Book III: Casino Royale (Pt. I)- Arriving At The Plaza

  --- Gregory Fischer ---

  Picking up the book covered in colorful chips and cards, he could faintly hear music coming from the book as the colors on the cover shifted with every movement.

  “Ooh, that one should be fun. Lots of games to play there.” Briar told him as she collected the rest of the books. “Maybe that’ll pick up Maeve’s mood?”

  “Maybe…” He sighed, eyes on the cover as something about the idea of gambling it all on something better just appealed to him right now.

  Briar glanced towards the children’s section once more. “Do… Do you think you can introduce her to things? I’d do it myself but…”

  “I’ll handle it.” He nodded, tucking the book under his arm with his usual one a faint twitch to his eye. (I need to get like a book carrier or something…)

  Even if he could just warp his book into hand, it was annoying losing his grip on it.

  “Good luck!” Briar called after him as he started between the bookshelves.

  Maeve was waiting for him by the door to the children’s section, just out of sight of the Lost Children within as she simply watched them run and play about.

  “Is it time to go?” She asked him, not even looking his way.

  “Suppose it is.” He answered, watching the kids. “Hope you don’t mind me picking where we’re going.”

  “I wouldn’t even know where to begin.” Maeve pointed out as she climbed to her feet. “I’m sure your own experience will lead the way well enough.”

  He couldn’t help but scoff at that. “Might’ve been better off picking yourself, given how my own experience led me to the Crimson Carnival.”

  “Ah… yes.” Roisin grimaced. “Hopefully this won’t end quite as badly as that…”

  “Hopefully.” (It’d be just my luck if it did end that badly.) “Anything you want to ask before we get going? Or you just want to figure it out as you go?”

  “The best way to learn something is by doing it.” His fellow librarian told him. “Unless there’s something you think I should know?”

  “You’ve already chosen which of your volumes you’re bringing with you, right?” He checked, as he opened his own book to make sure everything was in order.

  Maeve opened her own book and frowned down at whatever she saw.

  He tried to take a peek, but the words and images he was still learning to comprehend himself were even more difficult to understand by being upside down from his angle.

  “How do I change it?” She asked.

  “Just focus on it, a lot of this is just sort of willing it together I’ve found. It’s almost like a half forgotten reflex you already have.” Admittedly, he barely understood that much and was probably missing a lot more context but he’d rather avoid bringing up his inexperience if she was trusting him to lead. (A mistake that way too many people have made with me…)

  He shook that dark thought away as Maeve nodded to herself. “Alright, I’ve equipped the Black Briar Librarian.”

  Rather than commenting on how she’d likely chosen her weaker Volume, he simply nodded himself. “Good, then that’ll work with my [Library Hearth] which should help heal small injuries if we get into a fight.”

  “How common is fighting on this job?” Maeve frowned.

  “More common than I like, but if we’re smart we can hopefully avoid the worst of it.” Or he was hoping he could given what he now knew about collecting stories. Namely that it was significantly easier than he’d initially thought. (Really lucked out with that.)

  “Alright, well… I can handle fighting if I need to.” Maeve assured him.

  “Even with the… limiters?” He felt the need to check. “I mean, I know they fall off over time but… they’re worse at the beginning.”

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  The vampiric actor checked her book once more before nodding. “Yes, even with my abilities limited… That might actually be better for the time being.”

  He watched her for a moment before eventually nodding. “If you’re sure. For now though are you ready to get going?”

  “Yes, I think I’d very much like to leave the library after being stuck here for so long.” Maeve confessed, taking a few steps towards where she knew the exit to be.

  “Ah, ah, this is our exit.” He warned her holding the book up. “We open this and it’ll teleport us to wherever the book is anchored.”

  His fellow librarian gave the book the same wary glance he’d given it the first time Briar had given him one after his ‘interview’. “And it will take us to a real place not… not an illusion, yes?”

  “Well if it traps us in an illusion then… you and Ferris are part of said illusion I’m still under.” He shrugged, not caring to go down the rabbit hole of what is and is not real given his vast experience with drugs and illusionists. Often at the same time.

  “Very well.” Maeve grimaced. “Let’s get this over with.”

  “Stay close then.” He told her, taking a step closer as he began opening the book, pages slowly flying out of it.

  For her sake he pretended not to notice the way she grabbed his shoulder and closed her eyes.

  Just like every other time he opened a book of the library a veritable storm of pages flew into the air, far more than could ever fit between the actual cover of the book in his hands, before slowly wrapping them in a paper cocoon.

  Noise from outside the cocoon slowly drifted in, music of some kind, before after a brief pause the pages slowly fell away, seemingly vanishing once they left his line of sight, until finally Maeve and him were left somewhere that was very much not the library.

  The sky up above was dark, no stars or moon in sight, and all around them were neon lights that for a brief moment had him wondering if they were back in the Crimson Carnival. A second look though revealed that they were instead what appeared to be a shopping district of some kind, various advertisements and posters lining the walls and numerous people walking about talking amongst themselves.

  “It’s… It’s been a while since I’ve seen this many people.” Maeve confessed, her eyes wide as she took everything in. “At least without any screaming in the background.”

  “Yeah… same here…” He grimaced, already pulling a smoke out. “Don’t really care for them myself, but… guess this is what we’re working with this time.”

  “Quite.” Maeve nodded, eyes moving around with clear curiosity. “Do you have any idea where we might be?”

  “No, the books can take us to the otherside of the world. No telling where we are without asking someone and that’ll make it clear that we really don’t belong here.” He pointed out as he lit his cigarette and took a deep drag. “Our best bet is to just do some simple scouting for now, find some place where we can find some interesting stories to collect and hopefully a library somewhere we can use as our evac point. Rather have one of those after the mess at the Carnival.”

  Maeve’s face twisted a bit. “So would I, truthfully… Any idea where we should begin.”

  “Book can help us keep track of stories and such, but when you first land it’s not the best help.” He admitted, opening his book and finding that under Working Draft(s) was a vague section referred to as (“Casino Royale, Prologue(?).” About as helpful as I was expecting…)

  While Maeve was distracted with her own book, it apparently taking her a bit longer to read than him, he went ahead and checked her page under his Book Club section.

  Beneath an ink image of Maeve reading a book in the library, seemingly surrounded by Lost Children listening to her, he found a swarm of creeping and crawling eldritch text in need of deciphering.

  Given how he was fairly certain he’d gotten a glimpse at the first section during their fight, he instead read a little lower just past a paragraph on The Black Briar Librarian containing words he knew from his own book, and onto a new section he was completely unfamiliar with.

  (“A Vampiric Rose’s Thorns: At the start of every Turn gain a stack of Thorns. At Action end after damaging an enemy unit, Heal for every stack of Bleeding on the target. Bleeding deals half damage to self.”)

  With a frown he noticed some of those words shifting more than others, and focused on one of them, finding that the text proceeded to spiral out expanding across the ever shifting script. (“Thorns: Upon dealing or receiving damage in Melee, apply Bleeding to target and self based on stack Count.”)

  He blinked, an ache beginning to fill his head as he closed the book. A sign he was learning to mean he was reading too much at once. (Alright so, on paper her ability looks a lot more powerful than my Heat but… The fact that she’s making herself bleed even if at half power… Combined with how Toni’s arm builds off of my heat, I think I got the better end of things.)

  Short run he was probably weaker, given time though he was probably the one who’d be standing in the end. (If I can recover a couple more ranged options at least.)

  He noticed Maeve wincing as she apparently read too much too. (Likely from trying to read me in the Book Club too, but fair ‘s fair.) “Yeah, going to want to be careful of that kind of thing.”

  The vampire gave him a half-hearted glare before sighing. “Any idea where we should begin our search for a Story? My book was about as helpful as you implied.”

  He went ahead and took another look around, spotting a couple of places that could be of interest before eventually pointing at one that he had a good feeling about.

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