libraryassistants: (Default)
Unfinished Library Mod & NPC Account ([personal profile] libraryassistants) wrote in [community profile] unfinishedlibrary2025-10-31 06:42 pm

Careful of the stacks - LIBRARY LOG

Who: EVERYONE!
What: A bunch of Editors walk into a library...
When: October 31st - November 13
Where: The Unfinished Library
Content warnings: Please add them as needed in the comment titles!

Welcome to the Library, Editors.

As the new residents drop into the Library, they are bound to have questions. Unfortunately it seems no one (except perhaps someone on the phone) appears to have any answers. But there is a nice little cart with a carafe of too weak coffee, a pot of too strong tea, assorted creams and sugar packets, and what appear to be leftover boxed shortbread cookies. There’s a sign inviting people to help themselves but reminding them not to take any food or drinks into the stacks, or touch any of the books with their grubby cookie hands. But aside from this little display and the nametags they’re all given, which do reappear whenever removed for the first week (where do they keep coming from?), the Editors are more or less left alone.

The Library is eternal, or at least it seems that way, unbothered by its new inhabitants. It certainly does not seem like this is anything unusual within its operation. Are there other sections of the Library with Editors, tucked into a different part of the stacks? Have there been Editors here before, and the ones here are simply a replacement? It’s impossible to say, just that the Library seems quite prepared for them. The refrigerators are stocked with appropriate (if generic) foodstuffs, any tantrums in front of the circulation desk are completely ignored, and attempts to set the Library on fire fizzle out before anything can even catch.

However, after a few days, some of the scenery in the Library seems to be changing. Little singing bowls and white noise makers pop up on various shelves and counters, yoga mats appear tucked under the bunk beds (plenty for everyone, somehow), and some of the rooms have started playing relaxing, meditative music over unseen speakers. More confusingly, there are also small UFOs hanging by string from the lower ceilings of the contained rooms, which on closer reflection are revealed to simply be two paper plates glued together and painted silver. In the beginning they’re quite sparse, but by the end of the second week they are everywhere and impossible to ignore.

At the start of the second week, there is a possible hint as to why, for at least part of it. On the table by the circulation desk there is a sign: “This Week’s Recommended Reading: Invasion of the Body Snatchers!” Next to it, there is a sign up sheet: a waitlist to check-out the ‘reading.’ (There is no explanation or apology for it actually being a movie.)

[ooc note: The Library prompts from the TDM can be considered canon to the game. Remember any of the locations listed in the setting are fair game. Have fun!]
starandhope: (004)

[personal profile] starandhope 2025-11-15 02:08 am (UTC)(link)
"That is a very long time to be alive," Mina says sympathetically. "How much you must have seen! But - all alone?"
monstrous_bride: (flirting)

[personal profile] monstrous_bride 2025-11-15 04:15 am (UTC)(link)
"Too much, I suppose," she replies. "But it has its moments. And yes, as alone as I could be. Oh, I took lovers here and there when there was an itch that needed scratching, so to speak."

She knows this one will remind Mina of Lucy, and despite a frowning inner Nina, she can't resist going one extra step.

"Men, primarily, but there were some lovely women along the way. Especially in the 1960s. Now there was an odd duck of a decade."
starandhope: (026)

[personal profile] starandhope 2025-11-15 05:38 am (UTC)(link)
It's possible to know that one is being led down a certain conversational path - to avoid another, but also still find it nearly impossible to resist that path. Still, Mina is not going to ask how two women would even manage such a thing - her curiosity has not overcome her sense of propriety that much.

However -

"Is that common, in your time? To take lovers so casually?"

Lucy would make ribald jokes, but she was chaste as any proper young lady was expected to be. And even Mina understands what it is to feel certain... urges. But she can't imagine succumbing to them on a whim.
monstrous_bride: (neutral conversation)

[personal profile] monstrous_bride 2025-11-15 05:41 am (UTC)(link)
She shrugs.

"Depends on the person. But if I've learned anything, the times I've lived in have the same people as any other. Nothing changes. Look around you in your time, your place, you'll see what I've seen."

There's a pause.

"Besides, getting too close to me for too long...that tends to get people killed. So I stopped letting that happen. Best way, really."

starandhope: (031)

[personal profile] starandhope 2025-11-15 05:54 am (UTC)(link)
"There certainly are some people in my time who do the same," Mina admits. She's not that sheltered, and Victorians do love a good sex scandal.

"There's been no one you trusted, who was willing to take on the dangers of being your friend?"
monstrous_bride: (Default)

[personal profile] monstrous_bride 2025-11-18 02:08 am (UTC)(link)
"Yes," she replied, matter of factly. "She died. Badly."

starandhope: (018)

[personal profile] starandhope 2025-11-18 02:58 am (UTC)(link)
"I'm so sorry," Mina says quietly. "Death can be so senseless, so unmerciful."
monstrous_bride: (wondering)

[personal profile] monstrous_bride 2025-11-18 03:08 am (UTC)(link)
"Don't I know it," she replies. "Seen it enough. Caused it enough. You...remind me of her. A little bit. Certainly not in the face."

Again, too soft, and she straightens up a bit, visibly pulling back in that moment.

"She had gills, you see," she finishes.
starandhope: (004)

[personal profile] starandhope 2025-11-18 03:16 am (UTC)(link)
Mina smiles a little at that last bit.

"In that case, I hope we can be good friends while we're here. Even though I lack gills."
monstrous_bride: (neutral conversation)

[personal profile] monstrous_bride 2025-11-23 03:51 am (UTC)(link)
She's quiet for a long moment, not at all certain what she wants to say to that, let alone what she should say.

"We'll see," she manages. "Just hope you don't snore."