LSRO: Chapter 80 - Interrogations (Patreon)

Weeeee this is so much fun to write.

~~

Chapter 80

Interrogations

Malvolence rolled off the Serpensiril in waves. It boiled just underneath the surface, rippling through the three visitors.

Before Quinn could even think properly, an instinct ingrained so deep inside her she didn't know where it came from reacted.

"Gravitas tenere," she said, hand outstretched toward her unwelcome guests. Visible strands of thick air surrounded the Serpensiril immediately, pushing them to the ground face-first.

"Cateno," she said biting the word off with clipped anger.

Warning:

Combined skill usage requires the following cost:

Mana per second: 2

Duration based on current statistics: 14 minutes and 28 seconds without experiencing backlash.

Please be advised to replenish mana regeneration before this occurs.

It was the first time Quinn had used a spell that had a duration on it. To weight them down and secure them... she'd barely had to think. And there wasn't currently time to dwell on that.

Fourteen minutes wasn't that much time.

But she did need to figure out how she'd been so certain what she did would work.

This was her Library. She'd been given the responsibility to be its Librarian. She'd already waded through bookworm guts, been almost killed by a giant freaking octopus, ventured out to a world beset by chaos, and almost been eaten by a damn mimic, not to mention having to inhale copious amounts of chaotic sludge miasma in order to replace the filters downstairs.

Quinn wasn't giving anybody who wanted to hurt the Library a chance to do so. Plus, she needed to show them, and anyone else who sought to question it, that she was a Librarian through and through, not just in name but in power.

It probably helped that the three Serpensiril hadn't been expecting her attack.

"Clausura." She added in order to lock down their minds. It wasn't infallible and she only thought she'd understood correctly from absorbing the book. It should shield them from any telepathy being sent to or from them.

Lynx gaped at her.

Clausura's usage also flashed a warning at her.

Warning:

Clausura skill usage requires the following cost:

Energy per second: 1

Replenish Energy as necessary.

Quinn didn't exactly understand why the mental lockdown cost her energy instead of mana, but she wasn't about to argue. At least that meant the other abilities didn't have their duration shortened.

"That was amazing, Quinn." Lynx's runes were swirling in his hair, and his eyes had sparkles of enthusiasm.

"I guess we currently have hostages or prisoners or just people who really annoyed me." She could see three sets of reptilian eyes watching her, watching her every move and interaction.

Misha moved forward several steps. "Well initiated Librarian." There was even surprise in the supervisory golem's voice which made Quinn somewhat proud yet slightly offended that people had expected so little of her. Still, now wasn't the time to address that.

She watched them struggle internally. Not that they moved externally, but she got a sense of their internal turmoil at having been stopped in their tracks. "Is there any way for us to rummage through their thoughts and extract information? I mean there has to be a way to do that, right? There have to be books for that."

"Well, there are some books for that," Lynx said. "They aren't necessarily books you can manage right now."

"Really, Lynx? Does this look like something I didn't manage?" she said, cringing as she realized how cocky it sounded.

"I may have underestimated you, but there are approximately four more books you need to absorb before you can approach that one. Otherwise, there will be vast gaps in your knowledge and any skills from those books can go horribly wrong if you haven't taken all of the steps to get there. It's like going down a flight of stairs and having to skip five of them because they're broken, but not noticing and so you go plumetting to your death six stories down." Lynx spoke calmly.

"Oh," Quinn said, "that's a pretty good metaphor."

Lynx approached the three hostile Serpensiril.

Malakai moved with him, his sword out trailing on the floor as he watched them. He brought it very close to one of their hands. "Hi," he said. "I don't like you guys."

Quinn could feel anger rolling off Malakai in waves. Anger that bespoke a lot more animosity toward them than she'd expected, despite having almost been Kajaro's victims back in that cave. Yet another thing she was going to have to explore later.

"So, do we question them?" Quinn said, noticing that she was down to about 12 minutes on her skill now.

"Well, we could question them," Lynx said, "or you could call the Library guards and have them do their jobs."

Quinn blinked at him. "We have Library guards?"

"Well, yes," Lynx said. "If you summon them, we have Library guards."

Quinn shook her head. "Why did I not know about the Library guards?"

Misha sighed. It was a very metallic sound, almost ending with a bell-like flourish. "Same reason as always, Librarian. Yet another gap caused by your chip that never delivered the information correctly through your mind. You can summon the Library guards. Only you can summon the Library guards now that we are back in a mostly stable power mode. The Library and Lynx can only summon guards in emergency mode. You are in charge of that ability now."

"Very well," Quinn said, sort of scrolling back to the one mention in her mind of Library guards, which literally stated, 'The Librarian, given the correct situation, may summon up to eight Library guards. These are large construct golems who will take on the job of keeping the Library safe from threats.'

Quinn shrugged. "I summon the Library guards?"

"How many, Librarian? Define them and do not ask a question..." Misha's patience seemed endless.

"Oh," Quinn blushed slightly. "I summon three Library guards."

Three eight feet tall guardians made out of the most polished metal armor she'd ever seen, stepped out of the back wall in the office. Quinn gaped at them. They were colossal.

"Oh, wow," she said. Upon inspection, they were referred to as guards one, two, and three. After this was all over, she was definitely giving them names.

"Guardian One, activating imprisonment enclosures."

"Guardian Two, activating restraints."

"Guardian Three, activating mental broadcasting interference."

Malakai's eyes widened in awe. "These are awesome golems. Can I get some of these?" He looked at Lynx.

"No, Malakai. You cannot get some of these. They are not play toys," Lynx replied.

"We won't talk," Tenejo snapped, now the gravity sealing his movement had been lifted in favor of an imprisonment enclosure all to himself.

Lynx moved forward, slowly shifting from his human form back into his lynx-like form. This time, he was much larger, reminding Quinn almost of a saber-toothed tiger. His teeth were razor-sharp and he lingered just outside the reach of the Serpensiril's faces. Although they probably couldn't reach through their enclosure, she wasn't entirely sure it would keep Lynx out, given what he was.

She wouldn't want to be in their position.

"You don't need to talk," Lynx said, his voice purring smoothly. "All you need to do is give away everything you've already started to. I don't think you realize how much your body language, word choice, and cocky attitudes have already told us about your faction."

Tenejo actually gulped audibly, but one of his co-conspirators jumped to his feet.

"The Serpensiril will release chaos from your foul imprisonment!" Dejaro yelled.

"Quick, stop them!" Misha said, but it was too late.

A loud cracking noise came from Dejaro's mouth a split second before an explosion rocked the room. Quinn fell to one knee, momentarily losing her footing as blood, viscera, and barely recognizable scaly flesh plastered itself onto the shield inside of his singular enclosure.

"Guardian One, activating stasis shield. Any Movement apart from speech is halted, prohibited."

This didn't matter for Dejaro anymore because his remains were currently liquefying into a mass of bodily goop inside of the robe that he wore. The application they'd stolen and filled out for him lingered briefly on top of him as it was then dissolved into the liquid that he had become.

"Well, I guess that's one choice," Malakai said, holding his nose. "Any way to get that stench out of here? Why don't those shields contain it?"

Guardian Two waved his hand impatiently, glaring at Malakai. In other circumstances, Quinn might have laughed at the situation, but not right now. She wasn't under any illusions as to what had happened. These Serpensiril came here with an agenda, one they fully expected to result in literally destroying aspects of the Library.

They needed to know. They needed to know a lot of things.

Malakai put his sword away and strutted in front of them, next to Lynx, who actually came up to his waist. "You other two just, you're not going to have such an easy out."

For the first time since knowing him, Quinn watched him execute some type of magic spell that didn't appear to be linked to combat. There were two cracks, not quite the same as the sound that Dejaro made.

An object floated out of the remaining Serpensiril's mouths that looked suspiciously like a section of jaw. Indeed it was, because a few seconds later, small pockets of jaw ended up in Malakai's hands. He looked at them with disdain.

"I don't see why you'd do this. That is not a good way to go. He would have been in excruciating pain for a second or two." The pieces disappeared into Malakai's storage as he crouched down to speak to the other prisoners face-to-face. "So we're gonna do this a couple of ways. My buddies over here, Guardians One, Two, and Three, are going to help me make you talk."

"We're not going to talk," Tenejo spat again, but the strain that even trying to speak brought due to the restrictions was obvious in his voice.

"Well, guess you didn't get lucky," Quinn said, very glad that her mana was replenishing itself already. "Would you like a cone of silence so they each don't know what the other one says?"

"Cone of silence?" Lynx asked. "Wouldn't a box of silence or maybe even a cylinder of silence be better?"

"You don't get it at all. I'm extremely sad about this." No one here knew about Earth anything.

"We can move the interrogation room, Librarian," Guardian One spoke up. "We can have it excised from your office and moved over to next to it."

"Oh," Quinn said, glancing at Lynx, who was still grinning with very many pointy sharp teeth about a foot from each of the captive's faces. Considering Malakai's actions, she knew the manifestation could reach through to the prisoners, just not the other way round. She thought Lynx might be having a little bit too much fun with that.

"You can move the interrogation room after we've got something from them." Lynx practically growled.

"Like what?" Malakai said. "Do you see them talking?"

"Well, can't we just force them to reveal what they know? I mean, isn't there a way to make them talk like a truth serum or something that gets them to just start talking and never shut up?" Quinn asked, not understanding why they couldn't just magic a solution.

Malakai looked at her and raised an eyebrow. "I guess they did plant a mind-bomb in your brain, didn't they?"

"Yes. Yes, they did. And it's still there. It's just under lock and key." Quinn was flustered. She wanted to know what these two knew. If they had any idea what Kajaro or the leadership of this group of protestors was up to.

"Well, maybe we could do the same to them. You know, under threat of having a mind bomb and being completely incohesive for the rest of their natural lives. We could do that." Malakai offered, his tone consoling.

Quinn sighed, knowing that she was just frustrated. "No, we shouldn't lower ourselves to their level."

"Why ever not?" Lynx said. "That's a very human affection, Quinn. They're trying to destroy both you and the Library."

Quinn sighed. "Yeah, but we already know that they think that the Library is about to tumble down. They came in assuming we'd only just begun to pick up the pieces and assumptions - They're the key to all stuff ups."

No one said anything. So she continued. "Plus, in the meantime, we have to figure out a way to keep them from leaving and keep others from coming here. Any ideas?" She asked the Library directly.

I'd suggest a stasis chamber, but I'll give you a few options.

Several options popped up in front of Quinn's face. She frowned.

Stasis chamber: inserted in between their door and our entry door. Shuts the potential entrants inside until they can be verified. Can be configured to a specific planet, or species signature.

Immolation chamber: Identified potential threats based on banned species, people, planetary alignments and eliminates that threat.

Escrilian Mind Bug Borers

Quinn refused to read anything further on the last one. We don't need to torture people.

Could be fun. It could be entertaining a few hundred thousand years ago, the Library said.

If Quinn could have raised an eyebrow at her without raising suspicion that she was talking in her head to the people in the room, she would have. She mulled it over even though she really didn't think it was much of a choice.

"Let's use a Stasis Chamber. I think that's the best option. We can send guards if it's alerted. If the occupants kill themselves in the interim. Not my problem. Not my choice." She sounded a lot more confident about that than she felt.

"They're fanatics, Quinn. There's just only so much you can do for them." Malakai fixed her with a surprisingly melancholy look. One of these days they'd get to sit down and chat about their lives.

"Okay, congratulations," she said to Tenajo and Narajo. "You just managed to put the Serpensiril species on the blacklist of the Library. For, I believe, the first time. Is that correct, Lynx?"

Lynx nodded and growled. "First time. The Library has never excluded an entire species from entry before and you guys and Kajaro just managed to do that."

"Don't worry, you can still come, but getting in is another question." Quinn turned to the guards. "I think now is a good time to move the interrogation room away from me."

The Guardians began to comply and Quinn watched the walls warp as they moved. Her knees shook and her head swam with knowledge, and she needed alone time to figure out just what she'd tapped into.

~~

Don't we alllll want to know? I know I do. 

(I mean my brain knows, but I still need to write it... and then you can read it!)

Much love

KT