[Image: The Beginning of Everything: Remembering Distance
(oil on linen, 90 x 180 cm, 2010), by Kathryn Brimblecombe-Fox]
If it helps, think of him as a man in late middle age, his hair thinning, eyeglasses straddling his nose, perhaps a hint of a paunch from far too many hours spent sitting or standing still. Such a man would probably favor clothing of neutral colors — not too flashy or expensive — and he would speak softly but clearly, every meticulous syllable unambiguous in sound and sense. He would probably even eat lunch (ham and cheese on rye, with a good swish of coarse brown mustard) at his desk, from behind the little placard.
Again, if it helps, think of him that way. Think of him any other way, for that matter; think of him as her, if that eases your mind past the reality: he no longer had what you would call a “body,” not even of the mechanical sort. He had once had one, true. Like you, he once had grown from a molecule to a cell and thence, after a certain number of years, to a fully-formed individual, of dimensions on approximately your own scale. But that had been many, many millennia ago — thousands of millennia ago, just before it became obvious (and necessary, indeed imperative) that shedding a body would free a mortal creature from the limitations that had plagued every single life form up until then, everywhere in the universe of universes.The Librarian did not age or take ill. He suffered no pain, never hungered or thirsted. With impunity he passed through walls, mountains, asteroids and moons, entire planets. Cosmic radiation had bombarded him, supernovas had erupted nearby, and he had endured not a single atom’s worth of damage… because, of course, he had no atoms.
The Librarian had not decided on his own to forgo a physical self. That decision had been made by the ancients (the ancients now long, very long gone, The Librarian now and forevermore alone). Furthermore, they had developed the technology to enable the shedding of skin, bones, muscle, neurons and blood, leaving behind only a disembodied no-dimension point, a conscious and active self.
But they had had sufficient energy resources and sufficient time to do it for only one of their number, and only once.
They chose from among themselves by way of a lottery; their agent did not need to be the smartest, wisest, or most noble. He would have an eternity in which to accomplish what had to be accomplished, as The Librarian.
At first and for a long, long interval thereafter, he had been impeded by time itself — that steady, seemingly relentless pressure always invisible and always at the back of every conscious creature’s mind. Time always propelled him forward. He could look back, but could not be back. If he did something wrong, he could not back up to correct himself. He had to begin the something-wrong all over, from the start, which often meant restarting one or more previous somethings as well. Having anticipated this, the shrugging-off of time had been the first mission the ancients had assigned him.Time was stubborn. But time had never run up against an adversary anything like The Librarian, with intentions anything like his. Never aging, he had an eternity in which to imagine a solution, to theorize, to experiment, and ultimately simply to dispense with time’s constraints. It didn’t even require a machine, although at first he’d thought it might; he now just, well, put himself to whatever moment he wanted. It was simple, so simple in (yes) retrospect: lacking form, incapable of aging or deteriorating, he had only to recognize that he already had escaped time — transcended it. He could no longer remember what it felt like to be bound to a “present.”
Having shrugged off corporeal form and then time itself, The Librarian could at last turn his attention to his biggest task, to his true reason for being: the establishment and the stocking and the care — and ultimately, most importantly, the launch — of the Propagational Library.__________________________
This is the first of what may — will probably? — turn into an occasional series of tales of the Propagational Library. (Not that this introduction itself is much of a tale, ha.)
The Querulous Squirrel says
Hmmm. Curiouser and curiouser.
John says
Thank you, Squirrel. There may indeed be something looking-glassish about this.
Jayne says
Oh, I loved this. Very much. This, after Friday’s offering? Marvelous segue. I’m excited for you. I’m so looking forward to returning to the Library. (From the moment, as a schoolgirl, I read Shirley Jackson’s The Lottery I’ve been hooked by lottery in story. Especially sci-fi.
The artwork, too, is really something. A big bang, or maybe like looking under a microscope. Gentle and appealing. (Unlike ReCaptcha!)
John says
Huh. I hadn’t made the connection with Friday’s post!
(In general, I’m with Ciara Sidine, who — as I mentioned the other day — said, “whatever resonates with the reader is good enough for me.”)
I have a feeling I’m going to be using more of Ms. Brimblecombe-Fox’s artwork in this series. Should probably offer her a commission or something. The particular appeal for me of this piece lies in the ever-branching tree (of life?).
Froog says
So, immortal, incorporeal, and at least quasi-omniscient? You’ve basically created a god.
I think most conceptions of ‘omniscient’ tend to imagine it as meaning in practice ‘capable of attending to anything at will’ rather than the more hardcore theological line of ‘inescapably attending to everything all the time’. Is there a residual time/space limitation on your Librarian that he can only have a unitary existence, only be ‘present’ at a single point in the universe at any given time? If not, like your spaghetti monster the other day, he would eventually expand to true omniscience and omnipresence.
It’s always a problem how a consciousness created mortal would adapt to becoming immortal – remember Wowbagger?
All gods are dangerous. I’m a little creeped out by what might happen to your Librarian’s ‘mind’, imprisoned in infinity like this.
John says
Um, yeah, good point. I didn’t think of him as a god but I can see how a reader could so infer.
I guess he has a couple of limiting factors. The main one — and I don’t want to spell it out too baldly here — is that traditional gods operate omnipotently, omnisciently, omniwhatever in the universe. The Librarian here operates in a different reality — one (as referenced in an aside above) consisting of a multitude of universes. He’s stuck in this one. But—
And there, I think I’ll let that part of the discussion trail off.
I don’t believe this guy is (or even by nature can be) particularly ambitious/dangerous, or needs to be, and I don’t think he cares much about power except to the extent that it helps him in getting the Propagational Library launched. That will happen only when—
Oh, whoops, almost got sucked into another lecture there. Heh.
marta says
I’m sorry I almost missed this. An intriguing beginning. I agree with Squirrel.
John says
Depending on how far I take it, I wouldn’t be surprised to see echoes of your Famous in a Parallel Universe project. The story line’s nothing like it, and I can’t say there’s any other direct connection. But that is a very cool thing, and very challenging to think about, and at least incidentally touches on some of the same “things.”
Ashleigh Burroughs says
I’m hooked. Confused, but hooked. Dang, you’re good!
a/b