A short blonde thirteen year old girl was curled up on her second favorite chair next to the fireplace in the mansion library. Her favorite chair was actually in a different library, but the one she had chosen here was almost its rival in comfort and cushiness. The fire wasn't lit, but a rare sunny day assured that the room was plenty bright and warm.

Katrina was dressed for comfort in a soft, warm pair of sweat pants, a long sleeved cotton teeshirt, and a fleece zip up shirt. She didn't particularly care that navy blue, orange, and forest green didn't really go well together in one single outfit. In her lap lay a book she had found on one of the shelves called Teach Yourself to Knit, which she was valiantly trying to do with a par of borrowed knitting needles and a small ball of variegated yarn that blended pinks, oranges, and reds in a fiery rainbow.

Thus far, the teenager had figured out how to attach the first loop to the first knitting needle with a fancy type of slip knot thing. It had only taken her three tries to figure that part out, leaving her pretty confident that knitting would not be so difficult after all. Now, though, she sat puzzling over the process of “casting on”. She was holding her left fingers in a V shape, as prescribed by the book, and the two ends of the string were draped over her thumb and forefinger. Next she was supposed to do something with the needle that had the one stitch on it already. A sort of a twist around the thumb string, a twist around the forefinger string, a pulling tight maneuver, and she'd have her second stitch.

Katrina tried the movement again, but for some reason the stitch wouldn't stay on the needle for possibly the sixteenth time in a row. The young girl shifted her weight to get a better view of the picture in the book to figure out what she was doing wrong, but her ball of fiery yarn fell off the chair and bounced and rolled across the floor.

“Oops.”

Well It would seem that on this sunny and happy day Katrina wasn’t the only teen in the library. Little Miss Ruby Lupin, Age 13 and happily engaged in her own book a book on advanced robotics, quite a hard read for a girl her age. However, Ruby wasn’t like every other 13 year old, she was extremely good at robotics and had always wondered if that was part of her mutant ability as well. The girl had managed to find a nice snuggly spot in one of the other chairs in the library, looking at the schematics with great intrest, learning which robot could do what thing.

The problem with this is that Ruby had learned most of this already, so she was gazing off a little bit when the ball of yarn came rolling towards her. A robot that was resting by her feet, had caught it instead of it hitting Ruby’s foot and when it was caught it made a pleasant beeping noise. The little tin can looking robot wheeled its say over to Katrina, carrying the ball of yarn in its little robotic claws, beeping and booping softly as its wheels sped themselves over to her. It dropped the ball next to Kats feet and then wheeled back over to Ruby who had this point looked up to see the little creature rolling back over to her with great enthusiasm.

A small smile crept across Ruby’s face as her fox ears perked up a little bit. The Fox girl was wearing a pair of overalls with a red t shirt underneath them, her normal ‘work clothes’. “Oh, did my robot malfunction or something? Was that why he was rolling back over to me so quickly?” Ruby asked in her small voice to the girl not to far away from her. “If he pinched you Im sorry, he has been malfunctioning lately so im reading a book how to fix him. OH! And My name is Ruby, what’s yours…I haven’t seen people my age around in a while.”

The door to the library opened silently as a shivering Japanese boy stepped in, rubbing his hands together to warm himself up. A yay-sized meditation session in the cold outdoors really buried a chill in one’s heart. As he wordlessly walked to a chair by the fire place, he noted the others in the room. One girl was knitting, and another seemed to be reading a difficult-looking book. He decided to leave that one alone for now. She looked busy.

Plopping down in the comfortable red chair, he reached into his pocket for a book. After a moment of searching, he found it and cracked it open. Massive monolithic robots glared back at him. “No, Char!” He whispered as the man in the mask did something dastardly. “He won’t let you do that!” Glancing up from his reading at the sound of beeping, Shin caught sight of the robot and did a double-take. Hmm? He looked over at it, then back at his comic. Up and back. Up and back. Finally, it dawned on him.

That was pretty impressive.

Slipping the comic book away, Shin extracted a yellow phone book and began leafing through it for a number.

Katrina could hardly believe her eyes. A miniature robot doing its best voice impression of R2D2 rolled over to pick up her ball of yarn and then made its way to the foot of her chair holding it almost expectantly up towards her. After she bent to take the little rainbow ball from his metallic hands, he sped back towards the girl Katrina assumed was his creator. The thirteen-year-old illusionist had been so engrossed in her knitting attempt that she hadn't even noticed when the other girl had gotten there.

She looked over towards the young girl in the opposite chair. She had light brown hair and striking green eyes. She looked comfortable in overalls and a teeshirt. Perhaps her most noticeable feature was her furry and pointed ears. They seemed to perk up and twitch to reflect the sounds to which she was paying attention. They flicked towards Katrina.

Katrina's eyes flicked over to the Asian boy reading a comic in another nearby chair. When had he gotten there? Maybe she should have been paying more attention to her ears. Someone could have sneaked up and kidnapped her by now and she probably wouldn't have realized it until she was halfway to the door in a canvas sack.

She flicked back to the pointy eared girl when the opposite girl spoke in a small voice,
>>>“Oh, did my robot malfunction or something? Was that why he was rolling back over to me so quickly?” ... “If he pinched you I'm sorry, he has been malfunctioning lately so I'm reading a book how to fix him. OH! And My name is Ruby, what’s yours…I haven’t seen people my age around in a while.”

Katrina responded in her own small voice so she wouldn't disturb any of the other library occupants she hadn't noticed, “Don't worry, he just brought back my yarn ball.” She added a friendly smile, “I'm Katrina. And with all the older students around here, I'm not surprised that us two little people wouldn't ever see each other over their big tall heads.”

The Asian boy had flipped open a phone book. It wasn't particularly serious reading, so Katrina felt safe talking to him, “I don't think I've met you either. What's your name?”

“Yeah, everyone is taller than me, I’m used to getting boosts from my big sister when I want to see over everyone’s heads. Maybe I should make a robot that would help give us a boost.” Ruby told Katrina thoughtfully

Ruby smiled at Katrina with happiness, she loved meeting new friends, and especially ones that weren’t extremely tall like a lot of people were in the mansion. Nothing bad ever came out of making a new friend now did it? Well at least Ruby didn’t think so, only her older sisters seemed to think that darkly about the world around them. The fox girl thought they were too serious for their own good and Ruby liked to cheer them up whenever she could. The tiny fox girl glanced over at the boy who seemed to be rather into his comic book moments ago judging by his muttering to himself. Ruby reached down and patted her robot on the crone head, her tail curling around her body a little bit.

”Good Milo, Good little Robot.” She praised, causing the robot to beep several times in almost understanding. It was odd really because one would think a robot didn’t understand feelings or praise or what have you, not Ruby’s robots, they almost had a certain human like quality to them.

Ruby looked over at the boy and waved a little bit, the smile still on her face. “Hi there!” She exclaimed, watching as her robot begin to wheel about happily now that she had praised it.

Shin’s finger paused over the words ‘Electronics – Look Out’. He glanced up at Katrina. “My name’s Shin,” he smiled. His eyes trailed to her yarn and the needle in her hand. “Are you knitting? That’s cool. My grandma used to knit. Whenever she visited, she’d always bring all sorts of sweaters and socks for me. She even tried to teach me how…” His voice dropped a little as he realized he was dominating the conversation. He looked down at the phone book. His finger had slipped from its place, and now fell on ‘Employment Agencies – Allstar Staffing’. Was that a sign?

“What did you say your name was again?” He asked.

“Hi there!” Ruby exclaimed. Shin turned to shoot a smile her way too.

“Hi. Cool robot.”

>>>“Yeah, everyone is taller than me, I’m used to getting boosts from my big sister when I want to see over everyone’s heads. Maybe I should make a robot that would help give us a boost.”

Katrina thought about that for a moment. There were plenty of times when it payed off to be tall. You could reach things on the top shelf, you could tower over bullies, and you could see at parades and in movie theatres. On the other hand, there were lots of devices that could be used to make yourself taller, from shoes to stilts to ladders. It was nigh impossible, though, to make yourself shorter. And sometimes being small had its advantages. You could fit into small hiding places, for example, or wriggle through crowds without having to wait for people to get out of the way. You could also jump into people's arms or ride on their shoulders. In addition, you could easily wiggle your way into someone's bed to cuddle and keep warm after having a nightmare or just because it is too cold outside.

“I think I like being small, actually,” came her simple reply. Both had their benefits, but she definitely was happy to be her own size.

Unbeknownst to the blonde haired youth, there was yet another silent being sneaking up on the group next to the empty fireplace. His feet padded silently closer.

>>>”Good Milo, Good little Robot.”

The pointy eared girl patted her robot's head and it spun around in a happy circle dance. That was cute. The illusionist wondered if the girl had programed him to do that. It was very sweet.

Someone else watched the buzzing, clicking, beeping, and dancing robot with interest. His ears were perked forward as he tried to discern if the little metal creature was a threat.

>>>“My name’s Shin,”
responded the phone book reading guy to Katrina's question.

“Nice to meet you! Are you a student here, now?” Katrina smiled in the most welcoming way she could. Even though it was the middle of the school year, the mansion always had new students coming in. The teachers didn't even seemed phased about it, it happened so often. They just figured out what level the student was at, and that's where they started.

>>>“Are you knitting? That’s cool. My grandma used to knit. Whenever she visited, she’d always bring all sorts of sweaters and socks for me. She even tried to teach me how…”

Shin's voice trails off and he drops eyes back to the phone book. Either he was shy, or he was really into reading that phone book. Katrina shrugged. She'd seen stranger reading habits.

The unnoticed Rottweiler chose that moment to attack his prey. The black and brown protector of the innocent and defender against intruders, also known as Bruce, leaped forward with a growl toward the small robot that was still beeping on the floor. He had decided that it was a threat and therefore must be eliminated. He could tell that it was a close relative of the notorious vacuum cleaner, whom everyone knew belonged to the dark side.

“Yeah Im starting to Really enjoy being small too.” Ruby replied to Katrina’s question with a smile.

”Oh and thank you, Isn’t Monty just awesome?” Ruby asked Shard glancing at the little robot twirl about just before the massive dog lunged at the poor thing. That poor robot had no idea what to do and stood frozen for what it seemed to be eternity before he used his first reaction, most likely being through all caution programming to the wind and run for your life.

Well the little robots first reaction was to beep very loudly in a paniced tone, wheeling away from the creature that pounced at him. The poor thing was terrified and used its little wheels to get away as fast as it could, allowing its owner to pick him up with her quick little hands. The terrified robot was beeping about in a terrified way preceding to hide behind Ruby in fright.

”Aww poor little thing, you probably look as scary to the dog as it is to you.” Ruby soothed the beeping robot, who hugged her a little. He rolled himself on the table and toward Katrina, glancing down at the puppy with frightened beeping noises. It looked over at Shard as well, beeping furiously and actually sounding quite scared.

There comes a time in every young man’s life when he must act. This… Shin rose, waggling a finger at the Rottweiler, and shaking his head ‘no’—Was it.

“Here boy, come ‘ere doggy.” Shin leaned forward, ushering the dog towards him. “What are you doing in the library? Are you some kind of special ‘reading dog’. What will them scientists think of next, honestly?”

He glanced at Katrina. “Is she yours?”

Katrina leaped up from her seat and reached for the dog's collar, or rather the spare piece of rope that served as a collar, “Bruce, no!” She was too slow, and ended up snatching only at fur that quickly yanked out of her grip again. Luckily the little robot had quicker reflexes than the blonde teen. It scooted away and was scooped up by the pointy eared Ruby.

The robot's sudden disappearance from right beneath his nose had Bruce checking the floor all around and under himself to see where it had gone. This gave Katrina another chance to grasp the collar. This time she was able to get the fingers of both her hands around it. This wouldn't be much help, if the dog decided to lunge again, since he was at least as big as the illusionist was. So far, though, he had learned that it hurt small humans when he tried to escape their grasp. It had only ever happened once, but a dog never liked to see its owner sad.

Small frightened beeps from the top of the table alerted Bruce to where the robot had gone. He was a big dog and the robot was still easily within his reach, but the gentle Katrina was holding his collar, so he would not lunge. He licked his lips, pawed the floor, and whined impatiently.

“No,” came the firm response from the small being behind him. Bruce looked back at her, then back at the robot hopefully, Shin was also showing his disapproval by shaking his head. Bruce finally lay down. The act pulled Katrina forward and she ended up sprawled on top of the dog's back, still holding the collar. A soft landing.

>>>“Here boy, come ‘ere doggy.” ... “What are you doing in the library? Are you some kind of special ‘reading dog’. What will them scientists think of next, honestly?”

Bruce looked over to the young man talking to him. He had no way of understanding him, but the boy had a nice voice. He looked back to the robot again, waiting for it to come down again. It was like a squirrel in a tree. There were no other trees for it to jump to, so it would have to come down eventually. Bruce would wait.

>>>“Is she yours?”

Katrina scooted forward so she could sit up and hang onto the rope collar at the same time, “He's not really mine. Bruce kind of just lives here along with everyone else. He does like to sleep at the end of my bed sometimes or lay next to me when I study though.” Katrina let go of the collar with one hand and used it to scratch the base of Bruce's ear. He was a good dog.