, we have no intention
of being deprived
of the opulence of luxury the time drive provides.
Either you give us access to the data we require
or be prepared to be blasted out of the sky.
- But if you kill us, then you'll cease to exist.
- Better that than be forced to live like you,
like rats trapped together, marooned
in deep space. Your answer, 30 seconds.
- What do we do?
- Have we got any chance of winning?
Their craft is greatly upgraded.
We have no chance whatsoever.
- Then I say fight!
- Mr Rimmer?!
- Better dead than smeg!
- Yes! Cat?
Better dead than sofa sized butt.
- Kryten?
- Better anything than that toupee!
- Shields up. Arming lasers.
- Bringing her around.
- Target acquired.
- Locking on... Firing!
- Direct hit!
- Starbug thrusters! Nice shooting, sir!
- Bringing her round for desserts.
- Threat warning, they've got a lock-on.
- I'm going for the main fuel tanks.
- They're in your sights.
- Locked on... Fire!
- Mr Lister!
- Is he OK?
- He's dead, sir!
- The hull's gonna go. We'll all be dead in a minute.
(RIMMER) Cat!
Dead. But there may be a...
Kryten? Kryten?
There may be a what? A way out of this? Is that what you were going to say?
S-speak, Kryten!
How can we change what's happening?
# It's cold outside,
there's no kind of atmosphere
# I'm all alone, more or less
# Let me fly far away from here
# Fun, fun, fun
# In the sun, sun, sun
# I want to lie, shipwrecked and comatose
# Drinking fresh mango juice
# Goldfish shoals, nibbling at my toes
# Fun, fun, fun
# In the sun, sun, sun
# Fun, fun, fun
# In the sun, sun, sun #
