Editing Libraries of Faerie (section)

==Today's Libraries==

===Amos Freeman's Front Porch===

In the United States, Nebraska, specifically, there is a small town name of Benton.

Not much of a town, Benton. Just a few stores and a stretch of road runnin' between a few small farms.

One of these farms belongs to Amos Freeman, and had for as long as anyone can remember. 

In the 30's, the farm was huge and bustling, and Amos didn't turn down nobody who came with an empty wallet, hungry stomach an' strong back. Amos Freeman, a black man whose pa told him stories of bein' a slave every night at bed time, kept damn near all of Benton fed and workin' during that time.

Its mostly run down, now; though. Everything needs fixin' but there no one around do it. No ones lives at the Freeman farm now, 'cept for Amos and his nine granddaughters. 

Amos' nine granddaughter care for the farm as best they, milkin' the cow, feedin' the chickens and pigs, and keepin' some of the crops growin', but it just ain't much of a farm no more.

Thing is, any time of the day or night, Amos' nine granddaughters (all nine of 'em, just old enough to be considered grown women, all nine of 'em pretty as sin, eight as dark as night, and one as white as the moon) can be found cookin' up one hell of meal. Fried Chicken, spiral-cut honeyed ham, collared greens, corn on the cob, buttermilk buscuits, black eye eyes, an' a whole mess of other stuff. Homemade icecream an' pie for dessert. Apple, blueberry, or strawberry-rhubarb. 

While they're busy making up the meal (always more than enough for everyone to stuff themselves and take home left overs, no matter how many friends or strangers show up), Amos just sits in his favor rockin' chair on the front porch. Looks, for all the world, like a skeleton wrapped the wrinkly skin of a raisin, kept alive by sheer stubborness. He's got a piece of that drawin' charcoal and a stack of nice, heavy-stock paper sittin' in his lap, but he ain't drawin' nothin'. 

He just sits, and rocks, and looks up at the sun, or the stars, whatever the case may be.

Anyone who talks to him, they don't get an answer, they don't even get a look or a nod. He just sits, and rocks, and looks up at the sun, or the stars, whatever the case may be.

The granddaughters - their right friendly - always happy to have guests, and always willing to fetch a glass of iced tea or lemonaide, or a shot of bourbon, from a bottle older than they are. If asked about Amos, they get a real sad look on their faces, and they just say he's been like that, quiet, an' starin' up at the sky for as long as they can recall. But their sadness doesn't last long, because they have guests to take care of, and they sure do love to have guests, and make new friends.

Odd thing, though, about Amos, somethin' that the granddaughters are willin' to speak on if someone tickles their fancy...

While Amos is rockin' in his chair, if you ask him, "tell me the story of the Bible", he'll tell you the story of the King James Version... startin' with Genesis, and endin' with Revelations, he'll recite the whole thing. He'll even draw those timelines and maps that show up at the end of most Bible now days, usin' his drawin' charcoal an' paper.

It ain't just the Bible, though... he can reciet any book, as long as you ask for it. He don't even need to know the lanuage its in, or have ever read - or heard - of the book. Old Amos, he can tell you, word-for-word (in perfect French) what's written in some little French girl's diary from 1941.

Even though he never does anything no more, and the nine granddaughters don't get out much, word of Amos' strange gift has spread. 

The only men in the world to know everything written in the Dead Sea Scrolls are a few high-falootin' guys from New York City who came to pay Amos and his granddaughters a visit, meanwhile, an old woman from Plano, Texas came up to see Amos one day, to hear him read her love letters from her husband, who died in the same fire that destroyed the letters.

He ain't never gonna be famous, but there are people who know about him, people from all over the world. 

People from beyond it, too. 

The nine granddaughters, they've had guests far stranger than humans, but as long as they mind their manners, and wipe their feets (or tenticles) before comin' in the house, they ain't about to judge them, or turn them away.

No matter how long or short a book, or a series of letters, Amos always finishes one book when the sun goes down, and finishes another when the sun comes up.

If'n someone wants, they can stay a spell at the Freeman farm. The nine granddaughters are more than happy to make up rooms, especially for the people that they take a likin' to. Guests will eventually wear out their welcome, though, especially if the the granddaughters think they are takin' advantage of old Amos, and are usually asked to leave after a week or two. 

No one has ever refused the granddaughters' polite request.

===Rabbi Moishe's One-Word Library===

Rabbi Isaac, I write to you, my old teacher, for I am sorely in need of your wisdom.

You know from my last letter of the fire which destroyed the small library of our yeshiva. Rabbi Moishe, of course, was devastated. He had retreated to study the Talmud and meditate upon a solution, leaving me to instruct the students of the yeshiva.

In fact, I was using our only copy of the Torah to teach the boys their letters when it happened. Young Elazar was pretending he could not pick out the alef, despite my stern looks of disapproval.

We suddenly heard a voice like thunder from the back room: '''“SON OF A STINKING DROP!”''', so mighty that it shook cascades of dust from the rafters.

I realized immediately that Rabbi Moishe was in the back room, but felt it necessary to spend a moment calming the boys. Poor Elazar had quite fainted away in shock, with little more than a squeak of dismay.

When we found Rabbi Moishe in the ruined back room, it took us some time to piece together what had happened -- for he had been struck both dumb and unable to read or write, it seems. He sat on the floor, dazed, with a smoking brand upon his forehead with the Word written there.

I am afraid, my old teacher, that Rabbi Moishe must have found something in the Talmud that suggested a solution to our lost library. I think he called up the angel, Metatron, and demanded that our library be filled with words of wisdom.

I believe this, for I believe that what the angel branded upon the forehead of poor Rabbi Moishe was no word, but The Word.

The Word which was spoken to begin the Creation.

It took us some time to puzzle this out, though, for none of us could read what was written there, and poor Rabbi Moishe could not tell us. Clever young Shaul found the references to the angel Metatron which the Rabbi had surely been reading. And it was the Rabbi himself who guessed what the angel had written -- though it took some time of pointing at the Torah for me to understand.

Fortunately, the Rabbi’s wife Ismaela was wise enough to stop us from giving him a mirror to see the brand of the Word.

Poor Shaul tried to trace what the angel had written, but his writing burst into flames. With luck, he will heal and may even regain the use of his hand.

It took us several days before anyone could begin to puzzle out the Word there. 

But, everyone reads it differently. To me, it appears to say “Wisdom”. Shaul instead reads it as “Love”. Young Elazar claimed it to be “Joy”, although when I teased him about whether he could now identify the letters, he was unduly grave.

I suppose angels have that effect on us all.

Little Metibel, the Rabbi’s daughter, told us that the word was “Butterfly.” It is unfortunate she was not born a son, for she would have made a fine student in the yeshiva.

The puzzle of the Word has so obsessed the yeshiva that much mischief has come of it.

Ismaela has become convinced that she can add up the letters of the Word, and divine its meaning by gematria. Metibel tells me her mother pesters the Rabbi so much that he has taken to locking himself in a closet to escape her. Ismaela now wanders about muttering that the numbers do not figure up.

Each day, instead of studying the Torah and the Talmud, we sit together and attempt to read the Word written on the Rabbi Moishe. Although we have had many good debates thereby, I think that the Rabbi has quite lost his patience for it. Particularly since he cannot participate, of course, being dumb and illiterate now.

The reason for the urgency of this letter, though, came yesterday. Enosh was convinced he had finally puzzled out the Word, and attempted to speak it.

Enosh will be missed.

Now Enosh’s father plans the mourning, while the mother has been at Rabbi Moishe ceaselessly. I suspect she wants him to call up the angel once more, and return her son to her.

My old friend and teacher, please advise me on what to do, for I have reached the end of my wisdom on this. 

Write swiftly,
Kaleb ben Esai

===Middleton State Hospital's Files on 'Scoots' Williams===

Walter Williams is called 'Scoots' by the orderlies who care for him. 

He lives in a small room at the Middleton State Hospital in Middleton, South Carolina.

Its not a terrible mental facility, but its not a good one. All of its employees are good people who do what they can. The cooks in the kitchen, to the orderlies and nurses, to the doctors and even Mrs. Goldberg, who runs the hospital, they all truly care.

Its a good thing, too, because the state of South Carolina gives Middleton State Hospital little money to work with.

Scoots is a favorite of the hospital. Doctors and nurses pay him regular visits, and there is always at least one orderly in his room.

Even Mrs. Goldberg visits him, on occasion.

The thing is, Scoots is never quite the same person twice. He plays chess, with one of the doctors, and three of the orderlies. Sometimes, he is excellent, other times, his opponent has to remind him how the horsey moves. Sometimes, he just looks at his opponent, and says "I will beat you in 12 moves." And he does.

Sometimes, he is open, and talkative, and smart, and charming. one nurse had to be let go because she begain sleeping with Scoots. No one blamed her though. Scoots could be very seductive when he wanted to.

Other times, he won't talk for weeks at a time.

During these times when he doesn't talk, he writes. Not words. He writes little squiggles and spirals, and happy faces, and other doodles.

He writes them in notebooks, or scraps of paper. If he runs out of paper, he'll write them on the walls. If the pens run out of ink, or the pencils break, he'll bite his thumb, and write in his own blood, or carve into the cheap walls with the empty pens, or broken bits of pencil.

The orderlies are careful to make sure he has enough paper, and enough pens.

Each line, each squiggle, and each picture is a book. No one knows how it works, but every little doodle he makes contains so much beauty, and so much information.

A small frowny-face, when looked at for only a second, might be Hamlet. A stick figure could be a complete set of the Encylopedia Brittanica, and a swirling line could be the collected works of Nietzsche.

No one at the Middleton State Hospital understands these doodles, but almost everyone reads them. 

Many orderlies know several languages, and every word of "the Prince" and "the Divine Comedy" from looking at a picture of a house, with a sun above it, and a stick figure family standing outside of it. 

One nurse went back to medical school, and aced all of her classes because of a series of randomly curving lines. She is a doctor now, working again at Middleton State Hospital.

Even though Mrs. Goldberg has these writings locked away, nearly everyone who regularly deals with Scoots has a copy of the key. 

Sometimes, the employees sneak some of these writings out of the hospital. Perhaps they want their children to learn Spanish, or they want their wives or husbands to read "Love in the Time of Cholera". This is rare; however, as the Middleton State Hospital's employees know that they cannot explain these writings to their families. And, frankly, their frightening.

Scoots has made the hospital into an odd family, by virtue of this strange and bizarre secret they all share. Mrs. Goldberg secretly hopes and dreads the coming of the day she will have to show these writings to someone outside of the hospital.

===The Hidden Library of RPG.net===

Some say it's only a rumor, others spend countless hours and days at their computer, trying in vain to find it.

It's actually not that hard to decode a thread if you know that somethings hidden in it. But where in the endless reaches of the many forums are the hidden messages? Has the last dying member of the nazi Thule Society encoded his occult secrets in a Call of Cthulhu thread, using the old enigma machine and a little phantasy?

Has the true assassin of John F. Kennedy already told the world about his legendary crime concealed in one of the boardgame reviews?

And what about the incident when a poster died in a collision with a Königstiger tank; some dare to say in hushed voices it was driven by the mysterious overlord of the boards only known as Cessna?

Has someone deciphered one thread too many?

They even say every time a post is made here, it will get copied to multiple secret facilities deep underground, to be preserved in case any gouvernment thinks an information hidden here is so dangerous that a nuclear strike against the server is the only awnser.