Chapter Text
The landline on the counter began to ring, a loud interruption to Lysander's quiet morning. Phone calls were not a part of Lysander's pre-work routine, but due to the rare nature of this event, Lysander allowed it. He finished tying his hair back before answering the phone.
"Hello?," he asked.
The voice that came through the receiver was warm and kind, one he had not heard in a long time. "Hello nephew! I had some trouble finding your number, damn this new technology, but lucky me, I found it! So, how are you getting along these days?"
"Uncle Henry? Wow, uh, hi… good! Sorry, things are good! H-How are you?" Lysander hadn't heard from his uncle in months, likely closer to a year, at least. He had a habit of calling like he talked to you only yesterday, picking up conversations that had been finished for ages.
"Splendid! Absolutely wonderful, dear boy. Now," Henry took a breath, "I believe you have a special day approaching, don't you?"
"I mean, my birthday-"
"Quite right, boy, quite right!" Henry's smile could be felt through the phone, and Lysander couldn't help but smile a bit himself. "Your mother, bless her soul," he continued, "told me how lonely she thinks you've been over there by yourself, so I decided to try my best and remedy that! She's the one that gave me your information, by the way, so don't go blaming ol' Henry!"
"R-remedy… what?," Lysander faltered. "Uncle, what do you mean-"
"Ah, so sorry dear boy, unfortunately, I need to be off!" Henry sounded far away as he spoke before he came back to the receiver. "Work has been nothing but busy, busy, busy, you know, never-ending things to be done. I'm afraid I must go. Good luck!"
The dial tone hummed in Lysander's ear, echoing in his skull for a moment before he put the receiver down. Odd one, his uncle.
Knocks pounded on the door just as the thoughts behind his uncle's strange call began to turn. Such an odd thing to say, but he supposed odd meant normal for Henry. He had always been a little odd by society's standards; he loved to spend more time with his mechanical creations than he did with his own family, but he always made time for Lysander. When he was young, Henry was around a lot more often, and he was always trying to rub his liking for technology off onto him, although it never stuck. Now Henry was busy with his rather large tech company, and from what Lysander understood, said company had become very popular over the last few years.
Upon opening the door, all Lysander could think was 'What impeccable timing that man has…' What he could only assume to be his early birthday present sat on the doorstep; a large rectangular box, one that proved to be quite heavy as he pushed and pulled the thing inside, with a minimalistic, circular sticker of a bear with a top hat stamped on the top. By the time he got the box somewhere out of the way, he was out of breath and sweating a little. The word FazCo was printed around the sticker, a name that rang faint bells in his head as he looked at it. Lysander could've sworn he had heard that before…
No matter. Lysander's kitchen clock read 10:30, which meant he had 15 minutes before he had to leave for work. Henry's gift would have to wait.
The clock above the library's front desk struck 11:00 just as Lysander bustled through the front doors. Michael Schmidt promptly removed his feet from the desk once he saw his boss approach. He checked his own watch before saying, "Not a minute behind, Lye. Never a minute behind, either. Are you allergic to being late, or do you just not have a life outside of work?"
Michael was in his mid 20's but acted like he was a teenager: you could usually find him with his phone glued to his hand and his head bent over the screen no matter where he was, quick to insult anything different than him. His shaggy dark brown hair framed his slender face well, but Lysander constantly had to remind himself that despite his actions, Michael was in fact a functioning adult. Although, functioning was a bit of a stretch.
Lysander smiled ruefully as he hung his bag and coat up, the warmer library climate negating the material's necessity. "Some of us actually enjoy our employment, Mr. Schmidt," Lysander replied. "The enjoyment coming from the act of being employed as well as the job itself, of course." Lysander took his seat next to Michael, just like he did every day, and wiped the counter where Micheal's shoes had been, like he did every day. "Michael," he sighed, "if you are going to put your feet up, do so in the break lounge, please."
"Sure thing, Lye," Michael said. This request was made daily, and daily Michael ignored it.
The atmosphere around the desk was calm and quiet, just as one would expect a library to be: keys could be heard clacking in the computer lab, whispers came floating by from the study area, and excited giggles followed by a kind, "Inside voices, kids," echoed from the children's section. In other words, a perfectly normal day.
The library was a tall, brick building, with a domed glass ceiling at the very top, and it stood behind a busy street, tucked away with cherry trees that bloomed beautifully in the spring time. During the summer, the library hosted what they called "Starry Night", where children were invited to learn about Post-Impressionist painters, such as Van Gogh, Seurat, and Chigot, during the day and to stay the night under the dome to learn about the constellations. Double spiral stairs led to the second floor and an elevator stood next to the front desk for those who needed it. The floor was checkered with marble almost entirely, the exceptions being the computer lab, study rooms, and children's section which were covered in nylon carpet.
"So, have you upgraded your dinosaur yet?," Michael asked. His own smartphone zz zzzed, and he made quick work of checking the screen before placing the object back in his pocket.
Lysander frowned and pulled out his own phone: a blue flip phone that had to be dated by at least 10 years. "This dinosaur works just fine, thank you very much," he said. He flipped the phone open and began to browse through the days emails. Michael leaned over to watch and sighed, shaking his head. "Lye, dude, you can't even text on that thing. Don't you want-"
"No, I do not. I am perfectly happy with my phone the way it is, thank you." Lysander did not care for modern day technology, not for anything he didn't need anyway. The smartest thing he held in his home was his television, and even that was only used to watch DVDs. "Besides, it's too complicated for me. I like my phone. It's simple and it does what I need it to."
Michael rolled his eyes. "If you say so. I'm just saying you could get a smart watch or something, at least."
A patron then came up to their desk and placed several books before them. Lysander smiled at them and gazed at the titles as he scanned their library card. 'The Name of the Wind by Patrick Rothfuss. The Silence of the Lambs by Thomas Harris. The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas. Very excellent choices, I must say.' He scanned each one into the system, prepped the stamp with the return date, and marked each book. When he finished, Lysander slid the books back to the awaiting customer. "Excellent selection. Some of my favorite stories," he smiled. The customer beamed at their choices and thanked Lysander before they left.
"How is it you can work a computer even though you don't own one?"
Lysander bristled. "I am not completely incompetent with technology, I'll have you know. I just don't see the need in having one in my home, especially when I can visit our lovely library anytime I need and use any number of our computers."
"Whatever you say, Lye. Gotta get with the times eventually, though."
Lysander did not think so, but he knew talking about it any further with Michael would only prove to give him a headache, so he let the conversation drop. He had work he needed to do anyway.
"Have any of yesterday's drop-offs been checked in?"
"Nope," Michael shook his head and began to scroll on his phone. "Been too busy."
The library sat still.
Lysander sighed and stood, "I'm sure." He left Michael to his own devices at the front desk and headed for the drop-off room.
The room was set near the library's entrance, and was a small, uncomfortable space: the drop-off slot was etched into the right wall with a canvas roller below it, full after the previous day's drops; shelves lined with miscellaneous cleaning supplies stood on the left wall, brooms and dust mops and mop buckets propped against them. Wafts of must and fruit-scented cleaning supplies drifted about the room. Why anyone would establish this as a broom closet as well as a book drop-off, Lysander would never understand. Such things were before his time here.
Lysander pushed the canvas cart out of the suffocating room, huffing as he wheeled it into the nearby storage closet. This room held more carts, the kind Lysander would use to re-shelve the books and movies brought back to the library. In his mind, the best method was to remove everything from the canvas cart, sort it alphabetically, and then re-shelve the items in that same order. Ideally, this task would involve multiple people to divide the work equally.
Lysander was not in an ideal situation.
So he steadied himself instead and set to work. Movies were set to one side, books to the other. Only books and movies were allowed in the drop-off slot, due to the other items offered at the library being too fragile to be slid into the drop, but Lysander would still find crumpled magazines and chipped CD cases from time to time. The CDs especially made him sad; it was already rare to see the discs checked out and rarer still to see them returned in one piece. Should any of the items left in the drop-off be unusable, Lysander would remove them from the library's catalogue and take them home. Magazines made for a good break between books and sometimes the CDs were only a little scratched. Plenty of use still left in them. Any other items Lysander found were placed into their own pile.
Before long, Lysander had emptied the cart, and the respective movie and book piles had grown to the size of anthills. A smaller anthill had also formed, one of miscellaneous items, most namely a paperclip, a pen, and a small collected wad of gum wrappers. Lysander pocketed the paperclip and pen. The silver wad was tossed.
Now began the task of alphabetizing the two piles to be properly put back. 'Frankenstein, then Halloween, then Scream. Someone must've been getting into the Halloween spirit, my goodness. I don't think I've seen any of these films, nor do I think I could stomach them.' Lysander thought about the films he did enjoy and decided these horror films would not be joining his current film collection any time soon. Once he finished his sorting of the movies, onto the cart they went, and next came the books.
As tedious of a task as this was, Lysander did not mind it. It was time consuming, yes, but it involved organizing his beloved library, and he couldn't think of a better way to spend his time. Besides, it beat hearing Michael drone on and on about modern day technology and how Lysander should adapt to the new tech world and didn't he want the latest phone no he did not want the latest phone his phone suited him just well and so did his television and his DVDs and his CDs and his manual coffee maker and his regular refrigerator and everything else in his home.
Lysander knew Michael didn't mean any harm, but the conversation got exhausting day after day. What was so wrong with the way he lived his life? Ever since he was young, Lysander never cared for the latest tech. He was too busy reading his way through the same library he now worked at. If the modern world didn't require it, Lysander thought he wouldn't have a phone at all. His movies and music he would still keep, of course, whenever he needed a break from the pages of a book, but he would prefer to be without all the other technology.
With the books now sorted, Lysander loaded them onto the cart with movies and began the last part of this multi-faceted task: putting them all back. He brought the roller cart out of the closest and pushed it into the heart of the library. The movies were first, put back with relative ease, before Lysander moved on to the books. Aisle by aisle, books were slotted back into their respective places, and as per usual, the task of re-shelving books proved more time-consuming than should be necessary; for every book put back from the cart, there were at least three more on the shelf that were in the incorrect place. Lysander brought those down to a separate shelf on his cart to be dealt with later, hopefully by someone other than himself, although he knew the odds of that to be slim. Once the drop-off books were shelved, Lysander pushed his cart to the front desk.
Michael was still on his phone, although without a line in front of him, to his credit. "Michael," Lysander said, "could you shelve these books, please? I found these while re-shelving the drop-offs-"
"Why can't you do it?," Michael asked without looking up.
"Because I am asking you to," Lysander supplied. "It would do you some good to walk around, seeing as how you haven't had the time to do so."
Michael's head rolled on his shoulders to glare at Lysander. All Lysander did was grin.
"Fine," Michael sighed, "okay, you're right. I'll shelve the books."
"Thank you, Michael," Lysander smiled at the man as he began to take the cart back into the library.
After he left, Lysander took his previous seat at the front desk just as a small crowd of people come to check out. 'No wonder he was "so busy", no one wanted to approach while he was here!' Drums beat behind Lysander's eyes but he did his best not to let his aggravation show to his patrons. People rarely came to libraries anymore as it was and Lysander was not trying to drive away those few who still deemed them important. So he put on his best smile as he checked each of them out, complimenting their choices as he did and encouraging them to come back again soon.
The rest of his day was spent like that, checking books out as well as giving the occasional direction. At some point Michael had come back, said he was going on his break, and swiftly left again. How someone could seem so displeased about working here as Michael did, Lysander would never understand: there was so much to enjoy about working in the library!
When Michael finally did return, it was time for Lysander to go home. "And you're sure you've got it covered?," he asked.
"Of course," Michael waved him off. "I've been doing night shifts my entire adult life. I've got this covered."
"Thankfully we close at eight. No need for you to play security tonight, Michael."
Michael shrugged as he took his seat, "Just keeping an eye on things. You never know what could happen."
Lysander shook his head but grabbed his articles without another word on the matter. If Michael chose to stay overnight to play security guard, that was of his own volition. He knew the city didn't pay for overtime, as much as Lysander wished they did. Lysander wrapped his scarf around his neck, mentally preparing to leave his warm library and start on the dreadful walk home. This was the only part of his day he didn't like.
"Well," Lysander said, "have a good night. Try not to stay too late."
"Go do something fun for once, Lye! See you tomorrow!" Michael shouted at Lysander's back. The blonde cringed and shot Michael a glare and Michael's grin and wave disappeared as Lysander began the walk home.
Walking home was something Lysander usually enjoyed; it allowed him to clear his mind from any of the day's stressors (though if he were honest, Michael was the biggest and often the only stressor) and get some much needed fresh air. The only downside was the weather. This evening was the coldest yet, the wind blowing right through Lysander's coat and scarf. Cars and buses passed him by, drivers snuggled in their warm clothes and warm vehicles. Lysander envied them.
Shivering past shops and banks, Lysander saw a billboard posted above a particularly elegant bank building. The board had a familiar bear-shape placed in the corner, and the words FazCo Industries spread across the top. Robots of different colors and shapes stood posed under the words, a few being in the shape of animals. It took Lysander a moment to realize that he saw the same symbol on the package from his uncle earlier this morning.
Under the robots read, "Let your wildest dreams come true. Buy your New Friend from FazCo today!"
"Oh, please tell me he didn't," Lysander gaped.
Despite the cold, he hurried the rest of his way home.
When he opened his door, he saw the package still sitting where he left it. Funny to think it would have moved while he was gone… but if it held what he feared it did, the thought wouldn't be so far fetched. Lysander gulped as he set his bag and coat down, his forgotten scarf falling to the floor in his haze. "Alright," he began as he rubbed at his face, "alright. You've got to open the thing at some point. Or you could just send it back. Tell Henry it never arrived. Yes, yes that sounds like a good idea. I think." While he spoke, Lysander grabbed some wine from his refrigerator and poured himself a healthy glassful. He took a large gulp as he stared at the box from his place in the kitchen. Moonlight reflected off the bear-shaped logo, illuminating the ominous thing off of the box.
Lysander grabbed a pair of scissors and sat in front of the box, setting his glass near before slicing into the box and pulling the flaps open. The first thing he saw was a piece of paper, the words "Lifetime Warranty" largely printed across the top. On the back the title read "Warnings". The print was too small and too crammed for Lysander to read so he simply balled it up and tossed it aside. 'Don't need a warranty for something I won't be keeping.' Underneath the paper was a flat, metal panel with a power button.
Lysander pressed the button.
The power button lit up, a pulsing blue before it settled into a bright glow. Lysander could hear whirring and ticks coming from the box, whatever was inside coming to life. The panel began to tilt upward, out of the cardboard box, and it rose, taller and taller, as cream colored limbs spilled out and flexed. Lysander watched as the bot stood to its full height and, for a moment, marveled at its design; a circular head stood out from a long torso, crowned in rays of muted fall colors. Its face was split like a waning moon and into two colors: cream, like the majority of the body, and a color that reminded Lysander of crisp marshmallows, ones that would burn if left in the fire much longer. Its hand and feet faded into a rich brown at the fingertips and toes, and as its limbs moved, he could see more of that marshmallow color peeking between.
The bot blinked its large eyes, as if waking from a long sleep, and upon registering company, smiled at Lysander. "Hello," it said, its voice soft and smooth. "Welcome to your FazCo in-home caretaker. My name is Eclipse."