“Welcome to Introduction to
Nordic History of Aurora, where you’ll learn that the period is much more
complex than just ‘Vikings take over most of Aurora and then the Unification
happens.’ I Professor Erik Brynjarsson.”
“How are you holding up?” Flavia
asked.
“Fine. I have my recorder
going,” Olivia said.
“You usually record?”
“Yes.”
Olivia was called up when the
lecture finished. ‘Of course,’ she thought.
“See you later,” Flavia said.
Olivia nodded.
“So, you have dyslexia,’
Professor Brynjarsson stated.
Olivia nodded, wondering what
else he would say. She knew that the University had support services in place.
“Course materials are available
in audio format if you need it.”
“Thanks. There are times when
it’s too difficult.”
“But you are good with the
pattern recognition, right?” Brynjarson asked.
“Absolutely. That is why I
wanted to learn history, specifically Auroran history.”
“You have certainly come to the
right place.”
“Is that all?”
Olivia found that Flavia had
been waiting for her. “Oh,” she said, in surprise.
“I wanted to talk to you more,”
Flavia responded.
“That’s OK.”
“Where are we headed now?”
“The Main Library,” Olivia
responded. “I’d like to dig further into the Nordic Era on my own.”
“I like someone who shows
initiative.”
After talking to Ingurman, Freya
had headed to the Library herself, where she found Alexia looking at a
directory in the Grand Atrium.
“Hey!” she said.
“It looks like Architecture is
all over the place,” Alexia said. “Longhouses in the Nordic Section. Roman
inspired monumental Architecture in the Early Roman Section. Auroran
Architecture in general in the Ancient Section.”
“I agree. Most things are all
over the place. The Geography Section covers Geography in general, as well as
that of Aurora in particular, as I found when I looked on Wednesday. But Nordic
geography is covered in detail in the Nordic Section.”
“Like the University itself, has
expanded haphazardly over the millennia, and the same with Urbs Aeterna in
general.”
“But there are patterns to it,”
Freya said.
“I guess that there would be,”
Alexia said as she looked at the directory closely. “Maybe if the directory was
arranged differently.”
“Or a map of the Library color
coded by age.”
“Are there such maps?”
“They could be somewhere,” Freya
said.
Alexia looked at the directory
again. “Maybe in the Information Science section.”
“Sounds like a good place to
start.”
The information Science section
was relatively close to the Grand Atrium.
“Here we are,” Alexia said, as
she turned into an out of the way nook. There were few other students there.
“Very good,” Freya said she
followed.
“Directories, Archival systems.
This is in Auroric…” Alexia said.
Freya took it. “Renaissance Era
cataloguing systems,” she said.
“You’re Auroric?”
“I am, although from relatively
close to Urbs Aeterna.”
“What else does it say?”
“It gives a list of the
cataloguing systems. But there is no indication of a colour coded map of the
library,” Freya said.
“They have to be around here somewhere,”
Alexia said with a tone of exasperation.
“There!” Freya said, she bounded
over to a shelf.
“What is it?”
“Diagrams of the Main
Library.”
“Looks like there is a large
number of editions,” Alexia said.
“This is the 63rd,
published in 2004,” Freya said as she opened it.
They found a desk nearby and
started leafing through it.
The first pages were color coded
by topic. They could indeed see that all topics were scattered about the
Library. “But these are the top level by discipline,” Alexia said. “I would
think the more in detail topics are held together in whatever section.”
“I agree,” Freya said. She
looked at the time. She had plenty of time before her next, class, which was
after lunch.
They found what they were
looking for in the middle of the book. The Ancient Section, in the middle was
colored red, then it shifted through the rainbow, such that the sections built
in the 20th Century were marked in purple. “This is interesting,”
Freya said.
“But does it go into further detail?”
Alexia asked.
“Yes,” Freya answered. “There
are more shades for each subdiscipline in each area.”
“I see that.”
“Let’s copy this.”
“Wait,” Alexia said.
“We’ll then look at more pages.”
“Sure.”
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