"There has to be a mistake!" I plead with the head librarian/historian as he drags me along, not even bothering to look down on me with those hostile green eyes. "I didn't even fill out a transfer application!" I cry. I'm clutching a beat up suitcase in one hand. It contains the few uniforms, antennae brushes, and books that I wasn't able to fit inside my pod. I've never been a big clothesIrk, so one suitcase was fine for me.
"I know. That's why I picked you."
"What?" I ask, still confused. He pulls me over a bump and I nearly lose my luggage, so I cling on tighter. He has a death grip on my left arm with his claw, and the entire limb from shoulder to tip is beginning to hurt with a dull ache.
"All the girl librarians wanted to go there to go flirt with the tallests, like they'd ever get within two hundred meters of them. All the guys want to stare at the Massive's weapon system if there should be a battle. You're the only one I can count on to actually WORK if I send them to the Massive."
"But I don't want to go!" I protest again.
He pauses, kneeling down so that he can look into my eyes. "Look," he says, gripping my shoulders. "No other Irken wouldn't want to go work on the Massive. You don't want to be known as a freak, do you?" he asks. I slowly shake my head to indicate that I wouldn't like that. "You've been chosen, and you're going to go, or else I promise you that your life here will be hell until you wished you'd never hatched," he snarls as he shoves me into a line of Irkens. All shapes, sizes, and uniform colors seem to swirl around me. I grip my head as it screams in agony from trying to figure out exactly what's going on. "Make us proud," he says, shoving a packet containing my ticket and my identification into my palm, and then he's gone into the crowd.
All around me is a sea of endless faces. After awhile, they blend together so it looks like no one even has a face anymore. I watch in horror as fencing mask faced Irkens shamble past, creatures of the undead, not the flesh and blood of the sisters and brothers I left behind.
Finally I'm on the transport ship to the Massive. I huddle down in my seat, whimpering and hoping that it will be over soon. Somewhere on the way, I fall asleep. In my dreams, I'm being chased by two dark, black shadows with glowing red and purple eyes. Every turn I make, there they are, looming over me. They move along the walls like pure night, or perhaps I should say like pure evil. I wake up with a tiny pip of a scream when someone taps my shoulder with their spider leg.
I look down into the face of a shorter Irken with pale purple eyes, smiling brightly at me. "Come on, we've reached the Massive," she says, and then she melts back into the crowd, as if she was never there at all. Grabbing my suitcase, I join the end of the line filling slowly off the transport ship. It seems most of us slept through the trip, as nearly everyone in front of me is shaking the sleep out of their antennae as they yawn and rub their eyes.
I nearly drop my suitcase in surprise. Digging my fingers in, I study the red ship before me. It's at least three times of the size of my home library, which was the biggest building I'd ever been in. Hundreds of smaller ships are buzzing around it like insects surrounding a particularly desirable flower. The ship has a star behind it, so I'm trapped in its elongated shadow. The breath is simply knocked out of my lungs. I'm panting simply to keep from passing out as I stare at the ship that is to become my home.
"This ship is the size of a city!" a little Irken near my whispers.
The older Irken clinging to her claw quietly whispers, "The Massive IS a city, practically. It has all the parts of one in just one ship."
"ID," the security guard at the door barks. I nervously hand it to him. I hope he doesn't notice how my hand is shaking. He studies it, runs some kind of scanning device over my pod, and grunts. "Go," he snorts. "NEXT!" he shouts as I pass, making me jump. When I land, I scurry to get away from that place.
I seek out what I recognize, heading straight for the only tall Irken in a yellow uniform in the place. He looks down at me, his antennae twitching in what seems to be amusement. "So you're the new librarian, eh? Welcome to the Massive," he says as he extends a gnarled claw in my direction. I take it and shake, but my claw feels like jelly in his strong grip. He grins at me. "Nervous, my little one?" he asks, laughing in a wheezing voice. I wonder how old he is. "Come on, there should be a guided tour leaving soon. That'll give you a chance to see at least part of this place."
I sit beside him in the back of a hover train, staring in awe at everything we pass. "Don't let your mouth hang open, little one, it's rude," he comments gruffly. I feel my antennae bristle. I'm not THAT little.
"The Massive stands over twenty stories tall and thirty stories wide. It employs a crew of over a thousand," the guide tells us. Her big, purple eyes reflect exactly how much she likes her job as she cheerily tells us about everything we're gaping at. "What you see to your left is the auxiliary engines, maintained by a constant crew of five hard working mechanics and their android assistants."
"The front of the Massive is the tactical center. Just behind that is the living quarters of our almighty tallests, leaders or our entire race. New employees please notice that this area is STRICTLY off limits to anyone without level ten clearance." A couple of younger looking Irkens behind us begin whispering at this point, much to my annoyance. I'm trying to listen. I have much to learn about this new place.
"To your right you'll see the literature center," the guide says. This makes me perk up. It looks smaller than the library I left behind, but I can only imagine the kind of books they must keep on the Massive. Maybe I can learn to like this job…
"This is the cafeteria. If you take the escalators to the top floor, you will find directions to the sleeping quarters, and this is the end of our tour. Everyone off!" she chirps brightly, her grin taking up most of her face. I trip and nearly fall getting out of the hovercraft. The two from behind snicker, and I feel my blood rushing to my face.
The next morning, I find myself running through the seemingly endless halls of the Massive. I can't find my way back to the library for anything! I've stopped and asked everyone I see directions, and no one seems able to help me. I've been going in circles forever. I've only got five minutes to get there or I'll be late, and I don't even know where I am. My head is spinning with all the places I've been. Finally, I simply collapse, weeping into my gloves.
"What's your problem?" a hostile voice asks. I look up to see a taller Irken with deep purple eyes standing over me. He's wearing a most unusual uniform, but at the same time, it seems strangely familiar. I've seen it on Irk before, but I can't remember where.
"I can't find the library," I weep, rubbing my tears off on the backs of my gloves.
"Oh, is THAT all?" he asks. He reaches down and pulls me up from the floor. "You don't need to cry about that."
"But I'm going to be late for my first day!" I whine.
A flicker of amusement crosses the taller Irken's face. Only now that I'm standing up do I realize that he's simply huge, perhaps the tallest Irken I've ever been face to face with. I feel a bit nervous. "You're new, so I'll tell you this. This area is off limits to librarians," he says, "but I can see you're lost. Come on, I'll show you how to get there."
I run into the library only two minutes late. The old Irken smiles at me through his wrinkly face. "Got lost, eh? You made good time. Usually the new ones don't show up until two hours after they're supposed to begin work."
"I found a tall Irken who knew the way," I say, feeling sheepish. I'm not a good liar, so I don't even try. "I wanted to thank him, but he took off before I could."
"That's nice," he shrugs. "Let me give you the tour, show you what you're going to be doing." He walks me through a seemingly endless maze of teleporters, conveyor belts, and computer screens. "The Massive can't afford to carry a large library, because it would weigh too much, but we need immediate access to any literature necessary for the war. That's where you come in. Your job is to supervise the teleporting of books back and forth from all the major and not to mention the minor Irken libraries to the Massive and back again."
"You mean… the Massive doesn't have its own library?" I ask. I try to stop them, but my antennae droop visibly, making me even more miserable.
"There are some books, only the frequently needed ones. But, as a librarian for the Massive, you'll be handling lots of sensitive materials, such as high-class restricted literature. We put a lot of trust in you, so even though you won't be handling real books as often, your job is far more important than that of a regular librarian."
"High-class restricted?" I ask.
"Very sensitive, not for anyone without special clearance from the tallests PER BOOK. We trust our librarians not to abuse the privilege to handle these materials entirely," he says.
"Wow," I say. I've never felt so honored, but I also feel bad because in the back of my mind, I'm already plotting out ways to pinch a book here and there for myself to read. He shows me to a dusty console. Space crawlers are already building their webs on the chair and the blackened console. "This is your new workspace. The computer will load up a tutorial for you when you give it your palm print ID. Follow the tutorial carefully. If you do your job correctly, this is the last time we'll be talking one on one, since I'll be retiring soon," he says as he ambles aimlessly out of the area. Within moments, I'm alone.
I press my palm on the id pad. The computer's monitor glows brightly, making a bleeping noise as the armada logo pops up on the screen in a brilliant purple. IRKEN OSO 5.0 is written in bold type across the bottom. "Welcome Original 773," it says brightly. "How shall I address you?"
"Um… Original is fine," I say quietly.
"All right, Master Original. You have mail awaiting you."
"Mail?" I ask. The teleporter on my left fires up, frying several space crawlers in the process. A small box is sitting before me, wrapped in bright red paper. I cautiously approach it and being unwrapping it. Pulling open the top, nestled in packing peanuts, I find a small silver robot. "What is this?" I ask.
"This is your SLAW robot, or Standard Library Assistance Worker," the computer tells me in a deep monotone voice. "To activate it, give it your name and pod ID."
Feeling a bit stupid to be talking to an unmoving robot, I do. Within moments, bright yellow eyes pop open and the robot stands tall and at attention. "Ready to assist you, Sir!" it salutes in a metallic voice. A shudder runs down my back.
"You can adjust the robot's settings to be more desirable to your own preferences," the computer informs me. After about ten minutes of debating, I finally chose to give it a musical voice, like the sound of chimes dancing on the wind.
"You're going to need a name," I tell it. "SLAW sounds like something I'd sit on. How about… hmm… umm… Bookworm!" The robot gives me a blank stare, and the computer simply hums. "You guys don't like it, huh?" I say. "Then what about… um… this is harder than I thought. Oh! I know! How about Moby, after my favorite book character?"
"Moby?" the computer mocks.
"I like it!" chirps the SLAW robot, and that's how I ended up working with computer, as he refused to let me give him what he called a "silly name", and Moby the robot.
That night, standing out on the front observation deck of the Massive, looking out on everything there was to see, I sigh. It is beautiful, but my fellow librarians were none too friendly. I know I'm homesick.
"Star light, star bright, first star I see tonight. I wish I may, I wish I might, have the wish I wish tonight."
I smile. "Where did you learn that, Moby?" I giggle a little. It's funny to hear him say that in his little voice.
"I dunno. It was in my programming."
Why a SLAW would need to know that, I don't know. "What did you wish for?" I ask quietly.
Moby's eyes widen. "I can't tell you or it won't come true!"
"Right, right," I nod, turning back to the stars. It's silly, but… oh, what the heck? I make a wish on the stars. I wish… for a friend.