Post by kookybloo on Oct 16, 2014 22:49:05 GMT -5
A Blizzard and a Firestorm
Brightvale was completely dark. The University, the only place to be equipped with electricity, had a power outage thanks to the blizzard, and now the Seekers were snowbound thanks to a too-long meeting. Temperatures were running low and tempers were running high.
“We'll adjourn long before the blizzard, you said. You'll have plenty of time to get home, you said,” Sandro snapped, bundled in his outerwear as the rest of the Seekers were. “But no. We had to spend an endless amount of time dithering about things like how much we should pay the Library Faerie to enchant books not to disappear after reading and whether to rename the Murgatroyd Wing.”
“It's hardly my fault everyone likes to argue about stupid things,” Lambert retorted. “Besides, we should have enough coal to last for the night.”
Sandro picked an icicle off his ear. “We have no coal whatsoever.”
“What?! Didn't I send you to get some the other day?”
“We can't afford it. Ever since Madam Salt and Baron Goldnose started their little tiffs, coal would be less expensive pressurized into diamonds!” The fire was reduced almost to embers now, and there was only a scant bit of firewood left. Lambert tossed the last of the kindling onto the fire and stoked it with a poker and bellows. His Hoggir, Promethea, crept out from her hiding place under the couch and trotted towards the fire with a squeal of joy.
“Yes, you require high temperatures, don't you, Thea?” The Gnorbu scratched his petpet under the chin. “Is it nice and warm now, hoggy?” Just then Lambert noticed his niece coming upstairs from the basement.
“How are the backup generators, darling?” he asked her.
“F-f-frozen s-solid,” the young Kacheek chattered.
“I beg your pardon?” Lambert asked. Although his top hat kept his ears warm, it made hearing difficult from time to time. “No matter. Have a seat by the fire.”
“She said the generators are frozen solid,” Tom repeated. “What's more, we've no more fuel and gathering more firewood would be impossible.” He continued to stare out the window at the near-whiteout conditions.
“Even for the likes of you?” Lambert half-teased. “I'm sure you've been out in far worse.”
“I've seen calmer conditions on Terror Mountain!” the Lutari snapped. “There must be no more than two feet of visibility out there. To say nothing of how quickly frostbite would set in.”
Just then, the wind whistled down the chimney, almost snuffing the fire out. Lambert frantically took a bellows to it. “We'll have to find fuel sources within the library!”
Katie looked up from playing with Thea. “You mean we'll have to burn our own stuff?”
“Yes, we may need to. We'll just have to decide what. Everyone, take your lamps and search throughout the library for suitable kindling.”
A short while later, they returned to Lambert, who was still tending the fire. To his surprise, most of them were carrying books.
“I found a matchbook,” Katie announced, handing it over.
“Excellent. And what's all this?”
“We found some outdated textbooks that haven't been touched in decades,” Gyro explained. “They were only taking up space on the shelves.”
“Very resourceful. Hand me about three of the bigger ones.” Lambert set the the old textbooks in the fireplace, then struck a match and tossed it on top. The room glowed and everyone oohed as the fire roared and crackled to life.
“I'm just unsure about this,” Sandro said worriedly. “It's the principle of the thing!”
“You and your precious principles can go outside and freeze,” Tom growled. “Some of us are interested in survival here!”
Sandro sighed. “You do have a point.”
While everyone was huddled around the fire, no one noticed the Wherfy peering in through the window...
* * *
The Seekers awoke the next morning to loud shouts and pounding on the door. Glancing through the curtains showed the blizzard had stopped and some kind of rioters had cleared the path to the door. All of them seemed to be waving a copy of the Neopian Times. After some deliberation, Lambert was chosen to be the one to go out. As soon as he did, the crowd jeered and booed loudly. Someone flung a newspaper at his face. He caught it and read the headline:
SEEKERS BURN BOOKS!
Insidious society attempts to control information!
Lambert motioned for the crowd to quiet down...and smiled.
“I say, it's not often that an angry mob is kind enough to shovel the walkway,” he said, promptly going inside and slamming the door, to more loud jeering.
“They're completely mad. They can't be reasoned with,” he told the others, tossing the paper onto the table. “If they believe that drivel, there's no talking sense into them. And when did the Neopian Times become a tabloid, for that matter?”
Sandro's uneasy feeling returned. “It is technically true. Now I don't want to say 'I told you so,' but...”
“Then don't,” Lambert barked. “There is no possible way anyone outside of this room could have known what was going on in here. Or, for the sake of argument, let's say there was a Symol in our midst. How could they have relayed the information?”
“Telegraph?” Gyro suggested.
“No, it's in the basement. If the generators were frozen solid, the telegraph had to be,” Katie replied. It wasn't long before all the Seekers were arguing amongst themselves.
“Spies?”
“In that weather?”
“Let's hear your ideas!”
“I got nothing.”
“ENOUGH!” Lambert yelled. “Someone's got to speak to those rabble-rousers before they break down the door!”
Katie had an idea. “Maybe we should all go.”
* * *
All was explained to the mob...but not many of them believed it. They had seen that the only books in and by the fire were out-of-date textbooks, but they weren't convinced. Some of the mob were even Times reporters, who published their interviews with the Seekers as given, but still anti-Seeker sentiment ran high. Soon it seemed as though all of Brightvale was against them – memberships were canceled, ridiculous spin-off stories were published in less-reputable papers, they were yelled at and called names in the street, and even King Hagan no longer wanted anything to do with them. If a scandal was what the public wanted, a scandal they would have.
