The Assistant Librarian

© 2024 Duleigh Lawrence-Townshend. All rights reserved. The author asserts the right to be identified as the author of this story for all portions. All characters are original. Any resemblance to anyone living or dead is purely coincidental. This story or any part thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the expressed written permission of the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a review or commentary.

This is a work of love, a fan fiction. Many of these characters are the creation of Sir Terry Pratchett, as is the multiverse in which they live. If you would like to find out which of these characters is or is not a creation of Terry, please contact this author. This tale was not written to steal the fame that Sir Terry rightfully earned, but to enjoy one more romp in the shadow of Cori Celesti and remind the world of what we lost on March 12, 2015.

"One day I'll be dead and THEN you'll all be sorry."

- Terry Pratchett, 28 Nov 1992 on alt.fan.pratchett

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The Assistant Librarian

{With parenthetical footnotes}

A Discworld Story

Alissa Clutterbuck loved libraries. She was a rarity in Ankh-Morpork. She was a woman who could not only read, but she could write as well. As a matter of fact, she wrote several books on the importance of books, she wrote a book on how to write a book, she wrote three books on the care, maintenance, repair, and binding of books, and she wrote a 100,000 word tome on the "Importance, Upkeep, and Design of the Modern Public Library."

The problem was that she was in Ankh-Morpork, where there were no Public Libraries. The population of the largest city on the discworld was gleefully illiterate, a fact that most colleges on the discworld keep from their Library Science students. {They also do not inform their art history majors that there are no art museums. The only job an art history degree will get them is teaching art history.}

The sun was up when Alissa stood at the gate to the Unseen University. It was her first day on the job and she was excited to start as the Assistant Librarian in the Magic Library of the Unseen University. The Unseen University is over 2000 years old. It's the largest institution of learning on the Discworld and has always been the #1 school for learning wizardry and magic. She stood at the gate to the University and as the cock crowed, she swung a large knocker, causing the gate to boom like well-tuned timpani.

"Do that again," said the knocker.

She was shocked when it said that, like everyone else, she was aware of the magic that exists on the discworld and particularly here at the Unseen University. But a talking door knocker? She swung the knocker again and let it slam against the gate harder, producing an echoing 'boom!'

"Do it again," said the knocker, panting.

"Can't they hear you knocking inside the university?" Alissa asked.

"Yes, but I really like it when you do that to me," said the knocker.

Alissa suddenly felt a powerful urge to wash her hands.

Finally, the gate opened, and a scrawny, bearded man stood before her. He was nearly six feet tall but probably weighed eight stone. Maybe. Wringing wet. He wore tattered and faded wizard's robes and his pointy wizard's hat had felt stars and moons and sequins that were falling off. The hat proclaimed in faded felt letters he was a 'Wizzard.' "Can I help you?" the nervous 'wizzard' asked.

"I am Alissa Clutterbuck, and I am here for the position of Assistant Librarian." She held out the sealed note the Patrician gave her when he informed her she was officially an employee of the Unseen University. "This is for the Archchancellor with the patrician's regards." {The Patrician is the ruler of the Twin Cities of Ankh-Morpork. Although he's an absolute tyrant, he believes in the rule of One Man, One Vote. Fortunately for him, he's the man, and it's his vote.}

"I'm Rincewind the Wizzard," said Rincewind proudly. "I already am the Assistant Librarian; I don't think the University is hiring at this point in time." Rincewind stood proudly, but Alissa stood prouder, still holding out the note for the Archchancellor.

"The Patrician said that the University was hiring," she said sweetly.

Hearing that, Rincewind's shoulders drooped in defeat. He's lost worse jobs than this. "Follow me." He led the shapely young thing into the university. There in the central courtyard was a tremendously huge statue of a sea turtle, and on the back of the sea turtle was four elephants standing in a circle, tail to tail in the center, looking out from under the tremendous weight they carried on their backs. That weight was the discworld. The discworld was flat and circular, with a beautiful waterfall that spilled endlessly over the edge of the rim. {When the sun was just right, you could see the beautiful rimbow as the sun's light is refracted in the falling water.} The continents spread out on the surface of the disc and in the center stood a mountain peak a scale ten miles high. A tiny sun and an equally tiny moon circled over the discworld and the statue accurately reflected where the actual sun and moon were in their orbit around the real discworld. This was the most accurate model of the world they lived on ever made. It is said that if you look close enough, you will see a tiny sculpture of yourself bending over a tiny sculpture of the discworld, looking at a microscopic sculpture of yourself looking at...

Rincewind led Alissa into Poons hall, named for the famous Windle Poons, one of the few wizards in recorded history, to die of natural causes. {The usual cause of death in most wizards is the wizard behind you that wants your job.} They walked past a lecture that was being given to a room full of mannequins seated at desks and dressed as wizards. The lecturer did not seem to notice that his students were replaced with straw dummies. {He most likely thought it was an improvement.} They then turned down a corridor lined with labs. Things fluttered from laboratory doors, many exploding in a shower of sparks and guts, decorating the ancient stone floor with sparkling internal organs. Enchanted mouse traps flew after bats, snapping at them, trying to catch them, and from one door issued a column of smoke diagonally. The smoke suddenly froze, turned to marble, and crashed to the floor. As they walked past that door, stepping over the broken pieces of marble, Rincewind gave the wizard inside a thumbs up and a cheery, "Good one! Getting closer!"

"What were they trying to do in there?" asked Alissa.

"I... I really don't know," said Rincewind.

As with all buildings at the Unseen University, Poons Hall was saturated with magic, the results being that the inside of Poons Hall had more rooms and corridors than the outside dimensions allowed for. As they climbed a slowly rotating spiral staircase, Alissa was sure they just passed the fifth floor of a two story building. After climbing six stories, they alighted on the ground floor... even though they were on the ground floor when they started climbing.

Finally, they reached the Library which looked to Alissa like an ancient library made up of miles of bookshelves packed into one room. It had an air of a library from the depths of time when book binding was still on the horizon and books were handled with curiosity. Part of the library had stone bookshelves, but most of the library contained proper wooden bookshelves, blackened with age and lamp soot. "The books on the stone shelves are aggressive, they gnaw on the wood so we keep them on the stone shelves," whispered Rincewind. They walked past a book chained to a stout wooden lectern. "This book is on time out for inappropriate behavior."

"Why is yarn strung up on the bookshelves?" ask Alissa, seeing several trails of colored yarn disappearing off into the stacks.

"Probably freshmen," said Rincewind. "So they can find their way out."

The library was amazing. Above was a huge glass dome roof, allowing in as much natural light as possible. Many of the bookshelves were three stories high, with ladders on wheels to access the upper shelves. The very tops of the bookshelves were covered with potted plants and exotic vines, giving the top of the bookcases the look of treetops. "This is incredible," gasped Alissa. "The plants are a beautiful touch."

"The librarian likes it up there," said Rincewind the Wizzard. Just then, what appeared to be a rubber sack full of water covered in red hair swung down from a distant bookshelf using long, powerful arms and stubby legs with hands for feet. "...and this is the Librarian," whispered Rincewind.

Alissa was in shock. She's never seen an orangutan before, but she had read about them, and now one was standing right in front of her. With a sly smile, he placed a forefinger to his lips. He gave her the librarian's salute! Alissa returned the salute by pressing her finger against her lips, then Alissa turned up her collar and showed him her badge of rank. Librarian's badges are worn beneath the collar or under a lapel, so a glint of light reflecting from the badge won't interfere with somebody's reading.

The Librarian leaned forward and inspected her badge of rank, Technical Librarian, 1st Class. He nodded and showed her his badge, which was worn backwards on a leather thong around his neck. The orangutan was a Senior Master Librarian, next to the top rank and the highest ranking librarian she has ever met. "Wow!" she gasped quietly.

"Ook," said the Librarian.

"That's a long time to study," said Alissa. "But I want to go to the top someday, Chief Master Librarian."

"Ook," he said with an encouraging smile that included lots of teeth.

"Oh, this?" she suddenly remembered she had a letter in her hand. "The Patrician sent this with me, I'm supposed to give it to the Archchancellor. There was some confusion when I arrived last night and the Patrician told me I would be working here. The Patrician sends this letter with his regards."

"Ook."

"Well, if the Archchancellor doesn't read his mail, then here." And she handed the Librarian the letter. The Librarian opened up the message, read it, then he chuckled and wadded it up, and threw it in the trash. "What did it say?"

"Ook."

"Well, I'll try to live up to his expectations."

<><><><><> ֎ <><><><><>

Alissa became the official assistant librarian at the Unseen University, the foremost school of wizarding and magic on the discworld. She found that as long as she stays in the library, she won't draw attention. She is the only female on the staff of an all-male university and she's bound to draw attention. Mostly she stays in the library so she won't see something disturbing, but there's so much library packed into their library, who would want to leave?

Outside of the library, the student wizards were doing something that included entrails fairly often, and that was reason enough to stay among the stacks. She also discovered that the books in the library had lives of their own. Each book was imbued with the magic contained on the spells and incantations that were in the book. Then, to make matters more difficult, these books shared magical power with each other, making their spells stronger.

More interestingly, the books developed personalities. Some books were quite fond of her, but the older books contained the ethos of their time of publication and didn't like the idea of women reading, writing, and performing feats of library prowess. Occasionally books would fly off the shelves, the newer books throwing themselves into her arms, the older, crotchety books were aiming at her head.

The three made a team, as Head Librarian, the orangutan would spend hours rebinding ancient tomes and scouring the magical world for books they didn't have in their collection. Alissa, as Assistant Librarian, would check books in and out, help students and professors find what they need, restock shelves, check the card catalog against the books on the shelves, and organize search parties for lost underclassmen. As Executive Assistant to the Assistant Librarian, Rincewind would sweep floors and empty the trash.

Daily, they would have lunch together and occasionally swap stories of their past. Alissa told of her arrival to Ankh-Morpork. "I was born in Quirm, I was the only child, and when I was six my folks died of the Scurrilous Flu. My aunt sent me to Miss Pilgrim's Boarding School for Exceptional Young Women. There they taught us to crochet doilies, mend clothing, and bake. Luckily they had a library so I learned to read, and I eventually got a degree in Library Science."

"Ook?" asked the Librarian.

"Well..." Alissa sounded embarrassed. "When I arrived in Ankh-Morpork it was late and I was trying to find my way here and some guy grabbed me and demanded to see an example of my embroidery. He said he wanted to thread my needle for me." {The man assumed she was a "Seamstress" which in Ankh-Morpork is a woman of negotiable virtue whose company and affection can be purchased for an evening, or rented by the hour.}

"I don't sew," insisted Alissa. "I've never threaded a needle in my life and I've only wound a bobbin once and it made my arm tired... STOP LAUGHING AT ME!" When the librarian and Rincewind regained their composure Alissa said, "the guy groped me, so I called for the police and he groped harder so I stuck him with my nail file. The cops arrive and ask, 'What's going on' and I said 'he groped me' and they started making jokes about my pin cushions and I said, 'he didn't touch any pincushions, he grabbed my tits!' and I ended up standing in front of the patrician charged with Failure to Use An Appropriate Euphemism in Public. I told the Patrician my story and he sent me here."

The Librarian told of how he turned into an orangutan in a magical explosion, "Ook."

"Really? Nobody tried to turn you back into a wizard?" gasped Alissa.

"By the time we got around to it, he was already swinging from the bookshelves and stocking up on bananas," said Rincewind. "Believe me, we still try to change him back, but he keeps getting away."

"Ook!" said the librarian proudly.

It was really true, the orangutan's body was made for working in a library. He can swing up to the highest shelves with his arms, carrying books with his feet. Most of the Librarians' stories were about the fun he has at night down at the Mended Drum pub eating peanuts and trying to convince drunks they were hallucinating. His stories were better than Rincewind's stories. Whenever Rincewind told a story, it always involved running away from something horrible.

"Ook," said the Librarian one fine spring day.

"You put me in for promotion to Master Librarian? Oh thank you!"

"Ook."

A verbal examination held by Igor, the highest ranking librarian on the discworld, sounded terrifying, but the librarian was sure she could handle it. "When will that examination be?"

"Ook."

"Why so long? That's nearly a year."

"Ook."

"Tradition?" Alissa sighed, then said, "I suppose that gives me plenty of time to prepare." She was excited to be considered for promotion and saddened that the exam would be after the beginning of the new year. "I better get back to work."

Alissa walked through the library and many of the books greeted her in their own unique way. They thumped against their shelves or ruffled their pages. Books laying flat waved to her and even the dangerous, angry books rattled their chains to say hi. Books no longer tried to hit her head, instead they leaped into her arms and many loved it when she held the book against her chest.

As for the wizards of the Unseen University, most of them pretended she didn't exist. The library already had a wizard that was transformed into an orangutan, so it occurred to the senior wizards that Alissa was a wizard that got transformed into something curvy, something that inspired cold showers and a long lie-down. The students were different. Many of the younger students would try to talk to her, then begin to stutter and dash away. Others were insufferably rude.

There were a few students that she enjoyed talking to, and there were a couple that inspired the most interesting tingles in places she refused to admit having. It was Cayson Ewart that inspired the best tingles. She enjoyed his company and enjoyed his description of the campus outside of the library and he was just fun to be around regardless of what they were doing. The Miss Pilgrim's Boarding School for Exceptional Young Women taught her that young men like Cayson Ewart were dangerous and should be avoided, but Cayson wasn't dangerous. He could barely conjure a white dove {which was living in the Library and feeding off scraps left from lunch.}

Several times a day she had a stack of books to return to the shelves, which was boring work, but it helped her learn the layout of the library and eventually meet the friendly books which she planned to read. She's been sitting up nights reading and somehow, without lectures or labs, she was learning magic and accumulating Thaum.

As she carried the books back to their shelves, she entered a section of the Library that she's never seen before. The librarian always handled this section of the library and warned her away with a sternly worded "ook." It was high above the library floor on a chained off balcony far above the other books, situated just below the huge, domed skylight. She heard Rincewind call this section the "Plain Brown Paper Wrapper" section. She took the book up the long ladder and there on the walkway in the "Plain Brown Paper Wrapper" section, she looked at the book. Like all the books in this section, it was covered in brown craft paper colored leather and there was no marking on the book other than the Dewey Decimal System number at the base of the spine.

She had to open the book to see what the actual title was. The book fought back but it eventually let her open the cover to the title page and found that the name of the book was Thaumatic Accumulation Through Erotic Stimuli. Alissa knew what most of that meant. Thaumatic Accumulation was gathering magical power. The more Thaumatic Energy you could accumulate, the more powerful your magic will be. {The thaum is the basic unit of magic. One thaum is defined to be the amount of magic which is needed to produce a white pigeon or a twenty foot long chain of silk handkerchiefs tied together.} Using a simple spell, Erotic Stimulation could be converted to Thaum easily.

What she didn't understand was Erotic Stimuli. Alissa grew up isolated from the rest of the world in a girls' school in Quirm. When she graduated, she was completely on her own, and she continued her studies in Library Science as best she could. But library science did not prepare her for the world that hid behind the word 'Erotic.'

She looked up Erotic and found that it was an adjective that meant "relating to or arousal of sexual desire or excitement: titillating, salacious, prurient, lubricious, suggestive, pornographic, lewd, smutty, or hardcore." Most of those words meant nothing to her except 'sexual,' she knew what sex she was, so that was no big deal, and the word 'suggestive' which in the context meant absolutely nothing. She already knew she was a girl. There's nothing you need to suggest about that.

Alissa was never told about the "birds and the bees," it was never discussed in Miss Pilgrim's Boarding School for Exceptional Young Women. There were no boys, and the caretaker was a manly old woman named Maud. All she was told about sex was the one she had. As for where babies came from, she was told that they came from a midwife.