Author Notes - We started off with Artoo because the second Threepio enters a silent story, it ain't silent anymore. I say that like I don't like him. He's my favourite character in the franchise.
Thanks to Galaxydragon101 and MossyMeow for the favourites/follows. No offense to the readers (obviously, you guys are awesome for giving me a chance), but I was not expecting anyone to even read this. Let alone favourite it. There's a lesson to be learnt here: just publish your darn stories and you'll probably get some attention.
CHAPTER TWO - SHINY
Another day on the planet meant yet another day of collecting. How Artoo still managed to find new treasures every day was a miracle. A surprisingly-intact vase, a fire extinguisher with hardly any charge left, a bunch of bottlecaps... the kinds of things only the curious astromech would find interesting.
The thing people would find the most interesting was probably the rusted-over remains of an old Protocol droid. It was practically a skeleton of a skeleton, but alas far too big for Artoo to carry back home. Other than that, not much.
Artoo drove around among the smaller piles, looking for anything that shone under the burning sun. Nothing, nothing, a shiny object unlike anything he had ever seen, nothing, noth- wait!
'BIDDA BIP?!'
Jutting out of one particular pile was, well, a shiny object unlike anything he had ever seen. The best comparison he had was probably his lunchbox, but even then only vaguely. It was like a green, translucent DVD case with a data card inside.
'Wooooo-hoo!'
Artoo grabbed the thing and pulled it out. Upon a quick scan, it seemed as though the data card inside was compatible with him. Whatever data it held was currently a mystery, due to its plain design and writing that had long since faded away.
He did a little dance, beeping in joy. No need to check it yet, if only because he wanted to be in a safe place to check its contents. Perhaps it was more of that man and woman he loved watching. Or maybe even something of great significance to everyone who once lived on this planet. Or, heck, it could've been nothing. Perhaps just a recipe on baking cookies. Or literally nothing at all. Either way, treasure!
Artoo glanced at his previous findings, then back at the data card box. It didn't seem right to throw what was potentially the greatest thing on the planet in with the other stuff. So, he retracted his arm and put that treasure inside his own physical storage unit.
Whatever it was, he had a feeling that it was of great importance. He hadn't seen a data card like that since he had been dropped on this wreck of a planet. Thinking about that, it reminded him of a pressing question he mostly ignored - would they ever come back to pick him up? At this rate, unlikely. Care factor? Rather low. This was his life now.
More rolling, more collecting, more beeps... he couldn't sense any upcoming sandstorms, so Artoo continued his little search some more. But, did he really need to? Nothing was going to beat an intact data card! But collecting was fun, so why stop now? Even if the only thing capable of beating his new data card was some sort of strange and mysterious light.
Wait, strange and mysterious what now?
'Wruu?'
Artoo stopped making tracks, as dead in front of him was a little red light. It resembled the dot typically made by a laser pointer, and like the cats they normally appealed to Artoo found himself entranced by it.
'Tweeeeep...'
He leaned forward, unable to do so much further lest he fall over. Now, he had seen some weird things on this planet, but none as weird as a glowing red dot. Other than his home and himself, no piece of technology had worked on that planet in ages. He scanned the area, but he found nothing that could've been making any light at all, let alone one in this fashion.
But what made this little red dot even weirder was that it moved. It moved at a consistent pace and direction, away from Artoo.
'Wuh?'
As if he was going to let this light get away! He grabbed his things and headed after that mysterious dot. Where was it going? What did it do? Questions he knew would be answered if he followed.
He kept up with the travelling light, even as it drifted down a rather precarious rocky cliffside - that's what jetpacks were for. It arrived into the middle of a field that no doubt used to be some sort of docking bay, judging by all the shipping carts and rusted away spaceships.
Artoo would've followed it all the way, but he noticed something else. It appeared that a large ring of the red dots had been following the main dot too, and with every second the ring grew smaller and smaller.
He leaned back a bit to look up and... a ship. An honest to The Maker spaceship, at that very moment approaching the ground and scattering sand all around.
'WOOOOOO!'
Artoo couldn't believe it! Had his prayers for his old masters to return finally come true? His hope - and his happy dance - came to a swift stop when he studied the ship a bit more. It seemed to be a mere throwaway - nothing anything fully sentient would board. In fact, the chances of a droid storing on board were unlikely. If anything, it looked like the kind of thing a much bigger ship would dump on a random planet just to get rid of it.
'Mruuu...' He then proceeded to spout some mildly-frustrated electronic swears.
Whatever the reason this junk pile of a ship had arrived, Artoo already had enough of the amount of sand it threw up. He grabbed his box and hightailed behind a shipping crate, though still watching the ship intently.
The ship landed on the ground a little roughly, clearly not used to the uneven terrain. The dust mostly settled. Artoo remained in his spot, hoping that maybe - just maybe - there actually was someone inside that ship.
'Oh, my masters... they couldn't have given me a more comfortable ride, could they?'
'BIP?!'
That voice... it came from the ship. And it wasn't some terrible pre-recording, or a hologram, or anything like that. No, it sounded almost alive. Almost. It sounded like...
Another droid!
'Wree-wruu?'
Artoo couldn't believe it. He really couldn't. What were the odds of this, on the seven-hundred-anniversary of being forgotten? He knew the odds - astronomically low. Yet, here it was. No, his audio receptors had to be malfunctioning again.
Any doubt that astromech had was deleted when the latch that took up about half the ship itself opened up. The very first sight Artoo processed was the shine. Goodness, the shine. It hooked him in right off the bat. Nothing on the planet was as shiny as this. Nothing.
'And just look at this planet! Why, it's nothing more than a ball of dust. Why anyone thought this was the place for a Protocol droid, I'll never know.'
Artoo didn't even care how whiny the fellow droid already was.
The droid - turning out to indeed be a Protocol droid at that - emerged from his ship. He got one foot out, before falling face-first into the sand in a rather undignified position, flailing his arms around as he did so.
'WAAHHHH! ... Oof!'
Artoo laughed to himself, quietly enough that this other droid didn't hear him.
The golden exterior of this visitor reflected the sunlight almost perfectly. Any shiny object Artoo had found before now looked dull and rusty in comparison to this. Not only was the reflection perfect, but the light illuminated from the gold so well, he looked just like a god.
'I've been on this planet for ten-point-six-two seconds, and already my joints are frozen with sand!'
Grumbling to himself about how he 'hated sand' because it was 'coarse, rough, and irritating', he reached back into his tiny ship and pulled out what Artoo believed to be some sort of blaster.
A Protocol droid wielding a weapon? Now that was a very funny image. Especially since this one had no idea how to hold it right.
'They suspect those important plans might be in this wasteland? The chances of finding anything of interest are approximately seven million to one!'
With himself and his weapon out of the ship, the spacecraft decided to leave him there. It flew into the air and disappeared, with our Protocol droid still muttering less-than-pleasant things about the people who decided to leave him here.
'Typical. It's too risky for organics, so they get a droid to do it.'
Anyone else would dismiss this all as a hallucination, but droids do not hallucinate. And our astromech was about ready to explode from the sheer excitement alone, too happy to even dance anymore. So many years of staring at that imagecaster, wishing that one day he'd eventually have the same thing the man did... and now, it was right in front of him.
Most would say that any droid isn't nearly as lovely as the woman in the imagecaster. Artoo disagreed - that shiny, almost unscathed gold was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen.
Artoo backed up a bit. How would he approach this new potential friend? Judging from what little he'd seen of him so far, the guy was just a little fussy. Just a bit. Not exactly the most approachable type.
His dome snapped around. He backed into a can, kicking it away with a small sound very noticeable in the silence of the planet.
'AH! W-Who's there?!'
The golden droid aimed his blaster at the shipping crate with shaky as heck arms, and - after fiddling for a bit to find the trigger - managed to fire. The one wielding the weapon may have been weak, but the weapon itself certainly wasn't. With one flimsy shot, the shipping crate was consumed by a glorious explosion.
KA-BOOM!
Debris scattered around everywhere, away from the flaming pile that used to be the shipping cart. The smoke did little to damage the air quality - that air couldn't get any worse.
The golden droid made a sound akin to a human gulping. 'T-That's right! I-If you come at me, I'll... I-I will shoot!'
Artoo hid behind the shipping box next to the one just blown up, having just barely escaped the explosion. As much as he didn't want to admit it, he was shaking a bit. Turns out, even a harmless Protocol bot could be scary if wielding a powerful weapon.
Now Artoo really had to wonder how to talk to this guest, preferably without getting blasted to pieces. With how jumpy Goldie was, this seemed like an impossible task. He peered out from behind his hiding spot. The shiny droid walked away into the desolate land, complaining about his terrible job.
'I doubt my masters will even return when I run out of power! They'll just leave my skeleton to sink under the sand like a dead Bantha!'
Artoo watched him walk away, focusing on that beautiful shine. Surely something being that shiny on such a rusty wasteland was impossible! He reflected his surroundings so perfectly, Artoo didn't even notice that his right shin was actually silver until now.
A monochrome droid with an unusually-coloured body part meant a history. Did Goldie lose a limb in the heat of an epic battle? Or did he just trip over a loose wire?
But who cared if he had a history or not? Who cared about his whiny behaviour? Artoo finally had a friend! Or at least he would if he figured out how to talk to him without getting blasted. Once he was sure the Protocol droid was far away enough, the astromech rolled after him.
Who was he? Why was he here? How would Artoo approach him without getting blown up by a panicked firing? Artoo had no answers to any of these questions, but he knew one thing.
After so many years of solitude and loneliness, he was not going to let this guy get away from him.
No matter how long Artoo watched his visitor for, he couldn't get over that shine. Even after the sand and dust had buffered his exterior, Goldie still looked beautiful. And every time anything even slightly moved, he would blast it to smithereens in utter fear. Old buildings, trash piles, even immobile rocks... all decimated in panic.
The little astromech had followed him around all day, memorised. It still seemed impossible. No ships had come anywhere near this planet in those seven hundred years. And now, all of a sudden, there was someone else.
Artoo watched him from behind one of the many piles of trash. Goldie hadn't stopped complaining since his arrival, not that Artoo blamed him. Anyone would complain if they had to visit this place.
The Protocol droid stared at one of the piles, the disgust not at all obvious on his static face yet emanating from his circuits. With great hesitation, he stuck his hand in and searched around.
'Wruu?'
'Eugh! The sanitation levels are far too low for any species! There better be a nice long oil bath when I return. If I return.'
Shame they didn't share the interest of garbage searching. Like Artoo cared. He nudged himself a little forward, wanting to get as close to that shiny gold as he could without being detected.
How did one approach a jumpy droid armed with a dangerous weapon? Maybe he could just say 'hi', but Goldie seemed a little too jumpy for that.
Artoo stopped dead. Distracted by the shiny, he bumped into the tall pile of garbage. Leaning back to look up, he saw the top of it wobbling over. With the direction it seemed to be going, it would crush Goldie beneath it!
'I heard what they said. They sent me just because 'I never stop blabbering'. You're the best for the job my foot!'
And, in his complaining, he didn't detect it at all. Artoo couldn't let him get crushed! Protocol droids weren't made for impact. Forget trying to stay hidden. He had to save him!
He revved his rollers just like a car and charged around the tumbling pile, going so fast he turned on just one leg.
'WHOOOAAA!'
Goldie spun around with a yelp, nearly dropping his gun. He was too busy juggling the blaster about to fire it, allowing Artoo to slam his body into his and knock him out of the way with a nice loud BONK!
'Wah!'
The Protocol droid fell to the sandy ground. He looked around for his weapon, to see that it fell a few feet away from him. Unfortunately, his arms weren't built to reach.
'G-GET AWAY!'
Before he could either see his assailant or complain about sand in his joints some more, the trash pile came crashing down.
Right where he was standing a few seconds ago.
Author Notes - I've noticed that there's a severe lack of fanfics starring the two droids. I saw maybe a couple focused on Artoo, but practically nothing focusing on Threepio. So I guess I'm just doing my part.