The sprawling grassy areas and the broad pools and ponds just made this place beautiful and amazing. Acharya had no idea that any place like this existed. He had grown up in a place that most people couldn’t find on a map, and here he was, right smack dab in the middle of a true gem of the human experience and he hadn’t even been bothered to learn it existed at all. He felt bad about that. How much else in the world was he simply not aware of? How much existed that he couldn’t be bothered to even learn that it existed? You don’t know what you don’t know, he had been told some time ago. That was fine, except here was proof that not only were there things he didn’t know, but also things that he hadn’t cared about. And that didn’t sit well with him at all.
Aiman was able to ask for directions, as Arabic seemed to be spoken prevalently here, and they were directed to a library, whether it was going to be large enough to have anything that they were hoping to find was another question altogether. After another hour or so of walking they found the place they were looking for.
The National Library of Chad was parked inside a very nicely cared for piece of land but the buildings themselves were a little smaller than they had imagined for a National Library. The library itself was two, three story buildings placed close to each other connected by a walkway. They were sturdy little brick buildings that were well cared for and clean. They found some signs written in English, as well as some other unknown languages.
Unfortunately, one of the signs very clearly illustrated that dogs were not allowed inside the library. Asclepius growled low in his throat and Acharya shook his head. Tara volunteered to stay with the wolf outside. Acharya nodded and left the pair there as the rest of the pack went into the building.
Walking into the library they were greeted by cool air and the familiar scent of paper and ink. The first thing they noticed was that the library was sectioned off into different themes, archaeological collections, paleontological, traditional costumes, handicrafts, as well as others.
They were greeted by a very nice elderly man who was a librarian, they assumed. “Hello” was all they understood before he started speaking in Arabic.
Acharya let Aiman take over the conversation. The two spoke in short quick sentences. After a short amount of time Aiman turned to the rest of his pack, “he’ll show us where we need to start looking, follow me.”
Acharya and the rest of the pack followed Aiman and the eager man deeper into the library towards the back. The man showed them an area that was specifically for anthropological studies. They thanked the man and started searching the books.
The selection of English books was, as they feared, pretty limited. Most of the books reflected the spoken languages, Arabic and French. Mary had taken some French in high school but she remembered only enough to get herself in serious trouble in a conversation, not enough to read and actually get anything out of those books.
Aiman, on the other hand, was able to navigate the broad selection of Arabic works very easily. He pulled serval books off the shelf and immediately began reading the texts.
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Since there was nothing else that any of the rest of them could do, they went back outside and rejoined Tara and Asclepius. The sun was hot in the late afternoon. Soon it would be getting dark. They would have to find a place to stay for the night. But with the limited funds that they had, that was going to be problematic.
“Any idea on how long Aiman will take before he finds anything useful?” Malikah asked to no one in particular.
“Since he’s the only one that can read the books here, it might take him a long time,” Acharya said. “We do need to find a place to stay though and if we are going to give Aiman any time at all in there, we should find someplace a little closer to the library.”
“There are plenty of hotels not far from here, we passed a few places that looked pretty nice,” Mary said.
Tara nodded, “with emphasis on ‘nice.’ We couldn’t afford to stay in one of those places.” She looked over at her Alpha. “Acharya, how much money do we have anyway?”
Acharya looked at all of them, “Honestly, we have about thirty two thousand rupees. Now what that means here, I don’t know. Did anyone see a bank or anything?” They all shook their heads. “Well, if we want to do anything with the money we do have, we need to get it exchanged. After that we’ll see what happens.”
Thirty two thousand rupees didn’t seem like a lot of money, and they all knew that once that money was gone, it was gone. It would be better if they saved as much money as possible, using it only for food, the cheapest food they could find, not restaurants. They all knew this wasn’t a sightseeing tour.
It was getting dark before Aiman emerged from the library. He looked tired.
“Did you find anything?” Mary asked kindly.
Aiman looked at her with heavy eye lids, “Yes.” He said simply. “Much of which was unhelpful and there is much more to go through.” He sat down heavily on a stone bench rubbing the bridge of his nose. “I will begin again tomorrow.” The group all nodded, even Asclepius looked sympathetic towards him.
“There’s nothing more we can do here today,” Tara said. “Shall we go try to find a place to crash for the night?”
Acharya arched an eyebrow, “Crash? That might be exactly what we end up doing.”
They all got up from where they had been sitting and walked off the library grounds. They walked around for a while, looking for anyplace that might give them some semblance of privacy and protection. They found some people staking out areas in alleys and around the various parks. He couldn’t say that there was a homeless problem in N'Djamena, but there were several people that they came across that seemed to have no place else to go except the piece of concrete or dirt that they were lying on.
Finding a somewhat hidden place back behind two close buildings next to a wall, they built a small fire and made their camp for the night. Asclepius kept watch down the alley between the two buildings leading out onto the street. The group ate in weary silence. The night sky had darkened significantly since they left the library.
Tara could see only a handful of the brightest stars in the sky as she ate quietly. All of them were lost in their own thoughts.
Acharya felt a weight on his shoulders, looking at his pack. Their safety and well-being was his responsibility. Ultimately it was his job to complete this mission, if it even could be completed. He had been sent out with a job to do, with very little help, and even less advice. They were truly alone, something that they had never been before. They were on their own. And their lives were his responsibility. For the first time he felt a weight that threatened to crush him underneath it. The weight of responsibility was something he thought he knew how to handle. He was their Alpha. But he wouldn’t fail them, even if he died doing it. They wouldn’t fail, they couldn’t.