Chapter 163: Welcome to the Wanderer's Library
He didn't hit the ground.
He slid into it.
One second, there was only green light swallowing his vision, swallowing everything. Then the pressure changed, like surfacing from deep water, and his boots touched polished wood with a soft thud instead of the hard impact he expected.
The glow faded.
Sound rushed back in.
Breath.
Steps.
Whispers.
Pages turning.
Léonard straightened slowly.
The first thing he noticed was the height.
The ceiling arched far above him, a dark, endless vault of carved wood and shadow. Two rows of massive shelves flanked a central aisle, stretching out so far in both directions that they blurred into vanishing points. Books filled every shelf from floor to ceiling, spines of leather, bone, metal, woven roots, glowing crystal, packed so tightly that it hurt his eyes to follow them.
The second thing he noticed was the smell.
Old paper. Ink. Dust. Candle wax. And something else, ozone and rain, like every storm that had ever happened had left a little memory here.
Resh-1 landed around him one after another, boots touching down with disciplined precision.
Thud. Thud. Thud.
"Clear," one whispered.
No one raised a weapon, but every rifle shifted subtly, angles adjusted, fingers resting near triggers but not on them. Even here, where bullets were probably the dumbest possible solution, habits held.
Daniel and Damien dropped first, rolling as if they'd done this a thousand times, then standing smoothly.
"We're in," Daniel murmured.
Léonard's eyes swept the main hall.
The place looked like someone had taken an old-world university library and then stretched it out until it broke reality. Wooden arches marched in perfect rhythm down the length of the corridor. Iron railings lined upper balconies where more shelves sat, each level stacked with more books than Léonard had never seen.
And it did not end.
Perspective lied here. The aisle looked straight, but if he focused too long, the center bent subtly, like the hall was curving on itself, looping into infinity.
Footsteps echoed in the distance.
Patrons.
A figure with a hooded cloak walked past, arms full of scrolls bound in red thread. For a moment, the hood slipped.
No face underneath.
Just paper.
Another patron, this one clearly human, sat cross-legged directly on the floor between two shelves, surrounded by towers of open books like a fortress. They were scribbling notes into a notebook with three pens at once, the pens floating in the air and moving with impossible speed.
Farther down the aisle, something that had once been a man and now was mostly moss hunched over a tome the size of a coffin, turning pages with careful vine-wrapped fingers.
Léonard turned his head.
On the left, an entity passed the intersection of another row.
It walked on two legs like a person, but nothing about it was human. Gray chitin covered its body, plates overlapping like armor. Eight thin arms extended from its torso, each tipped with delicate hands, all of them holding different books. Its head was long and featureless except for a vertical slit of eyes, too many to count at a glance.
Trailing behind it, like a student chasing a professor, was a young woman in a patched cloak, arms full of more books. She watched the insect-thing with absolute focus, like every step it took was a lesson.
Nobody screamed.
Nobody pointed.
Nobody reacted.
Because here, this was normal.
Graves stepped closer to Léonard's shoulder, voice low.
"Welcome to the Wanderers' Library, Boss."
Léonard took another step forward, boots clicking softly on the wooden floor. Light from hanging lamps, were those lanterns, or stars caught in glass? spilled across the central aisle, leaving the edges in soft shadow.
He could feel it now.
A pressure at the edge of his mind.
Not hostile.
But watching.
Like the building itself had turned its head to look at him.
Behind him, Resh-1 closed ranks automatically, forming a loose protective shell. They didn't bunch up, too obvious, too aggressive, but their positioning shifted subtly so that no angle toward the Administrator was uncovered.
Daniel moved to the front, glancing around with the calm of a veteran tourist.
"No sudden moves, no loud noises, don't point weapons at anyone unless they point something much worse at you first," he murmured. "Keep your hands visible, don't step on anyone's tail, limb, or whatever else counts for them."
Damien added quietly, "And if a Librarian looks at you, nod politely. Don't speak unless it speaks first."
Léonard asked without looking away from the shelves, "What do Librarians look like?"
"Depends," Daniel said. "On their mood. And on you."
Not reassuring.
He kept scanning.
On a nearby balcony, a robed figure floated instead of walked, sleeves empty, hood sagging as if no body was inside. Books drifted around it in slow circles, opening and closing by themselves. Occasionally, one would flick to a page, linger, then shut and return to the orbit.
A child, maybe?, with fox ears and three tails flipped through a stack of picture books at the base of a pillar, humming to itself in a language that sounded like wind chimes.
An old man with circuitry carved into his skin plugged a cable from his wrist into a slot in the wall, eyes rolled back as he absorbed a book without touching it.
All wrapped in the smell of paper and the quiet sound of turning pages.
Léonard exhaled slowly.
"Alright," he said. "We're here."
His voice disappeared into the vastness, swallowed almost instantly.
"Boss," Graves murmured, keeping his tone low but steady, "our objective is research only. We get what we need, we get out."
Daniel nodded in agreement. "We'll start with the neutral stacks. Safer. Less… named places."
Damien checked the formations behind them, then leaned in slightly.
"Stay near the main paths for now, Sir. The further you go from the central corridors, the weirder it gets. And weird here isn't the same as 'anomaly' out there."
"Weird here eats you if you're stupid," Daniel finished.
Léonard smirked faintly.
"Noted."
He took one last look down the endless aisle, the warped perspective, the infinite shelves, the creatures, the wanderers, the silent gravity of the place.
He had the sudden, clear thought:
If we screw up here, we don't just die. We disappear like we were never written.
He adjusted his coat.
"Let's move," he said.
Daniel turned toward Léonard, still keeping his voice low out of instinctive respect for the Library's rules.
"Sir, what exactly are we looking for?"
Léonard didn't answer immediately. His eyes drifted along the infinite aisles, the whispering shelves, the distant silhouettes of wanderers and things-that-were-not-wanderers. Finally, he said:
"A technology capable of imprisoning, and killing, a conceptual entity."
Both brothers froze.
Then slowly, they exchanged a long look.
"You think it would be in Wing T-3840?" the younger muttered.
The elder shook his head. "No. T-3840 is combat thaumaturgy. Anti-divinity, anti-demon, anti-spirit. But not conceptual. That's… different."
They both fell silent again, brows tightening as they swept through every classified map and internal index they knew in their heads.
After a long moment, the older one exhaled.
"Let's ask an archivist," he said. "The main hall is nine kilometers from here."
The younger nodded. "Agreed."
Then they turned back toward Léonard, standing like a shadow behind them .
"Sir," the elder said respectfully, "to reach the central hall, we'll need to travel about nine kilometers. It will take roughly one hour on foot."
"One hour, hmm…" Léonard murmured, visibly displeased with the idea of walking that long in a place full of infinite shelves and eldritch commuters.
Then he asked, perfectly serious:
"Are we allowed to run in here?"
The elder blinked. "Yes, of course."
"What's your maximum speed?" Léonard asked.
The brother straightened. "Roughly fifty kilometers per hour. Seventy if we go all-out with thaumaturgic enhancement."
Léonard tilted his head.
"…A little slow, but fine."
Graves, hearing that, shifted slightly. Even behind the mask, his grin was obvious.
Then Léonard turned toward him.
"So," he said, stretching his legs lightly, "feel like a little race?"
Graves cracked his knuckles. "Always, Boss."
Léonard turned back to the elder brother. "Direction of the main hall?"
The operative pointed straight down the left branch of the primary aisle.
"That way, Sir. Just… just keep going straight. Whatever happens, don't turn into any side corridors."
"Noted."
Léonard crouched down instantly, palms touching the polished wooden floor in a sprinter's stance.
Graves sighed once, knowing exactly how stupid this was going to look, and took position beside him in the same stance.
Under the overwhelming aura of the Administrator, Léonard activated the tattoo stage of Demon Mode, the pattern illuminating faintly across his skin beneath his clothes. None of it broke the surface of his Administrator aura, he looked human enough.
Barely.
Daniel and Damien simply stared.
Even the Library's ambient noise seemed to quiet, as if the shelves themselves leaned in, curious.
Léonard whispered:
"On your marks… get set…"
A pause.
A spark of absolute, devilish joy in his eyes.
"GO!"
And the world cracked with sound as both Léonard and Graves exploded forward.
Two shadows launching down the infinite aisle at a speed that shattered the air behind them.
Leonard shot forward like a living thunderbolt.
The moment he pushed off the ground, the wooden floor cracked under the force, scattering dust and loose parchment into the air. Scrolls rattled on nearby tables. A robed wanderer yelped as a shockwave fluttered every page of the tome he was reading.
Leonard didn't slow.
A blur of black coat and white glowing eyes streaked through the aisle, weaving past towering shelves that stretched beyond the horizon.
He glanced to his right.
And despair washed over him.
Graves was right there.
Running normally.
Not struggling.
Not panting.
Not even trying.
"Graves!" Leonard shouted over the wind tearing past them, "What speed are we at?!"
Graves didn't miss a step.
"Hundred and twenty kilometers an hour, Boss. Not bad, actually your new personal record."
Leonard groaned internally.
"…damn genetically enhanced operators…"
They kept sprinting, passing confused wanderers and scholars who barely reacted in time.
A robed monk dropped his stack of scrolls in shock.
A six-eyed fae scholar hissed as its quills scattered.
A massive beetle-man carrying eight books trembled, clicking angrily as the gust almost toppled it over.
Somewhere behind them, a distant voice shouted:
"NO RUNNING IN THE- … oh never mind."
But Leonard and Graves were already kilometers away.
After a solid minute of pure speed, Graves finally spoke, voice perfectly calm despite sprinting like a missile:
"Boss… we are currently in a dimension that houses all knowledge. Written, unwritten, erased, forbidden. A crossroads of every universe, every timeline, every reality."
He turned his visor toward Leonard.
"And your first instinct… was to start a race."
Leonard burst out laughing.
A loud, unrestrained, absolutely teenage laugh.
"What can I say?" he grinned, pushing harder as sparks skidded behind his shoes. "It's been a while since I could run freely without holding back. And honestly…"
He leaned forward, accelerating again.
"I really didn't feel like walking for an hour."
Graves sighed, deep, dramatic, but with a smile hidden under the visor.
"I should've known."
And together, the Administrator and his second-in-command tore across the infinite corridor of the Wanderers' Library like two black comets, leaving stunned wanderers, fluttering scrolls, and a few traumatized archivists in their wake.
Finally, after a few minutes, Leonard and Graves slowed down almost at the same time.
Ahead of them, the corridor opened into a massive hall.
It wasn't empty.
The space was crowded.
Figures filled the area between the endless shelves, dozens, maybe hundreds, moving calmly, occupying the hall as if they had always belonged there. Every single one of them was draped in green robes, some dark, some faded, some almost emerald. On each robe, stitched or engraved somewhere, was the same symbol:
A tree with a snake-shaped trunk.
Some of them were seated on the floor, reading.
Others stood in small groups, speaking in low voices.
A few simply walked, hands behind their backs, observing the Library as if it were a place of quiet reflection.
Graves stopped completely.
"…Serpent's Hand," he said quietly.
Leonard didn't answer.
He didn't need to.
He had already noticed the details.
Not all of them were human.
Some had eyes that reflected light wrong.
Others moved with a rhythm that didn't quite match human motion.
Their arrival did not cause panic.
But it caused attention.
Conversations slowed.
A few heads turned.
Then more.
Eyes settled on Leonard.
Whispers started—soft, restrained, controlled.
Graves shifted slightly at Leonard's side. "Boss… we're noticed."
Leonard nodded once, his expression unchanged.
"Yes," he said calmly. "We are."
And they stood there, at the edge of the main hall of the Wanderers' Library, under dozens of watching eyes, without moving further.
There was a brief moment of silence.
Then Leonard heard it.
Whispers.
Low, restrained, slipping between shelves and bodies like smoke.
"…jailors…"
"…the Administrator…"
The words repeated, overlapping, growing just loud enough to be unmistakable.
Graves felt it too. The shift. The invisible pressure of attention tightening around them.
Then movement.
A formation stepped forward from within the crowd.
They were robed like the others, but different. Their green garments were reinforced, layered, threaded with sigils and armored seams. In their hands were rifles far too advanced to belong to any mundane world, humming softly with restrained energy. Their discipline was obvious. Their spacing perfect.
At their center walked a woman.
She wore the same green robe, heavier, darker. A hood shadowed her face, and beneath it, a mask, smooth, pale, carved with ancient runes that pulsed faintly with life.
Leonard recognized her instantly.
Midnight.
Leader of the Serpent's Hand.
She stopped a few steps away from him, her guards fanning out subtly, forming a protective arc. Even without seeing her eyes, Leonard could feel her scrutiny, sharp and unyielding.
She spoke.
"TA," she said, voice calm but edged like glass. "What are you doing here?"
Her head tilted slightly.
"You know very well that the Library is my territory."
Leonard smiled, amused.
"Does the Library intend to block a simple wanderer," he asked lightly, "seeking knowledge?"
Midnight laughed.
Not kindly.
"Oh no," she replied. "The Library doesn't block wanderers."
Her voice hardened.
"But I will gladly block a so-called wanderer who cages every other wanderer and being he deems 'not normal.'"
Graves shifted his weight.
Leonard ignored the jab completely.
"May I pass?" he asked simply.
Midnight didn't answer immediately.
Then: "Not until you tell me what you came here for."
At that exact moment.
Footsteps.
Rapid. Coordinated.
Resh-1 arrived.
The rest of the unit emerged from the corridors behind Leonard and Graves, spreading out with practiced precision. No shouting. No hesitation. Weapons raised, angles covered, bodies positioned instinctively beside their commander.
Graves didn't look back.
He didn't need to.
Midnight's guards reacted instantly.
Rifles came up.
Behind them, the robed figures of the Serpent's Hand rose as one. Some drew blades etched with sigils. Others lifted their hands, runes igniting in the air as spells were prepared, reality itself beginning to bend under whispered invocations.
The hall held its breath.
Two forces faced each other among infinite knowledge.
The Administrator and the Serpent's Hand.
Leonard and Midnight locked their gazes, one hidden behind a mask, the other glowing faintly white.
No one moved.
No one spoke.
The tension was absolute.
Suddenly, a voice rang out from behind the ranks of the Serpent's Hand.
"Ladies and gentlemen," it said calmly, carrying effortlessly through the hall, "I would like to remind you that fighting within the Library is strictly forbidden. Continued escalation will force us to intervene."
The tension snapped, not vanished, but checked.
Both sides turned.
A short distance away, set slightly back from the main flow of the hall, stood a wide wooden desk positioned before a branching access corridor. Behind it sat three entities.
The one in the center dominated the space.
It resembled an immense owl-like being carved from reddish wood or hardened clay, its body layered with feather-like ridges that looked sculpted rather than grown. Its face was masklike, symmetrical, and ancient, with deep-set eyes that glowed faintly with quiet awareness. Curved horn-like protrusions rose from its head, blending seamlessly into its avian silhouette. It did not move much, but it did not need to. Authority radiated from it naturally.
To its left sat something… incomplete.
A neatly dressed humanoid in a pale shirt and red tie rested upright behind the desk, headless, pristine, almost politely arranged. From the collar floated a single pale blue hand, hovering where a head should be. The hand slowly turned, palm outward, fingers gently flexing as if waving or signaling. Despite the absurdity of it, the presence felt attentive, patient, and unsettlingly polite.
To the right stood a tall fungal entity rooted in a shallow ceramic basin placed on the desk. It looked like a cluster of white mushrooms fused into a single stalk, their caps drooping and leaking thick, dark fluid that dripped lazily back into the pot. Thin, root-like tendrils curled around the rim. It swayed slightly, as if breathing or listening.
Midnight immediately raised a hand.
Her guards lowered their weapons at once.
She inclined her head respectfully toward the desk.
"My apologies, Lords Archivists."
The owl-like entity spoke, its voice deep, layered, and impossibly calm.
"That will be acceptable, Lady Midnight. You and your people do much to help defend the Library."
Leonard raised his fist as well.
Resh-1 lowered their weapons without hesitation, every movement crisp, disciplined, final.
Silence settled again, this time enforced.
Leonard stepped forward.
He passed Midnight without so much as a glance, his long coat trailing softly behind him as Graves and the rest of Resh-1 followed. The Serpent's Hand parted just enough to let them through, dozens of unseen gazes tracking his every step.
He stopped in front of the desk.
The three Archivists turned their attention fully toward him.
The owl-like being tilted its head slightly.
"What brings an entity such as you before us?" it asked.
Leonard hesitated.
For the first time since entering the Library, genuine confusion crossed his face.
Then—
They feel it, a voice murmured inside his mind.
Low. Familiar. His demon.
"The fragment. The Administrator's fragment. They know you carry the fragment and authority of a Supreme Divinity.
Leonard's eyes narrowed slightly as understanding settled in.
The Archivists remained silent, watching him with patient, ancient interest.
Waiting.
Finally, Léonard spoke.
"I wish to read a book," he said calmly. "I am seeking knowledge regarding an entity."
The owl-like Archivist regarded him for a long moment, its carved face unreadable.
"Do you possess a Library card?" it asked.
Léonard blinked once.
"A card?"
Before he could say more, Graves stepped forward and placed a small green card flat on the counter, sliding it toward the Archivist.
The owl took the card delicately between two clawed fingers and examined it.
"Acceptable," it said.
Léonard slowly turned his head toward Graves.
His expression asked a single, silent question.
Where did you get that?
Graves merely shrugged.
The owl-like Archivist returned the green card to the counter, then shifted its attention back to Léonard.
"Would you like to be issued a Library card?"
"Yes," Léonard answered without hesitation.
One of the owl's arms rose.
A glowing sigil formed in the air above the desk, rotating slowly. From its center, a card materialized, pristine and pale. It drifted downward, hovering inches above the wood.
"Proceed," the Archivist said. "Take it."
Léonard reached out and grasped the card.
The moment his fingers closed around it, the surface darkened.
Then darker.
Then completely black.
The card dissolved into nothingness in his hand, vanishing like smoke.
The owl-like Archivist let out a low murmur.
"…As expected."
Without pause, another sigil appeared. A second card emerged, followed by a floating fountain pen that dipped its nib and began writing on its own. Elegant letters formed across the surface, precise and deliberate.
When the writing finished, the pen vanished.
The card floated gently into Léonard's hand.
This time, nothing happened.
He examined it.
The photograph section was filled entirely with black, no face, no silhouette, just absence.
Under True Name, a single entry was written:
The Administrator
The Watchword field below it was blank.
Léonard stared at it for a moment longer than necessary.
Then he slipped the card into his coat pocket.
The Archivists watched him closely.
The Library had acknowledged him.
Then, the Archivist spoke again, its voice lower now.
"You mentioned seeking information on an entity. Would you specify which one?"
Léonard did not hesitate.
"I am looking for information on The Black Moon," he said evenly. "And a way to defeat it."
The reaction was immediate.
All three Archivists froze.
Midnight stiffened as well, the movement sharp and instinctive, as if a realization had snapped into place in her mind.
"…So that's it," she said quietly. "That explains all the Foundation's strange movements lately."
Léonard turned his head toward her.
"You were spying on us?"
Midnight tilted her masked head slightly.
"And you?"
Léonard let out a short breath that could almost be a laugh.
"…Fair enough."
One of the Archivists finally moved. The owl-like figure straightened, its presence suddenly heavier.
"That request," it said, carefully, "is… sensitive."
Its black, hollow gaze fixed on Léonard.
"You must understand that the information you seek concerns an entity classified among the Old Gods. While we may provide fragments, guidance, or indirect references, knowledge of that magnitude requires authorization."
Léonard's expression remained calm.
"From whom?"
"Our Chief Archivist."
There was a brief pause.
Léonard inclined his head slightly.
"Would it be possible to make such a request?"
The Archivist considered him in silence for a long moment.
"…We can attempt it."
Then, without further explanation, it rose from behind the desk.
The owl-like Archivist lifted its head and released a sound.
Not a shout.
Not a word.
Something sharper, thinner, almost nonexistent, a vibration that slid past human hearing entirely, yet made the air tremble, the bookshelves hum, and the floor beneath Léonard's feet feel suddenly aware.
The Library listened.
The air shifted.
Suddenly, something moved above them.
Not footsteps.
Not wings.
A distortion, as if the ceiling itself had decided to remember that gravity was optional.
Then it emerged.
A vast, segmented form began to descend from the ceiling.
Not breaking through it, not opening it, but passing through, as if the stone, the arches, and the endless shelves were nothing more than fog to it.
The creature resembled an immense centipede, its body composed of thick, fleshy segments stacked one after another, stretching far upward into the ceiling until its true length became impossible to judge.
Each segment bore a single, swollen red eye, slit-pupiled and half-lidded, as if watching different moments in time all at once.
From every segment extended long, thin, jointed arms, too many to count, dangling loosely at its sides.
The hands were small, dark, almost skeletal, fingers twitching subtly, as if constantly cataloguing the space around them.
At its lower end, the body widened into a grotesque, crown-like head, mandibles curved inward like hooked ivory, framing a cluster of smaller, pale eyes embedded unevenly in soft flesh. A string of red, bead-like growths wrapped around its "neck," swaying gently as it descended.
It kept coming.
And coming.
Resh-1 stiffened instantly, weapons half-raised before Graves subtly lowered his fist. "don't."
Léonard felt it then.
A pressure.
Not physical.
Not psychic.
Something deeper.
Something that pressed through him instead of against him.
It was familiar.
the same weight he felt when standing near fragments of divinity, when the Administrator's presence stirred within him.
And yet…
It wasn't.
This presence wasn't hostile.
It wasn't benevolent.
It wasn't curious.
It was categorical.
As if he were a concept being evaluated by another concept.
Léonard's breath slowed despite himself.
His aura reacted instinctively, tightening, folding inward, the fragment of the Administrator humming faintly under his skin.
The creature finally stopped descending.
Its body coiled slightly, eyes aligning, some on Léonard, some on Midnight, some on nothing at all.
The pressure intensified for a heartbeat.
Then, understanding brushed the edge of Léonard's mind and slipped away just as fast.
Not knowledge.
Recognition.
He didn't understand what he was looking at.
But it understood him.
The massive segmented entity finally stilled.
Its countless eyes adjusted, some narrowing, others widening, focusing on Léonard in layers, as if it were examining not just his body, but every version of him that had ever existed, or ever could.
Then it spoke.
Not loudly.
Not softly.
Its voice arrived everywhere at once.
"Greeting."
The sound vibrated through wood, stone, ink, and thought alike.
"I am the Chief Archivist of the Wanderers' Library," it continued, each word precise, carefully indexed.
"Leader of all Librarians. You may address me as Rounderpede."
A pause.
Léonard straightened his posture instinctively.
"Greeting," he replied evenly. "I am the Administrator. Leader of the SCP Foundation."
The reaction was immediate.
Every Librarian in the hall froze.
Books stopped floating.
Pages stopped turning.
Whispers died mid-breath.
Rounderpede's eyes widened, many of them.
"…The Jailors."
The word landed wrong.
Before Léonard could respond…
BOOM.
A shockwave detonated outward, invisible but devastating.
Shelves shattered.
Tables overturned.
Wanderers were thrown back as if hit by a freight train.
Léonard felt himself launched across the hall, coat snapping violently as he skidded across polished wood, boots carving lines into the floor. He barely managed to twist mid-slide before crashing to a halt nearly ten meters away.
Resh-1 slammed down around him in a tight formation, weapons snapping up in perfect unison.
Daniel and Damien landed hard beside them, rolling into cover.
"Contact!" someone barked.
Smoke billowed across the hall.
Then it cleared.
Rounderpede hovered at the epicenter.
Flames crawled along its segmented body, pouring from between plates of flesh like molten veins. Its countless eyes burned red now, furious, focused.
It stared directly at Léonard.
"JAILORS!"
"NONE OF YOU WILL LEAVE THIS PLACE ALIVE!"
Léonard blinked.
Once.
"…What the fuck did we do?" he asked, genuinely baffled.
Rounderpede screamed.
Not a sound.
A declaration.
"WHAT YOU HAVE DONE? ARE YOU MOCKING ME ?!!
ACROSS COUNTLESS TIMELINES, YOU, THE JAILORS, INVADE US.
YOU STEAL OUR BOOKS. YOU TRY TO IMPRISON OUR KIND. YOU PLUNDER THE LIBRARY.
YOU HAVE ENTERED THE WINGS OF FORBIDDEN KNOWLEDGE.
AND NOW YOU DARE WALK HERE, AS IF INNOCENT, ASKING FOR KNOWLEDGE?"
Its body writhed, flames intensifying.
"YOUR ORGANIZATION, IN YOUR TIMELINE, HAS ATTACKED US SEVERAL TIMES
YOU STOLE PART OF THE LIBRARY.
YOU STOLE BOOKS.
YOU DARED ENTER THE FORBIDDEN WINGS.
AND YOU ASK ME WHY?"
Léonard stood there, stunned.
Slowly, he leaned his head slightly toward Graves.
Graves leaned in just enough, voice perfectly calm, like he was giving a briefing during a routine op.
"Boss," he murmured.
"First and last Foundation raid in our timeline: thirty years ago."
Léonard's jaw tightened.
"The stolen Library wing?" Graves continued quietly.
"Almost certainly Site-01's library."
"And the missing books?"
"…Yeah. That sounds like the O5 Council."
Léonard closed his eyes.
Just for a second.
Of course it was the O5s.
He opened them again and looked back at the flaming, screaming, multiversal centipede-god hovering in front of him.
"…Okay," Léonard said carefully.
"Hypothetical question."
Rounderpede hissed, flames roaring.
"SPEAK, JAILOR."
Léonard pointed at himself.
"Would you believe me if I told you I had absolutely nothing to do with any of that?"
Rounderpede's rage surged.
"DIE, JAILOOOOOOOR!!!"
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Sorry about the past month, i was getting cooked by my shift. But good news, WE ARE BACK!!!