Well, I don't know where this has come from. I don't think I have updated this fic in three years but suddenly it came banging against my door again. I might (emphasis on -might-) even be able to finish it this time around! If people are interested. I forgot how much I kinda loved this story, it's been nice to pick it up again.

Hope people enjoy, especially if there are any of my original readers out there!

Eventually Anneke fell asleep, Rimmer feeling increasingly helpless as he watched her fade into unconsciousness. She'd been in relatively good humour to begin with, all things considered, playing their little game of questions and answers with her usual curiosity, but in under an hour she was blue under her eyes and around her mouth, her exhausted smile petering out of assistance. He could almost swear that he could feel the pain beginning to emanate from her in waves with every breath she took, a disturbing, wet rattle rising from her throat with each inhale as she slept.

It had been a long time since Arnold Rimmer had experienced real, actual pain. Now it was boring into him, starting in his tachyonic sternum and spreading in hot, constrictive pulses outwards through his metaphysical bones. He wondered if this was what it felt like, in that millisecond between leaping off a building and splatting across the pavement below, when your body had just enough time to register the impact ripping through it before you were turned into a spray of pink mist. He was certain it had to be be that same abject terror, seeing the ground hurtling up towards you and knowing you're powerless to stop it; that same terror he felt now listening to Anneke's breaths being swallowed up in fluid, at the mercy of something so infinitesimally small inside her it couldn't even be seen, and yet they were totally powerless to make it stop.

Walnut colour eyes turned down to peer at the pale hand on the bed, resting upon the ship issue scarlet blanket. It looked so small, slender fingers slack but turned towards him, as though reaching out. Just like when she'd been balled up on the shower floor, ice cold rain lacerating it's way through his useless, pointless, worthless form. He couldn't hold those frightened fingers then and he couldn't now. And still she seemed to reach, as if somehow, something might change, if she needed comfort badly enough then by some miracle he'd be able to give it to her...

He swallowed, starkly aware of how inane the habitual action was, then reached to hover the tips of his fingers as close as he could get. He could almost feel a faint hum, some minute prickle where she might be disrupting the field of his projection, but that was as good as it got. When it came down to it, he couldn't give her any sort of support, or grounding, no anchor to hold onto in the storm of her illness...

A strangled hitch in the former communication officer's throat snapped him out of his wallowing, hologrammatic fingers flinching through hers, not that he noticed. His gaze instead was fixed on her face, stomach plummeting somewhere into the deck below as he waited to hear her take another breath. The seconds went by like molasses, till finally there was a muffled inhale beneath her mask and he actually let out a groan, head sagging for a moment so he could collect himself, chin on his chest.

"'Ey... How ye doin'..?"

Lister's voice broke the quiet that had until now been perforated only by the ventilation unit within the quarantine tent, his tone steeped in genuine concern. Rimmer took a moment to set his jaw before he lifted his head, looking out to see his bunkmate leaning against one of the medibay's counters, arms folded, one ankle tucked behind the other. His usual fur trimmed hat was not on his head but tucked into the crook of his elbow, an attempt to be respectful of the delicate situation that was before him. For all his faults, and Rimmer was not remiss about pointing out they were many, he could read a situation like a copy of Vindaloo Monthly.

The hologram let out a weighted sigh, turning his gaze back to Anneke's sunken frame on the bed.

"I think I'd rather have my nostril hairs plucked out one by one than spend another day like this..." he murmured, spotting his fingers intermingled with the girl's and pulling his hand away sharply to fold it in his lap.

"Y'might not have to..." Dave pushed away from the counter hips first and took a couple of measured steps towards the tent, peering over the top of Rimmer's head to gaze at the pale woman as well, a furrow in his tawny brow that grooved a deep line. "Look, I don't wanna be the one to bring this up... I hate me'self for bringin' this up but... We might need to have a think about how long we're gonna let this go on for..."

"I know. I'm not stupid. Kryten's already told me, the antibiotics aren't taking... She's drowning in here..." For the thousandth time that day Rimmer wondered what would happen if he did actually vomit. Would he just spray sparkles into the air, like some sort of confetti cannon? Staring at Anneke's motionless form while he spoke, he was sure he was going to find out soon enough...

"I know she's yer mate... Apparently no accountin' fe'taste-" Lister paused to give him an attempt at a smile that was so painful Rimmer truly wished he hadn't. "- but Kryten's not a medidroid. S'a bit different, if it's just patchin' up the odd hole or dishin' out some aspirin, but this is serious." The emphasis on his last word actually had a little something trying to bubble it's way up Rimmer's throat... "I jus' think it might be time to start thinking about the fact that we don't have the right stuff to save her..."

The only sounds in the room was the low whoosh of the extraction fan pumping clean, cold air into the plastic bubble, coupled with the nauseating wheezes of Anneke's struggled breathing. Some small part of Rimmer somewhere knew the reasonable thing to do would be to respond; agree, disagree, shout, scream, laugh right in Lister's stupid pug-dog face, just something... Infuriatingly though, he sat there in silence, staring, while one minute ticked by, then another, then another after that, precious moments that were running away from them and taking the blonde's very finite time left with them.

"Rimmer-"

"She knows she's going to die. She's being so disgustingly dignified about the whole thing. Properly, genuinely brave. It's maddening." He swallowed again, the motion only serving to further the anger that was coursing up from somewhere deep in the pit of his stomach as he gazed at Anneke's face, fixated on the way her platinum lashes rest on her cheeks.

"Rimmer..."

"Nobody ever likes me. Not as a person. Not even you. Especially not you..." Oh God, it was spilling out of him, like word vomit, he couldn't hold it back, couldn't stuff it back down his gullet again as much as he wanted to... "I don't know... Maybe it was just pity... But honestly, I'd take pity over loathing any day of the week. When I was alive, frankly, pity from someone like her would be a victory..."

"Rimmer, man, will y'stop talking for one second?!" Lister almost shouted but caught himself just in time as the exclamation burst out of him, the words frustrated and honestly a bit embarrassed. One hand swiped down his face, tugging his features into a droop for a moment, Rimmer scowling at nothing in particular because he couldn't face looking his bunkmate in the eye. His fingers twisted tightly into the fabric of his trouser legs as he heard the Liverpudlian continue;

"Nobody's gonna let her die. You'd have to be mad as a box of frogs to think that... We just can't fix it, at least not yet..."

"If you could avoid talking like a cryptic crossword, that'd be wonderful, Lister..." Rimmer wasn't sure he meant his words to be as acidic as they sounded, he just couldn't help it. He felt as though he was on some horrible ride he couldn't get off and right now Lister was at the controls.

"It was Kryten's idea; we put her in stasis." To his credit, the ship's lowest ranking crew member was unflappably calm. He moved to tug on his hat, pulling the fur trim down low over his forehead as he continued,

"We haven't got time to try and figure things out now. She's gettin' too sick too fast. So, we take what blood samples an' stuff we can, put her in stasis where she's outta harm's way an' carry on lookin' fer a cure. She wouldn't feel a thing. S'gotta be better than this..."

Rimmer felt a wholly unfamiliar sensation creeping over him, something unpleasant and yet also oddly mixed with a wash of relief. His eyes began to burn at the very corners, a solid lump of lead clogging his throat as he balled his fingers tighter in the phantom fabric of his trousers to try and compensate for the burning need to take Anneke's hand.

"She'd... she'd be safe in stasis... That might actually be erring on genius..." The momentary crack in his voice betrayed his usual cynicism his was trying to project, resulting in a rare moment of exposed sincerity from the hologram. Lister felt a twist of sympathy for him as he heard it. He may usually be at loggerheads wth Rimmer, but he didn't hate him, not really. And although he was absolutely certain he'd never admit it, he knew that look on his bunkmate's face; that torn, agonised, totally lost expression he probably didn't even realise he was wearing, the same look he knew would have been written on his features when he realised Kochanski was gone and never coming back... He'd never call him on it, but anyone could see it. A blind, dumb and deaf monk who'd taken a vow of silence could have called it; Rimmer was soft on their rescued shipmate.

"Kryten's already sortin' out a booth, gettin' it set up real comfy like, with a bed and everythin'," he breathed with carefully measured gentility, his urge to offer some comfort to the man sat inside the plastic tent coming from a sincere place. "An' then we'll get her well. We will. We'll find a way to stop this virus, however long it takes, while she's snug as a bug in a rug, and then when we do, we'll bring her out again an' she can live a proper life..."

Rimmer's mop of unruly curls bobbed in a short nod, his gaze fixed deliberately away from Lister's and instead returned to Anneke's tiny fingers resting on the crimson blanket, seeing them twitch. No longer caring if he was seen, he leaned forwards to lay his palm close to hers, only molecules away, as he murmured thickly,

"We should do that, then..."

A couple of short hours later Lister was stood holding Anneke in a cradle carry, her platinum head lolling against his chest, one arm looped around his shoulders while the other was carefully arranged to rest across her stomach. Rimmer followed like a skittish shadow as they made their way to the stasis corridor, his arms crossed over his chest so he could cling to his biceps and give himself something to do with his hands. There was an oxygen canister strapped to Lister's back, a plastic tube feeding to the mask carefully arranged over Anneke's mouth and nose, and they were all hyper vigilant nobody stepped on it or ripped it out. They were also extremely careful not to comment on the fact that she'd not stirred once the entire time she was being moved.

When they finally reached the single booth that was powered up and open-doored, Kryten was waiting for them and Rimmer felt the constant companion that was his own nausea rear it's head once more when he looked inside. The droid had gotten a narrow gurney from the medibay down there and had set up a makeshift hospital room complete with a vitals monitor on its castor wheels and a drip stand. As he saw them approach he shuffled out and gave Lister a sheepish nod while he relayed,

"I've tried to make it comfortable, sir, but there isn't a great deal of room. If you'd like to settle her inside I can finalise things."

"Got it," Lister replied and sidestepped into the narrow space that accounted for their own personal physics-breaking broom cupboard. He let out a low noise of effort as he lay the sickly blonde on the bed, not from the effort of carrying her but simply the awkwardness of manoeuvring her onto the gurney. She actually felt disturbingly light...

Once she was down he exchanged places with Kryten and the mechanoid began to affix the various monitoring pads and other life-preserving equipment with the utmost of care. Rimmer watched in silence, lagging back a good fifteen feet away down the corridor. He was experiencing an odd bout of tunnel vision, the only thing truly clear in his vision Anneke's face, tilted slightly to one side and heavily shadowed in the half light of the booth. This could be it. The last time she was ever part of his universe, as a living, breathing being, however weakly that might be applied. The one slither of something that might have approximated genuine joy for him and he was literally watching it crumble and end. She might never get the chance to open those brilliant violet eyes again, but instead remain frozen in an eternal moment, in her glass box. He found himself drawing rather embarrassing parallels with certain fairy-tales and shoved the thoughts down immediately. This wasn't like that. This was horrible.

As Kryten was carefully arranging the tubing for her oxygen over her shoulder, there was a low groan from the base of her throat, the sound full of pain. The droid started, quickly laying a cuboid hand on her shoulder as he said in gentle tones,

"It's alright ma'am, you're quite safe. Do try to stay still, I'm almost done..."

There was another strangled noise, half buried by the plastic mask over her face. One white hand clawed at the fabric of her hospital gown, a desperate motion, and Listen darted forwards through the narrow gap of the door to grasp her fingers, leaning through one knee. Clearly all thoughts of quarantine were well beyond any of them at this point.

"It's alright, it's alright, Anneke, don't you worry. Yer safe, you're just gonna go for a little nap and when you wake up, you'll be right as rain..." He was speaking in a near whisper, hovering close to the edge of her bed as he knelt, her fingers trembling in his as white lashes lifted to reveal bloodshot, hazy violet eyes, pupils blown wide and unfocused as she looked at him. She rapsed something, Lister frowning as he leaned in closer to her, head bowed low to better hear;

"Arnold..."

Rimmer watched from his spot dropped back in the corridor, unable to hear the exchange but finding the sight of it gut wrenching. He swallowed back the lump of concrete in his throat when he saw Lister lift his head and turn his gaze to look him dead in the eye, still grasping her hand as he called in a voice that would not be argued with;

"She's asking f'you."

For a second he froze. He'd never been privy to a moment such as this, never mind been an integral part of it. What was he supposed to do?

Then he saw Anneke turn her exhausted gaze to him as well, eyes heavily lidded, her chest moving in stuttered swells as she fought to breathe. Her gaze was barely focused, but it was pleading none the less, wordlessly begging him not to shatter the faith she'd placed in him as being a friend to her.

For what he was fairly certain was the first time in his life, Rimmer found himself thinking solely of someone other than himself in that moment, petrified feet moving forwards of their own accord to carry him towards her, his tunnel vision guiding him to her without actually feeling himself move. By the time he reached the door both Lister and Kryten were out, everything set up to quietly beep and tick and whir for those brief moments she was still with them.

In the booth he slid in to squat beside the bed, bringing himself eye level to her, walnut meeting the clearest, deepest blue violet. She managed to shuffle her head closer to his across her pillow, the movement clearly an immense effort, irises shining glassily as she tugged the mask off her face with a quivering hand. Rimmer didn't bother to protest. He couldn't deny her anything she wanted in that moment.

"I'm here..." he murmured as he hunkered down close to her, that rib breaking pain from earlier returning. Her bangs were in her eyes. He'd give just about anything to be able to brush them away for her.

"Arnold... I just... I just wanted... to say..." Every word was laboured, the infection in her lungs snatching her voice away from her. She bit her tongue and swallowed back a cough, the effort making her eyes water.

"Don't..." He had to interject, had to stop her before she said something he'd have to carry with him for the rest of his existence while she was frozen in time. He lifted a hand to lay it close to hers as he could, just like before, only now she was awake to see it. She watched as she caught her breath, a strained but fond smile twitching her lips. For a few long seconds they remained that way, until she lay back on the pillow to look up at him, clearly struggling to hold focus, her lips by now turned a pale shade of blue. Rimmer dragged his gaze to meet hers, fighting as hard as he could to keep his voice even;

"You won't feel it. You won't even notice. You'll close your eyes and then open them again, and we'll be there, waiting for you. It's nothing..."

She continued to watch him, letting his words hang in the air for a stretched moment, before finally she whispered,

"Don't forget me..."

"Never. Never ever. Not in a million years."

"What about three million?"

She tried to laugh but it turned into a gasping, choking cough and she had to grapple the mask to her face, giving Rimmer the opportunity to bow his head and blink furiously. When he lifted it again Anneke's eyes were closed, her fingers slack on the mask. She wasn't really conscious anymore, he knew. Unable to make any real goodbye, he watched her for a few seconds, then whispered close to her ear,

"Sleep well..."

Later on he wouldn't be able to recall actually getting to his feet, or stepping out of the booth, or returning to stand listlessly in the corridor. He wouldn't remember what Lister or Kryten said or if he said anything in return. The only lasting impression he'd have would be seeing Anneke freeze, the thrill of fear when for a moment he thought she'd just stopped breathing, until he'd realised there was a tear frozen midway in it's track down her snowy face, hanging there indefinitely until by some miracle someday they'd be able to open the door.