Cassandra: Rant

<snip>
“Honestly” said Jay “I don’t give a smeg about being ‘in charge’. I just wanna get this ship back under our control so we can restore it, and get it back to our own time…”
</snip>
<snip>
“All I’m asking” he said eventually “Is that you guys help me get back what we all lost, I don’t know how we’re gonna do that yet….but I’ll figure something out after all….. when have I ever steered any of you wrong?”
“well you did blow up the Earth…” Seymour chimed.
“Apart from that…”
</snip>

Cass shook her head
“I dunno about you Jay, but I’ve not lost a thing; I was less than nothing before all this, and now here I am: One of the last humans left alive in an unknown universe of opportunity and adventure – I’m free! Why the hell would I or any of us want to go back to what we left?”
“But what of your friends?” Jay asked incredulously “Your family?”
Cass snorted derisively
“What friends I had all died in the red light zone the day the Hymenoptera carved the ‘Dwarf in half; and as for my family…” she paused to let her lip curl in distaste “Let’s just say that if you were me, you’d be as happy as I am that they’re all dead”
Jay blew his cheeks out, raising his eyebrows
“Shit…” he began
“Anyway” Cass cut across him “Don’t change the subject. I’m curious as to exactly when ‘our own time’ would be Mr. Time traveller? Would that be just after you apparently died? Before then? Or perhaps somewhere nearer your actual chronological age?”
“And what happens when you actually do get back? Are you going to go back to bumming around the universe looking for the Red Dwarf again? I’m not sure if I can see you as an obedient little JMC employee, doing Seymour’s bidding...”
“Bloody hell” Jay muttered evasively “I didn’t expect the Spanish Inquisition…”
“Or perhaps you’ve something else in mind?” Cass continued “What is it? Buy a farm and live the simple life? Maybe you’ve some inside knowledge from the last six hundred years and you’re looking at capitalising on it? Is it possible to change time? Will your ex-employer allow you to do whatever you’ve got in mind? Are they monitoring us now, or are you just a double agent they’ve parachuted in for some reason?”
“They don’t…” Jay started angrily, wishing that this bloody woman would just shut up and give him an opportunity to speak
“Don’t what?” Cass rounded on him “Don’t need to monitor their recent deserters in case they smeg up the continuum, or is it that they don’t, for some reason, have the capability do that sort of thing, and yet can travel through time at will!? Come on man! It’d be naïve to think they’re just going to let you walk away without either keeping tabs on you or killing you!”
“You!” Jay shouted “Are too bloody cynical!”
“And you should start expecting the worst of everybody!” Cass snapped “You’ll find you’re hardly ever disappointed and occasionally even pleasantly surprised!”
They regarded each other in peevish silence for a moment or two until Cassandra’s expression softened
“I’m not trying to make things difficult for you Jay” she said quietly “but you’ve got to understand that some of us might not want what you want; Our time is right here, right now, three million glorious years away from all the crap we left behind... But if you want to go back: Sure I’ll help, but until I’ve a better reason ...I’ll be staying here”
Jay looked somewhat mollified
“Thanks” he grudgingly conceded
“As for restoring the Dwarf…” Cass sighed, settling back onto one of the crates of mushy peas and folding her arms “Should we!? I mean: At least three civilisations have emerged on board here; to them, this is their home world - Do we have the right to change it?”
“Smeg ‘em” Jay growled “Wouldn’t be the first time I’ve eradicated a whole species”
“Yeah, but we’re responsible for these” Cass tried again “And as much as I hate it: I’m probably more responsible than anyone - I created Holly and couldn’t be arsed to implement any prohibitions against him meddling with evolution, and look what happened!”
Jay eyed Cassandra coolly; he didn’t know her that well, but from what he did know of her, this kind of moralistic standpoint was definitely unusual, so on balance, given her stated intention of remaining here, he was inclined to think she was just taking the piss
“Are you going to be this bloody obstructive all the time!?” he asked quietly
“Oh smeg off Jay!” Cass snapped “Don’t be so smegging impossible! From a scientific perspective (if you ever manage get this rusting blue crate back to ‘our time’), these creatures are going to be the stuff that whole careers are made of!”
<snip>
"Hold it, hold it guys!" [Davie] shouted above them and they quieted down. "Keep it cool and keep it down, every time you get loud you give away our position. Now, I say we vote. Should we vote now or wait until after we've all killed each other?"
</snip>
“Vote on what?” Cass sneered “On who gets to play at being Captain of a dead, rusting hulk with smegged up drives, so they can try to call the shots on my smegging life? I don’t think so!”
“Smeg’s sake” Jay muttered “What’s with you?”
<snip>
The outsized hamster turned to the rest of the group and said, "Well Jay, I don't know about getting you back to what you all lost, but I do know we've got to take control of the place where that access card can be used before they do. I think the best way to do that with our limited man power is to get to & take over the engineering deck then try to use the ships systems against them. What do the rest you think of that?"
</snip>
“I guess it’s an idea” Cass sighed “Although after three million years, we’ve no way of knowing which systems are even operational. Holly’s crazy, remember, and even if the bit of leverage I had over him still works, there’s no guarantee he’s even sane enough to grant us systems override – he might just try and kill me for using it”
“Well, thank heavens for small mercies” Seymour cackled
“Engineering would be good though” Cass continued, scowling at him “We might be able to run a diagnostic from there - Before Holly fried my terminal, I think I saw evidence of a new part of the ship that had been added after we all went into stasis”
“What!?” Jay snapped incredulously “And you never thought it worthwhile to mention this to us?”
“Well…” Cass started sheepishly “We were all having so much fun exploring, and I’m not entirely sure if the readout was correct…”
She looked around at everyone
“How about we just go down to engineering and have a look?” she asked brightly

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