things. Dr. Mel Practice: The station's conniving science officer (and mad scientist, though he prefers the term, "sanity-challenged scientist"). He often creates monsters and machines (killbots), but inevitably fails in his plans to conquer the universe. One of his craziest inventions was a "Procrastination Ray", which sent troublesome objects into the future, so one would have no choice but to deal with them later. He is bald and wears a white lab coat, black gloves, and spectacles. Dr. Mell is based on Dr. Sivana of the Captain Marvel strips. Cliff Clewless: The station's engineer - a position for which he is completely unqualified. He got his position through his computer-hacking abilities by hacking into NASA's computer and upgrading himself from "programmer" to "engineer". He believes himself to be popular with the ladies. He is fat and is invariably shown sporting a cap and sunglasses. Winky: A bright-eyed but hapless child crew member and assistant to Dr. Mel. He is often stuck with the nastiest or most dangerous tasks. His resulting injuries commonly leave him uttering some variation of the phrase, "AHHHH! MY SPLEEN!" He also is quite often attacked by angry badgers, usually accidentally released by Dr. Mel. Revealed in a series of 2020 strips, Winky is actually a clone of one of the Ensign Kennys. Other characters Agent X: A mysterious government agent from the Department of the Paranormal. His job is to seek out the truth about aliens, then cover it up. The R.U. Sirius was his idea. Pal 8000: A computer creation of Dr. Mel who views him as a father figure. He regulates the station's life-support systems and is a bit immature, throwing juvenile tantrums when he doesn't get his way. He wants to participate in human activities such as baseball and biking—despite being a three-ton computer. A parody of HAL 9000 from 2001: A Space Odyssey. Bucky the Robot: A "robot" who, as is often pointed out by Pam and Dr. Mel in vain, is merely a "bucket on a coat rack!" Built by Cliff at the request of Brewster on the comic's second day, he sports an unvarying smiling face. He is a recipient of a worker of the year award for the R.U. Sirius. He also got the same score on the intelligence exam as Brewster. He once won an election against him to become captain, not to mention when he won the