The Season Finale.

"HMS Upskirt, investigating a scientific, honest, anomaly in the Unprintable System. Possibly the smallest black hole ever trapped between and orbiting a binary star and visibly sucking up star juice as it slowly exsanguinated them. Why don't you do this, Science Officer?" Captain Seymour DickLogic tucked his reading glasses away and glanced in the appropriate direction.

"Too much Azure Hue. He was so excited at the chance to do some actual science with real scientific words that he hyperventilated and passed out." Communications plaything first class Slime Dispenser replied. Indeed, the sensors were covered with bright orange tea cozies in an attempt to slow the flood of Azure Hue. It dripped malevolently on the floor...

"Is that why you're sitting on his face?"

"Someone has to do it." Communications plaything first class Slime Dispenser pointed out.

The captain frowned and furrowed his brow. It was time to make an important decision. He needed to look chiseled to perfection. He glanced at Ensign Truly Lovelyjugs in her announcer's safety harness. She swooned and he began to wonder if she was partially liquified or something. That was good enough. "Mater-at-arms, load the script writer into a research probe and fire it at the black hole."

"Why?" The First Officer asked, for one, such an act wasn't in the script and they didn't have a mater-at-arms. Did they? He looked in the right direction. Yes, it was Mister Tripod, in drag. He actually looked quite good too, properly decked out in a maid uniform. That looked suspiciously like the Maid Centurion's uniform too. They must be incredibly stretchy material.

"Remember that event back in series two where we rescued a script writer from our own research probe. We forgot to tie up the loose end."

"Captain, something on screen you should see." A random redshirt wibbled, "it's orbiting the black hole!" He pointed, "there, just to the left of that dead pixel."

"Zoom in on it." The Science Officer ordered from under a skirt.

"Zooming in on it." The redshirt wibbled, he pressed a few buttons and it zoomed in on the dead pixel. "Oops!" It changed to show a strange ship that resembled a large ring. "It's that space station from 2001?"

The captain furrowed his brown and grunted manlificently, he recognised that design of ship all too well. "A Kree Torus, I haven't seen one of those in years. It's a big one too. What's it doing?" He gestured at Communications plaything first class Slime Dispenser's bottom.

"Sorry, it's dark in here, I can't read my script! It tastes funny too!"

Communications plaything first class Slime Dispenser squeaked, she rescued the script from where she was sitting on it and hastily found the right answer. "Nothing sir, it's just sitting there. Like me only not as tasty."

"Careful with those adlibs, they can get us into trouble." The First Officer reminded her, "series three, episode four, after the break for example." Communications plaything first class Slime Dispenser turned bright red.

"All Kree Toruses are unique. Someone get Jane's book of spaceships and check." The Captain grunted, furrowing his brow manlificiently as he tried to decide whether or not to science it. "It's a good thing they are extinct. That thing is bigger than the battlefleet of Admiral Big Ones."

"He used mirrors though."

"You know what I mean." The Captain grunted. "I'm more interested in why it's here, and in such good condition. We're well out of The Erroneous Zone."

"It probably doesn't want to be left out, this being the season finale and all that." A new voice interrupted from his umpire's seat near the emergency coffee dispensers.

The captain stage whispered to the First Officer, "who is that?"

"The official treaty of the thousand nudes observer. To make sure we behave ourselves," the First Officer explained. "This means you Ensign Lovelyjugs. No heavy breathing." He glanced that way, "did she like, melt or something?"

"Maybe we're supposed to explore it and find lots of lovely shiny loot. Lost technology or something?" The First Officer mused, "we haven't lost an away team full of redshirts in over twenty minutes," he lamented.

"The legendary O-drive!"

"Season finale here," Doctor Firm-Posterior ruined that.

"Perhaps it wants to explode?" The weapons officer was a big fan of bangs, the bigger the better. More so if they included that all new "in space you can hear explosions(tm)" system.

"What is it with you and explosions?" The Engineering officer asked, he was on deck for a reason, he'd lost his script. "You've never had to put a whole ship back together armed only with a seven twoths knurling spanner."

GROLIOUS TINKLY CHIME THING! IN STEREO.

"Loli on the bridge!" The Vagendra of Manocide, off duty, chimed cheerfully, with tinkly things, she handed some lozenges of supreme-narration-skills to the ensign in the announcer's corner, they could congeal even the most resistant blancmange. A second glance and she handed over the entire packet.

"Where were you?"

"Having breakfast. Porridge with full special effects. Gorg so good you need a fork." The young woman answered agreeably. She sat on Captain Seymour DickLogic's lap and briefly lamented the presence of clothes and a large audience.

"You don't drink grog with a fork!" The Observer pointed out from his umpire's chair, "that's a travesty!"

"Visit our canteen first before you blaspheme like that," the Vagendra of Manocide (off duty) laughed, a sweet sound entirely unlike a horse, mentioning no names, Communications plaything first class Slime Dispenser. She looked suspiciously at the man, then stage whispered to the First Officer, "who is that?"

"The official treaty of the thousand nudes observer. To make sure we behave ourselves," the First Officer explained. "This means you Daisy Jones, strictly no unscheduled evictions."

"I scheduled them specially." She pouted cutely.

"Oh, that's alright then."

"Captain!" The redskirt in charge of the machine that beeped, sometimes emitted dangerous clouds of sparks and Azure Hue wibbled, "a humongous fleet has just warpulated in!"

"Maybe they want to explode too?" The weapons officer offered optimistically.

"Don't be silly. Enemy fleets don't just explode."

"Why not?"

"That's a dangerous thing to do this close to a black hole." The captain grunted manfully ignoring the bickering about exploding going on somewhere behind his mighty manly captain's chair with inlaid stainless steel, genuine fake leather and adorable fluffy toys stacked along the back. He furrowing his fists and then re-arranging the lolly to try and stop her playing with his perfectly preened hair and plaiting it.

"Maybe they want to explode too?" The weapons officer offered optimistically.

"Don't be silly. Enemy fleets don't just explode." The official treaty of the thousand nudes observer interrupted furiously.

"Why not?"

The Captain could tell a cue when he heard it, "Indeed, why not? First Officer, make it so."

The First Officer nodded curtly, then whispered something to the Weapons Officer. "We can finally use those extra hairdressers."

"That's a Hive Collective fleet. Any idea which one? Check the script." Daisy Jones looked over the edge, "Slime Dispenser, orange space nappies?"

"That's a problem. It's not in the script." She showed it to Daisy Jones, "see, nothing between page three and five. Ignore the embarrassing orange stains. It's anti-azure."

The Weapons Officer perked up, "We can negotiate! Look at how much negotiating stuff we have. Extra hairdressers!"

Daisy Jones pointed at the screen and the weapons officer started counting on her fingers. She borrowed the Mater-at-arms' hands to count on too. Captain Seymour DickLogic glanced in the direction of the Weapons Officer, that was indeed, a lot of negotiating. "How much negotiating can we do? That's a very big fleet and we are just a cute little Research Ship."

Daisy Jones gestured to the redskirt, "zoom in on that Nadship. Can you see the markings?"

"Nadship?"

"The big round one, it's a fuel ship, a fleet that large needs lots of anti-nega-mol and plus-mol." Daisy pointed, "hence two large Nadships. What, don't you use Neo-Antimatter Divertium tanks?"

Captain Seymour DickLogic forcibly restrained Daisy Jones, his perfect hair was now a ruffled mess but he could still be manlificent due to his chiseled good looks, awesome gravelly voice of manliness and testosterone fueled aftershave. He ignored the strange noises from the announcer's corner. "We haven't used anti-matter in centuries. Our ships are powered by lazy-eight fusion."

"Why?"

"Because antimatter is really dangerous!" Communications plaything first class Slime Dispenser's bottom informed them. "there was an incident." The bottom then proceeded to enlighten them on the incredible amount of energy that could be achieved by strawberry fusion. Toruses were such old had when you had a massive strawberry fusion powerplant. Sure, they didn't taste that great, but these were not strawberries for eating. These were strawberries for war. Sorry. Science!

"How come her lips move when her bottom talks?" Daisy asked sweetly, causing much consternation. "strawberry powered fusion indeed."

"I'll show you during the advert break if you promise to leave them alone." Communications plaything first class Slime Dispenser's bottom offered.

"What about me?" Communications plaything first class Slime Dispenser's top asked her bottom.

"Only if you leave your fork in your drawers."

"Deal!"

"And the can of spray cream."

Meanwhile, important events were happening not even ten paces away in front of the blue screen! Besides wondering why Communications plaything first class Slime Dispenser was wearing nonstandard undies under her space onesie.

"Miss! Miss! Er. Miss Lolly? I can just about make out the letters JW from this angle." The redskirt whimpered, not knowing the correct form to address the apparent schoolgirl who was sitting on the captain's lap with casual abandon.

"JW? Oh, it's the SJW fleet. The cursed Strawberry Junk Warriors get all the best equipment. I mean, look at the size of their primary cockship! It's humongous!"

"Now, now, size isn't everything." The official treaty of the thousand nudes observer pointed out. Every single woman on the bridge, even the redskirts stared at him angrily.

"Well, the harder they stand, the harder they explode," The mater-at-arms mused, while no one was looking she loaded the script writer into the Real Humdinger prototype research probe and nodded to Tiffany Bangbangbangkaboom who quietly launched it at the black hole.

Captain Seymour DickLogic looked at the checklist, "I don't think we have that many research probes."

"What, no? No-" the mater-at-arms looked to be on the verge of tears. "Negotiations cancelled!" He handed a hanky to the weapons officer and reminded her that the make-up was not waterproof.

Captain Seymour DickLogic clenched his fists and grunted manfully, mostly to stop Daisy playing with his antique watch, she pouted cutely at him and threated to sit on his lap until his legs went numb forever. "It is time for secret negotiations. Target the primary cockship engines and prepare to enter underspace."

PARMESAN!

Doctor Firm-Posterior went to the sound-effects corner, "are you alright?" she solicited, it was entirely apparent that Ensign Truly Lovelyjugs was not alright, not even half-right, she appeared to have dissolved in drool. Hopefully her own this time. Fortunately there was a cure for this. Unfortunately it was in the possession of the enemy. But there were pills available in the canteen that would do.

"Oh whee, underspace. The red lighting makes my make-up look weird."

"Here, wear these Eltons, it'll filter out the extra red."

"How?"

"That's what it says in the script." The redshirts bickered amongst themselves as they tried to stop the ship's cat from eating the microphone and the sound man trying to keep the boom out of reach.

---

• UNDERSPACE. The space equivalent of under the bed. Where the monsters live. Only more three dimensional and more nautical buffs than Captain Haddock and a shark-shaped submarine. Completely unlike hyperspace and all those fancy warp drive things except that one in that series no one can remember the name of. Not even remotely similar for copyright reasons.

• OVERSPACE. In overspace, no one can hear you scream. It's just too loud. Even the mega-discos of planet Phtud can only aspire to such glory and their sound systems go to 11 on the Richter scale. Overspace has way more mirror balls, flashing lights and all the problems these bring. This is why no one uses overspace anymore.

• CRAWLSPACE. We really aren't sure what this is, but the Carpet Crawlers use this to get in to get out. Crawlspace also has the curious distinction of being nineteen inches wide and nineteen inches tall.

---

Captain Seymour DickLogic admired the red lighting, it did alarming things to Daisy Jones' costume. Really alarming things. "Up periscope." He grunted, marching malificently to the correct spot on the bridge floor, then taking a step back having been clocked by the periscope before. Daisy found a cushion and sat on the captain's seat of captaincy. She was fully able to command a fleet without a cushion. But it helped. She also liked the red light, it wouldn't show the blood at all, she made a memo of that. Hive Collective used green for some reason.

"What if they hear us coming?" A redshirt struggled with his script, the notes were written in orange and not showing up too well.

The First Officer knew this one, "we play traditional Hive Collective music until they beg us to stop." Captain Seymour DickLogic made a querulous grunt. "There's a reason they win the Eurovision song contest every year." As an afterthought he added, "we also have the weaponized 8-track full of polka, but that's just cruel."

"I see. Carry on." Captain Seymour DickLogic looked at the periscope, for some reason there were two pairs of fluffy dice, one on each handle. It took him a few moments of brutal cogitation to remember what they were for. Then he glared manfully through the periscope. "Forward slow, two points to the right and watch out for the space whales."

The First Officer flipped the cap on the speaker tube, "Oarsmen, Ahead Bossa Nova." There was a manlificent grunt of acknowledgement and then the sound of drums.

"Captain, two of the Hive's thong ships appear to be slowing to drop number twos on us." The redskirt in charge of the machine that went ping read from her notes. "Space whale to port, range... not close enough to be worrying."

"She means off the left side, Captain." The First Officer explained smoothly, "the one you write with, Captain."

"Captain, those two thong ships are sinking, it looks like they hit a space whale. The machine that goes ping is showing me little flashing esses now converging on the thong ships." She frantically looked at her cheat sheet. "Space sharks," she counted quickly but ran out of fingers, "more than ten!"

"Underspace temperature rising!" The Science Officer was functional again due to the massive amounts of anti-azure light. Even if it did make it amply clear what Communications Plaything Slime Dispenser had for underwear. Non-regulation Sexy Silkies that turned invisible in anti-azure. "Hand hot and rising! Captain, we're sailing into hot water. Well, hot underspace, you know, bad scary Azure Hue in capitals stuff."

"Stop worrying Science Officer, we do that every episode."

HADAKA APRON INTERVENTION!

"That's new." The Captain grunted, "Hive Collective Cockship dead ahead, range... The big hand is pointing at the three and the little hand at the nine."

"Prepare for Science!" Daisy Jones ordered from her cushion.

The official treaty of the thousand nudes observer suddenly realised he'd missed his cue, it being written in orange. "The treaty of the thousand nudes precludes undeclared acts of war!" He hollered, trying to get attention.

Daisy looked at him and arched a perfectly black, actually blue but the lighting didn't help, eyebrow at him, "It's not war. It's Science!"

"You can't fool me!"

"It's the apron provision of protection from hot water," Daisy knew her bureaucrats and that they pureed nicely. "Check the orange book."

"What are we sciencing then?"

"Load hairdressers into the research probes!"

"I have a spare gaffer too," The weapons officer added optimistically as she loaded the research probes with hairdressers. "Proximity or impact?"

"Set them for NO Damage, Grolious Explosion type-R. Extra slow yellow dot."

"That does not sound like science!" The official treaty of the thousand nudes observer observed angrily. "it sounds like warmongering!"

"My poor man, are you a scientist?"

"No."

"Then you have no idea what we are doing, do make sure your seatbelt is done properly."

"Seismic wubble detectors ready Ma'am!" Communications Plaything Slime Dispenser chimed in, "and the sensors are not indicating Azure Hue at all!"

"Excellent. As soon as the research probes are off, dive to ten danglies and set a course of full garters at top speed!" The Captain grunted. "Fire when ready," he directed the weapons officer. "Mater-at-arms, time to hand out the barf bags."

"Yes sir!" The mater-at-arms had a lovely selection too. Daisy selected one that claimed to be finest brown paper bag flavour. "Seatbelts! No smoking signs!"

"Oarsmen, prepare for maximum thrust. Come about and dive to ten danglies." The First Officer translated, trying not to notice the girl on the cushion making boogly eyes at him.

"Surely we should target the Nadships and not the Cockship!"

"We are."

"But that's a Cockship." Indeed, it was a Cockship. The SJW fleet had all the latest toys and this was one of them, one of the new Prototype ORN* Cockships, nearly twice the size of the regular ones, blessed with phenomenal girth and stiffness. Unrivaled firepower should one choose to stand in front of it.

Admiral of the Fleet recommendation: Don't stand in front of Hive Collective Cockships. If they don't shoot you, they'll just ram into you because they have horrible space anchors.

The official treaty of the thousand nudes observer grumbled, "I feel I am missing the point."

Daisy Jones couldn't have resisted that if she had tried, she didn't. "The Captain's point never misses."

FNARR!

"Captain, that Kree Torus we spotted earlier, sensors indicate *plaid* that means it's still got a functioning O-field." The Science Officer scienced. Fortunately Communications Playbeing Slime Dispenser was off camera.

"Excellent. I have a plan." Captain Seymour DickLogic ejaculated manlificently, causing several unscheduled redshirt swoonings. "Get ready to set a course for the Kree Torus as fast as possible." He ordered the normal space pilot, then indicated the underspace pilot "stay on target."

"We're too close!" someone wailed, clearly having looked at their script, or around the back of the screen. "It's no good, we're going to hit it!"

"Research probes away." The Weapons Officer, Tiffany Bangbangbangbangkaboom-Holyshit declared.

"Dive! Dive!" Captain Seymour DickLogic pushed the button on the periscope that made it go beep, then returned to his captain's seat. Daisy Jones obligingly sat on his lap and faced forward, fluffing out her skirt and making sure her lolly-sized seatbelt was done.

"Oarsmen! Double Porridge Rations! It is time for-"

MAXIMAL ASS THRUSTING!

A loud bang shook the bridge, but none of the usual sparks and smoke at all. It had come from the announcers corner of announcing.

"AFT! Doctor, do something with the narrator, she's exploded!" The First Officer had never seen one of the special issue barf bags burst before. Those things were carbon fibre!

"Too much heavy breathing," Doctor Firm-Posterior reported, brandishing her tricorder at Ensign Lovely Jugs, "pull yourself together before you find out how many orifices my tricorder will fit in."

This had entirely the wrong effect.

"Pilot, steady as she goes."

"We're thirty seconds from running out of underspace." The First Officer reported, looking at the timer.

"Science Officer, you are quite sure that that Kree Torus is still powered?" Captain Seymour DickLogic grunted manfully, pausing to wonder why his chiseled good looks reflected in the front screen making him look really fat.

"Indeed, the sensors were indicating unusual O-field readings and that was how we found it." Communications Playbeing Slime Dispenser's bottom replied, "Communications Playbeing, you can stop sitting on my face now. I'm calm."

"You're just saying that." Communications Playbeing Slime Dispenser observed petulantly, but she got up anyway. With all the orange lighting, the chances of an Azure Hue event were dramatically reduced.

"Normal space resumed!" the pilot reported as the timer dinged and fell over. "Kree Torus dead astern."

"We're too close!" someone wailed, clearly having looked at their script, or around the back of the screen. "It's no good, we're going to hit it!" This time this redshirt was on the right page of the script. The person behind the screen had kindly pointed it out to him.

"Nonsense," Captain Seymour DickLogic ejaculated manfully, having an intense calming effect on the panicking redshirts and indeed almost everyone except Ensign Truly Lovelyjugs in the announcers corner who was hyperventilating and unable to do her effects. The Captain put a hand on the ship's wheel. "You just need to respect the Kree Torus, and not slam into it backwards."

"We're going to slam into the Kree Torus!" The redshirt near the screen panicked valiantly. "Backwards!" he added but the momentum was gone.

"Ten seconds to impact!"

There was a faint wheezing "aroogah!" sound from the announcer's corner.

Doctor Firm-Posterior decided it was time for the ultimate cure, "pull yourself together and I'll give you this pair of unwashed captainly undies. Here, have a sniff."

AROOGAH! AROOGAH! OHNOWEREALLGONNADIE!

"Captain, the foomage has started." The Science officer was looking at the forward screens, that was the ones in front, not the aft screens that were behind.

What happens when you throw a lot of exciting high energy particles, or a hairdresser, into an already phenomenally exciting place like say, the very large primal thruster of the biggest Cockship in the Hive Collective? Not a Mary Quant bob for one. The Cockship exploded, slowly and gloriously because the CG budget for the final episode was the highest yet. An enormous bulge rippled along it from base to apex, whereupon it simply sundered into a lot of fast moving bits. No flames because this was real space. No sound either because they forgot.

Fast moving bits that collided with the two huge Nadships containing all the fuel for the fleet. And the smaller tankers that had both fuels on for actual use.

MASSIVE FOOMAGE! UNBELIEVABLE FOOMAGE! MORE FOOM THAN EVER BEFORE! "Aroogah?"

The H.M.S. Upskirt zipped right through the middle of the Kree Torus and its O-field. They stopped to watch the show as two of the most exciting chemicals in existence proceeded to annihilate themselves in an uncontrolled chemical reaction. Detonations so powerful they bent light. Detonations so glorious that they could actually hear them!

"Wow," Tiffany Bangbangbangbangkaboom breathed heavily. "What a blast. Maybe I shouldn't have used so many hair dressers."

"Why? How many do we have left?"

"None."

"None?"

"None. I counted them twice."

Daisy Jones relaxed and enjoyed the show. "Gosh captain. Using the Kree Torus' O-field to shield us from the blast. Outstanding." She chimed, then handed the script to the Communications Playbeing First Class, Slime Dispenser. "Do something about the orange stains please."

"Sorry!"

The lights returned to normal slowly, except in the Science Officer's corner where they remained orange for some reason.

"Cockships don't explode like that." The official treaty of the thousand nudes observer complained, "you attacked them!"

"Sure they do. Enemy fleet - SCIENCED!" The Weapons Officer objected.

"What, never played billiards before?" The Mater-at-arms was surprised at this revelation, for some reason he was talking to Daisy Jones, who was sitting on the Captain's lap contemplating more grog.

"Not where the balls explode, no." Daisy Jones admitted. Her fleet had no Cockships, not any more. There had been an incident with suggestive imagery resulting in unscheduled defenestration. Quite a few of them actually. Shortly before the captain of the Cockship had attempted a highly risky maneuver now known as the cockblock gambit and destroyed an entire space mall. He had also been defenestrated. Twice.

"Scienced? You blew them to bits!"

"With science!" The Weapons Officer explained.

"That's how we do a science." The First Officer failed to find anything wrong with this. He had been serving Captain Seymour DickLogic for three whole seasons and an awful lot of science now.

"Mater-at-arms, why do we keep this person on the bridge?" Captain Seymour DickLogic asked.

"Entertainment value."

"Oh." The captain grunted, then looked at the official treaty of the thousand nudes observer, "say something funny then."

"Funny?" The official treaty of the thousand nudes observer raged impotently, "you just destroyed that entire fleet without warning!"

"Mater-at-arms, reason accepted." Captain Seymour DickLogic noted manfully. The mater-at-arms positively beamed at him.

"I preferred the previous one," the Science Officer lamented, "what happened to him?"

"Redshirted."

"Captain, the O-field is building rapidly. It's time to warp off into the distance and roll the end spliffs." The Science Officer looked at his sensors. Yes, that was a disturbance in the farce, an awful lot of unused Azure Hue just waiting to get out. "Like, now. Ay Es Ay Pee! Immediately if not sooner."

"You should have gone earlier, during the advert break." The Captain Grunted. "Pilot, punch it."

The End.

---

"I'm going to be a space cowboy," Daisy Jones declared as she watched the credits roll up the end screen. A couple of redshirts had decked out a research probe as a giant spliff and were now crying as the Weapons Officer had launched it.

Captain, now retired unless there was a movie, Seymour DickLogic stood up, he posed a manlificient pose, complete with Daisy Jones' panties on show, "Men! Raise your forks! Double Grog!" He ejaculated manlificiently.

"shush! The microphone is still glowing!"

"So are my nipples."

"Not now bosun!"

"You know, using the grog to make porridge was probably not such a smart idea…"