[pfsb] silence in the library

[stilljustandrew]

Andrew doesn't check out the Milliways library that often, but there are a few books that a patron left downstairs, and he's volunteered to return them.

The library door's pretty thick; it's designed to be. For better soundproofing.

There's no reason he should hear anything happening inside before he opens the door.

Comments

[stilljustandrew]

"You know what, though," he says, "it couldn't hurt to look. While we're trying to find the way out. Maybe we'll hit something useful."

[semicharmed]

Matt looks to Andrew, brightening in a slightly guilty way.

(Don't let this place get to you, Jamison.)

"At the very least, we can keep entertained."

[stilljustandrew]

Andrew glances back, and gives a crooked half-scared grin. "Good, 'cause I'd hate to be doomed and bored."

[semicharmed]

"I won't lie," Matt says, his own smile widening a tick, "although I strive not to be boring, but I feel a lot better with a multiversal library backing me up."

[stilljustandrew]

"I'll take the books on this side," he offers, "you take that side?"

[semicharmed]

Matt nods.

"Shield'll stretch that far, no problem."

Reading, it turns out, is a pleasant distraction, even when the first few books Matt pulls are about the history of tentacle-styling among a variety of alien races. He almost manages to ignore the sound of tiny weapons pinging against the edge of the shield.

[stilljustandrew]

"I think this one's a cookbook," says Andrew, a little blankly. "... and a romance novel."

It goes back on the shelf; another comes off.

"Oh, cool!"

[semicharmed]

Matt, who finds romance-novel cookbooks highly relevant to his interests, looks up from his current tentacle-adjacent book curiously.

"Hmm?"

[stilljustandrew]

"Oh, uh --" Slightly sheepish: "Cool but not really useful under the circumstances. It's a book of post-Reformation Vulcan epic poetry."

[semicharmed]

Thank God or whoever, finally a reference Matt gets.

"Wait," he says, "the race of aliens, or the Roman deity of the forge?"

[stilljustandrew]

"The race of aliens," Andrew says, with an unspoken and points for asking. "I've wanted to read this stuff for ages, I've never been able to figure out how you can even write epic poetry in the form of serial syllogisms."

[semicharmed]

"That sounds ... potentially really beautiful, actually," Matt says, sidling back Andrew's way with his own book still in hand.

Poetry places a close second to magic in terms of Matt's preferred reading topics, but it hasn't occurred to him until now to expand his scope to different planets. Color him intrigued.

"I mean, maybe a little not-our-topic, but it seems like we both found books about non-terrestrial life-- these guys could be from some non-Earth planet."

And seriously, he wants to see the poems.

[stilljustandrew]

"... huh," he says, "that's a good point. We could be on the right track, then?"

Color him intrigued-shading-to-slightly-hopeful in turn!

"What've you got next?"

[semicharmed]

"Uhhh," says Matt, with a glance down to his book.

"After this one? Because this one looks like personal style tips."

For aliens, though! Admittedly, none of them much resembles their attackers.

[stilljustandrew]

"Yeah, keep going ..."

Andrew's tucked the Vulcan poetry book under his arm for future reference.

"I got ... I think it's a rulebook for some kind of game. Involving wings and exoskeletal flanges."

[semicharmed]

"Sounds fun," Matt murmurs, sliding his book back (more or less) where he found it. As he glances down the shelf for some more promising title, his eye catches an interruption in the stacks, a shadowed gap--

A door?

"Hey," he says, a little more urgently, "Andrew. I may have found something."

[stilljustandrew]

"Yeah?" He steals a quick look over his shoulder.

[semicharmed]

Was that door there a few minutes ago? WHO CARES. Matt eyes the door with an intent, strategic attention.

"Not sure if it's unlocked," he says, since he is not the kind of magical person who can just lay down some Latin to jimmy locks, "but, uh ... wanna try and lose these guys through there?"

[stilljustandrew]

"Uh, that's a definite yes," he says fervently. "Give it a shot?"

[semicharmed]

"Make a break for it on three," Matt concurs.

He casts an uneasy glance at their winged buddies.

"One, two ... three."


And you know, karmically, they're probably owed this by now, but the door is in fact unlocked.

It also appears to lead into a closet.

[stilljustandrew]

The winged things set up a high-pitched snarl of frustrated rage, and cluster closely around the border of the shield where it intersects the doorway. It's not letting them in.

"Go, go --" Andrew waves Matt in, holding the door braced open until he's through and then tugging it closed after them both.



Iiiit's kind of dark in here now.

[semicharmed]

Matt barrels in and encounters a wall with his outstretched hand, but luckily it's just a dry, normal-feeling wall. Nothing weird, hazardous and/or eldritch about it.

"Uh," he breathes, in the dark.

"Do we ... still want the shield?"

[stilljustandrew]

"... Maybe let's see if the door can hold them?"

If Matt's shield works anything like the kind Jonathan sometimes uses, it's a massive power-sink.

[semicharmed]

"Sure." He nods.

Matt's shield is one of his most intuitively accessible spells, one he doesn't need much concentration to maintain-- but this one's been modified at least once, and he's underestimated the strain that so many teeny-tiny attacks would put on him.

He's cool for now. And for awhile yet, if need be.

But if he doesn't need to be powering this spell, he thinks he might benefit from a breather. He peers towards the door, eyes having adjusted slightly to the gloom.

[stilljustandrew]

Fumbling with the doorknob in the dimness, Andrew finds a locking mechanism and turns it to (he hopes) the locked position.

"Okay," he says, "let it go."