Kester Elion's main preoccupation is currently surgery. For the past few hours, they've been sequestered in the cool enclaves of the Athenaeum's operating arena, in theater G. The quiet tick and whirr of the observation spell around their head is one of the only sounds in the theater-- the seats on the observation deck are deserted, the other operating theaters empty. The air is dry, flat, and unnaturally muted, and the only light in the room is directed at their patient; a woman in her early thirties. She lies still on the operating table, less like the dead and more like a machine, pinned open under the lights, wires lifeless, but not without the potential to operate once again.
The malady is a simple translation, a migration of the heart. It had begun to move from the left side of her chest to the right, causing strain to her body, which couldn't adapt fast enough. It's a common phenomenon, here in Salera City, common enough that other surgeons are sick of performing the surgery to repair it. Kester does it for free, at all hours of the day, including six in the morning, which is supposed to be Accountancy. That's why it's so quiet here; all other Librarians are at their personal repositories, accounting. Kester has nothing they want to account, so they work through the hour without much hassle.
Kester pulls a swath of tissue carefully to the left, pulling it taught, then releases their Adson forceps. Instead of falling upon release, it floats there, unmoving. They make a quiet clicking noise with the tip of their tongue behind their front teeth, twice, and an answering two clicks sounds from beside them. A small, gloved hand darts to the cutting needle in the tray beside them, then sets it into Kester's waiting hand, already threaded.
At the end of the procedure, Kester stands back and strips off their gloves before snapping their fingers. The overhead light shuts off with a quiet hiss, and for a moment, in the darkness, the only thing visible is Kester's glowing observation halo and a little girl, standing by the instrument tray. She watches the dark silhouette of the patient steadily, never looking away, ensuring that the patient reanimates properly. She's dressed exactly as Kester is, in a large white apron over light green scrubs, and a cap tied tight over her hair, and she seems so confident in her actions that she doesn't look so odd in a place like this.
Then Kester turns on the ordinary lights and everything comes back into view. The girl does not appear to glow, nor does she speak to Kester, but she moves to the operating table to awaken the patient. She places two fingers to the patient's forehead, solemn in her actions, then stands back and bows slightly as the woman opens her eyes and looks around.
The woman has shining hazel eyes feathered by long, soft lashes, and a lively blush fills her once pale and ashy face as she takes a couple breaths. She seems unperturbed about being bare chested, and probably would not have minded even if Kester themself were before her.
"The operation has completed," the girl tells her. "Thank you for your patience."
"Thank you very much," the woman says, eyes following the girl around the room as she pushes the instrument cart into a waiting receptacle in the wall. "What's your name?"
"Please continue to rest," the girl says, instead of answering. Kester, washing their hands behind the patient, glances at the woman, mild curiosity kindling in their eyes, then dying quickly.
"I will." The woman looks back up at the ceiling, then lifts a hand to feel her chest. Her flat, smooth fingertips find the slight bump of protective synthetic skin that keeps her stitches in place, tracing it downwards gently. "Seems like you did a good job, Kester. I don't feel a thing."
Kester doesn't respond.
"The Doctor requests that you rest for two days within the Athenaeum," the girl says flatly.
She removes her gloves, throws them away, and retrieves a robe from another indented slot in the wall. The walls of the operating theater are curved, made of a smooth, plasticine material. Aside from the sink, there are indentations in the wall, like the one made to perfectly fit the instrument cart, and the one that dispenses patient garments. Other than that, the room is nondescript and empty, not especially warm or cool. There isn't even an obvious door.
"I don't have two days to rest," the woman says. "I need to leave right away."
Typically patients who have no money for an operation have no right to also be greedy with their time, so Kester doesn't usually have to restrain their patients. They glance at the patient chart by the sink, then at the woman's back as she struggles to sit up.
"Refrain from agitating the sit of the incision, Miss Maren," the little girl says. "You will re-injure yourself."
"I must insist," the patient, Maren, says, and Kester comes around the operating table quickly.
The little girl vanishes, leaving the robe hanging in the air, and Kester lifts the woman upright by the shoulders, supporting her awkwardly as the robe floats towards them on its own and wraps itself around her.
"I see you didn't name your little helper," Maren says, sliding her arms gingerly into the sleeves. Kester doesn't reply. "Are you going to get me out of here?"
"Yes. Hold still."
Maren watches the surgeon as they support her with one arm and reinforce the synthetic skin over her wound with the other. She seems to be keenly interested in them, watching their movements and their face closely. They, on the other hand, avoid looking at her altogether. She lifts one hand to tuck a section of her hair behind her ear, the movement prompting Kester to glance quickly up at her. Her hair falls in loose, wild curls, struck through with slight hints of auburn and silver, obscuring her right eye for a moment. She has a proud, striking face, with a tall nose and dark brows, and a fascinating animation to her expression. Looking at her directly feels like a shock, and Kester quickly looks away.
"Rest, when you can," Kester says, then releases her and straightens, adjusting their glasses and avoiding any more eye contact. They click their tongue quietly, almost inaudibly, against their teeth, and the girl appears again. She appears to take a hold of a door handle in the wall, though there isn't one visibly there, and an opening yawns wide in the wall, revealing the center of the operating arena.
Maren slides her legs over the edge of the table, one hand pressed to her chest. The robe she was given is made of thin cotton, and it's cold out in the greater operating arena. Kester walks out of the room without waiting for her and steps down to the center of the atrium.
The operating arena is a circular atrium with twelve operating theaters in its walls, twelve darkened archways framed by some sort of glowing material-- the frame on the atrium they just left had been glowing, but is now quickly fading. The observation decks are visible from the arena, though invisible when inside one of the theaters. All the lights are out, too. No one else is here.
The domed ceiling is made mostly of frosted glass, but the ribs of the dome are made of perfectly clear glass, which let in bits of light. They flood the arena with tepid bluish gray rays just beginning to warm to the sun, barely illuminating the tall console in the center of the room.
"I thought we were underground," Maren says, voice hushed, looking around. Her eyes take in the sunlight, then the carved reliefs that ring the room and divide the upper dome from the observation decks and operating theaters below. Kester doesn't answer her, but makes a quiet noise to acknowledge that she said something.
They approach the console at the center-- really a large, cylindrical set of lockers with a set of controls at the base-- and press a couple buttons. The top part of the console, the lockers, start to swivel around soundlessly, then sink down into the floor until one specific locker is directly in front of Kester. They reach two fingers out towards it and it pops open, revealing Maren's belongings.
Kester hands them to her and turns away awkwardly as she dresses, standing there with their hands behind their back. They look pretty young for a surgeon, young even for a Librarian, but their hair is a dark gray and their glasses are super thick, plus their observation halo spell casts a strange light over their face, so it's hard to tell how old they actually are. Maren assumes an older, more experienced surgeon would be less awkward.
"How do I get out of here?" Maren asks them, and they turn back around hesitantly. She's done dressing, and pulling her bag over one shoulder. Kester notices she pats her bag to check to see if something is there, then slips it out and puts it into her pocket. A pink slip of paper, probably a travel pass.
"Where do you want to exit?"
"Canyon-side."
Kester nods, then shuts the locker door and beckons for her to follow. There's no apparent entrance or exit, but some of the operating theaters are spaced farther apart than others, and the engaged stone columns there seem to be more worn at shoulder height than the other columns. Kester steps up to one such gap and waits for Maren to get closer. Again, they reach out with two fingers and tap them against the wall.
A gentle amber light blossoms beneath their touch and shoots up and down through the column in a split second, casting the room in a warm, almost sunny light. The column appears to peel open, revealing a silvery portal on the other side, emitting a hissing noise at a frequency so low that it feels uncomfortable to listen to. Kester takes a firm grip of Maren's shoulder, holding her close to them, then steps them both through.
Stepping through the portal feels first like getting very heavy, then like getting very light. Maren can't see anything, but she can hear the sounds of many different voices and movements. Sometimes it's the solitary sound of a page flipping, sometimes it's the sound of many voices echoing around a chamber, or the chirping of birds, or something similar to the sound of blood rushing past the ears.
They seem to stop in this darkness; there's nothing to see, nothing to feel for them to get their bearings, but Kester does something and they begin to move in a different direction.
They appear suddenly outside, moving with such speed that they're still sliding forward across the stone dais in front of the Athenaeum's front entrance. Kester lifts up one foot slightly and plants it on an approaching pedestal beneath a statue of a pretty woman, carved out of blue stone. The pedestal itself is worn in exactly the place where Kester had put their foot down; the passage they took must be used frequently.
The front facade of the Athenaeum is carved out of the side of a canyon wall, towering over fifty feet into the air. It retains the canyon's natural color, a smooth, milky gray striated with many slightly bluish and yellowish variations in color. Hanging ivy and ghostly moss flourish around it, dripping down past the evenly spaced columns and obscuring parts of the frieze, which is carved to tell the story of various constellations. Small, twinkling bits of light float lazily through the air, coming to cluster around Kester and Maren— equally to illuminate their way and to make their presence obvious to others. The front courtyard is a large, hemicircular dais raised a couple inches from the ground, connecting the canyon floor to the steps into the Athenaeum's public area. Five statues ring the dais. Closer to the Athenaeum, an archer stands to the left, bow raised with an arrow set straight against it, and a healer or mage stands to the right, one hand outstretched. Midway through the dais, a muscular man wielding a large sword stands to the right, eyes fixed on something slightly further right than the others, and to the left the statue of a leaner man holds a long, thin sword and crouches as if ready to lunge forward. At the very front, in the center, is the statue that they had stopped on, of a woman with long hair holding a staff. Each statue is made from stone of a slightly different color, but are all basically blue.
"Who's this?" Maren asks, looking up at the statue, and Kester gives her a funny look. "I'm not from around here."
"...Enrose Sang," Kester says. Then they give her one last suspicious look before turning around, walking two steps, and disappearing.