Life in Red... • RED DWARF • Arnold Rimmer x OC story

4. Is arson really a crime?

Fine. I confess.

I had never really been branded as a 'criminal' before.
'Hooligan', 'miscreant', 'delinquent'...
Although, 'criminal'? It was a strong word.

On Mimas, that was a title reserved for some of the more harmful antagonists that roamed the busy streets.

Mimas.

A small, lawless Saturnian moon colonized sometime in the mid-twentieth century by the space corps. It was home...

The better parts of the moon were near the loading docks for ships and mining vessels where space crews and civilians alike frequented after long periods travel in deep space.

Although, for those who didn't want to get the faint aroma of garbage and burning hair stuck on their uniform, tourist terminals and shuttle boarding also had the possibility to take the more adventurous and rich visitors to orbit up above in an artificially generated, still polluted atmosphere.

Back down on the streets, rows upon rows of expensive brothels, restaurants and destinations highlighted by neon signs that were meant to attract unlucky tourists was commonplace.
The entire planetoid was sick and predatory like a carnivorous plant secreting its curious perfume to unlucky prey. An unlucky sort of prey that would unknowingly spend a week's pay in a matter of hours.

Yes, this seemed to be the appeal of Mimas for many.

Those who didn't have the luxury of wages to waste, like I did not, were certifiably trapped on the small, tumultuous moon.
How did I get there? Well, it was obvious. I had washed up on it's shores, similar to all of the other Bliss freaks, Gameheads and Scumbags that grew from the planetary soil.

I hadn't been born there, I'd just more appeared... Appeared in the way a disease just sort of 'appears', or mold just sort of 'grows' in dank, musky corners. In my case, I was that same mold. My parents were mold too, and they manufactured me and expelled me into the world to live a life of rot and pestilence the same way that they did.

I wasn't sure where they were once I'd initially left to work on RedDwarf.

I knew that my father was a 'Bliss freak'. A middle aged man who lived with his head down the gutters, growing like algae on street corners and spouting his otherworldly nonsense with the confidence and self-assurance of a caffeine-riddled Televangelist, but with the speech pattern of an equally caffeine-riddled toddler. Of course, that was due to the Bliss; a designer drug that made you feel god-like and had you hopelessly addicted just by looking at it.

My mother had an equally compulsive personality. Although, her insufferable disposition wasn't a result of some daily drug induced catharsis. But, in fact, more due to her addiction to social status.
Ironic, considering we were all at the bottom of the Mimian 'scum pyramid'.

She'd gotten remarried to the Mimas equivalent of a used car salesman at the turn of my adolescence and left me soon after.
The last I'd heard of her was from a digital postcard from a party ship touring around mars with her new husband.

As a young teen, I desperately needed a place to live. I payed every cent I could get to an old woman, Mrs. Dufresne, who owned a decrepit seafood restaurant and didn't speak of word of English.
She let me stay, albeit reluctantly, in a storage room in the basement with the promise that I payed rent on time.
And so, like the mold I was, once I was established, I was hard to get rid of.

After that day, most of the money I made went towards supporting my ever growing empire of shady business.

I took change off of tourists and 'borrowed' goods from various establishments. although, to my dispute, everyone else did too.

So yes, by definition I was a 'criminal'.

On Mimas, people had to face the hurdles of Bliss freaks, Gameheads and run of the mill scumbags.
Out of the three, being branded a scumbag was probably the easiest for acquiring a modest income.

'Days' on Mimas, unlike earth, really spanned as long as it took until you passed out in a ditch.
The days were just as artificial as the nights, illuminated by store fronts and obnoxious street lamps that hovered hundreds of feet in the air. The sun was too far away to create a viable source of light, so instead Mimas was nearly in a constant state of evening.
Giant bulbs were opted in the absence of the sun. Around the loading docks especially, these artificial lights were so high that they looked like they nearly touched Saturn.

And Saturn. It was constantly visible and unnaturally large in the otherwise black sky. It's ever imposing presence represented an imprisonment to life on Mimas. A constant reminder that we were especially small in the vast universe.

Time was nearly irrelevant on Mimas.
Not only did the environment support the culture of the Mimian nightlife, but a constant and never ending supply of drunkards and partygoers ensured that there was no escape from the disorder.
Although it was often dangerous, that disorder made the perfect target for some rather, unconventional wage.