This one goes out to Jed, whose request for my 100th hit was "Medieval Cyberpunk"
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“Saint Augustine, Brother Marcel?” Jean's voice was soft and yet it still echoed in the bare tone hallways of the Monastery of St Illumine the Engineer. The sound bounced down the corridor, off angled stones and statues and carvings, all lovingly measured to give the most distance to even the softest word to the “Reference Desk” at the top of the stairs that lead directly to the Reference Niches. While he waited for his voice to carry and be returned, he spun the wheels next to him. “St”, “A”, “U”, “G” they read.
“Oi, Brother. Anything relating to Just War.” In the background he could hear the voices of the knights, a pair of young knight errant wanting to ensure that their souls would be safe if they followed their desire for conquest. “Also, Saint Bernadine’s writings relating to the Templar if you please. They are donating quite a sum, we can go to the extra effort I thing.”
Jean nodded as he pulled on the gloves, the chains and sticks that lead into the mechanism around him giving only faint resistance. As he pulled the helmet on he realized, as he did almost every time, that Marcel couldn't actually see his head.
God above. Every time. “Of course, Brother. Please tell them to be patient, switching collections will take some time.” The metal helmet fit snugly over his head, the rubber rings tight to his eyes. Moving his foot out to kick the Enlightenment Pedal, he could feel the gears and pulleys and chains, a system beyond his comprehension, slide into place to grant him access to what he sought. Another would perhaps wonder what was going on, or would have curiosity as to how it all worked but Brother Jean was not a man to question like that. He took this as he did all acts of God, something to simply accept. His was not to understand the how of God's miracles, merely the why. St Illumine had been given the guidance for this from above, he had done God's will, and that was that. His was not to intemperate, merely to use to further His will.
Light poured into the previously dark goggles and Jean blinked to clear the spots as the mirrors reflected the area around the Cherub to him. Tilting his head slowly down to see the metal framework of the Cherub's lower body, he did the standard checks. Moving his hands, his feet, the chains pulled and slid through unknowable distances in the edifice, and after a few seconds the hands and feet of the Cherub moved to match. A little slow, a Brother Engineer would need to look at that, but that was for another time. Looking around slowly to get his bearings, he quickly found his way, “walking” the Cherub like a great, far away puppet, a Punch and Judy doll writ large, through the sealed Libraries. This kept the knowledge in a central place, and allowed faster referencing, limiting the fingers touching the books.
Finally coming to the row of codices that bore the words of St Augustine, Jean leaned forward in his chair, looking, looking.... there. The Cherub followed his reach and took the book in soft cloth-tipped fingers, placing it within the chest of itself. He always hated that, seeing the movements match his he somehow always expected to feel the book in his own heard, inside his chest. There was a hissing noise down the hall as the pressure system the Saint had long ago designed began its holy work, the capsule in the Cherub's chest hurtling through the tubes to end up, he knew, at the Reference desk. The muttered curses and amazed praises that reached his ears made him smile... let the Knights know of God's work and know that their bloody mindedness is nothing compared to Him. Disengaging the pedal, he spun the wheels again. Now for the rule of Saint Bernard.
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