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It started out as an average Wednesday afternoon until she made a faithfull phone call. All she wanted was a little bit of information but just a few short minutes into the call she was abducted by means unknown to her, they just called it a Transfer. So, now Catherine Gillespie is huddled behind the information desk of a Library on the moon hoping 2 things: 1. she doesn't relieve herself in her pants & 2. she didn't die. These two hopes are both as a result there being a large muscle bound alien with four arms & a laser gun in each hand.

As Catherine huddles, she hears the creature screaming something in some alien language. She had no idea what it was screaming since to her it sounded like gibberish. Then came another a voice in a language she did understand, it was english. The voice said. "I'm sorry to once again inform you that my master, Lee Bookman, is currently not here at the moment."

There was more angry gibberish.

"No, I'm not lying to you. I'm not programmed that way." was the reply.

Catherine turned around & peeked up over the counter. There a few yards away was the Alien & standing next to it was a man or at least it was man shaped. It was that robot butler Catherine had seen Lee Bookman the last time she was there, she couldn't remember it's name. He was looked to be an amalgam of C-3PO & one of Iron Man armors from the past couple of years. His outer casing was a few different shades of grey (some lighter, some darker). His torso was covered in a black colored metal which, to Catherine, made it look like it was wearing a suit jacket. The only piece of clothing he appeared to be was a red bow tie. Also, Catherine noticed that even thought the robot had a pair of orange lights for eyes there seemed to be some life to them.

The two appeared to be having some small talk between them but that was short lived when the robo-bulter had apparently said something that had upset the pistol packing alien. This interaction held to another series of rounds being shot off from his laser guns. Which prompted Catherine to duck back down behind the desk.

"I'm sorry you feel this way." The Butler said kindly. There was a short pause, then he said. "No, In fact I don't since I don't actually have any feelings just emulators & right now I'm not processing sadness. I'm processing anger."

The alien said some more gibberish.

"Well, you disrupted my day & the days of the other patrons. Neither I nor them started off ours day wanting to be in the middle of an altercation like this." The Butler said & then added "Well, maybe they did, I'm not programed to read brain patterns."

This was followed up with more angry alien gibberish.

"Now listen here!" The butler said then Catherine heard 2 sounds: One, a slapping noise & the other was the sounds of metal hitting a hard surface, it was most likely a wall.

"Now that was uncalled for. You are just making me process more & more anger emulators. You will not like me when my anger emulator max's out."

The alien made a noise Catherine didn't understand, it was laughing.

"All right. I warned you." The Butler said & Catherine heard the sound of machinery.

Catherine peered over the counter once more to see the humanoid butler robot transform into a larger humanoid robot. It also looked like it was now part tank.

This lead to a fight between them & caused Catherine to take cover once more. As she hid there, she heard someone else, they were laughing. It was a woman's voice. Catherine looked around for the voice & couldn't see anyone until he looked up. There floating in mid-air was the head & shoulders of a woman. She looked to be a caucasian, had short blond hair, looked to maybe be around Catherine's own age & was mostly see through.

As Catherine looked up at her for a moment or two, the head & shoulders looked down at her & said. "Oh. I didn't think anyone was still up here. I'm sorry."

"About what?" Catherine asked wide eyed.

"I've locked down the library so you can't get to your ship."

"That's ok. I didn't come in a ship, I was abducted."

There was a look of concern on her face, she then said. "You were what?"

"Yeah. I called, the person on the other end took an offhanded comment too literally & I found myself here."

"Hmm. I must check in on the communication service node if it's abducting people." The hologram said to it's self.

Then she looked up & towards the fight. "Oh." She said & she floated down as a chunk of robot that could have come from either an arm or a leg flew over the desk.

"That Ohmposian is really giving A.L.F.RED the business." She said with a laugh. "But then it's good for him to let out his anger in way like this or else he would get really cranky & you don't want a cranky droid on your hands, do you?"

Catherine shook her head no. She a bit stunned who/what she was having a conversation with.

She asked "Do I have a stray pixel on my face or something?"

"No. Why?"

"Because you've been staring at him the whole time were being talking."

"Sorry." Catherine as she started to blush. "It's just that I've never talked to a hologram before. You are a hologram right, not some ghost or something?"

She laughed. "Yeah, I'm a hologram. Or at least who your seeing is. I'm actually not actually here on this floor. The real me is down a few floors in the heart of the Library. Also, the real me isn't really all that attractive either, just a box filled with computer parts with lots of wires & cables come out of me." The hologram said.

"Ok." was Catherine's reply which made the hologram laugh.

There was a lull in the conversation so their attentions went back to the fight at hand. Both women peeked over the counter & the limb A.L.F.RED was missing was an arm. Also, the Alien's guns were gone.

"I wonder where the other one is?" the hologram asked.

"What?"

"The Ohmposians always travel in pairs. Right now is pretty much a standard fighting style for them: one attacks solo while the other one hangs back a bit & then they finish their prey off together."

"oh."

Again Catherine's reply made the hologram laugh.

"By the way, The name's D.D. Well, that's not my real name. The real one is a long, complicated boring one but my nickname is D.D."

"Hi. I'm Catherine."

"Hi. So, your from Earth?" D.D. asked as the robotic butler & 4 armed behemoth grappled with each other.

"Yeah. What gave me away?"

"Well... No ship. You said called, not communicated. You'd never talked to a hologram before. Plus, the way your dressed just screams Earthling!"

"ok."

D.D. smiled, then looked back at the fight & said franticly. "DUCK!"

Catherine did & just as she did A.L.F.RED's other arm flew over the information desk.

Once they heard it land, the two peaked back up over the counter to A.L.F.RED was busy kicking the Alien.

"It's just a flesh wound." Catherine said.

"Nice." D.D. said with a smile.

"Thanks. Plus, I don't think.." Catherine said affecting a pseudo french accent "I fart in your general direction. Your mother was a hamster and your father smelt of elderberries" then dropped the accent & said ".. would have made much sense."

D.D. laughed, harder then any other time before. This caught the Alien's attention. It gave a slight head nod & the other Ohmposian that had been hiding came out. It lunged at Catherine & D.D. As it did so, Catherine noticed that this one was slightly more feminine then the other.

Catherine froze as the female alien continued to run at her & one thought ran through her mind: Don't loose control of your bowels.

D.D. turned to Catherine & said one word: Sorry. Before Catherine could react, she was elsewhere.

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TO BE CONTINUED...

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I'm surprised A.L.F.RED didn't really lose his temper and explode the musclebound multi-armed alien. Of course that would have caused some damage to the library, but when has A.L.F.RED worried about that?

If they keep having invaders they'll have to hire Anna as temporary security. She doesn't argue or fight quite so much - she would just drag the two through the building and toss both of them out the closest airlock. Of course then the lack of destruction isn't quite as funny, unless you translate the curses the two aliens give as they're dragged and tossed out.

A.L.F.RED can't explode people, not unless he blows them up with a explosive & those he only uses as a last resort.


Always. He's very picky about how the Library looks.


Having non IOL sanctioned entities working at the Library is a big no no, one Lee won't even do. Now they could attempt to get Anna sanctioned but since she's from Earth there is little chance. The IOL find the people of Earth beneath them.


Lee likes that to. He's mostly non confrontational. If Lee was there to meet up with the Alien he would have just downloaded some massive tome into it's brain, overloading him thus preventing a fight.


The Library was on lock down so the air locks wouldn't work.

> Of course then the lack of destruction isn't quite as funny, unless you translate the curses the two aliens give as they're dragged and tossed out.

But then we still might not understand them since some words just don't translate well.

Nice to see AlfRED and D.D. come into play, and it led to some fun dialog! AlfRED was being quite polite for the amount of dismembering that was going on. Hopefully there will be a bit less of that next time, assuming that DD managed to get Catherine away from the second alien.

I'm pretty sure I wouldn't call the librarian's number a second time if I was Catherine.

I did the other "automated systems" to show how different Lee's take on the Library from how the IOL does things. I have/had a half finished story somewhere on my computer (I might have lost it) where Lee when to the central hub of the IOL & got the same run around. Never got around to writing why he was there.

> Nice to see AlfRED and D.D. come into play, and it led to some fun dialog!

A.L.F.RED & D.D. were always to come into play. If I was going to show the MPL, those two had to show up sometime.

Ian also mentioned about the dialog, I just wrote what I thought would be fit with the character/situation.

> AlfRED was being quite polite for the amount of dismembering that was going on.

Yeah. But wait till next time to see how the fight turned out.

> Hopefully there will be a bit less of that next time, assuming that DD managed to get Catherine away from the second alien.

Well, it will be there but not & Catherine is tucked somewhat safely away from the action.


She might call again but she'd prepare more next time.