Hundreds of volumes of large tomes cover shelves that reach up to the very high ceiling. You are in narrow crack between two long shelves. You walk through the space between the shelves, trailing your hands on the book. The shelves are so close you can't help but bump into a book here and there. The shelves are so large and heavy they don't make even the slighest movement when you fall against one accidently.

You've tripped over a ladder. It's laid along the ground, edges from shelf to shelf, the same kind as there is in every other row. They were used to reach the books once, but no one reads these records anymore. Now they just keep the space between the shelves uniform. Those maps hate being in the same place as the other non fiction and always try to push the shelves apart.


The books are all a dull green, faded from dust and time. They are larger than usual. Each one is about as wide as your palm and the same length as your arms. They are stuffed in very tightly, leaving not one inch of space. You wouldn't want to have the job of putting them into the shelves.

You reach one end of the row. There's next to no room between the wall and the shelf, but you manage to squeeze through. The rows of shelves seem to go on forever in this direction. You use the next row to turn around and face the other way. The shelves end a few rows up, so you head that direction. You come out into a small space between a shelf and the grey stone wall.

There's a door here you could try it but it's locked. Oh. There's also another small shelf here at the end of the row. You look at the small selection it has. Most are records of the books in this library. They include just a topic and a number. There are too many books to even list the names in this tiny shelf.

Three books that are not records draw your attention.

You pick up the grey book

You pick up the grey book. With just that slight movement a huge cloud appears. As you discover through the huge dust cloud and your tears, it's actually a very old blue book, not grey.

You walk through the cloud, past the door, and sit down where the air is clearer. You open up the blue book to the first page. In large flowery letters the title is written, "The Journals of Pip: Volume 8". Below that, "His Search For the History of the Colour Blue".

You turn the page to read tiny block letters.

"In his first year of journal writing, three years before his first published novel, "Theories on the Disappearance of Gravity During the Great Regression" (since which it has been discovered that spontaneously reverting the universe to a previous state may cause gravity to turn into small quantities of gravy, one of the outlined theories connecting the disappearance with the large increase in gravy mining during the years affected), Pip completed a few journals. One of these was a detailed plan and record of his three month long search for the nature and history of the colour blue. In the following pages you will see his journey as he discovers blue."

"I have tracked it to a cave near the Grinning Stones. At first their wide mouths and the little giggles unnerved me, but I have grown used to their strange habits now. It has been nearly a week since I have seen it enter the cave, but I know it is in there. I hear the little snores before I sleep, "blu-o-o-o-o-o-o-o.... blu-o-o-o-o-o-o-o..." it calls. At dawn it will wake me up with a "Cocklebluedoblue!"

You close the book. You just can't read through this radical nonsense. You've read through Pip's research; it's very good. But the man obviously has some trouble telling reality from fiction in his everyday life. You've been to the Grinning Stones; there are no caves anywhere near that region. It's too bad, he was a smart man. A little jerky and obsessive, but smart nonetheless.

But you have to admit, those stones are creepy, especially at night.

You pick it up and start on the... long, long journey, to row J786.