The grandfather had been in the construction crew. It was the first job that he'd held when he was 18. There were photographs of him in a hard hat, helping to build the three main projection pylons that sent the image of the library off into the air over the harbour. And because he'd been so young and light and graceful he was also part of the construction crew that was sent up in the turbo skeltons that allowed people to soar and hover like hummingbirds, to seed and water the organic gold skin that grew around the light patterns. It had taken five years to build the library and another ten to get all of the stories straight enough to be projected. The grandfather, by that time, knew many of the stories by heart, and told many of them to Faith when she was a child, as she drifted to sleep each night. . Smith told the press that he especially relished flying after dark. "Daylight exhibitions are like a pink tea party by comparison," he said, while the reporters scribbled avidly. "Of course, there are only a few of us now who feel at home in the air, really at home, knowing the air and its ways, so that we can roll about up there among the clouds like a kitten in a basket." Invention & Technology Magazine. The only catastrophe had been when a truck had crashed into one of the smaller projection pylons and brought down the children's wing temporarily. There was a blank spot with fibres running across it on one edge of the library, it was as if a spider had run out of breath at one point while spinning a web. All of the children's stories had melted together for a while. Winnie the Pooh dancing with King Arthur. Groucho Marx determining the outcome of the Civil War. Homer Simpson arguing philosophy with Aristotle. The Children's Librarian didn't have the heart to put it all back together properly and kept her favourite muddles and put them into the new Children's Wing when it was built. It was a beautiful shape but still looked new and patched on. It was a different sort of gold that ran at a different speed.     next