Unprecedented feat of human design, engineering and craftsmanship. The Spriton libraries will bridge the gaps present between cities. For what we lack most is unity, a single, coherent whole that will enable the restoration of Ousthur. The fragmented pieces that humanity has taken shelter in will only last so long without a new foundation to restore our society to its former splendor.

Knowledge and information will be that foundation. The Spriton libraries will hold vast amounts of wisdom compiled from all nearby cities. In order to detach them from the current issues, their outward appearance will be themed after the revolutionary century. The countless safety measures and a final line of defence capable of submerging the entire structure underground into a bunker capable of withstanding an all-out kinetic strike will ensure its safety.

The information stored can include anything and everything not already present. All cities that contribute and/or provide intellectual worth will be considered equals in usage and ownership of the library. Moreover, the three nearest cities will be eligible to have control over security systems and the finer details.

This will ensure that no monopoly takes place while cities have to engage in peaceful relations with each other to gain access to the libraries outside their influence.

The libraries will have a tier system whereby the access level of a city determines how much of the library it is allowed to access. The only way to increase this access level is to contribute unique information. The weight of which is determined by one of the three closest cities which is selected at random. The chosen city will then review the information and give an appropriate amount of points to the donor of said data. These points then dictate the access level for the city and its respective library.

Each library will have localised information in order to force the aforementioned peaceful negotiations.

However, they will also have a secondary major purpose: to empower the agents in the field. Those who underwent the Caricare project will automatically be entitled to free access to their local libraries’ store of knowledge and a further basic access to all other libraries.

However, these agents may choose to act on their own accord where their access levels are on a personal level and not tied to the city they come from; enabling an almost mercenary like network of information gathering.

The final ability of the libraries will be to perform basic operations for any of the agents and give them tasks, handed from a city. Upon completion of the task, the agents will further acquire points to increase their own, or their cities points and thus, access levels.

Our team’s hope is that this will usher a new, information-driven age that will serve as the foundation to build our future upon.

Initial proposal of the Spriton Library.

Only four were constructed, but all were soon abandoned.

********

‘Woah! You’re not going to just jump in there, right?’ Gash glanced over and responded,

[Why not, I could probably make that.]

[Or you might not.]

‘Exactly!’

‘Just like Nicks said, you don’t know for sure.’

[Fine, in that case you two hold me by the legs and let me hang over the edge. That’ll give me a better look around. There’s gotta be something we can use to get down.]

‘Fine, I’ll do it.’ With that, Gash inched his way towards the edge of the black pit. Right before he falls in, I grabbed his legs while also lying down. Everything was going smooth until Gash was hanging upside down with no support but me, his weight started to drag me forward into the hole.

‘Shit, Nicks help!’ At the rate I was going it would take me a minute to fall, but the idea itself made it feel much, much faster than that. It did give Nicks plenty of time grab a hold of my legs and stabilize everyone.

‘See anything?’

[Not really, there is a wall that we saw before, about two metres from this hole, the balcony and...could you turn me forty degrees clockwise?]

‘That’s an oddly specific amount.’

My position did not give me a whole lot of room for maneuvering so Nick's got up and started dragging me across the floor clockwise around the trapdoor. I was the wrench and Gash was the bolt, figuratively of course.

[That’s good...give me a sec.]

I was not sure of Gash’s weight, but there was little strain on my arms to keep him up, so there was no kind of time-limit, heck Gash could spend the rest of the day ther-

[Alright, you can pull me up now!]

Who knew that going up is far more difficult than going down. I needed Nicks’ help to get back on my feet and only with the combined power of our arms could we pull Gash up.

‘So, did you find anything?’ ‘Send.’

[Other than what I said? Yea. There was this ladder attached to the wall, about three meters away from us. I think it can move along the wall, it had those wheels on the top.]

‘Three meters? That’s pretty far, not to mention we don’t have anything to close that gap.’

‘That seems to be the only way to get down, any ideas on how to reach it?’

Nicks was staring into the hole, giving it the entirety of his attention while Gash just sat, looking back and forth between us.

‘There’s no reason to go down there but scavenge for something useful...we should just find a way to take down the screen and call it a day. Without a rope or something similar...’ Silence permeated through the room for a few more minutes.

[If you guys don’t have any ideas, I do.]

****

‘I can’t believe we’re doing this.’

[Ready?]

‘Yes.’

I was back on my stomach, holding Gash by his feet. The two of us took our time going down the hole. According to Nicks, the opening was not too thick, instead sloping into the hole from the bottom, creating an upside down funnel. This allowed us to carry out the plan.

Nicks was holding my feet and following us towards the whole. The whole thing revolved around whether or not he could support both my own and Gash’s weight by himself through a deadlift. He would lower us until my waist was flush with the opening, allowing me to bend in an L-shape - provided we ever get that far.

‘The problem is if Nicks can’t support our weight, either all of us are going down, or just Gash.’ We had agreed to let Gash fall in such a situation, this way the two of us would still be functioning, and it would tell us if we could survive the fall. Though Gash wasn’t quite informed of these minor details...

‘Nicks, how you feeling?’

[It’s good for now. But I am getting some notifications on my HUD about high tensions, so do it quick.]

[I’m starting then.] With that, Gash started bringing his arms and torso to create some momentum. I helped him by bringing my own body closer to that L-shape whenever I could.

At first he was just swaying a bit, but now Gash was in full swing, going side to side with incredible speed. All the while I assisted him by swaying to match his rhythm.

[Those warnings are turning red, hurry the hell up!]

I could only imagine Nicks standing over the hole. Each foot on either side, while squatting and holding me by the legs.

[Almost...there!]

Came Gash’s reply. I had no idea how many more swings he can take before Nicks lets go. Each swing he got closer to the ladder, and each miss elongated the time he had to oscillate back then forwards.

[Guys! I can’t-!]

I felt myself lurch downwards.

‘Not like thi-’

[Got it!]

However, it was too late, Nicks had lost his grip and I was...still holding onto Gash’s legs! I tilted back my head, instead of seeing just a part of my body falling from the hole, I saw the upper half of Nicks suspended below the trap-door still grabbing onto my feet.

‘We did it!’

Together we formed a 3-man rope, with Gash holding onto the top of the ladder, me holding onto his legs and Nicks held my legs, while somehow keeping himself from falling through the hole.

‘Nicks, you okay?’

[Yea, somehow. I risked breaking into a split to give you guys an extra second.]

‘So that’s how he is keeping himself up?’

‘You’re saying you saved us by spreading apart your legs?’

[Correct.]

‘Damn, now that’s some quick thinking.’

‘Just to be sure, instead of dropping us you let yourself fall with us and risked it by making a T with your legs on top of the hole?’

[Pretty much.]

[Nicks you the best.]

The three of us just hung out for a bit, calming our nerves after the close call.

‘Gash, you ready for the next part?’

[Can’t wait!]

We waited until Gash pulled the ladder closer to us so that we could continue. [It’s no use, the thing won’t budge.]

‘In that case, we continue as is.’

‘Nicks, ready when you are.’

‘Please let this work just as well, or even better than the first part.’

[Now!]

Nicks gave a quick warning as he brought his feet in and started falling. With Gash acting as the only anchor point, Nicks and I started to accelerate straight towards the ladder. With the drop being nine meters or so, Nicks would smash into the wall with far higher velocity.

I watched him brace for impact by bringing his feet in-

A sudden screech sounded through the entire building, loud enough for us to hear several echoes.

[Touchdown.]

‘What was that?’

I looked up at Gash to see if he knew, but got a quick response.

[Slide, slide, slide! Thing’s coming loose!]

We did not need further explanations, the ladder couldn’t handle the weight and was breaking off. I let go of Gash, grabbed the sides of the ladder and slid down as fast as I could. The distance between me and the wall increased as the ladder fell further and further.

‘Shit, shit, shit!’

‘The top part must have come loose or something.’

I saw Nicks drop and roll out of the way as he was closest to the ground. I followed suit a split-second later and Gash was right behind me.

[Grab it!]

Nicks was dashing past me and Gash to grab the ladder. ‘Why would he-? Oh! We could still use it to get back up!’ I hurried over to help Nicks stop the ladder from falling over the railings.

Except we were too late. By the time Nicks ran towards it, the thing was three-quarters over the edge.

The three of us stood frozen-still as we watched it fall until we couldn’t see it anymore. It disappeared in the darkness and a few seconds later a resounding crash came from below.

The fact that we could not even see the bottom, much less the ladder before it finished the fall, made it clear that the drop was huge. The three of us stood there, basking in the silence after the close call we just had.

[Wow, that was awesome! Let’s do it again sometime!]

I rubbed the sides of my forehead at Gash’s comment. ‘No way in hell would he make me do that for fun.’

[How are we going to get back up?]

I surveyed the trap door, the single light source in this pitch-blackness. Even then, it can barely even be called that as the light has to go through the few windows from the top floors and then bounce around until they get through the trapdoor.

[We can’t.]

‘Nicks being the realist.’

‘Looks like the only way forward then, is down…’

Within a minute the three of us started to walk along the wall, taking occasional glances at it to see if anything changed. However, as we delved in further and further, the darker it became.

It got so bad that even with night vision active it was not enough.

‘Perhaps there is a command, similar to night vision, that gives off light?’

At this point it became impossible to see even a few centimetres in front of myself.

[Something like a flashlight?]

‘A flashlight? Those things that...give off light in a cone? Sure.’

‘Flashlight!’

[Attention: Cannot activate Flashlight while Night Vision is active.]

[Nevermind, I tried it and didn’t work.]

‘Night vision off!’

‘Flashlight!’

I winced at the unpleasant sensation of my eyes twisting and turning to disable the night vision and execute my latter command.

However, it seemed to work as I could now see some ten metres in front of me with not only clarity, but colour as well.

[Oh god that’s bright!]

I looked over at Gash and Nicks but that made them cover their eyes and turn away.

[Turn it down man!]

‘Would that even work?’

‘Decrease brightness by half.’ Nothing.

‘Decrease intensity by half.’ The effect was immediate and my cone of light dimmed. The two weren’t afraid to look my way anymore.

[How did you do that?]

‘I got a message to disable night vision before enabling flashlight. You guys should try it.’

The two of them stood still for a moment, before shaking their heads.

[Nope, I guess your new nickname will be Mr. Gadget as you seemingly have cool stuff we don’t.]

‘I can count on Gash to remain even somewhat upbeat in these situations.’

‘I’ll act as your light source then, you keep your night visions on and tell me what you find.’

With that, I settled into a pattern of moving my head side to side to give them a chance to examine everything.

That was when I heard a soft patter coming from up ahead.

‘You guys hear that?’

[No...wait I do now.]

[Same.]

We slowed down and approached the noise with absolute caution. There was a square opening, from which two metal bars stuck out. As we got even closer we realised it was a ladder leading to the floor below us.

I scanned it with my flashlight and-

‘You guys see that?’

[Hundreds of mole-like things climbing up?]

‘So they’re real then, god damn it-’

[Break the ladder to stop them!]

We kicked, rattled and struggled against the metal connections but age and rust had weakened the support to the point where we ripped it off within a minute. As we watched the ladder start toppling over, a sense of relief overcame until my light lit up its destination. The wall.

There were hundreds more of these creatures traversing within the wall itself. Using the cracks as footholds. They weren’t as fast as those on the ladder but that mattered little. We needed to get out of here.

‘We need to run. Now.’

No questions were asked as we picked up our pace and bolted down the balcony we were on.

[Now what?]

‘We’ll need to find a safe point and think of a way out later.’

[Got it.]

As we raced over the increasing noise of the moles, a single, overbearing roar from below caused us to falter. That was not something a small critter could do.

[Whatever that was, it does not sound happy.]

‘Great explanation Gash, couldn’t have done a better job myself!’