The Library

The Library

A new batch of missions sure stirred up business in the Library; they had not seen this much action in months. The one request after the other came in. Although troublesome to the administration branch, the high demand for services was a good sign for the mercenary branch. Liaison, a manager in the mercenary branch, had been awake for two days straight. That showed;

Liaison was the man who had written the missions and his streak of not sleeping had become more apparent with every paper he put up. People had began to avoid him (not very hard because you could often hear him cursing from two blocks away.)

Sadly for one of his secretaries; she could not avoid the cranky forty year old man. She appeared to be very busy with paperwork, when Liaison came in, but that didn't stop him.

“Sweet mother of mercy. Look at this!” He grumbled as he threw another batch of papers on her desk. “These came in just now after yesterday. If this keeps up, I'll be going on missions!”

His secretary barely looked up, mumbled “Yes, sir.” And tried to hide by focusing on her tasks, but Liaison hadn't come just to complain.

“Are those last missions from yesterday taken yet?” He demanded to know.

“The last five have been taken, all mercenaries have left recently. I have their forms here.” She took the mission sign up's and passed them to her boss.

“Well good,” Liaison mumbled as he looked over them. “When the dogs come home I'll have more for them. Don't let them slack off, I'm going to bed.”

”Yes, sir.” The secretary replied; too afraid to laugh at her boss, even after he had walked out of his office. She pitied the mercenaries, but not as much as she pitied herself as she looked at the new forms; today was going to take overtime again.

Cargo Retrieval

It was a hot day; especially near the tracks. The mercenaries that had taken the Cargo Retrieval mission must have been sweating. They stood near the Highland Tracks; soon they were going to board a moving train. It moved many valuable ores; manite, essential to the creation of mana-ran engines. An unknown band of thieves had taken the train and were heading this way. It wouldn't be long now...

Codename: Midsummer Explosion

Olivia Town was experiencing the day just like any other; unaware of the dangerous explosives hidden somewhere in the city. The director of Midsummer & co. however, was shivering in his boots; anxious for the arrival of the mercenaries he had hired. The Library was Max Midsummer's last resort; would they not be able to track down the lost experiment thousands of deaths could be his responsibility...

All of a sudden the elevator doors opened and Max was stunned in shock; the mercenaries! He sat behind his desk, invited the people to come closer.

The X-files

The mercenaries walked down the pier, looking for the mysterious man with the mysterious package. It was busy at the pier and many eyes were on them; after all not many strangers came to a small port town like Paggio. The contractor had been very secretive about the mission and had requested utmost care, it wasn't unlikely the same instructions were given to the one that had to deliver the package to the Library... It would not be easy to find him with so many eyes following them!

Great Spring Cleaning

The insects would get to them long before they reached their assigned post, it seemed. The constant buzzing and biting, the sound of birds chirping away in the distance -- the heat of the forest was no picnic either. Well, all in a days work for the good ol’ boys down in the mercenary ranks of the Library right? Some other mercs fucked up, and now they were on clean up duty, at least they were paid damn well to be the B-Team to the A-Team’s screw ups. But when they got there, could they handle what they found?

Dragons in the Dunes

Fucking Dragons! Can you believe it? They sent the mercs to hunt down a damn dragon, in the desert, the dragons PLAYGROUND. They must have pissed off an higher up to get stuck with this crappy job. Oh well, you can never keep down a good mercenary, and these guys weren’t about to be the ones to fail. Hell, if they survived this damn mission, what could the library possibly throw at them next? Even the heat of the desert couldn’t keep down these good ol’ boys, and if a burrowing dragon can’t, well then, the Library would have to pull them out of whatever doghouse they kept them in and teach them some respect. But, of course, they’d have to actually survive, first.

Great Spring Cleaning

"So what do you guys think went wrong? Monsters, holders, traps?"

What had happened in the forest, Lux had no idea and he would theorise about anything that happened to the mercs before them as long as it kept him from worrying about the bug bites. He considered electrically charging himself with Thunder Spear, but fortunately his sanity prevented him from a suicidal action like that.

"My money is on the mosquitoes."

Great Spring Cleaning

Daniel raised his arm to wipe the perspiration from his head; unlike his companions he found himself suffering from an entirely different dilemma. Which was worse, to continue wearing full body and his cloak and suffer the near unbearable heat it created or to remove it and be forced to deal with the army of insects laying waste to the other team members. Considering there expressions, he could probably last a few more minutes or an hour.

“Can’t say which way id’ be leaning Will, I'd have to say it depends on the type of monster or human. There’s also still a slim possibility that the first team is alive, could be there mission required them to stay here past their original deadline they reported they’d return by. Considering our options and the fact we could literally be facing anything capable of taking out a team of holder's we should probably try and meet up with the witness’s that reported them in the first place, in fact it seems a bit odd that they bothered to report this group at all. And Lux, think you could create you’re, um, ice mist and kill off a few thousand’s of these pest or at least drive them off? On the bright side if it is the mosquitoes then I guess you’re prepared to kill them by the thousands then.”

For perhaps the seventh time, Aven tapped the back of another shady looking man he hoped was the supposed contractor. Without even turning to look him, the man took off at blinding speed, as if Aven had threatened him with his life. "Another miss?", muttered Aven. He cursed his luck, this was far from the easy mission he was expecting. Ensuring the successful transfer of some package from Paggio back to the intel department. The idea that the Library had to send three holders for such a trivial task perplexed him.

Or maybe they had withheld information during the briefing and unspeakable dangers lay ahead of his team. Right, and pigs could fly. Aven sighed, he was thinking too much. They probably sent three just as a formality as the contents of the package were supposedly really important. A little over half an hour had passed since he split with his companions, within that time they had probably scoured through the whole pier; it wasn't that large anyway. If they hadn't encountered the contractor yet, chances were that he wasn't in Paggio.

Speaking of his companions, Aven knew next to nothing about them. Adeline Tourret, Knight and Andre Jackson, Rook. It had only been a year since he was officially allowed to take up missions which allowed him to acquaint himself with a good number of holders. It would be his first time undertaking one with these two though. Aven placed his hands into his pockets as he waited in front of the inn they agreed to regroup at, casually whistling a tune as he observed the mundane actions of the town's residents.

This was his next best choice, Ramza thought. He'd read the papers over and over again back in the Library. Took too long to consider on which mission to sign up for. The first that came to his mind was doing those letter delivery job. Seemed easy enough for his rank within the company but there's already takers. Besides, he didn't think such a job would require more than the pair of mercenary. Cursed his selfish spirit being. He could've taken something more exciting than doing some chores if whatever that resided within him would just emerge like how the majority of the holders had. He could've taken that dragon mission or complete that task the batch before them failed to complete.

Finally, after months of hanging around in the intelligence department, Ramza learnt something about these spirit bearers. He'd taken some tests himself and it was confirmed that his blood shared the same unique pattern these holders had. But it's frustrating not to fully communicate with the blasted thing. He'd dreamt about it though. A winged creature terrorizing a village or something. He'd even heard it spoke to him once.

Bah! Best not dwell on such things! There's more important task to do now than to worry about some creature... which might not lend me it's strength to protect myself for who knows how long.

Ramza had wished it was that easy to brush aside. What if it decided not to appear at all? He shook his head and stared straight ahead as the lift opened. Orion Brenton was the other holder who'd signed up for this mission as well. They'd left the Library earlier that day and headed out to Olivia Town as soon as possible. The risk was too high and there's no time for sight seeing. Having skimmed through the profile of his partner, Ramza thought that he couldn't have gotten a better partner.

Fight fire with fire.

When comes to worst, at least he could hide behind Orion and escape the explosion. Ramza sighed. Just how could something so deadly fall into the hands of a bunch of thieves? Then again, as a thief himself, he did find the idea kind of exciting. So much power within one's hand. Ramza stepped forward as the man behind the desk beckoned them closer.

"Orion.." he glanced over his shoulder. "..would you please do the questioning? Don't forget to ask about the video footage as well.."he said before turning to the nervous man before him.

Andre huffed a ring of smoke from the cigarette he's been smoking ever since he's arrived to the town. He thought the mission this time would be a quick one, what with three holders going for a retrieval. The Library had ordered them to remain inconspicuous during the mission however and he feared that that would be the harder part of the mission right now with all the town people giving him the eye. He was glad that he took different route to enter the city, if this was an action done when a stranger visited a town, going into the town in a single group would incredibly limit their options.

He recalled the mission briefing as he headed to the inn he and the other two holders agreed to regroup in after they tried to contact the contractor. The orders were simple find the contractor, get the document, deliver it to Intel without any of them know what's inside. Perhaps he was wrong when he thought that this would be easy, after all, the contractor hadn't been seen and he began to wonder if there were some things the Library forgot to tell them. Andre shrugged the thought, even if they weren't told the entire thing, completing the mission was what he was trained to do and he planned to do just so. He put down and throw his cigarette away sometime before reaching the inn where he spotted one of the other holder, Aven if he wasn't mistaken. He tugged his tie a little as he approached the pawn holder, "Any luck on your end?"

The town gave off an lonely and hostile aura. Rows of drab houses lined the streets, interconnected by a twisting maze of alleyways. Afraid of the darkness of the shadows, Adeline hurried down the largest path she could see towards the Portsmouth Inn where she would meet her teammates. Adeline wore a faded grey coat over her equally boring t-shirt and knee-length black skirt. Her legs were covered with brown stockings with large leather travelling boots. It gave her a sufficiently boring appearance that blended well with the town, although the local residents still gave her wary glances when she got too close. Adeline didn't try to look for the contractor; she surmised that the other two holders would probably finish the job regardless of what she did.

Adeline took this job only because it was easy. She had to take a minimum amount of missions to keep up her reputation as a member of the Library, whether she liked it or not. The mercenary branch was also short of personnel to deal with the sudden pile of requests over the last few weeks.

"I hope the guys have already found him," Adeline muttered as she continued her brisk walk. The inn was soon in sight, and two guys who were obviously not local residents stood near the entrance.

Aven easily spotted Andre from a distance, the fact that Andre's clothes stood out like a sore thumb helped. Judging from his expression, his teammate was probably unsuccessful in his search. The fact that he was alone and empty handed also hinted at this. Aven cut his whistling short as his companion opened his mouth to speak.

"Any luck on your end?"

Aven shook his head, "That damned contractor is either a man who takes caution way too seriously or is an extremely tardy person." There was a slight hint of annoyance in his words. Paggio was small, cramped and dirty. The wind stung and the salty air made even breathing uncomfortable. All this together with the fact that their contractor was missing made the day extremely unpleasant.

Aven was about to continue the conversation when he noticed their last member approaching them, a short and rather irritated looking girl walking briskly. "I guess that makes three duds", Aven said dryly. He greeted her with a simple nod before proceeding to voice his thoughts. "I highly doubt we missed the contractor but we should probably search one more time, just in case", began Aven, who paused briefly before continuing again. "If we're still unsuccessful then we should take a break. I don't know about you guys but I'm hungry."

"Tell me, oh Arthur, why do we have to go through this? Why isn't the world fair enough, so that those who are pure of heart would live in peace? Is the world really such a corrupted place, that those like me, and like you, are to fight for the longest time in order to vanish evil from the land? Tell me, oh Arthur, wielder of the sword of swords."

"You shall not think too much about this, Lady Salia. The world was never a fair place. But that is why people like us exist. So that we may bring the world a fraction closer to being as fair as people would deserve. Now, let us rest. We need to be in full strength if we are to tackle your next mission with good chances of succeeding. Be my master, and I will be your sword. Rest assured."

Salia closed her eyes, and tried not to think too hard about the next mission she was to face. Soon, she was falling asleep between the silky sheets of her bed. That was one thing the Library had; while its rooms were not luxurious, they were comfortable enough. "Stop calling me 'lady', like that, Arthur. Why would you do that anyway...?" Salia spoke, her voice revealing she was half-asleep already."That is the term we use with women who deserve the highest respect in my land." Arthur, King Arthur in fact. He was the ruler of a kingdom of old times. Not just any kingdom, but a kingdom from another world. How he came to be her spirit, Salia did not know. "You are in my world now, Arthur. And when we trust someone, we simply use their name, to show our proximity. Understood?"

Salia had read a lot, as it was to be expected from someone who lived in the Library. She had learned a lot of stories from old times, when the knights were a commong sight. At first she was curious to know if she would find Arthur's kingdom. But it was soon obvious she would not find it. Therefore, she had come to love those times, with the nobility and their stories. However, she was not part of it, nor wished to be called 'lady' in such a way. "Of course... Salia". In the end, the girl fell asleep, and so Arthur came to guard her mind for the time being.

"Such heat... why did I accept a mission on these terms? I mean, not just taking care of the mission but also supervising what the other two do... not like I'm above them anyway" It took a good while, but Salia finally arrived to the town. It was a rather backwater place, but it had its charm. Salia knew she could come to like it. So this mission was about getting some stolen goods back, and making sure they didn't explode? What was that, a bomb? Salia didn't like things that could possibly explode. It meant they'd have to be extremely careful with it, and an added danger is always bad.

A sweatdrop went down Salia's temple. "But it really is hot in here..." She was also supposed to work with these other two people who were supposed to be speaking with Mr.Midsummer. Apparently, one used to be a thief and the other one had the profile of a diplomat... interesting combination. With her aboard, that would make them look like the odd trio around. Her orders were clear about not having to go inside until her partners were to leave the building. Salia was worried the library was planning to keep information hidden from her. After all, she'd have to trust those two in whatever they said, or she would not be able to help at all. Could she trust anybody else, other than herself?