Lisa had a flash of pure genius. "Jessy," she said, turning smoothly and heading toward a spot north of the city building, "have you ever been to the library?"
Jessy hadn't; and she was delighted. She had, of course, seen TVs and tape players before—though the headphones connected to the latter seemed new to her—but the flashing lights of the video games were a source of instant fascination. She ran back and forth among the machines, standing on tiptoe to see over players' shoulders, occasionally trying to touch the images or teek them through the screens, and generally making a minor nuisance of herself. The preteens playing the machines, most of whom had probably fled the game rooms at their hives for the express purpose of getting away from younger kids, were not inclined to be patient, and after a few minutes Lisa corralled her young charge and took her upstairs to the second floor. Much of that level was taken up by nature exhibits, and Jessy wandered among them for nearly twenty minutes, stopping by each exhibit and listening to part of its accompanying information tape before moving on to the next. The exhibits ranged from dioramas of Tigris's native plants and animals to cages housing small, furry animals, both earthstock and native; and as she watched Jessy's exploration, Lisa was again reminded of her own girlhood. She could still spend hours here, watching the gerbils and furheads in their cages and imagining what it must be like for them in the wild. Today, though, her mood was more one of impatience than interest as she waited for Jessy's excitement to wane.
Finally, she couldn't wait any longer. Soon they would have to head back to the hive. "Jessy, there's one more place I want to show you," she said, dropping to one knee beside Jessy and the ant farm she was studying.
"Do I have to?" Jessy asked plaintively, her eyes not leaving the scurrying insects.
"Yes," Lisa said. Don't worry, you'll be able to come here again. But I want to show you what the library is mostly for."
Reluctantly, Jessy pried herself away from the display and followed Lisa up one more flight of stairs.
It was like traveling from the hive to the city building in an instant. Suddenly, everything from the heavy wooden chairs and tables to the quiet colors and quieter footsteps labeled the room as adult. Jessy froze just inside the doorway, and even Lisa—who had known what to expect—felt a strange reluctance to go any further. But she was determined, and taking Jessy's hand she forced herself to walk toward the tall shelves she could see off to the right.
It wasn't an easy trip. They first had to pass by a tall desk, from behind which an even taller librarian gazed down at them, then they walked through a lounge area where several adults and a couple of teens sat with books. Lisa could almost feel their eyes on the back of her head as she and Jessy passed, and she sighed with relief when they finally reached the shelves and ducked into the space between two of them, out of sight of the adults.
Jessy looked up at the shelves, packed solidly with books from floor to ceiling. "What are those?" she asked, sounding awed.
"They're books," Lisa told her, pulling one out at random and carefully opening it. Neat lines of black letters on white paper stared back at her. "You see, when you get to be a teen and go to school, you'll learn how to read these. You can find out things from them." Gazing at the page, she looked for the handful of letters she knew. They were there, certainly—but in so many combinations!
"Can I hold it?" Jessy asked, and Lisa felt a teekay tug on the book.
Automatically, she countered with her own teekay. "No, Jessy," she said, leafing through the pages in hopes of finding pictures that might give her a clue as to what the words might be.
"I want it," Jessy insisted.
"May I help you?"
Startled, Lisa looked up as the tall woman who'd been behind the front counter came down the aisle toward them. Her lips held a pleasant smile, but there was something in her eyes that reminded Lisa of the storm cloud she'd had to pull a Nine out of a year ago. "N-no, not really, thank you," she managed. "I was just showing Jessy what books are."
"I see. Hello, Jessy," the adult said, and Lisa thought her smile a little more genuine this time. Stooping beside the girl, she deftly plucked the book from Lisa's hand and held it open in front of her. "See, Jessy, this is writing. When you grow up you'll learn how to understand what this says."
Jessy reached for the book, but the librarian held it back. No, no, you mustn't touch," she said firmly. "These are very valuable—some of the last books made from the big spaceship's records before the machines were destroyed in the Lost Generation. They're very durable—much more so than the books printed today—but they can be damaged if they're mishandled. That's why we don't allow children or kids to touch them. Do you understand?"
Whether she understood or not, it was clear Jessy wasn't about to buck such heavy adult pressure. "Uh-huh," she muttered.
"That's a good girl. Don't worry; you'll be able to look at the books all you want when you grow up." She shifted her gaze to Lisa. "Was there anything else you wanted?"
"Uh..." Lisa's tongue locked awkwardly against the automatic no that had tried to come out. "I... is it allowed for preteens to take books out of the library? I'd be very careful with it."
The smile slipped a bit. "I'm sorry, but we can't allow that. But if you really want to look at them, you can do so here, out in the reading area." She gestured in the direction of the lounge chairs they'd passed through on their way in.
"Oh. I—thank you." Lisa swallowed hard, feeling a shiver run down her back. To actually sit there with all those disapproving adult stares on her... "I guess we'd better be getting back, Jessy," she said, taking the little girl's hand and mentally bracing herself to pass among the readers again. "Say thank you to the nice lady.
"Thank you," Jessy murmured.
"I think you'll find the library's first two floors more interesting to you," the librarian said as she walked them to the door. "In the future you'd probably do better to stay down there."
It wasn't until they were flying above Barona again that Lisa was finally able to relax. One thing, at least, was clear: she was not going to be able to learn reading in the library. In fact, it was likely to be a long time before she even ventured into the building again.
But she wasn't yet prepared to give up. There had to be other places she could get books from, places that wouldn't be so hostile toward her. The librarian had said that books were being made, possibly even in Barona... but Lisa had never seen any store that sold them. She could, of course, search the whole city in her spare time, but even if she found such a place, she probably wouldn't be allowed to buy a book there. Preteens weren't given actual bills but could buy things only at certain specially marked stores in town by charging the purchase to their hives. It didn't seem likely that any bookseller she found would have the blue hive symbol in its window.
What she needed, really, was a person to guide her around the problems she was running into. Someone who would be sympathetic to her ambition, perhaps a teacher from one of Barona's introductory schools or even the university; someone who could break these unspoken rules—
Or someone who could get around them.
"Hey, we're going faster!" Jessy said. "Whee!"