Library System Reset: Overdue: A Magical Library LitRPG Adventure, page 35
"Yeah, I've gathered that much. I really love how the rest is a non-answer," Quinn said, slightly disgruntled. She glanced over at Dottie and then up at Milaro. "Where's Malakai?" she asked.
"I sent him back home to retrieve his things, so that he might stay here in a little bit more comfort, and perhaps less begrudgingly." Milaro grinned. "He'll be back very shortly."
Quinn paused, looked around a bit more, and decided she was just going to grab the bull by the horns. "Okay, so what are we going to do to help Lynx?"
"Well, I'm sure he'll come to us when he realizes what sort of help he needs," Milaro said, obviously uncomfortable.
Quinn shook her head. "No. Because despite everything, I think right now he really needs all of us. And I think he might be a bit stubborn."
Milaro chuckled but it sounded somewhat forced. "The Library, and Lynx with it, are an extremely complex organism."
"I get that," she said gently, because in truth she did. "Trust me. I've been right there up in that link with the core, and the glimpses of a history I still find too complex to piece together."
"Ah." The elf watched her for a moment, and Quinn saw Dottie, very decidedly, raise one of her wooden legs and smack him directly on the top of the foot with it. Milaro winced and glared down at her.
"Fine," he grumbled. "You realize what Links stands for, right? Library Interface Neural Knowledge System. That's why he's called Links. I realize you think of him as the cat he sometimes presents himself as, but that's what he is."
A lightbulb practically went on in Quinn's mind. She'd seen it come up of course when information referred to him as Links whatever his designation was. But she still liked the Cheshire-like cat she'd first encountered and insisted on calling him Lynx. The acronym made a lot of sense. Sort of. She'd have thought it would be a lot longer. "Well I guess he sort of is the interface, right?"
"Not entirely. Lynx enables the full interface to activate. If the manifestation is not able to be projected, then the bare minimum the Library needs to function is not present. Lynx is literally what links everyone to the Library. He is an integral part of it, and yet also partially his own entity."
Quinn mulled that over while she munched on another piece of that candied bacon stuff. "So… is the Library also its own entity."
Milaro nodded emphatically. "Yes. Entirely. But it is also a part of Lynx and the latter cannot survive without the former."
Quinn shook her head. "That's enough of that. What we should be talking about is just how we're going to help the stubborn cat out."
Dottie pushed gently against Quinn's leg, before speaking softly. "That's just it, I don't know that we can help him. I think calling him stubborn is an understatement. For him as well as the Library."
A whoosh of air breathed over them all, and Quinn paused her next bite, a smile crossing her face even as the pages of the still open tome on her lap fluttered.
"I'm really not that stubborn, you know." Lynx was there. In all his softly glowing purple and black rune-ringed self. "I do appreciate the concern, though. There's really nothing you need to be concerned about."
Which was the precise time his form decided to flicker. Ever so slightly, but to Quinn it appeared like a glitch.
Not like when the television got a bit of static or anything. But more when she thought of some of the anime or even movies that she'd watched. That type of glitching. Like a hologram having issues remaining solid. She frowned up at him and decided that maybe it wasn't the best idea to just take what he said at face value.
Everyone's survival depended on this, not the least her own. His. Dottie’s… anyone who'd get gobbled up by chaotic magic if she'd understood that whole spiel correctly.
"I don't think you're being entirely honest. And well, while we're talking about honesty. I actually think I can feel the lie." She tried to lock gazes with him, but he avoided looking directly at her. "Lynx… you need to talk to us. I can’t read your mind when you’re not letting me communicate with you. We're all in on this. We're here to help reopen the Library, to recruit assistants, to return books, and make sure we filter the chaos out of the magic. But we can't do any of that if you're withholding what seems to be pretty heavy stuff from us."
"Heavy?" Lynx cocked his head to one side, but then he sighed. Because he knew full well what she meant. "You are right. This is just a lot for me, and it’s very difficult to admit to others."
Malakai stepped into view, obviously returned from his trip, and plopped down on the armchair to the left of Quinn. Folding his arms he cleared his throat and got straight to the point. "It might feel difficult to tell us, but you could also just export it to every single one of us through the system that reacts to your every thought, and then you wouldn't even have to speak. So you can't use that as an excuse."
Quinn wanted to hug Malakai right then and there, but she was too comfy in her perch on the couch. "There. No excuses, spit it out."
Aradie hooted for punctuation.
Lynx sighed and a ripple of runes wound around his body. They seemed to do that when he was accessing information, or in a mood about information, or sometimes even just irritated. Quinn frowned, because this time even the runic line appeared to be somewhat glitchy.
"Very well. But you asked for it."
There was silence for several moments, but Quinn ignored the prophecy of doom in his words and concentrated on going over how her mind felt now that the information she'd absorbed was making the rounds.
She felt like a computer, with a heap of space had been emptied into her mind so that she might categorize and arrange her thoughts more efficiently. Like there was a lock on the door of her mind. It wasn't very sturdy. So after some analysis, she realized that there was information she had to attune to and understand in greater depth that would then allow her to protect herself in a way that maximized her energy output.
Hours of fun, instead of television. All the building blocks and tools, with basic blueprints. She couldn't wait to get started. Once Lynx had finally told them everything, anyway.
Finally, Lynx squared his shoulders, and she gave over her full attention. She'd figure out how to compartmentalize later when Milaro could help her practice the basics.
"You have to understand, when we first lost Kor and had no one to replace her, there were very few options open to me. Continuing the Library’s function as they were was not one of them. We would have run out of power in a matter of months. I did what I had to in order to preserve the primary function of the Library." Lynx spoke softly, and there was pain hidden behind his words.
"To control the chaos, right? To prevent the magic from blowing up in everyone's faces?" Quinn asked.
"Yes. That's a decent enough summation." Lynx began pacing ever so slowly, back and forth in front of where they were all sitting. "You see… I knew we couldn't let anymore magic out, because until we found a replacement we'd need every single drop to maintain our cycle as best we could."
"But wouldn't all that magic you were filtering have ambient mana you could pull from?" Quinn asked, the idea occurring to her suddenly.
Lynx and Milaro winced, and the elf spoke up to explain. "Wild magic is unrefined. While you can get some energy through ambient magic, it wouldn’t be enough. Wild or chaotic magic requires energy to refine it. Any energy the Library pulled from that process would have gone back into refining it. Leaving it pretty much zero sum with no excess energy. Frankly, I'm surprised it lasted so long."
The manifestation shot the elf an unreadable look before continuing. "Anyway, to cut a long, almost five-hundred-year boring story short, I conserved magic where I could, while constantly scanning for any sign of the correct magical signature in any of our usually traversed worlds, and only managed to sustain the bare minimum of filtration of the chaotic magic at all."
He took a deep breath before continuing. "It was rough. Bumpy, even. I had to conserve all of the energy to such an extent that some of the bookworm containment areas broke, silverfish escaped, night owls hibernated. And still I had no sign of a signature, nor a reason for why it had suddenly disappeared. There were so many of my abilities, my functions that I couldn't utilize. I had chalked it all up to lack of power. Even while chaos started to leak into the filtration chamber.”
He sighed and focused on Quinn. “I discovered Quinn in a last-ditch effort scan. Basically it was the final chance I had to do a long-range sweep that might find someone, anyone that was compatible. Just on the off chance. Nothing else yielded results."
Quinn stayed silent, and Aradie pressed in close to her head offering soft, feathered comfort. The Librarian could tell that this was something Lynx had mega difficulties with, so she pushed the questions back and listened. Apparently, everyone else felt the same way.
"Quinn’s energy was wispy at first, as if the system wasn’t entirely sure she was real. But it was the only lead I’d had in so long, it was my literal last chance.” He sighed.
Silence engulfed the room for several seconds and Quinn wasn’t sure how to break it. But she needn’t have worried.
Lynx flashed a very forced smile. “Anyway, Quinn is here now and her energy alone allowed the Library to wake up some of its functions. Add to that the return of three integral books to the system and while our power levels are still critical, we’ve moved ever so slightly out of the danger zone… but even though we’ve rebooted, there seems to be so much missing from my usual box of tools." He flickered again as he continued to pace back and forth, making eye contact with none of them.
"I haven't been able to access segments of information, or whereabouts of some specific books or exact locations, or even just some of the things within the Library. I just thought it was all a matter of the system not having enough power, or still rebooting, or else just being rusty after almost five hundred years’ lack of use.”
"But that's not it, is it?" Quinn asked, as trepidation tried to choke her.
"No. That's not it at all." Finally Lynx looked up, and his double eyelids open and closed in rapid succession. "It has nothing to do with the current Library power levels, or what magic is available. Right now… I'm quite literally glitching. The system isn't working as it should, and I have no idea why, nor how to rectify it."
40
BREAKDOWN
Quinn wasn't sure what she was expecting upon the revelation that Lynx had no idea what was wrong, how it had happened, or how it could be rectified, but it wasn't complete and utter silence. She glanced around at Dottie, Malakai, who’d just wandered in, and his grandfather. All of them were simply staring slack-jawed, as far as Quinn could tell.
Once she mastered her most recent texts, she was going to find ones on mind reading.
Quinn, on the other hand, felt like her mind was completely and utterly open to the possibility that something had gone inherently wrong, but that it could be sorted out. While she knew the Library wasn’t a computer, it acted in much the same way, and the system was inherently like an operating system.
Her connection with the Library was oddly calm, she sensed no panic, just an idle curiosity. It seemed that the Library itself wasn't too concerned, at least not yet, whereas Lynx seemed to be taking the news a little harder.
Granted, he was the one who had to interface with everyone, for want of a better word.
She didn't want to repeat what he'd said. She didn't want to ask him to repeat what he'd said. But at the same time, there were a few points that Quinn wasn't clear on. "Okay, so it's not working in the way you're used to, which means you're not functioning at peak capacity. So the things that you've forgotten to tell me or forgotten about, like the time disparity when we went to the Highlands, those sorts of things, those are because the system isn't working correctly. Is that right?"
"Yes and no. It's more than that. I cannot access elements of the system that I've always had access to. It's like they're corrupted, or how can I put it? It's like there's something in the system, like sludge, causing it to stick together. I can't pry my way into it." He nodded, as if he was reaffirming that description for himself. He looked up expectantly, right at Quinn, like she should suddenly have some amazing solution for him.
She didn't, but she wasn't about to sarcastically dismiss him. He didn't need that right now. None of them did. "Look, I don't know how things were supposed to work before, but I think we could start by maybe making a list of exactly what it is that you can no longer do or gain access to."
"That's perfect," Milaro piped up. "Do that. Do you have exact knowledge of what it is that you're missing access to?"
Lynx perked up a little bit. "Well, for the most part, yes. The functions and the system allocations that I'm missing. Just give me a moment." His double eyelids flickered in and out of each other, blinking in that odd way.
Quinn glanced around and wondered how much time she had, and if she could balance a plate of food on his head this time without him noticing. But his focus was already coming back.
Damn it, she thought. I'll have to do that another time.
This time, Lynx seemed to take a slightly different path to process the information he was trying to access. His form wavered, and for a few seconds, he diminished down to what almost looked like a crocodile, before morphing back into human form, through that of the lynx. Quinn occasionally wished he'd just revert back to being a talking cat. It had been adorable.
Besides, who didn’t want a talking cat?
Finally, he solidified enough and began listing out.
Links A542 Edition Category F manifestation has processed the following information.
Manifestation lacks access to the following areas:
Recollection - holes in past data. Including events, locations, and items.
Further defined: Type of texts required are not all clear, occurrences jumbled, locations hazy.
Dimensional Locators not fully functional. Precise drop-off points unattainable. Visitation locations will require specific buildings. No wilderness drop-offs for the immediate future.
Calibration and reconfiguration of files and history must be established. Errors in memory amalgamation.
Retention of specifics is fragmented. Memory and functional assessments require attunement.
Connection to Links A542 is tentative, lacks cohesivity, and is obscured.
Connection to Librarian Quinn, designation LA342, not fully functional, mind meld not complete.
Communication system is currently in critical mode, closed to outsiders, preventative measures sought.
The words came out of him, slightly robotic, and less human than she was used to. It was as if he was just rattling off something he'd read, almost like an automaton.
Not to mention the words hung in front of her eyes like a visible bad smell.
Quinn didn't like how long the list was. But the good thing about lists was that they always gave you somewhere to start. A launching point.
Both Milaro and Malakai looked slightly shellshocked, and Dottie was actually shaking. Quinn pushed herself up from the couch and walked over, approaching Lynx. She waved her hand in front of his face, and he blinked rapidly before focusing on her.
"Sorry, that was a lot of information to organize into a cohesive list," he said, cocking his head to one side. "There's something in the system that wasn't there before, or at least, I couldn’t sense it. And I've got to figure out a way to clean it out. It just feels extremely elusive. Every time I think I’ve found the problem, it slips through my grasp."
She pondered exactly how to phrase her next words. "Which means somebody, besides you, managed to insert something into the collective stream of the Library, right?”
Lynx started to shake his head, as if it was an automatic response, but he paused. “Well. While I think that’s unlikely, I have to confess it’s the only thing that makes sense.”
Quinn pushed on. “And how is that even possible?"
Milaro looked very shaken up, somehow even paler than usual. "That can't be possible. You don't operate like that."
Lynx sighed. "I know this, and you know this. And sadly, the more I discover, the more obvious it is becoming to me that this was done by somebody, perhaps even someone I trusted." There was a hitch to his voice as he said the last bit.
Quinn did a double-take. Somebody Lynx trusted? Did he mean it could have been a member of the Library or even a Librarian? Surely not. That would devastate the manifestation. And besides, who would kill themselves just to pull one over on the Library?
Then again, there were people on Earth willing to die for a cause, she had to assume they existed everywhere in the universe.
She kept a close eye on Lynx as he continued his conversation with Milaro.
"Do you really think she…” Milaro let the question hang in the air.
Lynx shook his head. “If you’d asked me two weeks ago I would have adamantly said no. I would have banned you from the Library for suggesting it.” He paused, his eyes rapidly blinking as he processed.
“Now? I don't know. All of those memories from that period, they're distorted and fragmented. They're not cohesive enough for me to get a read on anymore. Yet, I know they were clear while the Library was disconnected from the Universe. I’m sure there’s a way to restore it. I just have to… I need more energy, and I need several of the more advanced books back." There was a deflated quality about the way Lynx spoke now.
"Okay," Milaro said, his voice heavy with determination. "I will aid you. I will fetch you help."
Lynx actually flashed a half-hearted smile. "Thank you, my friend."
Quinn thought maybe Lynx’d hit a low point. He seemed so bewildered, and not the same Lynx she'd met when she first arrived. Gone was the expectant and mostly cocky cat who'd greeted her, and in his place was a slightly lost library manifestation.
It was as if everything he'd been aiming for had somehow completely and utterly fallen apart.
