strangetrip | [GP / EP] Welcome to the Madonna Inn Expanded Public Library

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[GP / EP] Welcome to the Madonna Inn Expanded Public Library

Freedom from her bonds had given Illyana more than freedom of movement. It had returned to her the use of her magik and her ability to teleport. These abilities had, in turn, allowed her to finish making ready the library for public use. It was less about collecting books and media from around the premises (and some from Limbo, or donated collections harvested from the Otherworlds) and arranging shelving and seating, most of which had been relatively easily done. It was more a matter of laying the appropriate wards, and negotiating the finer points of the old-fashioned catalog and check-out system, which included odd donated items such as sporting equipment and electronic devices available for rental. Xavin's espresso machine counter necessitated a mini-bar refrigerator, glass-domed cake stands for assorted pastries brought in from the kitchen, and various cafe sundries.

Repurposed from what had been the 'Garden Room,' the library space with its high wooden ceilings, chandeliers, and landscape murals over busy floral carpet still looked somewhat like a touristy banquet hall, yet the area was now also highly saturated with layered magic. The hodgepodge collection of random books and so on were fiercely protected by these magics. When needed and as possible, worn volumes had been restored. The books could not be damaged nor marred from here on out, at least not by coffee spills nor page-tearing or inconsiderate attempts at margin notation. Nor would they leave the boundaries of the library area without proper dispensation, simply stopping mid-air and dropping should the attempt be made at the threshold. Ask at the Desk for Assistance With These Items, prompted the signs on several glass display cases featuring certain perhaps unsettling curiosities within - books in arcane languages, skulls from indeterminate creatures, and artifacts such as a green glowing cube suspended on a chain. At said desk, a gleaming service bell sat waiting, should the staff be needed and not clearly present.

Illyana finished affixing the large engraved plaque to the wall beside the double-doors, and then returned to attend the newly opened library with little fanfare:

Madonna Inn Expanded Public Library

Established ~01.25.2018 Earthly Gregorian Calendar

Open All Hours

Volunteer Staff on Duty as Schedules Allow

Classes & Tutoring for Most Subjects Available Upon Request

Donations Encouraged

Disruptive Patrons Will Be Zealously Evicted

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Just like being back at home, fucking up in front of Batman. Steph smiled sunnily in reflexive self-defense and held up a bag. "I brought you donations."

Illyana's gaze didn't soften for the bubbly annoyance of a person she was faced with, but it did relent briefly, shifting to the bag and its prospective contents. "What did you bring to donate?"

"Movies! DVDs. Good for a girls night or for baffling your pre-industrial boyfriend." She held out the bag which had, as she'd promised, three DVD cases in them. "So how do you get a library card?"

Illyana didn't know what the girl meant by the boyfriend remark, but she didn't actually care enough about a random inhabitant's personal dramas to inquire further when new materials were the real subject at hand. She accepted the bag as tribute and then opened it, withdrawing the DVDs. Mean Girls. The Matrix. Moulin Rogue.

...Yes, that seemed fitting, given the source.

"The library doesn't issue cards. Simply bring any items you wish to borrow to the circulation desk or ask if you can't find something readily available. Your name and room number will be recorded and cross-referenced with the registry the spirit at registration maintains. Then the items will be released to you for an agreed-upon period. You will then return your items before that period is over."

"What happens if you don't?" Steph asked, more out of curiosity than because she thought she'd need the information. The whole thing was impressive and a lot of work had obviously gone into setting the library up. As the protege of a librarian, Steph had respect for the position.

Even if only because she was pretty sure Babs would reach across time and space to slap her if she didn't.

"They will be forcibly reclaimed." The words were leaden. Illyana looked up from the discs and stared at the woman as intently as if she intended to disembowel her.

Steph held up both hands. Nothing to see here, just a mild-mannered masseuse, not a thief in poor disguise. "A perverse part of me wants to find out what that means but the rest of me knows it's probably a terrible idea."

"Is this what you did before? The library thing?"

It was, in fact, a terrible idea. But there didn't seem to be a need to reiterate that fact.

Illyana turned to move in the direction of the circulation desk in order to add the DVDs to the catalog. "One of my duties as a child was to maintain a substantial library. I have continued to curate that library over the years." After deposing the demon-mage that had imprisoned her with a show of power.

"Cool. My boss was a librarian." Steph followed Illyana, because harassing the grumpy was an old habit and nearly always entertaining. "Not when we were working together, I mean, but that was her degree. She could literally find any piece of information you wanted. It was scary cool."

Illyana hardly let the chirpy girl interrupt her from selecting one of her ledgers to flip open and scratching a pen across a blank row to inscribe the pertinent details for each of the discs. "That is rather the power of the library sciences," she said as to the painfully obvious.

"What was your occupation?"

"Me? I'm a college student." Steph twisted her head to watch Illyana write. "I worked as...kind of a personal assistant for her? She'd send me out to take care of stuff for her, pick up packages, deliver messages, that kind of thing." From one angle, that wasn't entirely a lie.

"And your not-then-a-practicing-librarian needed a bubbly collegiate dogsbody in her role as...?"

Illyana finished writing the entries, then looked back up expectantly.

"Private investigator," Steph said promptly. She had argued that information broker sounded better, like a spy, which Barbara had pointed out what exactly what they were trying to avoid happening. PIs were, noir movies aside, very boring.

Illyana gave a sketch of a nod, seeming to accept the answer and the implied boredom inherent. Life was rarely so dramatic or romantic as painted in popular media.

She set the encased discs into a neat row with space between them, opening each cover, then focused on the spell that would bind them to the library. A hand held outstretched over one disc at a time, she charged the air over the items until an intricate illuminated glyph momentarily flashed with light in time with a glow of the ledger's pages.

Steph whistled, though she knew it was probably a pretty simple trick for the librarian. "That's cool. How did you learn magic?"

"Raised by demons," Illyana answered, brisk and dry.

Steph blinked and pursed her lips thoughtfully. "...you mean that literally, don't you?" After she'd said it, she realized she probably should have sounded more skeptical. Or horrified. But when your best friend was raised silent so that her only language would be violence, horror at childhoods was a little harder to come by.

"Yes," Illyana agreed, her tone losing some of its sardonic edge at the affirmation. Not many would have taken the remark for its face value. She set aside the movies onto a short stack of items to be shelved. "I do."

"Uh. Wow." Steph looked her over again. She looked human. But so did Superman until he started flying. "Are you...no, you said raised by. That sounds like it would be...hard to get over."

"You don't 'get over' your upbringing," Illyana said simply. "You internalize it. To what degree and in what way will vary. But your experiences don't generally evaporate from your being."

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[GP / EP] Welcome to the Madonna Inn Expanded Public Library

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