Another reason why
Normally, the feeding was Jenkins' task. Cassandra had the feeling, that the old man was actually quite fond of it. On the one hand, the Large Collection Annex (or, what they had rediscovered of it until now) was a long way off from the Annex, giving Jenkins some away-time from her and the others. On the other hand she always thought that the gruff old man liked having things around that were closer to his own age. Maybe, she thought, swapping the heavy bucket from one hand to the other, his own age didn't weight as much on him when he was around ancient things.
But today Jenkins was needed elsewhere, guarding the Back Door. They expected Flynn and Eve to be back every moment from a journey to Paris, retrieving an ancient ring of some famous person. Eve had said, that it was some kind of powerful relic, forcing people to obey its bearer whatever he might tell them to do, while Flynn seemed more interested in sight-seeing with his Guardian.
While they were gone, the Clippings Book had sent an urgent message, forcing Stone and Jones to team up and make a trip to Germany.
They forced Cassandra, who had just recovered from a bad cold, to stay behind. Stone had insisted on it and no matter what she said, he wouldn't change his mind. Jones, who normally never agreed with him, backed him up this time.
The redhead sighed. The bucket, which was wriggling with live fish, was getting heavier with every step she took.
Her life was even more crazy now then it was before and sometimes, she had trouble distinguish between what was real and what were hallucinations. What if everything around her only existed in her mind?
Cassandra, shaking her gloomy thoughts, passed the fake UFO and turned right.
After two more turns, she could see the large pool before her.
The water had a slightly blue-greenish hue. The color unsettled her every time she saw it, something did not seem right about it, like it was not entirely real. Like something else might be there that she could not see.
Then again, the inhabitant of the pool also wasn't supposed to be real or in the Library, for that matter. Maybe it was just the underwater lighting and some sort of algae, after all, the last cleaning of the pool had been quite some time ago. Cleaning it wasn't exactly an easy task.
She had accompanied Jenkins twice before, but she had never been here alone.
A sudden movement in the water caused her to flinch. This hadn't happened before. The other times, the animal had only appeared after Jenkins had flung the bucket's content into the pool.
At first, Cassandra could only discern a shadow, coming in her direction from the bottom of the pool, illuminated from the underside, then, slowly, a head, comparatively small, rose out of the water, attached to a very, very long neck.
Cassandra was frozen to the spot and only able to stare back at the huge beast, twice her own size, slowly swimming toward her. She could feel it intently staring at her with eyes that seemed far too knowing, too sapient, too awake to belong to an animal.
Cassie gripped the bucket tighter, took a deep breath and then said, just as Jenkins had told her to do: "Good morning, Nessie! Feeding time!"
The animal, hearing the familiar sequence of sounds, lowered it's gaze to the bucket in the woman's hands and halted a few meters from the edge of the pool. It was obviously waiting for her to start. She didn't dare to just empty the bucket into the water, because that way she would have to go nearer to the edge. Instead she grabbed one of the big, live fishes and threw it towards the plesiosaur.
As soon as the fish hit the water, the remnant of old times dived after it.
Cassandra, relieved to have escaped its gaze, was now able to empty the rest of the fishes into the pool.
She stayed for a little while, watching the dinosaur hunting down the fishes.
Suddenly a thought struck her. She couldn't help herself and started laughing: If anyone had told her a year ago that she would feed the Loch Ness Monster, would work in a Library containing magical objects and save the world at least twice every week, she would have laughed too, but for entirely different reasons.
Maybe, she mused, this was another reason why Jenkins liked feeding the live creatures in the Library: Because they made it all appear more real somehow. A three-meter-beast really was hard to ignore.
The smell of fish on Cassandras hand was definitely real as well.
On her way back Cassie realised that Jenkins must have noticed her mood and sent her on her own to the pool to help her get over it.
So, when she returned to the Annex, she gave the old man a quick hug and was not surprised as he warmly hugged her back.
A/N: After watching "The Curse of the Judas Chalice" yesterday, I just had to write something about Nessie. I do know she is not supposed to be a plesiosaur, (… well. She is not supposed to be real, either...) but who cares what a bunch of scientists say?
The Librarians, oddly enough, certainly don't.
I hope you liked this one!