The Proscribrary System

"You've slept long enough, my little kaydee," Mom announced, as she tore Maizy away from the ever-warm fold of the blanket dimension. "It's time for breakfast."

She placed Maizy down on the floor in front of a plate of large, wriggling, leaf-green insect larvae. "If you can eat sugar snap beetles, you can eat these. They're super good for a growing kaydee!"

And easily obtained, Mom thought to herself. They were practically right outside the door.

Maizy partook in a moment of pankadulation, then smelled the plate in front of her. Yuck! They did not smell yummy like those sugar snap beetles. She made a sneeze-like sound of disgust.  I'll just stick with milk this morning, thank you, she thought to herself, and tried to crawl back into Mom's pouch.

"Oh no you don't," Mom stopped her. "You're not doing anything else until that plate is empty."

Maizy tipped the plate, poured all the worms onto the floor, then held it up in front of Mom, as if to say, "All done! Plate is empty."

She's way too young for rebellious sass! Mom thought.  She kills a snake monster and now she thinks she's the boss.  Thinking about it some more: Hah, I bet my mom was like this. She's got Grandma's chaos in her blood.

Maizy was a hundred wobbles too soon to get away with something like that with her mother, though. Mom reached into her poncho and pulled out the books from yesterday's trip to the library, then held them up in front of Maizy.

Maizy's eyes caught sight of the tiny, wrapped book on Kad Sign Language and immediately surrendered. With the tragic resolve of a storybook heroine, she squinted, closed one eye, and ate one of the larvae.

Not—horrible, Maizy thought.  Tastes a bit... nutty.

She ate the remaining worms and looked up at Mom, wide-eyed, with her head tilted toward the book. Mom, helpless in the face of such cuteness, untied the bow keeping the book small. It rapidly expanded in her hands, then she placed it on the floor in front of Maizy.

"Let's start with the alphabet. I'll teach you the letters along with the hand signs," Mom said gently. Maizy nodded in excitement. With a quick flip of the page, Mom revealed a spread full of letters, each one carefully matched with a tiny picture of a hand showing the corresponding sign.

Thank goodness! The alphabet is simple characters—and only 22! Maizy thought, quickly scanning the page before hopping to the next section, which was clearly about colors. She knew that's all it would take to commit each letter and its corresponding sign to memory.

"We're not done with the alphabet yet, silly!" Mom said, reaching to flip the book back.

But then Maizy's tail glowed faint blue, and she swiftly signed all the letters of the alphabet, in perfect order. The motions were a little wobbly, and she didn't know the sounds yet, but her hands danced with determination.

"Aha!" Mom jumped and pointed at Maizy's glowing tail. "So that's what your tail does!" She grinned. "It's a memory tail! Oh, I'm so envious!"

Then, realizing what this meant, Mom beamed with excitement. "Wow! I guess we can get this over with fast! Eee!" She ran around in circles, chasing her own tail a few times, bursting with pride over her capable little kaydee.

Mom began speaking each letter aloud, pointing to them one by one. Then she did the same with the colors, pronouns, and everything else in the book. She kept going, quickly moving through the beginner reader books, pointing at each word as she read them and showing Maizy the signs for the ones she knew.

Finally, Mom quizzed her, "Okay, that's done. How do you think you spell your name?"

Maizy confidently signed the letters that made the sounds, "Mm," "Eh," and "Zee."

"No, but that's close!" Mom said, utterly astounded.  That's close enough that any adult would know exactly what she meant.  She then showed Maizy how to spell her name properly.

"How about Path and Pathy?" she asked next. Maizy signed both names correctly, her tail glowing bright blue.

GODS! Is my child a genius or something?  She was both proud and a bit scared at the same time.  Her tail gift just grants her memory, not understanding... right?  She decided not to think about it too much just yet.

Then, a thought struck the Proscribrarian, and she asked Maizy, "Do you remember being born?" Maizy shook her head, then made the signs for "small" and then "after." Mom thought she understood, "You mean you remember the moments just after you were born?" and Maizy nodded.

Mom was trying to process the implications of this, and then Maizy made two hand signs that shook Mom to her core: "also" and "before."

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Mom—with Maizy poking her little head out of her pouch—arrived at the library with the enthusiasm of a child about to take their first trip on an uppee. She bolted through the entrance, dashed to the counter, and slammed down the books the Head Librarian had given them the previous day.

Willow—the Head Librarian's apprentice—was standing near the counter and jumped, startled by the sudden book slam. "Hello, Miss Proscribrarian. What can I do for you?" She asked.

"Where's my sister, er, the Head Librarian?" Mom was still flustered, amazed, and just a little bit giggly from what Maizy had shown her.

"She's at a meeting with the Postmaster and said she'd be gone most of the day," Willow explained, smiling politely. "I can take a message for her, if you'd like?" She always seemed exceptionally polite and professional.

Must be about the armed serpent and tree security, Mom thought.

"No, that won't be necessary. Just let her know I was here and looking for her," Mom said with a laugh. "I'll definitely be back here tomorrow morning—first thing! Might even move in for a few days! Ha!"

Mom paused to catch her breath, pulled Maizy out of her pouch, and plopped her down on the counter in front of Willow.

"Oh, hello, Maizy," Willow said, "You look very cute today."

Maizy made the signs for "Thank you" and "So do you." Then Willow's eyes widened in shock as Maizy flawlessly signed a complete sentence in Kad Sign Language: "I'd like to see books on magic, please."

Completely taken aback by the sudden fluency that usually takes a whole wobble to master, Willow turned to Mom and asked, "How long since she emerged?"

Mom beamed, practically shouting, "Two days!" She threw her hands up and repeated, "Just two days! Isn't she amazing?!"

"That's... Incredible, Miss Proscribrarian." Willow's brain seemed to break as she tried to process the situation.  None of the training prepared me for this!  Willow thought, suddenly feeling like an impostor.

"I'll... show you to the books you requested, Maizy," she then gestured for them to follow, "Right this way."

Willow then led them to a back corner of the library where there were a number of rows labeled, "Magic." "These three rows are all about magic. Is there anything in particular you were looking for? Unfortunately, we don't have any children's books on magic."

Maizy gasped, her mouth opening in wonder. She didn't know where to begin! Luckily for Maizy, this was Mom's area of expertise, "Where's Burrow's book on magic symbols and their practical applications?" She asked.

Willow's tail briefly glowed a greenish-grey, then she climbed to the top shelf and used her right hand to shrink and retrieve the book in question. She started to wrap it, but Mom stopped her, "Oh, no need to wrap it." She motioned for Willow to hand her the book.

Mom placed the book on the floor in front of Maizy, who grinned broadly as she quickly flipped through the entirety of the book as it slowly expanded back to its original size. She gave a thumbs-up, and Mom handed the book back to Willow.

"All done! Now we want Creek's Magical Mechanisms." Mom requested.

Willow returned Burrow's Book on Magic Symbols to the shelf and grabbed the requested book on magical mechanisms. She understood what they wanted and placed the book in front of Maizy. With the glove on her left hand, she expanded it to normal size in an instant, then watched as Maizy flipped through.

Willow couldn't hold back her curiosity. "What is she doing?"

Mom grinned and exclaimed, "She's memorizing the book!" She picked up the book and smiled, eager to show Willow how awesome her little kaydee was.

"Maizy," she paused, then opened the book to a random page, "what's covered on page 34?"

Maizy's tail glowed blue and she made signs to spell out the word "switches."

"Isn't she amazing!?" Mom beamed.

Willow replied, "That is... Incredible, Miss Proscribrarian," then asked a very poignant question, "Is it a good idea to let such a young kaydee learn all these things?"

Her words exploded in the Proscribrarian's mind like an uppee overfilled with magic.  FRICK! She's right! What am I thinking!?

The thought slammed into her mind just as Maizy reached for a book on the bottom shelf titled, Magic Self-Defense: Weaponry.  Without missing a beat, Mom swooped in and scooped her up—like someone with way too much experience shutting down fun before it could begin.

"Let's do languages." Mom declared, thinking that would be mostly harmless. Right?

Willow returned the book on magic mechanisms and began walking to the opposite side of the library. "Right this way."

They arrived at the area of the library with language books, and Mom spotted one book in particular that had tormented her for wobbles during her training to become a Proscribrarian. "Labyrinthine: The Language of Labyrinths, if you please, Willow."

For Mom, this was a pivotal moment.  This is either going to prove that Maizy's gift has limits or I'm going to have to spend a lot of time locking up a ton of books in the Proscribrary.

Willow retrieved the book and placed it on the floor in front of Maizy. Just as before, Maizy flipped through the book, but this time, she paused at each character?   What the heck IS this!? Maizy thought, squinting at the strange symbols.

After the long introductory chapters, the remainder of the book resembled a dictionary. On each page were symbols that looked a bit like emoji faces—if expressive, deep sea creatures could be considered faces. Next to each symbol was a description of what it meant, but "what it meant" had dozens of possibilities, highly dependent on context.

Who even came up with this nonsense!? Maizy thought, then looked at Mom with a pleading expression, as if to say, "What the heck?" She threw her hands up in the air, then signed, "Are", "you", "T O R T U R E", "me?" She had to spell out the word for "torture" because apparently nobody in this world was wise enough to include that word in children's books on Kad Sign Language.

"Just finish it," Mom stated, and Maizy did so. Then Mom picked up the book and handed it back to Willow, who put it back on the shelf.

"Now we need Stickarn Boodegah's Treatise on The Importance of the Proscribrary System," Mom said to Willow.

Willow's tail glowed a bright greenish-grey as she replied, "Sorry, Miss Proscribrarian, we don't seem to have that book."

Mom laughed, "Hah! What are you talking about? I see it right there!" She then pointed to an entire shelf of dark green books. "Apparently, my sister hasn't taught you Labyrinthine, yet." She smiled, thinking, She's such a workaholic, I bet she'll start trying to learn it tonight.

"Oh my!" Willow seemed flustered and embarrassed at the same time, then retrieved the first book and placed it down in front of Maizy.

Maizy gave Mom a pleading look, as if to say, "Really!?" Mom replied with her own look of, "Yes. Do it," which was mostly just a sinister smile.

Maizy opened the book and immediately noticed that it was written in Labyrinthine.  Why would anybody DO this!?  She thought, then flipped through every page, closed the book, and pushed it away in disgust.  I'm NEVER going to waste my time reading this.

Mom had her flip through every book in the series, then dismissed Willow, "I think we've taken up enough of your time, Willow. Thank you."

"Of course, Miss Proscribrarian," Willow bowed her head and said, "Let me know if you need anything else." She then took the book on Labyrinthine and walked back to the counter at the front of the library.

I knew it! Mom thought as Willow wandered off.  It's hard to believe she's spent this long around my sister without learning how to fake working better.  She chuckled to herself.

Mom turned to Maizy, "Okay, my little kaydee. It's time for the ultimate test." She reached down and patted Maizy's head. "It's simple, really—tell me the first sentence of the first book in that series you just absorbed." She then gave a sinister smile and said, "I completely understand if you can't. Not everyone is capable of reading Labyrinthine."

Maizy gritted her teeth, Oh no, she didn't!  Then her eyes went glassy, and her memory tail glowed very brightly. Moms can be so motivating sometimes.

Very slowly, one highly contextual, emoji-like sea creature at a time, Maizy translated the first sentence of the treatise, making the signs for each word:

"In"

"Books"

"I"

"Tell"

"Secrets"

"This"

"World"

Mom gasped in shock, and then Maizy passed out.

Oh no... What have I done?