The Contrariness Of Being

Clara sat behind Flynn's desk, his tweed jacket draped across her shoulders. With some trepidation, she watched Flynn tear a strip out of the sullen Charlene and silent Library, berating the former for putting ideas in Clara's head, and the latter for letting her carry them out. His reaction to her escapade had surprised Clara. She'd been bracing herself for the inevitable storm, but he was treating her as if she was the wronged one, rather than the one that had done the wrong.

"What the hell were you thinking?" he yelled up at the vaulted ceiling. "She could have died!"

The Library remained silent, still.

"Whatever point you're trying to prove," Flynn continued, not caring, "you can stop trying to prove it as of this moment!"

"The point is already proven, Flynn," Charlene pointed out with maddening calmness. "Clara's here, she came back alive."

"Because I was there," Flynn snarled, whirling on Charlene. "I'm the only reason she made it back in one piece."

"And that blonde woman," Clara interjected, "she helped a bit as well."

Flynn just glared at her.

"You can't claim all the laurels of glory for yourself," Clara said reasonably.

"I don't need anyone!" Flynn hollered up at the ceiling, ignoring her. "I'm doing just fine on my own, thank you very much!"

Charlene just rolled her eyes, before stalking out of the library wing, Judson wringing his hands nervously in the mirror. Clara caught the old man's eye, something in his face making her heart twist in her chest. She'd really set the cat amongst the pigeons by doing what she'd done, but she couldn't shake off the feeling she'd did the right thing. Alright, clinging to Flynn's leg in fear was hardly her finest hour, but she had to start somewhere. Stepping through a magic door into the unknown had been the first step in the right direction, even if it had led to a ruined dress and severe humiliation.

"I really think you should calm down now," Clara said coldly as Judson faded into thin air, "or you'll end up in that mirror, big boy."

"Just listen to her!" Flynn shouted at the wall. "She's talking like a Librarian!"

Clara just gawped at him.

"Don't you see?" Flynn said suddenly, stooping down and grabbing the arm-rests of her chair, his face inches from hers. "The Library's in your soul now. It won't let you go. It won't let you live."

Clara's face paled.

"See the way you were out there today?" Flynn said, straightening up. "I was like that once. Naive. Raw. Inexperienced. I nearly died more times than you had hot dinners. And I promised myself never again."

"Never again what?"

"Never again would I let the Library do that to someone else," Flynn whispered, "never again would I let it hurl somebody into the depths of hell with nothing but a book between them and the flames."

"How?"

"I learned. I lived."

"And you don't think I can do that as well?" Clara said, standing up, insulted.

"I don't want that for you," Flynn said quietly, looming over her, "I want you to leave the Library - to live your life as if the Library never existed. But until then, you have to stay here, and you have to stay out of the Library's sight. It let you through that door for a reason, but it's never going to happen again, do you hear me? Do you hear me?" he shouted up at the ceiling again.

The Library heard, but it didn't listen.

~*~

Clara tugged down her high-necked blouse, the buttons straining against her stomach. Thanks to Flynn's crazy ideas about cooking, she'd started to put on the pounds. With the amount of walking and cleaning she did every day, she thought she'd be losing weight, not gaining it. But like dreams, living in the Library went by contraries.

"What's wrong?" Flynn asked, juggling the Opal with an orange plucked out of his pocket.

"I've put on weight," Clara said uneasily.

"So what?" Flynn shrugged. "It suits you."

Clara looked at him, surprised. Then she jumped violently as the phone rang. Flynn didn't even glance at it. As it rang on, Clara looked at him questioningly.

"What?" Flynn asked, annoyed now.

"Well, aren't you going to answer it?"

Flynn just shrugged his shoulders again.

Clara rolled her eyes before gingerly picking up the phone, just in case it came alive in her hands. She still hadn't recovered from her experience with the hairbrush. But to her relief, it remained as innocuous as ever.

"Hello?" she asked, voice uncharacteristically timid.

"Hello," a man replied, his tone urgent, "I must speak to Flynn Carsen."

"Umm," Clara said, startled slightly at his forthrightness.

"I must speak with the Librarian," the man reiterated, his voice becoming desperate.

Clara glanced helplessly at Flynn, but he just mimed slitting his throat, indicating for her to cut the call off, "Mr. Carsen isn't here," she said, biting her lip. "He's at Minneapolis attending a Library Scientist Seminar."

Flynn applauded the inventiveness of her lie, nearly dropping the Opal and orange in the process.

"Flynn Carsen is not in Minneapolis," the man said, "he was in Berlin recovering the Opal of Sumara."

Clara frowned at the phone, Flynn nonplussed as he carefully placed the Opal on a display mount.

"Who is this?" the man demanded. "Are you his wife?"

"Clara Carsen?" Clara said before she could stop herself. "It does have quite the ring to it."

Flynn tutted, snatching the phone out of her hand. "Bonjour?" he shouted down the line, Clara leaning in to listen.

"Is that you?" the man said in disbelief. "Is this Flynn Carsen? The Librarian?"

"It's me," Flynn admitted reluctantly, throwing the orange up into the air before catching it again. "How do you know who I am?"

"You won't remember me," the man said, sounding out of breath now, like he'd been running, "I'm outside, I'm coming in!"

"How do you know about the Library?" Flynn said, shoving the orange into a confused Clara's hands as he suddenly took off between the bookshelves, Clara hastily putting the orange down on the table, before following him, struggling to keep up.

"I'll explain everything in greater detail," the man wheezed, "just tell me where to meet you."

"What's going on!?" Clara demanded, grabbing Flynn by the arm, forcing him to face her.

"Just stay here," Flynn ordered, ramming the phone into her arms. "I'll be right back."

~*~

"What, he was murdered?" Clara said in disbelief. "That man I was just speaking to on the phone, he's actually dead?"

"As a dodo," Flynn said abruptly, shoving a sheet of paper inside his pocket.

"What's that?" Clara asked, gesturing to it.

"That's nothing," Flynn snapped. "Keep your little snub nose out of my business, Hartley."

"Am I ever going to leave the Library?" Clara said suddenly, startling him. "Or am I going live out the rest of my days here, dying a lonely old woman surrounded by scrolls, the Library burying me in a tomb built from books, Excalibur throwing a party celebrating my demise, singing sweet, sweet revenge?"

Flynn just stared at her, his eyebrows climbing up his forehead. "That man who was murdered, that's not going to be you," he then said, startling her this time, "you're going to leave the Library, and you're going to live. So don't worry about the future, it'll be fine."

"That's precisely what I'm worried about," Clara scoffed. "You being the janitor of my life."

"I'm the Librarian, not the Janitor," Flynn said pompously, tying his cravat around his forehead Rambo-Style, "what could possibly go wrong?"

"Everything maybe?"

He just patted her patronizingly on the head before skipping off, disappearing out of sight behind the bookshelves. Clara watched him go, her heart sinking in her chest. It was starting to dawn on her that she obviously wasn't as high up on his list of priorities as she'd like to be. Time was ticking on, and she was still here, the stuff about the Serpent Brotherhood going to ground starting to sound like an excuse for Flynn to slack off.

But after the debacle of yesterday, she couldn't help but unwillingly see the situation from his perspective. There had been a flesh-eating zombie resurrecting Opal for him to deal with, on top of the nuclear bomb and everything else. Clara's problems rather paled into insignificance beside such potential catastrophes. If Flynn was dealing with these kinds of disasters on a daily basis, well it was really no wonder she was at the bottom of his to-do list. And now a man had been murdered practically on the Library's doorstep, another situation Flynn had to sort out. At this rate, she was never going to get out of the Library, not unless she took matters into her own hands again.

As she headed for the library wing, she bit her lip, wondering if she should chance another door. Whatever Flynn said to the contrary, the Library seemed to have some sort of purpose for her after all. In all the time she'd been within its walls, it had been unfriendly and distant, barring doors to her and removing books from her hands. Now it was steering her to somewhere, but where Clara didn't know. But the Library seemed to realise as Clara did, that she couldn't live here forever, cleaning its shelves and filing documents that turned blank whenever she touched them. She had to move on, and the Library was possibly pointing her in the right direction.

Clara came to a stop outside the library wing's doors, hesitating before tracing the metal framework of the sword with the tip of her finger. Despite her best efforts, Excalibur remained as elusive as ever, hovering just out of reach, always skittering off like a scalded cat. She thought it wanted to be friendly, but her middle name was getting in the way, forcing the sword to remain fervently loyal to its original owner. Shaking her head slightly, she pushed the doors open, thankful to find the library wing empty, the mirror only reflecting the room.

"Judson?" Clara called out, turning on the spot.

"Hello, Clara," Judson said from behind her, making her whirl around.

"Hey," Clara said tiredly, before sitting down on the edge of Flynn's desk, ignoring its protests.

"How are you holding up?"

"Like a fortress made of pillows," Clara replied, "ready to collapse at any time."

"You and Flynn friends again though?"

"If anything, he's more my enemy."

"Don't be so dramatic," Judson tutted, shaking his head. "Flynn's anything but that."

"Well, what is he, then? Flynn doesn't exactly do friendship," Clara pointed out.

Judson just shrugged his shoulders, reminding Clara of Flynn for a moment, before realising he must have picked up the gesture from Judson.

"I'm not just here to be Flynn's errand boy, Judson," Clara said earnestly, "I think I'm here for a reason."

Judson merely shrugged his shoulders again, getting on Clara's last nerve.

"Flynn pays me in ancient gold drachmas and Christmas puddings," Clara snapped, starting to lose her temper. "If that's not a reason to seek a higher calling, I don't know what is."

"The drachmas will turn to dust as soon as you leave the Library," Judson said gently. "And as for the Christmas puddings, well... Flynn has a fondness for them."

Clara just scoffed.

"I'll have a word with him about your wages," Judson said hastily, not liking the look in her dark eyes.

Clara just nodded before getting up from the desk, ignoring its sigh of relief, and heading instead towards the boards Flynn had set up in the wake of the man's murder. None of his scribbles and symbols made any sense to her, and the papers pinned up remained resolutely blank. Of her own pictures, there were none. Flynn seemed to be focusing solely on the man's murder and not the murder attempt made on her own life. As Clara stared at his messy handwriting, she wondered uneasily if there was a connection between the killing and her, if the Serpent Brotherhood were involved in some way. The factor that linked both cases was Flynn, as though he were the catalyst which drew danger and death to whoever crossed his path, including Clara.

Could it tremble stars from moonlit skies
Could it drag a tear from your cold eyes
I live on the right side, I sleep in the left
That's why everything's got to be love or death...