I am quite grievously upset.
That Artoo unit killed my hamster.
That overweight glob of grease. He must have picked up a flutter or some sort of malfunction; that’s the only explanation I can give.
Let me start from the beginning:
I am C-3PO, human-cyborg relations. I am a hard working droid and I believe I perform my human-cyborg interfacing duties to the best of my abilities. It is not surprising, therefore, that Mistress Leia would award me with an assistant.
Two days ago, General Calrissian presented Mistress Leia with a MMAUS-1 (motorized miniature assist unit series-1). She in turn presented the droid—whom humans erroneously call a mouse droid, especially considering that it speaks the electronic Varxel-Nutley-Wakefield computer language which much more closely resembles the language of the Peequee hamsters of Bith, and should therefore really be called a hamster droid—to me as an assistant. And she stated that his duties would fall under my purview. I named him Hammy.
Hammy was quite small, measuring only ten centimeters in length, but he had an astonishing number of versatile accessory arms and features, and was quite agile.
Artoo never liked Hammy. His protests when Hammy was presented to me were most vociferous.
I must admit, Hammy was a little overzealous in the execution of his tasks, but it only demonstrated his eagerness to please. During the first day, however, Artoo would have none of it, blocking Hammy whenever he tried to do something.
Finally, yesterday morning, I felt I really needed to discuss this situation with Artoo. I thought I had been quite succinct and reasonable. I pointed out that Hammy’s presence would only enable us to do our jobs better. Artoo was very grouchy about the whole thing and insisted things had been fine the way they were. Really! The range of beeps and whistles he used were most unsuitable. Finally, however, he relented, and said he would not stop Hammy from doing his job.
Little did I know then what trouble would be brewing.
Now, Mistress Leia, while proving herself to be an extremely competent Chief of State finds herself unequal to the task of cooking. Therefore, it falls within my domain to program the autochef. Normally, Artoo would assist me in my culinary duties. After my discussion with Artoo, however, I suggested Hammy might help me cook, instead.
Unfortunately, Hammy was a bit—overeager—in the dispensing of spices for the Corellian stew. Usually this is a favorite of Captain Solo’s.
My, my. The resultant spew of choice epithets that came from Captain Solo at the dinner table—and in so many languages!—was a bit—startling. I tried to explain to Captain Solo that it was Hammy’s first run with the autochef and that he had been a tad overeager, but Captain Solo would have none of it.
Hammy felt really quite terrible over the error. To make amends, he tried to be more helpful. He started helping Artoo and me with some of our other household chores, which included taking over Artoo’s job of vacuuming.
Now, on the first night, Artoo had flatly refused to allow Hammy near the vacuum, even though I suggested it might give Artoo some extra time to spend in the oil bath—what with the way he’s been acting, I’m sure he needed extra oil for the cranky rusty innards of his—but Artoo used quite shocking language when he told me to, and I quote, “Butt out of it!”
Last night, however, Artoo did not protest when Hammy started vacuuming. I had been quite pleased. I had thought that perhaps they might finally get along and that peace might reign in the household once again.
How wrong I was.
Artoo neglected to tell Hammy to postpone vacuuming the second floor until the next morning. So, having finished vacuuming the first floor near midnight, long after the family had retired, Hammy took the vacuum cleaner upstairs and proceeded to try to vacuum Mistress Leia’s suite.
Now, I’ve never fully understood what humans occasionally do in the middle of the night that necessitates making so much noise, but, suffice it to say, Captain Solo was most displeased to have it interrupted when Hammy came to vacuum.
Poor Hammy! To make up for his error, he tried even harder.
Imagine my subsequent dismay and horror when I heard Captain Solo shouting in the refresher the next morning.
The whole Solo family ran in to see what was going on.
Hammy was scrubbing the toilet bowl, which I thought was most industrious and commendable of him, until—
“He’s cleaning the toilet bowl with MY TOOTHBRUSH!!” Captain Solo followed this outburst with another long string of expletives, which—well, frankly, it amazes me that more of my circuits weren’t fried from that.
I expected Artoo to have something to say about the morning’s adventures but he was strangely silent.
Hammy felt even worse about this. Trying even harder, he quickly went to the front foyer and began to wax the floor.
Captain Solo was still very grumpy about the events of the last day when he entered the front foyer from the left at the same time Artoo entered the foyer from the right.
Oh dear, I’d forgotten to tell Hammy to put out a warning sign that cleaning was going on.
Captain Solo was reading something on his datapad and muttering under his breath as he entered the front foyer and immediately slipped. He tried to steady himself but only succeeded in falling forward, headfirst into Artoo who keeled over with a loud thunk!
Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear! The shouting!
By the time Mistress Leia arrived with the Solo children, Captain Solo had already pulled Artoo upright again and had picked up his smashed datapad.
Captain Solo started shouting at Mistress Leia that he was going to sell the lot of us droids to a junk dealer or a jawa if these mishaps kept occurring.
That’s when Artoo snapped.
That’s the only explanation I have for his behavior.
Artoo rolled straight up to Hammy, extended his access arm and fried the circuits off poor Hammy.
Hammy gave one agonized electronic squeal—and then fell over on his side. Oh, the circuitry of it all!
“I always knew Lando hadn’t gotten over the fact that I won the Falcon from him,” Captain Solo muttered as he stalked out of the room. “First he gets me encased in carbonite, and now he’s trying to destroy my house…”
Mistress Leia surveyed the carnage with a distracted air, shook her head, and then quickly ran after Captain Solo.
The Solo children took Hammy away. Young Master Anakin seemed most interested in trying to repair Hammy’s fried circuits.
I stood rooted to the spot, in stunned disbelief.
But that miscreant astromech, that hamster-droid murdering criminal Artoo just finished waxing the floor as if nothing happened, and then went out to get the vacuum cleaner.