• Choose a category
• All
• Classic-Fiction

“I’m sending you this message because there has been an accident. Admiral Ackbar’s shuttle crashed on the planet Vortex. Leia was with him, but she’s safe and unharmed. The admiral ejected her to safety before his ship flew out of control, directly into a large cultural center. Admiral Ackbar managed to power up his crash shields, but the entire structure was destroyed. So far at least 358 Vors are confirmed dead in the wreckage.

“This is a tragic day for us, Han. Come home to Imperial City. I think Leia might need you as soon as she returns.” Mon Mothma’s image wavered, then dissolved into staticky snowflakes that faded in the air.

The messenger droid said, “Thank you. Here is your receipt.” It spat out a tiny blue chit that landed in a puff of snow at Han’s feet.

Han stared as the droid turned and streaked back toward the base camp. He squashed the blue chit into the snow with the base of his turbo-ski. He felt sick. The excitement he had just experienced, all the joy with Kyp, had evaporated, leaving only a leaden dread inside him.

“Come on, Kyp. Let’s go.”

See-Threepio thought that if his fine-motor control had allowed it, his entire golden body would be chattering with cold. His internal thermal units were no match for the frozen polar regions of Coruscant.

He was a protocol droid, fluent in over six million forms of communication. He was able to perform an incredible number of diverse tasks—all of which seemed more appealing at the moment than baby-sitting a pair of wild two-and-a-half-year-olds who saw him as their plaything.

Threepio had taken the twins to the snow-play area at the bottom of the ice slopes, where they could ride tame tauntauns. Little Jacen and his sister Jaina seemed to enjoy the spitting, cumbersome creatures—and the Umgullian rancher who had brought the furry animals to Coruscant seemed delighted to have the business.

Afterward Threepio had stoically endured as the twins insisted on making a “snow droid” of him, packing layers of snow around his shiny body. He still felt ice crystals caked inside his joints. As he enhanced the output from his optical sensors, Threepio thought that his golden alloy had taken on a decidedly bluish tinge from the low temperature.

On a sledding slope the twins spun around, giggling and shrieking as they bounced against padded restraints in a child’s snow skimmer. Threepio waited for them at the bottom, then began the long trudge back up the hill so the children could do it all over again. He felt like a low-capacity labor droid with too little computing power to understand the drudgery of its own existence. “Oh, how I wish Master Solo would get back soon,” he said.

At the top of the ramp he secured Jacen and Jaina snugly into their seats. In tandem they looked up at him with rosy-cheeked faces. Humans claimed to find the winter chill exhilarating; Threepio wished he had outfitted himself with more efficient low-temperature lubricants.

“Now, you children be careful on the ride down,” he said. “I shall meet you at the bottom and bring you back up.” He paused. “Again.”

He launched the children in the spinning snow skimmer. Jacen and Jaina laughed and squealed as feathers of snow sprayed down the slope. Threepio began to move with a rapid gait down the long ramp.

When he reached the bottom, the twins were already attempting to unstrap themselves. Jaina had managed to disconnect one buckle, though the attendant at the equipment-rental station had assured Threepio that the restraints were utterly childproof.

“Children, leave that alone!” he said. He refastened Jaina’s restraint and switched on the hoverfield beneath the snow skimmer. He grasped the handles and began to climb back up the slope to the launching platform.

When he reached the top, both twins shouted, “Again!” in unison, as if their minds were linked. Threepio decided it was time to lecture the children about overindulgence in enjoyment, but before he could formulate a speech with