Chapter Two: The Rivers let me sail downstream where I pleased.
Disclaimers: Underworld and BtVS are so not mine. This chapter does take a few elements from the movies Wings of Desire and City of Angels, but only slightly. The Seattle Central Library is a real place. Definitely Wikipedia it to get a feel for the amazing architecture. And the title of the story and chapters is taken from Arthur Rimbaud's poem, The Drunken Boat.
Summary: "I was under the impression we were to make sure important people didn't get hit by cars or crushed by falling boulders. This is decidedly more voyeuristic."
A/N: This story has truly taken over my brain at the moment and will probably consist of about five chapters. Please let me know what you think!
"We're at a library?"
Tara looked over at her companion and had to fight a grin at his glower directed towards the building.
"Yes, a library," she said. "Surely in all your years you've graced a library with your presence. Possibly even used a card catalogue?"
Lucian transferred his glower to Tara.
"Yes. I've been inside libraries," he said. "However, they were usually dark and filled with scrolls and not quite this..."
He squinted at the building again.
"Shiny," he finished.
"Well, looks like you're about to have another new experience," she said with a grin. "Come on, we need to get inside."
Lucian looked apprehensively at the structure and then followed Tara. The building in question was the Seattle Central Library. It stood eleven stories high, a monument of glass and steel and was not at all the type of building Lucian would have called a library.
But, as he was finding out, most of his preconceived notions were out of place. The world had continued to advance in ways he was only now becoming truly aware of. The only time he'd ever looked at the progress made in science or engineering was to judge it's usefullness for his campaign. It was a rude awakening to see just how much the world had changed.
But lately all his awakenings are rude ones. And while he probably couldn't ask for a more patient companion (partner?) than Tara, he still had trouble reconciling his old life with his new (un)life.
"Are we just going to wander in?" he asked Tara as they approached the library. Tara stopped and looked over at him. People walked past her as though she didn't exist. They didn't move through her as such, they just made a slight diversion to avoid running into her. Lucian could feel the heat of the humans as they brushed past him as well.
"Well, that depends," she said. "Do you want to try jumping in?"
Lucian looked at her and then again at the building. He saw a floor plan on a nearby information kiosk and walked over to study it. Tara followed.
"If we jump into this corridor here," he pointed to a service hallway. "We would most likely be alone and not land on anyone."
He finished with a tinge of irritation in his tone. Tara had to bite back her grin, but he caught it.
"Not one word," he warned her.
"Of course not," she said. "I wouldn't dare."
"It was only the once," he went on.
"Yes, yes absolutely," she agreed seriously. "I promise not to say anything."
He nodded and looked back at the floor plan.
"It was just the most spectacular shriek I've ever heard someone make," Tara said absently. "And I didn't know that old ladies could move that fast or have such accurate aim."
Lucian growled and with a glare at the young woman by his side he abruptly vanished. Tara allowed a full smile to surface on her face and then vanished after him.
For the most part, Lucian had taken to his new status as Guardian with minimal complaint. He delighted (secretly, of course) in the fact that he could come and go quickly in the daytime and the night. Tara and he had spent countless hours figuring out how to teleport or 'jump' from place to place. It took an amount of concentration and discipline and all those centuries of willing his transformations was coming in very handy. Once they figured out that they could easily 'lock' onto the other's position, they could keep up with each other extremely well. The time he wasn't with Tara, he found he was free to come and go as he wished. Time seemed to just pass around him like a current of water and he was trying to get used to the notion of existing without the driving force of vengeance behind him.
They walked quietly through the library. Lucian took in all the activity around him. People of all ages reading, writing typing away on computers, the building was filled with a peaceful, industrious hum. He heard Tara sigh contentedly next to him. He glanced over at her and fought the urge to smile at the look on her face.
"You're right at home aren't you?" he murmured as they approached an escalator that would take them to the level Tara had mentioned.
She looked over at him with a small smile. "I spent most of my life in libraries or immersed in a book of one kind or another. So yes, this is my kind of place."
They arrived on the floor where the so-called Book Spiral began. Lucian looked at the bookshelves that stretched and winded their way above his head. He shook his head once again at all he had missed.
"They're supposed to be around here somewhere," Tara said softly. She started walking up the sloping walkway. Lucian followed, his eyes open and senses keen. Lucian still wasn't quite sure how Tara received the 'assignments', but for the first time in his life, he felt content to follow instead of lead.
"Ah," Tara said as she spotted something. She stopped and turned to face the bookshelf. She then took a book off the shelf and started to read. "It's the young man over there with the blue shirt on."
Lucian leaned against the shelf next to her and took in their assignment.
He was really just a boy, no more than sixteen according to the information Tara had shared with him earlier. The boy was currently sitting at a desk, books piled in front of him and writing furiously in a notebook.
"So, what," Lucian said softly. "We wait here and watch his back and keep him safe?"
"Actually," Tara said. "He's not in danger. He just needs to meet someone."
Lucian looked at her in disgust. "What? We aren't saving him from anything?"
"Nope," she said calmly leafing through what appeared to be a book on theoretical physics. "Soon, a girl will walk over and need a place to sit down. We have to make sure she sits at his table."
"That's all?" Lucian asked. "I thought we were Guardians, not yentas!"
"Shh!" Tara shushed him. "Part of the job is making sure things happen. It's not all big battles and confrontations."
"Apparently," he grumbled.
"Do you know how much often rests upon the smallest of details?" Tara looked at him with a slight glare. "Did you know that supposedly the beginning of World War I may have hinged upon the wrong turn of Franz Ferdinand's driver? What do you suppose could have been prevented if he had turned in the other direction?"
She turned back to her book. Lucian looked back at the young man as he studied. The lycan frowned and slumped a little. His attention was then caught by the arrival of a young woman with short blonde hair. She seemed to be looking for something. Lucian nudged Tara.
"I think she's here," he said. Tara looked up and watched the girl as she weaved around some people and looked for an empty space at a table. Tara frowned when she noticed that the boy's books had spilled over into the space in front of the empty chair opposite him. She handed Lucian the book she was holding and walked casually over to the boy's table. Lucian watched her as Tara 'accidently' knocked one of the boy's books off the table and onto the floor. To the boy's eyes, it appeared as though the book had just fallen all on it's own. Tara walked back over to stand next to Lucian and they watched as the boy scrambled to pick it up. As he surfaced, the blonde girl had arrived to stand next to the empty chair. The boy's eyes widened as she said something. He grinned and gestured for her to sit down. The girl smiled gratefully and took a seat.
Tara casually took her book back from Lucian and opened it up again.
Lucian looked from her to the two sitting at the table. He noticed that they were now trying to glance surreptitiously at the other. Lucian frowned and crossed his arms over his chest.
"Now what?" he asked.
"Now, we wait and we watch a little," Tara said.
The two Guardians stood while the pair in front of them studied and flirted silently.
"You know," Lucian said in a low, irritated tone after a few minutes. "I was under the impression we were to make sure important people didn't get hit by cars or crushed by falling boulders. This is decidedly more voyeuristic."
"Don't be silly. It is not," Tara said. She looked thoughtful for a moment. "If they were shagging on the table, then you could probably label it as voyeurism. But they're just sitting there."
Lucian rolled his eyes.
"This is the most critical point for them," she continued. "That moment when meeting someone and determining if they could be your friend or perhaps more at some point. It was very important for the two of them to meet. They need to become friends."
"Friends?" Lucian said. "Only friends? What good does that do either of them?"
Tara stared at him and then asked. "Lucian, when was the last time you had a friend? And I mean a friend, not a minion or a soldier or even a lover. A friend."
Lucian opened his mouth to scoff at her and found his mind completely blank.
"Hunh," he said eloquently. Tara just looked at him smugly and went back to her book.
"That proves nothing," he said grumpily. "I was busy you know. I hardly had time for flirtations and, and that."
He waved a hand in the direction of the table.
"Mmmhmm, and now you're dead and you have all the time in the world, so what's the problem?" she asked.
"What, are you offering to be my friend?" he asked in disbelief.
"Well, I was," Tara said pensively. "Now I'm not so sure."
She smirked at him over her book.
Lucian felt extremely out of his depth. He had already accepted the fact that Tara was now his partner and held the reins, so to speak, as far as their assignments went.
However, she did have a point. He was dead and what was death but the next great adventure and all that, so...
"Fine. I would be delighted to accept your friendship," he said formally.
The smile Tara gave him made him feel warm in a way he was sure he'd never felt before.
"Why Lucian," she said happily. "I'm delighted to hear that."
He nodded and turned his attention back to the table. The boy was currently leaning over the table to point something out to the girl. She was listening carefully and they began debating back and forth.
"Well," Tara said. "That's that."
"What?" Lucian said sounding confused. "You mean that's all?"
"All we had to do was make sure they had a chance to meet," she said putting her book back on the shelf. "The rest is pretty much up to them."
Lucian looked at Tara seriously and asked, "Who are they? Do you know?"
"I wasn't told the specifics," she said. "I never am. But they look important don't they?"
They looked at the couple and Lucian took in their young, ordinary features and characteristics, like the shoelace that come untied on the boy's shoe and the slight frizz to the girl's hair.
"A left turn instead of a right one," he murmured. Tara nodded in agreement.
"Alright then," he said. "Where next, Milady?"
They began walking down the passageway towards the escalator.
"Well, there is supposedly a very rare metoer shower taking place that is only visible in the Arctic Circle?" Tara offered.
"Meteors?" Lucian asked in disbelief. "All of the world at your fingertips and you want to watch rocks fall into our atmosphere?"
Tara rolled her eyes. "What do you suggest?"
"I was thinking of stopping in Budapest," Lucian said. "Seeing how Michael and Selene are getting on."
"Didn't you do that yesterday?" she asked. "It's not good to linger on the living you know?"
"Fine, fine," he said. "What else have you got?"
"We-ell, we could practice your jumping again. See how many old ladies you can manage to land on in an hour?" she said with a teasing grin.
Tara vanished quickly with a laugh just as Lucian lunged for her. He disappeared after her instantly.
The library continued to hum with life in the wake and the couple at the table continued to talk.