readsalot
Member
Hey all, would love your opinion on this piece. It's just fanfiction. Some of my friends said since I'm a writer and a crazy star wars loving fan I should indulge in fanfic... so here is the result of peer pressure.
“May I please speak with Dee-four?” I inquired sweetly of the protocol droid stationed there to intercept people just like me making requests just like mine.
C-111, affectionately known as Tri-ace, eyed me with mild irritation. Anyone who says protocol droids can’t show emotion is blind as a baby mole rat. They have ways. “I am sorry, Mistress Keeoli, but that unit is currently unavailable. Can I be of service in some other capacity?”
“That’s all right, Tri-ace. I can wait,” I replied, feigning ease. I can wait five minutes, I thought casually slipping my hands into tunic pockets to activate my datapad.
“My courtesy programming prompts me to inform you that it could be quite a long time, Mistress Keeoli. The unit in question is undergoing extensive maintenance,” Tri-ace explained in his prissy voice some idiot tech head probably thought cultured.
Liar. That droid would sooner brave Coruscant’s nightlife. I gave Tri-ace a curt message-received nod and stepped away from his desk. The five minutes it took my mini-memory glitch to take in Tri-ace’s processors were not the longest in my life, but they came close. It allowed me just enough time to stir up a nice emotional soup in me.
There is no emotion, there is peace. The Code came to mind easily. And pieces of this dumb droid if my code doesn’t work, I added. That came from the other side of me. I couldn’t help it. The Force in all its black humor touched a Kuati noblewoman’s cute little whoops, and the Jedi Council gave the noblewoman’s family a convenient, ethical way to remove the mistake. Too bad for me, the Force decided I needed eidetic memory and attunement with others’ emotions instead of something useful like strong psychokinesis and crazy-good reflexes.
My mind slipped into self-pity mode. Seriously, what being doesn’t want to remember exactly how long one has to wail before a servant attends to the duty of disposing of your diaper droppings? That knowledge will certainly save you from a field full of blaster bolts. We’re only in the throes of a little galactic hiccup called The Clone Wars, which by the way is mostly against droids. There goes my big advantage.
When my datapad vibrated to let me know the memory glitch would take place in five second, I pulled free of my thoughts with a tiny leap and a yelp.
“Are you quite all—hmm. What was I saying?” asked Tri-ace.
“Thanks. I’ll just be a moment,” I said, striding past with barely a glance.
I found Dee-four exactly where I expected him to be, hiding in the storage closet. He beeped and tootled at me.
“Don’t give me that, you overgrown multitool,” I snapped. “Use the voice simulator I gave you, and for circuits’ sake, speak basic!”
“Hello, friend Olianna,” Dee-four said, cheerfully complying.
“I had a lousy two and a half weeks, Dee-four. Do you know why?” I narrowed my eyes and glared down at the ungainly piece of cowering droid set before me.
“Sorry to hear ill news, friend Olianna. How may I be of service?”
“You recently did a short stint up with Master Khaner, did you not?” I asked, crossing my arms over my chest.
Dee-four emitted a plaintive beep and slid back the meter until his back wheel hit the wall. “I did.” He sounded apologetic.
I promptly closed the distance between us and pointed a finger between Dee-four’s photoreceptors. “As soon as I leave here, you haul your metal behind down to maintenance and get that glitch fixed by one of the masters.” The anger in my tone was partially directed inward. I’m pretty good with droid tinkering. Nothing like the Chosen One or anything, but I know a fair bit.
Three months ago, I pulled polish duty again. Near the end, Dee-four admitted a calculation error in his programming that could alter his performance and his fear of a memory wipe if he went to maintenance. So, playing the part of kind fool, I offered to fix it. My patch changed the probability of a mistake from .00000012% to 1.2 x 10-12 %, quite an improvement if I do say so myself. How was I to know Master Khaner’s regular assistant would have a meltdown and need a quick replacement? Or that Master Kenobi would actually be in the Temple resting from some hush-hush mishap with a bomb then off gallivanting on another secret mission that never happened?
“Yes, Mistress Keeoli,” Dee-four said with enough enthusiasm to make me suspicious.
“I mean it. You, maintenance, now,” I ordered, re-crossing my arms.
Dee-four whined and buzzed pitifully. “There will be dark memory,” he lamented.
“I listened to that sob story once and got shot for it,” I said without sympathy. “Thanks for that.”
Dee-four gave off a little eep of surprise. “What has transpired, Mistress Keeoli?”
“Search back into your precious memory banks and look very carefully at the orders you issued in Master Khaner’s name,” I instructed, speaking slowly so my passion couldn’t rise to damage-something status. There is no passion, there is serenity. There will be serenity after I vent.
The droids photoreceptors darkened slightly and the hum in his head increased a trifle. “Oh, oh dear,” said Dee-four after a moment.
“Do you see the problem?” I asked.
“Yes, indeed, Mistress Olianna, and I can assure you the probability of this—”
“Not good enough,” I interrupted. “The probability was infinitesimal the first time and look what happened.”
“It is easy enough to avoid repeating,” the droid said with a pleading note.
“It should have been easy enough to avoid in the first place,” I shot back, feeling my anger rising. I slipped a hand into my other pocket and activated the make-shift personal sound damper. “I am twelve-year-old, pre-puberty Olianna Keeoli, Jedi Youngling. Does that look anything like old-enough-to-sport-a-beard Obi-Wan Kenobi, Jedi Master?”
“Well—”
“No!” I answered before he could give me the breakdown of every similarity between the two names. “Did you even bother to look at the profiles? Did you not see some intriguing differences? Gender? Height? Age? Mission history?” Each question got slightly louder than the last.
“My programming would like to remind you that your vocal emissions are rising above civil levels for a work environment,” said Dee-four. Apparently, my message wasn’t sinking in.
Taking my purloined training saber out of my voluminous left pocket, I lit it in front of Dee-four’s photoreceptors. “Listen, Dee-four, I like you, which is why I’m here in person telling you to get your head checked. If you won’t listen to reason, I will be forced to short your circuits in ways that might be irreparable.”
Dee-four shook his metal dome in protest.
“That might sound harsh, but I just spent a week on some Force-forsaken spit of a world getting shot at, captured, rescued, shot, and very, very dirty!” I winced. Trust the Kuati snot buried in me to come out now. I shut down the training saber so I wouldn’t accidentally fry his circuits before he made a decision. Straightening in an effort to feign serenity, I said, “It wasn’t all that bad. Sort of like a game really. You know, if you show me your advanced scouts, I’ll show you mine. If you shoot at mine, I’ll shoot at yours.” I knew I was babbling now, so I poked Dee-four in his metal equivalent of a chest. Oddly, my irritation faded to almost nothing. The more I thought about the mission, the more I had to admit it was kind of all right. “If it happens again, just try to pick a world with less insect life.”
“May I please speak with Dee-four?” I inquired sweetly of the protocol droid stationed there to intercept people just like me making requests just like mine.
C-111, affectionately known as Tri-ace, eyed me with mild irritation. Anyone who says protocol droids can’t show emotion is blind as a baby mole rat. They have ways. “I am sorry, Mistress Keeoli, but that unit is currently unavailable. Can I be of service in some other capacity?”
“That’s all right, Tri-ace. I can wait,” I replied, feigning ease. I can wait five minutes, I thought casually slipping my hands into tunic pockets to activate my datapad.
“My courtesy programming prompts me to inform you that it could be quite a long time, Mistress Keeoli. The unit in question is undergoing extensive maintenance,” Tri-ace explained in his prissy voice some idiot tech head probably thought cultured.
Liar. That droid would sooner brave Coruscant’s nightlife. I gave Tri-ace a curt message-received nod and stepped away from his desk. The five minutes it took my mini-memory glitch to take in Tri-ace’s processors were not the longest in my life, but they came close. It allowed me just enough time to stir up a nice emotional soup in me.
There is no emotion, there is peace. The Code came to mind easily. And pieces of this dumb droid if my code doesn’t work, I added. That came from the other side of me. I couldn’t help it. The Force in all its black humor touched a Kuati noblewoman’s cute little whoops, and the Jedi Council gave the noblewoman’s family a convenient, ethical way to remove the mistake. Too bad for me, the Force decided I needed eidetic memory and attunement with others’ emotions instead of something useful like strong psychokinesis and crazy-good reflexes.
My mind slipped into self-pity mode. Seriously, what being doesn’t want to remember exactly how long one has to wail before a servant attends to the duty of disposing of your diaper droppings? That knowledge will certainly save you from a field full of blaster bolts. We’re only in the throes of a little galactic hiccup called The Clone Wars, which by the way is mostly against droids. There goes my big advantage.
When my datapad vibrated to let me know the memory glitch would take place in five second, I pulled free of my thoughts with a tiny leap and a yelp.
“Are you quite all—hmm. What was I saying?” asked Tri-ace.
“Thanks. I’ll just be a moment,” I said, striding past with barely a glance.
I found Dee-four exactly where I expected him to be, hiding in the storage closet. He beeped and tootled at me.
“Don’t give me that, you overgrown multitool,” I snapped. “Use the voice simulator I gave you, and for circuits’ sake, speak basic!”
“Hello, friend Olianna,” Dee-four said, cheerfully complying.
“I had a lousy two and a half weeks, Dee-four. Do you know why?” I narrowed my eyes and glared down at the ungainly piece of cowering droid set before me.
“Sorry to hear ill news, friend Olianna. How may I be of service?”
“You recently did a short stint up with Master Khaner, did you not?” I asked, crossing my arms over my chest.
Dee-four emitted a plaintive beep and slid back the meter until his back wheel hit the wall. “I did.” He sounded apologetic.
I promptly closed the distance between us and pointed a finger between Dee-four’s photoreceptors. “As soon as I leave here, you haul your metal behind down to maintenance and get that glitch fixed by one of the masters.” The anger in my tone was partially directed inward. I’m pretty good with droid tinkering. Nothing like the Chosen One or anything, but I know a fair bit.
Three months ago, I pulled polish duty again. Near the end, Dee-four admitted a calculation error in his programming that could alter his performance and his fear of a memory wipe if he went to maintenance. So, playing the part of kind fool, I offered to fix it. My patch changed the probability of a mistake from .00000012% to 1.2 x 10-12 %, quite an improvement if I do say so myself. How was I to know Master Khaner’s regular assistant would have a meltdown and need a quick replacement? Or that Master Kenobi would actually be in the Temple resting from some hush-hush mishap with a bomb then off gallivanting on another secret mission that never happened?
“Yes, Mistress Keeoli,” Dee-four said with enough enthusiasm to make me suspicious.
“I mean it. You, maintenance, now,” I ordered, re-crossing my arms.
Dee-four whined and buzzed pitifully. “There will be dark memory,” he lamented.
“I listened to that sob story once and got shot for it,” I said without sympathy. “Thanks for that.”
Dee-four gave off a little eep of surprise. “What has transpired, Mistress Keeoli?”
“Search back into your precious memory banks and look very carefully at the orders you issued in Master Khaner’s name,” I instructed, speaking slowly so my passion couldn’t rise to damage-something status. There is no passion, there is serenity. There will be serenity after I vent.
The droids photoreceptors darkened slightly and the hum in his head increased a trifle. “Oh, oh dear,” said Dee-four after a moment.
“Do you see the problem?” I asked.
“Yes, indeed, Mistress Olianna, and I can assure you the probability of this—”
“Not good enough,” I interrupted. “The probability was infinitesimal the first time and look what happened.”
“It is easy enough to avoid repeating,” the droid said with a pleading note.
“It should have been easy enough to avoid in the first place,” I shot back, feeling my anger rising. I slipped a hand into my other pocket and activated the make-shift personal sound damper. “I am twelve-year-old, pre-puberty Olianna Keeoli, Jedi Youngling. Does that look anything like old-enough-to-sport-a-beard Obi-Wan Kenobi, Jedi Master?”
“Well—”
“No!” I answered before he could give me the breakdown of every similarity between the two names. “Did you even bother to look at the profiles? Did you not see some intriguing differences? Gender? Height? Age? Mission history?” Each question got slightly louder than the last.
“My programming would like to remind you that your vocal emissions are rising above civil levels for a work environment,” said Dee-four. Apparently, my message wasn’t sinking in.
Taking my purloined training saber out of my voluminous left pocket, I lit it in front of Dee-four’s photoreceptors. “Listen, Dee-four, I like you, which is why I’m here in person telling you to get your head checked. If you won’t listen to reason, I will be forced to short your circuits in ways that might be irreparable.”
Dee-four shook his metal dome in protest.
“That might sound harsh, but I just spent a week on some Force-forsaken spit of a world getting shot at, captured, rescued, shot, and very, very dirty!” I winced. Trust the Kuati snot buried in me to come out now. I shut down the training saber so I wouldn’t accidentally fry his circuits before he made a decision. Straightening in an effort to feign serenity, I said, “It wasn’t all that bad. Sort of like a game really. You know, if you show me your advanced scouts, I’ll show you mine. If you shoot at mine, I’ll shoot at yours.” I knew I was babbling now, so I poked Dee-four in his metal equivalent of a chest. Oddly, my irritation faded to almost nothing. The more I thought about the mission, the more I had to admit it was kind of all right. “If it happens again, just try to pick a world with less insect life.”