Tess and Lanse's second outing in the modern world began with suspicion hanging in the air like a storm cloud. Troopers and officials kept their sharp eyes locked on her as the two of them crossed beneath the library's immense glass archway.
The building loomed ahead like a crystalline fortress, its surface catching the morning light and scattering it into prismatic colors across the polished stone courtyard. Tess could feel every stare digging into her back, branding her as different, dangerous, unwanted.
Inside, the library was no less overwhelming. The absence of the earthy smell of books was the norm. Instead, the air was sterile, humming with faint static. Towering shelves floated above the ground, their contents shimmering with holographic projections. Whole aisles pulsed with shifting light, words re-forming into images, then fading back into text as researchers passed their hands through them.
