by Royston Wood
Chapter Four
Librarians
Groaning I roll onto my hands and knees and suck in some deep breaths. With a grunt I push myself to my feet. After about a second the world starts to spin and I sway and stagger. Fortunately the feeling passes quickly and my head clears.
There’s another groaning noise behind me. My body spins, my hand flashing to draw another knife from the bandolier strapped across my body. In the light of one of the torches left lying on the cavern floor by the werebeasts, I can see that the wererat is starting to come round.
Rats! I don’t need another fight now. I already feel like a punch bag!
Tie him up! Rope? I quickly search my body but don’t find any handy rope. Not surprising really, it’s not the kind of thing you usually carry around; mobile phone, money, penknife...maybe; handy rope...no. But then again I don’t usually lug around a sword and a load of knives.
What can I use instead? Spotting that the wererat is wearing a cloak I pull it from him and, using the knife, cut it into strips. I quickly tie some of the pieces together and bind the wererat’s hands and feet. I use one of the remaining strips to wipe some of the blood from my cheek. The flow seems to have stopped. I think the blood clotting in my beard has sealed the wound. Hah! Now, there’s a thought I didn’t expect to have today.
What now? I should try and get back up to the library. There must be a way up somewhere!
In a bit of a daze I pick up the sword and the knife that I dropped during the fight and fumble them back into their sheaths. I’m just wondering what to do about the knife sticking out of the wererat’s shoulder when an ancient pop tune from the 1990’s starts echoing around the cavern. Dad’s phone!
It’s a bright spark of reality in this grim underground world. But where is it?
I dropped it during the fight!
Spinning around, my eyes search the floor for the phone. Please don’t end the call! There’s a narrow chink of light on the floor to my right. There it is! It’s lying screen down. I snatch it up and stab at the screen with my finger.
“Dad? Dad is that you?!” I blurt.
“Tyger?”
“Dad?”
“Tyger! Thank god! You sound different.”
“Dad! What’s going on!” I burst out, relieved at hearing a familiar voice. “I was messing around with your phone and Sandy and I were having a fight and then the world started spinning around and I think I blacked out and now I don’t know where I am. Or who I am! I’m not me! Or at least my body isn’t mine! And I’ve been attacked by werebeasts! It’s all totally mental!”
“Slow down Tyger!” says dad. “Take a breath and calm down.”
I take a deep breath and calm down, a bit.
“Tyger, now listen to me and answer my questions as calmly as you can. Don’t panic and everything will be alright.” I try to keep calm but there’s a panicky tone in Dad’s own voice that isn’t helping. “Firstly, are you alright: you said you’ve been attacked?”
“I’m ok. I got beaten up by werebeasts but they’re gone now.”
“Are you hurt?”
“I’ve got some cuts on my cheek and a few bruises but I think I’m ok. What’s going on!”
“Nothing too bad then,” says dad with a sigh, some of the panic gone from his voice.
“Well it’s not great!” I snap “I don’t know where I am, except that I’m in a huge underground cavern with a tied up wererat, and I seem to be in a strange body, which is bruised and bleeding! What’s going on!”
“You’ve been messing around with my Editor, that’s what’s going on!” Dad doesn’t sound happy. “Sandy burst into our emergency meeting to tell me you had collapsed. When I got here I found your body slumped on the floor. And then, when I stuck my hand in my pocket to grab my Editor, to call for an ambulance, it wasn’t there. Sandy told me you had it; that you had been fighting over it when you collapsed. I’m guessing you’ve activated a mission! You’re in the story!”
“In the story? What the heck does, ‘in the story’ mean?”
“You’re in Fictonia. It’s where all the stories happen! Hang on a minute and I’ll check the computer to see where the mission’s taken you.”
“Dad, what are you on about? Where am I?” Even Victor’s deep bass voice has a high shrill quality to it by now.
“I think you must be in the Fantasy Section somewhere, if there are werewolves there. I’m just checking the mission log.”
“In the Fantasy Section? You mean I’m in the library?” Phew that’s a huge relief! “I’ve never seen anything like this in the library! Is it some kind of play you’re putting on? It’s a bit violent!”
“No, Tyger!” I can hear dad taking a few deep breaths. “You’re in the Fantasy Section in Fictonia. Now just let me concentrate on this a minute.” There are faint clicking noises coming from the phone as dad taps away at a keyboard.
In the relative silence I think I can faintly hear the sound of running feet echoing from the far side of the cavern. Is that the guards Cretin was running from? They still sound a long way away.
There’s a scuffling noise behind me and I turn to see that the wererat is fully conscious now and struggling against his bonds. They seem to be holding.
As the tapping from the phone continues my mind starts whirring over what dad has told me so far. Not a lot! I messed with his Editor and now I’m on a mission in a story? What’s an Editor?
“Dad! What’s an Editor?”
“What?”
“You said I’d been messing around with your Editor.”
“The phone, we call them Editors because they help us edit, or change, the stories when they go wrong.”
“Oh!” I don’t know what else to say. “Hang on, if I’ve got your phone how can you be calling me?”
“What?”
“How can you call me if I’ve got your phone?”
“It’s not the only phone in the world Tyger. I’m using the landline on my desk. The desk your unconscious body is lying next to! Now, be quiet whilst I...ah! Here we are. Here’s today’s mission list…”
“Dad, this is all too weird for me. I just want to know what’s happening!”
“That’s what I’m trying to tell you!” I can hear dad taking a few more deep breaths. “Sorry Tyger. It’s all a bit complicated. Basically the stories have lives of their own. They all take place in Fictonia. If the Librarians don’t keep them in check, the plots, that’s the story lines, all go wrong.”
“Librarians?” I’m finding it hard to listen because I don’t really want to hear what’s being said. I think I’m missing bits. “But you just look after a load of books and stuff.”
“Yes. We do that too. That’s the easy part. Books tend to just sit around on shelves. They’re easy to take care of. But the stories are a different matter. If there weren’t any Librarians to look after them they’d go out of control. It’s a lot of hard work keeping the stories on plot. And the characters are always changing, or even going missing completely.”
“So you’re telling me I’m actually in a story?” I need to check this because it’s majorly weird.
“Yes! Now will you let me have a look at these missions?” I hear the faint clicking of keys again in the background. “Here we are. This looks like the one. It’s a story set in the Fantasy Realm. It’s part of a series about Victor the Victor and his arch enemy Cretin the Cruel.”
“Yes!” I exclaim, relieved that I recognise something that is going on. “That’s it. The leader of the werebeasts was called Cretin the Cruel and he kept calling me Victor.”
“Yes, that would be right. According to these mission details you’re going to be Victor the Victor. He’s the hero: Cretin the Cruel’s arch enemy. For some reason he’s gone missing from the story in Fictonia; probably slipped through a hole in the plot and ended up in another story.
“Right,” dad continues, “
your mission is to fill in for Victor and complete the story so Cretin the Cruel doesn’t win. And let me tell you, we don’t want that to happen!”
“Why not? How bad would it be if this Cretin did win?” I ask.
“Well, for the characters in the Fantasy Realm it would be a disaster: destruction, ruin, death...! But worse than that it will send shock waves through every story nearby, like an earthquake. Before we know it the whole Fantasy Section could go wrong and start leaking into other stories. Can you imagine what would happen if a flight of dragons turned up in Winnie the Pooh? And then there’s the clean-up work, putting everything back as it should be after things have gone wrong.”
I can’t help thinking a flight of dragons would liven up Winnie the Pooh enormously.
“But don’t worry Tyger. This is a really easy mission. You can’t go wrong.”
Phew!!
“It looks like you’ve come in near the end of the story. According to this mission log, you - Victor the Victor - have been magically teleported into the path of a band of werebeasts that are escaping with the stolen Portal of Infinite Power. It says here that Victor the Victor is a magnificent fighting hero. So, all you have to do is let his body take over. It has all the fighting skills you need built into it. He should easily be able to overpower the werebeasts, or at least stop them from escaping until the guards catch up.”
“But dad! The werebeasts have already escaped!”
“What?” Dad sounds worried.
“I told you! The werebeasts attacked me! They beat me up and ran off!”
“What! How could that happen? It’s not in the plot. You’re a fighting hero that nobody can beat?”
“Well, I was fighting pretty well. But then I freaked out because I felt out of control. So I tried to take control...and then it all went wrong.”
“Oh no!! That’s a disaster! According to this log the story ends there. There isn’t any more story. This could bring the whole Fantasy Section down! And it will be all your fault!”
That hits me like a snowball in the face. “That’s not fair! I didn’t know what was going on.”
I hear dad taking more deep breaths. “No. I guess you’re right. But you shouldn’t have been messing with my Editor, Tyger! That’s top secret, Library Service equipment!”
“Sorry...” I mumble. I feel like pointing out that if it was so top secret and important then he should have been more careful with it and not left it lying around in the first place but figure I’m in enough trouble already.
“Right! Look, you’re going to have to continue with the mission. You’ll have to try and track these werebeasts down and capture them before they cause too much damage.”
“But dad! How am I supposed to do that?”
“Well, there’s no plot to help you because the story is supposed to have ended. So you’re going to have to make it up as you go along. The most important thing is to play the part of Victor. Be Victor. The other characters have to believe you are Victor.”
“Why?” I ask.
“They don’t know they’re in a story. It’s all real to them. They mustn’t find out that their world is controlled by the Librarians or it will all go wrong.”
“Dad, I don’t think I can do this!”
“Don’t worry Tyger, it will be all right. I’ll track down another Editor and hack into the story to get you out. In the meantime I know a few Librarian secrets that you can use that will help. Firstly, you must always…”
There’s a long silence.
“Firstly I must always what? Dad? Dad!?”
The phone has gone dead!!
I give it a shake.
Still dead!!
The battery’s flat! I must have drained it using the phone as a torch in that tunnel!