Rebel in the Library of Ever

by Zeno Alexander

  Lenora in Cahokia

  Haruto and Lucy turned and ran as Lenora stood her ground and studied the creature emerging from the hole. She had, after all, seen much worse than this, this being something that looked like a very giant octopus. On its (—head? She didn’t know—) was a helmet that emitted a glittering field around its entire body. Each of its sixteen or so tentacles was holding advanced devices that were like nothing she had ever seen. Overall, she felt that this giant octopus-like creature had a scientific air about it and there was nothing to fear.

  “Hello,” she said, hoping this impressive-looking being could communicate in English. “How may I help you?”

  “Hello,” it replied (somehow) in a quite courteous and gentle tone. The voice seemed to come from its helmet area as the creature floated up and out of the hole and hovered about five feet above the ground. “I am relieved to see a librarian. I need help, but there are so few around, for some reason.”

  “I will do my best, but I should warn you, I know absolutely nothing about this place, which seems to be called Cahokia.”

  “Oh, have no fear about that. I am considered one of the galaxy’s leading experts on all the most significant North American cities.”

  Now Lenora had a number of questions, as one might expect after hearing such a sentence. She decided to list them off. “The galaxy? Where are you from? What is Cahokia? And what shall I call you?”

  “Ah, Lenora, my apologies for not introducing myself, as is your custom. My name is … well, why don’t you call me Rosa. And I’m from a planet known as Zarmina’s World by your scientists, in a star system they call Gliese 581. As for Cahokia, let’s discuss that while we go to the scene of the crime. Will your friends be coming with us, or are they going to stay hidden behind that copper workshop on Mound 34?”

  After quickly scrawling Zarmina’s World—Gliese 581—Investigate into her notebook, Lenora called to her friends, “You can come out! It’s okay. This is Rosa!”

  Lucy and Haruto popped their heads around the side of a building atop a nearby mound, then walked cautiously down its steps. Reaching Lenora and Rosa, they both gulped and said, “Hello,” in slightly shaky voices.

  “Are you an octopus? You look like an octopus,” added Lucy.

  “Oh no, not at all,” Rosa answered. “Although their DNA is so very strange that a few Earth scientists have suggested one explanation might be that they are descended from alien DNA, so it’s within the realm of possibility that we are related to Earth octopuses.”

  “It’s octopi,” said Haruto.

  “No, it isn’t,” said Lenora absently. “Octopus comes from Greek, not Latin, so it’s not pluralized with an i.”

  “What?” asked Lucy.

  “Remind me to lend you my copy of Latin versus Greek: Battle to the Finish,” said Lenora, and, after scribbling Possible alien DNA in octopuses? Must research into her notebook, she said to Rosa, “You mentioned a crime?”

  “Yes,” said Rosa, floating down the avenue while Lenora tagged along, Lucy and Haruto staying a few cautious feet behind her. “You see, I am an archeologist who came here to study the Library’s full-scale re-creation of Cahokia. Cahokia was one of the largest cities in the world during your thirteenth century, rivaling cities such as London and Paris at the time. Though it was later abandoned, no city in North America was larger until Philadelphia toward the end of your eighteenth century. Fascinating place.”

  Lenora was writing wildly in her notebook. “Really? Who built it?”

  “Your anthropologists know them as the Mississippian culture. They thrived for eight hundred years or so, their lands and cities stretching from the Great Lakes to the Atlantic Ocean and the Gulf of Mexico, and far to the west as well. I intended to write a book about them, but a thief has stolen my notes and I have no idea how to track them down, and with my return vessel arriving soon, I don’t have time to repeat my studies.”

  “Hmm,” said Lenora. She didn’t know much about solving crimes, but she was determined to give it her best shot.

  They reached the foot of the very largest of the hundreds of mounds, and either ascended the steps or floated up, depending on whether they had feet or not. The mound was really quite tall and the humans were panting heavily by the time they got to the top, where they found many large buildings and terraces all around. Rosa led them into the largest of them all, which it explained had probably been the residence of Cahokia’s leader.

  Rosa pointed to a copper table. “I left my notes right here. Rather stupid of me, but I never imagined anyone would bother stealing them.”

  “Hmm,” said Lenora again, thinking hard. “I suppose one of the first things you do when you are trying to solve a crime is dust for fingerprints. But I don’t know how to do that and we don’t have any … fingerprint dust or whatever, anyway.”

  “What is a fingerprint?” asked Rosa. Lenora showed hers to the alien.

  “Ah, that’s no trouble, then,” said Rosa, and pointed at the top of the table with one of the many devices carried in its tentacles. Immediately, several fingerprints shone brightly. “Now what?”

  “Ummm,” said Lenora, who hadn’t thought that far ahead. “I’m not sure. We’d need a … fingerprint database or something. Something to match the prints with a person.”

  “No trouble, either,” Rosa replied, and touched another device to its helmet. The device glittered for five seconds or so. “That’s odd,” it said, lowering the device. “No person matching these fingerprints is anywhere in the area. But my notes were only stolen a short time ago, and I began searching for them right away.”

  Lenora was crestfallen. If she could not solve this mystery, then Rosa would never be able to write its book, and it sounded like a book Lenora would very much like to read. She snapped her fingers. “You said the prints didn’t match a person. But what about something else? Something not a person, I mean.”

  “Don’t only people have fingerprints?” asked Lucy skeptically.

  “I don’t know,” said Lenora. “But it’s worth a shot.”

  Rosa put the device to its helmet again, and immediately it lit up brightly. “Yes! I have a match. The fingerprints appear exactly like your human ones, but their owner is a small, furry creature with no tail, a large head with fluffy ears, and a nose shaped like a spoon.”

  Lenora snapped her fingers again. “I knew there was something suspicious about that koala.”

  “Yeah, me, too!” said Lucy, crossing her arms. “They’ve always looked a little suspicious to me. I bet they can steal anything with their little fingerprint trick.”

  Lenora continued, “We saw it outside the Flight section a little while ago, wearing a green backpack. Do you think you can catch it?”

  “Absolutely,” replied the alien. “I can locate anyone once I have their image.”

  Lenora scribbled Human and koala fingerprints look exactly alike, k’s could be master thieves into her notebook and dropped it into a pocket. “Let’s go get your research, then. Which way to the koala?”

  “Oh,” said Rosa. “I can teleport us all right to him. The trip will take no time at all.” And the alien raised another of its devices.

  “Wait,” said Haruto. “I’d love to go … wherever … with you, Lenora, but I have to return these aircraft.”

  “I understand,” said Lenora. “But Haruto—there is a reason you aren’t seeing many librarians around. We have to catch that koala, so I don’t have time to explain, but if you … run into any trouble, or you want to help the Library, find the Googology section. A librarian there named Milton Sirotta can explain.”

  Haruto, looking a bit surprised, nodded. “I will.” Then he and Lucy and Lenora hugged their goodbyes, and Haruto departed.

  Lenora nodded to Rosa.

  Rosa activated its device, and the three of them vanished.

  The ancient city of Cahokia vanished, too, and Lenora suddenly found herself in what appeared to be a completely empty section of the Library. Bu
t there was no time to study their surroundings, for the extremely shocked-looking koala was crouched in a corner right in front of them.

  The koala bolted for the exit.

  “Get him!” cried Lenora, and she and Lucy threw themselves upon the thieving marsupial, each grabbing it by one of its forearms.

  The koala grabbed for something wrapped around its arm as Lucy clung on.

  Lenora recognized it.

  “Uh-oh,” she said.

  Rosa made a strangled, panicked noise, and whipped something through the air into Lenora’s pocket.

  Everything vanished again.

  A hard, thick rain pelted them. Lightning bolts cracked the sky all around. Men were running about on the deck of the wooden sailing ship upon which Lenora and Lucy were now standing, men who were shouting to one another in an unknown language as dark, massive waves crashed over the railings, soaking the girls through and through.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  Lenora Hunts a Thief

  As one might expect when one suddenly finds oneself on the pitching deck of a sailing vessel amid a terrifying storm, Lenora and Lucy immediately lost the koala they were holding as it took the opportunity to break free from their grasp and race across the soaked deck and down an open hatch.

  It certainly looks like it knows where it’s going, thought the part of Lenora’s brain that wasn’t immediately engaged in finding something to hang on to. Another pitch of the deck threw the girls into a railing, and both grabbed hold desperately.

  “Where are we?” screamed Lucy over the howling wind as spray from another wave crashed over them.

  “I don’t know!” yelled Lenora, and was about to add We’ve traveled in time! But she quickly realized this would require too much explaining about how she was able to recognize the time machine strapped to the koala’s forearm (she’d seen one before on the wrist of her time-traveling robot friend), and they really had more important concerns at the moment, such as recapturing the koala and not dying in a shipwreck.

  A man in a short white robe carrying a coil of rope came stumbling by. He spotted Lenora and Lucy and stopped dead in his tracks, eyes wide. He shouted something at them, and then another pitch of the deck sent him staggering back off in the direction he’d come.

  “I think we’re in the ancient past or something!” screamed Lucy.

  “Good guess!” yelled Lenora. Could they make their way over to the hatch and follow the koala belowdecks, she wondered, if even these men, who must be professional sailors, could barely walk? But catch the koala they must, for not only did it have Rosa’s notes, but it had a time machine, and if it vanished again they’d be stranded here in the past in what looked like entirely dire circumstances.

  That problem was partially resolved when the koala popped back up out of the hatch, this time carrying a wooden box that was rather too large for it to handle easily, especially when it was being chased by another sailor in a short robe, who was yelling something angrily.

  “It’s stealing something else!” screamed Lucy.

  Obviously, thought Lenora, also thinking that whatever it was, it must be quite important, for the koala was hanging on to it tightly even though this meant it could not move very easily and could not activate its time machine. Only the wildly pitching deck was preventing it from being snatched up immediately by the man giving pursuit.

  Lenora made a decision. She threw herself forward once more, this time not at the koala itself but at its green backpack, which she was sure contained Rosa’s notes on the ancient North American city of Cahokia. She was also certain the koala would not be willing to give up its prizes in the backpack and box, and if she could just get control of the time machine somehow she could use it to get her and Lucy and the notes out of here and back to when they’d come from.

  She grabbed hold of the backpack with a cry of victory. But the koala surprised her. It dropped the box, wriggled free from the backpack, and, as the sailor was almost upon it, evidently made the decision that its cause was lost, because it jabbed at its time machine and vanished immediately.

  “Drat,” said Lenora.

  A blur raced by. It was Lucy, taking advantage of a momentary lull in the storm to chase after the box, which had gone spinning away across the deck. Lenora jumped up and ran after her, while the sailor who had been chasing the koala stood staring in utter astonishment at the spot where it had vanished.

  Dodging a couple of sailors who were also taking advantage of the lull to try to fix something on a sail (leaving them no time to gape at what Lenora was sure was her very odd appearance), she chased after Lucy down the length of the deck.

  “Come back!” she yelled, thinking that they had to at least get to a relatively safe place belowdecks while she figured out a way to escape their predicament. But Lucy was determined to get that box, and get it she did. She popped off its lid immediately.

  “Oh my gosh!” she screamed, looking down at whatever was in the box. She started toward Lenora. “Lenora! This is the coolest thing I have ever—”

  And that was all, for then Lucy stepped into a puddle of water in her platform shoes, her feet went out from under her, and she and the box went over the railing and into the wine-dark sea.

  Freezing cold water crashed over Lenora as she dove into the waters. She had given it no thought whatsoever before diving over the railing after Lucy, but on the way down she realized she had no idea if the other girl could even swim. Though Lenora was not about to abandon her friend anyway, leaving aside the fact that their situation, bad already, had just gotten immeasurably worse.

  Fortunately, Lucy could swim. For when Lenora surfaced, struggling a bit in her dress and still gripping the koala’s backpack (fortunate also that not only could Lenora swim, but was in fact quite a good swimmer), she could see Lucy bobbing in the water, paddling desperately, only a very short distance away. Knowing that they could easily be separated in the rough seas, she kicked toward Lucy and put the arm holding the backpack around the girl as she paddled with her free hand.

  Lucy seemed on the verge of tears. “Lenora,” she screamed. “I’m so sorry. I lost the box! It sank.”

  “Forget about the box!” yelled Lenora. She was busy looking desperately for the ship. Despair crashed through her as she saw that it had already drifted quite far from them, and in a few more moments had disappeared almost entirely from sight. There was absolutely no way she and Lucy could swim back to it.

  An enormous wave came up, and for a moment both girls went underwater. When they resurfaced, sputtering, Lenora almost losing her grip on her friend, she wondered if she should drop the backpack, and then wondered if it even mattered, for there was no help in sight and the two of them were not likely to make it for long in these rough, cold seas.

  “What should we do?” screamed Lucy.

  It did not help a bit, thought Lenora, that Lucy seemed to harbor no doubts at all that Lenora had a fix for this situation. She hated to disappoint her—and then she felt something bump into her leg. And she remembered:

  Rosa, making a strangled, panicked noise, and whipping something through the air into Lenora’s pocket.

  Rosa had known exactly what was about to happen, just as Lenora had.

  Kicking hard to stay afloat, Lenora stabbed her hand into her pocket. When it came back up, she was holding another of the alien archeologist’s glittering devices, this one the size and shape of a large and heavy pen displaying a lot of swiftly changing symbols that Lenora did not recognize, and one thing she did recognize—a button.

  “That’s Rosa’s thing!” screamed Lucy. “I think you should

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  Lenora and Ada

  press it!”

  But Lenora, of course, had already pressed the button on Rosa’s device, and by the time Lucy finished her unnecessary suggestion both girls were sitting on the Library floor in front of the floating alien, who was waving each of its sixteen or so tentacles in what seemed like a happy fashion.


  “It is with relief,” said Rosa, “that I see you ascertained the purpose of my device.”

  “Not exactly,” said Lenora, panting from exertion. A large pool of water was collecting around the girls, dripping from their clothes. “But you had obviously given it to me for a reason.”

  “Yes. That”—and here Rosa used an alien word that Lenora did not understand—“will return objects and persons to me from anywhere they might be. I was sure you would return, but I am surprised to see you also recovered my notes in the process. Extraordinary.”

  “I was not going to lose your notes,” said Lenora, handing the device and backpack over to the alien, who accepted both with one of its tentacles. “I hope they are waterproof and fireproof, like my notebook.”

  “Naturally,” replied Rosa.

  “The koala tried to steal something else, too,” said Lucy sadly. “But I lost it. It sank to the bottom of the sea.” She shivered, crossing both arms around herself.

  “You must be cold,” said the alien. “Here.” It pointed another device, there was a flash, and the girls found themselves completely dry.

  “Geez,” said Lucy. “Is there anything you can’t do?”

  “Quite a bit,” said Rosa, but Lenora was not listening to this conversation. For she was looking past the archeologist now, and seeing that what had once been an empty section of the Library was now anything but. The room was rather small for a Library section, but the formerly bare walls were now covered with images of watery and badly corroded dials, gears, pins, and cranks, some of them looking like a partially assembled mechanism of some kind, and some simply lying on cloths on their own. Some of them had inscriptions on them that looked rather Greek-ish to Lenora.

  In the middle of the room was a large table, and on that table was a giant cloth, and on that cloth were many bronze fragments that looked very much like cleaned-up versions of the things in the images.

  Lucy had noticed them, too. “Hey,” she said, “that stuff looks really familiar.”

  There was something else on the tablecloth. Pieces of a box, partially reassembled, with many parts missing, but looking much like a broken-up version of a box Lenora had seen only moments (or perhaps thousands of years, depending on how you looked at it) before.