Lister falls ill after entering a contaminated area of Red Dwarf trying to find Kochanski's hologram disc which Rimmer has hidden. But Red Dwarf has two unwelcome guests on-board, Lister's Confidence and Paranoia.
Rimmer is abducted by the high IQ crew of the holoship Enlightenment, who have abandoned love in favour of daily sex. Wishing to join the crew and leave the Red Dwarf behind, Rimmer must engage in a battle of wits to earn his place.
An experiment with a machine that can make duplicates of an object goes wrong and Red Dwarf explodes. Where the Red Dwarf crew find the machine has made two copies of Red Dwarf, both ships contains their good and evil selves.
Kryten diagnoses Rimmer with a stress-related condition, as a surviving Simulant attacks the crew. Fleeing in an escape pod, Rimmer enters a wormhole and must spend the next 600 years on a deserted planet with only his clones for company.
Hiding in an asteroid, surrounded by a Simulant Death Ship and its fleet of Annihilators, the Dwarfers wonder if this is the beginning of the end. Only one man can save them. Unfortunately, that man is Arnold J. Rimmer.