• Chapter 6 - Let the Games Begin!

    For a moment, Bree didn’t realize that the Library was moving her. She was still in the Yellow Home, but she felt a squeamish, tingly feeling in her stomach. First she ignored it, thinking that it was nerves, but the feeling began to spread and she started to feel lighter and lighter, almost as if she could fly. Though she never experienced that feeling before, some voice in the back of her head shouted “This is it!” and she knew.

    “Gar!” Bree called. She didn’t know why she called out, but she felt that she ought to leave some sort of goodbye, as Yellow and Rob did. “Gar, I’ll see you soon!” The Home began to blur and fade and Bree could hardly make out Gar’s pale face. “I’ll find you, alright? With Yellow and Rob!”

    Before her final sentence was out, the room snapped back into focus. Bree was no longer in the Yellow Home. The room was dimmer and much larger. It appeared to be empty, but Bree couldn’t tell for sure. She shivered and wondered how much of the farewell Gar heard.

    A bump suddenly sounded through the room, from a connecting corridor. It could have been made by another player or a book or even a rat (where there rats in the Library?). In any case, Bree decided quickly that she had better move and find the rest of her team. Once they were together, they would quickly find the final task, solve it, find the Writer and win the game!

    The thought of this plan not working perfectly did not occur to Bree. She quickly pulled out her compass, snapped it open, and watched the needle. After swinging aimlessly for several seconds, it came to rest near the “E”, pointing to right. Bree stared at the direction it pointed. Nothing in the room that way but a solid wall.

    Well that made sense. Rob had told her that the compass did not account for walls. Perhaps one of her team players was in the room to the right. It was worth trying. She looked around the room for any exits. There was a corridor going from the front of the room (the part in front of Bree) and one connecting to the back of the room (behind Bree). No doors or corridors led right.

    Bree thought for a minute as to go forward or back. Somehow forward appealed to her much more. Perhaps somehow the positive connotation of “moving forward” was stuck somewhere in her mind, young as it was. Probably it came from her remembering the bumping noise from the corridor behind her. In any case, she ultimately chose to move forward.

    Down the corridor she went, at a brisk pace. Several times she considered whether to risk running or not, but decided against it. Somehow, she felt safer walking quickly. It was really the wiser choice. If she ran, she might have missed something important or went straight into a trap or been Captured. As it was, she went along for some time in the dim light. No doors or branching corridors could be seen and Bree was eager for a chance to go right. The compass needle was positioned between the “N” and the “E”, which meant that she had not yet passed the room. Still, Bree was beginning to grow anxious as the minutes passed by without incident (good or bad).

    Quite suddenly, she walked by a door on the right side of the corridor. She was so surprised that for a moment she stopped walking. But she quickly recovered and headed boldly down the new corridor, determined to find whichever team player was closest.

    As she continued down her path, Bree began to notice the sound of laughter and talk coming from somewhere to her left. “Those must surely be the books,” murmured Bree to herself. “Or else it’s a clever trap from one of the other teams to Capture me. Perhaps the Red team. They seemed cheerful enough to try something like that.”

    As she continued to listen to the laughter however, she became more and more certain that the voices were not the players. For one thing, there were far too many of them, even if every player in the game were in on the trap. Therefore, Bree decided that the voices must belong to the books.

    Although the voices were coming from the opposite way she ought to be going, Bree decided that at the first chance she got, she would find the books. Ever since she had spoken with the Philosophy book, she had wondered what the other books were like to talk to. Now it sounded as though there were a large number of them and it seemed like too good of an opportunity to miss.

    “Here we go!” said Bree happily, finding a door that led to the left. It was closed and the handle was so elaborate that Bree feared that she would never figure out how to open it. But the latch must have not been caught, because the instant her fingertips touched the door, it swung open. The voices could now be heard much louder and clearer.

    “Excellent,” said Bree, and she entered to meet the books of the Library of En Moll.