Nodding, but also wondering why he didn't just do so himself, Kurumi turned to the back of the book and removed the card to hand to him. "When do I need to return it by?" she asked. Kurumi was probably going to have to rearrange her color coded daily planner for all this. She didn't really have too much 'free reading' time penciled in at the moment - not when she had NEWTs to study for.

Watching the claw leave towards the biographies Mr Kitridge turned his attention back to the task he had been working when he was interrupted.

Mr Kitridge listened attentively as the girl explained the situation with her owl. She had had Snaty for more than a year now and they still weren't exactly best buddies. It was alarming and saddening to hear that the owl tried to bite its owner when the girl wanted to give it some love and affection. This seemed to be a matter which books alone couldn't solve. "I think you should go ask Professor Newlin for help with Snaty too. She is the new COMC professor and she might be able to tell you why Snaty is acting like he is towards you and how you can change that."

Picking up the books from under the counter; luckily he hadn't had time to put them on the shelves yet Mr Kitrdige showed them to the girl. "Here you are. These books should be easy to read and also include some pictures to illustrate what the writers are teaching about owl care." That was what the girl had meant about readable for a second year, right?

Accepting the library card from Kurumi he wrote the day's date and her name on it before placing it in the drawer for Gryffindor cards. "You should return it in one month from now. Will that work with your schedule? If you need more time just let me know. Generally dragon breeding books only has a few readers each year I assume you can borrow it again later if you'd so choose." Mr Kitridge commented. "How is the work in the reference section going by the way? Its not too messy I hope?"

--------------------

New scene:

It had been a quiet day in the library with student’s coming and going in between classes, returning books and borrowing new ones. Mr Kitrdige was in a brilliant mood as he walked amongst the shelves with his trolley putting books back on the shelves and re-organizing the shelves where books were just squashed together in piles.

Arriving back with an empty trolley several minutes later to the front desk he stepped into something dark which splashed when he put his foot in it. Feeling his sock get wet he looked down aghast. Eyes widening with recogniction and fear when he saw what it was he exclaimed to nobody particular "There is WATER in the library!!!"

Pulling his wand out from under his robe Mr Kitrdige eyed the trail of water on the floor which was coming from the entrance to the library muttering to himself "This is not good. Not good at all. The books are in danger. Who’d do such a thing and where does the water come from?"

Gideon had spent an hour in the library between looking for books and reading through them to see if they might be useful for studying. NEWTs were only gonna sneak up on him and since he had the rare free time to spend on such a task, he opted to devote it. He had come across one or two he figured to take out for further study, Whose Whorls: Guide to Galaxies and Philomon's Potion Fixes so he planned on returning to the front desk to check them out.

He had just spotted the librarian at the desk with his back towards him so the Gryffindor decided to take care of things lest he forget. However as he moved towards the front area of the library, Gideon heard a yell...something about water. WATER?!

"Water in the library?!" he asked confused looking to man. 'What's going on?"

Mr Kitridige was about follow the water trail with his wand raised when a voice behind him stopped him. Turning on the spot he breathed out exasperatedly as his eyes landed on Mr Gert, one of the Gryffindor prefects. "There is a water coming in to the library from somewhere on the fourth floor. I intend to find out where it is coming from and who is behind it." Hopefully it wasn't Peeves, clogged up toilets or worse trouble in the infirmary.

Gesturing with his wand towards the water trail on the floor Mr Kitridge asked. "Can I count on your assistance Mr Gert? I could use an extra set of eyes and mind to get to the bottom of this."

Water coming in to the library from somewhere on the fourth floor...

Hmm, that certainly wasn;t good where moisture could badly effect the books that filled the vast room of the library. Which was probably precisly why Mr. Kitridge was seemingly freaking out about it. Now to find the source and put a stop to it before any damage was done. Other than to the floor of course seeing as it was already there as the seventh year spotted what the librarian already had.

"Aye," he said with a nod as he set his own books down on the desk to keep them out of the way for the moment. "That ye can." The prefect moving closer to the older man. He wasn't about to rush away when there was trouble that needed to be dealt with.

A month? Oh wow, that was much longer than she thought she would get. "That would be just fine, Mr. Kitridige. More than enough time probably," she beamed. When it came to books about dragons, Kurumi tended to get a bit caught up in the text and ended up being unable to put the book down. She needed to be a bit more disciplined right now. "It is going alright so far. I've only been doing some dusting for now. Mostly preparation for completely reshelving everything."

Which was what she was going to go do now.

Cassia nodded at the librarian, "I shall go to the new Professor and ask for her opinion too," she said. She was glad that she had come here to ask because she actually never thought of asking the care of magical creature professor and now thinking of it, it really fit asking her. Good thing she came to the library, well sometimes she does make good decisions but not when buying pets obviously.

The second-year took the books from the kind librarian, "Thank you ,sir," She smiled at him. Peering at the books she was relieved to find that they didn't look complicated and bulky. Oh there were pictures too! Cassia beamed at that . So reading them should be exciting and helpful and now that she knew they are easy and they contain pictures she was looking forward to start reading them.

The twelve-years old squared her shoulders feeling much better than when she came into here. It's nice and encouraging to know that you can always get help when you need it. "Thanks again ,sir. I really appreciate your help a lot," She told Mister Kitridge. "I will read the books and ask the Professor," Now she had a plan and it felt better doing something about the matter and trying to understand the moody creature. "I'll tell you what happens when I return the books." She said offering him one last grin before turning on her heels and heading for the exit.

Nodding as Mr. Kitridge asked if his name was Isaac. "Yessir." Listening as he explained about what he wanted Sarah him to do he nodded frequently making note of each thing. Ok, sorting either alphabetically or by genre....checking the back of each book...

Glancing Sarah's way he smiled at her "I'm Isaac." he said greeting her as well. "I think we can handle that easily." he said nodding as the librarian explained to Sarah what he'd just told Isaac. "We can get righ' on thet!"

Kat decided to check some books at the Library during her free time. She hasn't been to the Library since her First Year and she's missed the smell of books and shelves for a while. During her one and only term in Beauxbatons, she's visited the Library there a couple of times and that was when her interest for books sparked.

Picking a topic of a book was a different case. She wanted to check some subject-related books but she had enough information already from lessons and her own school books. Then, it enlightened her when she thought of her successful Quidditch tryouts earlier. She decided that she might learn a fair bit of Quidditch information if she borrowed a book. "Good morning, Mr. Kitridge," the Fourth Year snake smiled at the Librarian. "I wanted to ask where I could find more books about Quidditch, its history and such?"

"Good, good. If not you can always re-borrow it." Dragon breeding was a dangerous business but Leobald could see the allure of it given that the former COMC professor had let the student’s watch a dragon grow from its birth during the course of last year. Mr Kitridge nodded "Dust I’ve come to consider my enemy. It shows up everywhere and always come back. I wish someone could discover a dust repellant charm that actually works." He ranted on before stopping himself and blushing. "Nevermind me dear, just uhm let me know if you need any assistance." Mr Kitridge concluded.



"No problem dear. Helping out is never a shore." Assisting the young came with his job description and so far Leobald only enjoyed it. Nodding he replied "I’d love to hear how it goes. If Professor Newlin for some reason can’t assist you I’ll help you come up with a new plan of action." Mr Kitridge offered.

He watched the young girl leave with a grin on her face before continuing with the task he had dropped in order to assist the students.

Another point to him!

His memory wasn’t so bad after all. Looking from Isaac to Sarah he beamed. "Well then you know what to do. The storage room is that way." He pointed with a thumb. "Stay out of any box with a big red X on it or similar. Those books are possibly dangerous and I don’t want you to accidentally get hurt. If you need any help just come and find me." Mr Kitridge cautioned his new helpers. Maybe the storage room wasn’t an ideal placement for the restricted section books but where else could he place them?



Retracing his steps back into the library again after watching the balloon gang finish their clean up Leobald hoped for a few moments of peace. As he had hoped there were only a few specks of water still visible on the floor which he could take care of later. Slumping down in his seat at the front desk, feeling awfully tired all of a sudden he was tempted to close his eyes when he heard approaching steps.

His head jerked up as a voice addressed him. Hastily Mr Kitridge adjusted his possibly tired features and smiled broadly at the girl. "Good morning dear. Quidditch books you say? Hm, you can check the reference section I think that there is a large collection of quidditch books there or you could try looking on the sports shelves by the study area."

Sarah made a mental note of what the librarian said and nodded. Stay out of a box marked with an X... that was a negetive statement... At least he never used the word don't but maybe...
"Storage room? Great! We will get right to it... if we need help, we will let you know!" At least she did not commit to not checking the boxes... just incase she might want to have a peak... Also, she found it hard to understand how a book could be boring. "Come Isaac, lets get going... the day is short and we have so much to accomplish!" she said with exhuberance.

Kat could tell Mr. Kitridge was having a baaaad day. She pulled on her confused face. "Are you alright, Mr. Kitridge?" Kat asked. There was no harm in trying to fix someone's day, right? "You don't look well today,"

Hmmm... Reference section, or if not the sports shelves. "Okay, thank you Mr. Kitridge," Kat smiled, then left for the reference section.

Sarah walked over to the front desk. "I would like to check this out please" she said purposefully. She then gingerly placed the book on the desk. "When do I have to return it by?" she asked. Nature's Nobility: A Wizarding Genealogy looked like it was not going to be solid read, yet Sarah was going to plod through it. It was so sad how these families died out. Yes it was. Sarah was going to read the book to honour the legacy of those families.
While she waited for a response, she looked through the card of people that had previously taken it out. This book was old and Sarah wondered how many more family surnames had joined the rankings of extinction. Students had checked out this book centuries before. Hermione Granger was written there, along with Albus Dumbledore, this book was history itself!

Back again, a few weeks after she had checked out her first book, but still sooner than she had expected, Kurumi set two books on the desk and pushed them towards the librarian. "Good day, Mr. Kitridge," Kurumi said as she took the card out of the back of the book she had just pulled from the shelves. "I'm returning this one," she said as she pushed Not Over Easy: the Diary of a Dragon Breeder forwards a bit more. "But I'd like to check this one out."

Yeah, Kurumi knew the jump of subjects from dragons to timeturners and hour glasses was a bit...odd, but ironically still creature related in its own little roundabout way.

Leobald eyed the book in front of him with furrowed brows. It was a charmed book very much like the ‘monster book of monsters’ which you need to stroke the spine off before you could open it. This book however wasn’t giving up its secrets besides it being yet another encyclopedia but of plants and herbs rather than creatures.

Getting frustrated he huffed loudly to himself. So focused on one troublesome book Mr Kitrdige didn’t see Sarah Edwards until a book was placed on the desk in front of him next to the other one. Looking up he quickly plastered on a smile. "Good day Sarah, you can return it in 3 weeks. If you need more time then let me know." Taking the library card he briefly eyed the title of the book "A nature’s nobility, wizards genealogy is a solid read, are you sure you don’t want to borrow something lighter?" Mr Kitridge asked.

One of the perks of being a librarian was that you had a huge collection of books at your disposal. Turning the page of the book he had just checked out for his own leisure he heard the distinct clap of footsteps coming nearer. Taking a sip of coffee from the mug on the counter he beamed at the sight of the Gryffindor prefect. "Good day Miss Hollingberry, back already?"

With a few swift motions Leobald fetched the appropriate card from the Gryffindor card case and put it back into the returned book. Putting away the book on the returned trolley he with another swift motion took out the card from the new book about time turners and hour glasses. Curious Mr Kitridge wondered. "Not interested in dragon breeders anymore?"

"The book needs to be returned in 3 weeks. Let me know as always if you need to re-borrow it." From dragons to time turners, the leap was a weird one but Kurumi probably just wanted to broaden her knowledge.

Sarah actually considered the offer. "Well, I really wanted to take out 'When the ministry turned on us' which is lighter"it was a novel in fact, a historical novel based during the second wizarding war about a muggleborn, "yet, this book is more challenging so I want to give it try," really she wanted to take out both books and alternate. Yet she did not have the courage to ask that.

Kurumi simply offered the librarian a smile accompanied by a nod. Technically, she was here everyday studying for NEWTs or doing some sort of classwork...or working on reorganizing the reference section. Recharming had been the most difficult, but after teaching Beezus and Kat the spells and enlisting their help, the Gryffindor had made progress. Lots of progress. Another week and they would be done.

"Oh no, I still am," Kurumi chirped. "I've sent off my application to university last week to hopefully go into the field. This is just to appease my curiosity." Accepting the book from him, Kurumi promptly put it in her bag and closed the flap. "Thanks, Mr. Kitridge." And with that Kurumi made her way out of the library to do a bit of light reading.

Ah, now Sarah was sort of making sense. A challenge was always nice. Cocking his head sideways Mr Kitrdige commented. "You are allowed to borrow more than one book at time dear. So you can borrow ‘When the ministry turned on us’ too if you want?" In his opinion though neither book seemed action packed or a page reader but he didn’t judge. If Sarah wanted to read these books then Leo wasn’t going to object.

Kurumi visited the library each day Leo knew that but she didn’t come and borrow books that often or chat with him unless she needed assistance. So well now he was stalling. Nodding he beamed. "Good! Dragons are noble creatures that need a person with courage and love to continue to breed their race before it goes extinct." Leo didn’t mention that he didn’t think that dragons were a creature that he feared and rather not go eye to eye with unless forced.

"Let me know what the university says. I could send after more dragon breeding literature for you if you want to get a head start." It was the least he could do even if he wasn’t a fan of dragons himself.

"Bye Kurumi!" Leobald called after the retreating Gryffindor Prefect.

Presley had figured it out. She knew the answer. She dashed to the library as quickly as would not look awkward. "Mr. Kitridge?" she said approaching the front desk of the library. "I figured it out. I know who Captain Kirk is." Finally, after searching every resource she had for months, she had found the answer in her mothers journal.

Taking up his coffee mug he sipped on it as he began reading the book in front of him again. Leo flipped over the page and continued to read on. Just because he was engrossed in his book didn’t mean he didn’t know what was going on around him. Multi-tasking was an art which he did his best to master as the number of students visiting the library sky –rocketed by each passing month. Who knew what foul things they could get up to if he wasn't paying attention?

He was reading his book when Presely dashed up to the front desk looking excited. "Hello Presley." Leobald greeted the young Ravenclaw. Excited he asked "Oh really, who is Captain Kirk? Tell me everything." The librarian demanded trying his best to contain his eagerness.

Presley had been so excited to tell her discovery, she didn't even think about how she was going to explain it. "Well, I...it really depends on how much you know about muggles." Pres didn't know. Maybe he knew so much about muggles he could live inconspicously in their world, or maybe he knew absolutely nothing about them. Oh well, here goes.

"You know they have the television, right? I found out that they have picture shows broadcast onto thier televisions all the time. And lots of them are series." Once, they'd done movies and things at Hogwarts, but Presley couldn't remember if Mr. Kitridge had been there then. It was a while ago.

And here was her awesome discovery. "Captain Kirk is a fictional character in one of their televised broadcasts." So those kids talking about him didn't know more about history than Presley. They knew about stories, and fiction. Captain Kirk was fake. He was a story that someone dreamed up. So they were stupid in assuming that the portrait of the esteemed Sir Isaac Newton was in fact this fictional man.

Sarah's eyes lit up at the pronouncement. "Thank you so much... I would like to take both... anything else you can recommend" while she was at it she may as well know what else was good read. She could read both books that night and then come beck the next day to get more books. She read quickly after all... reading well over 100 pages an hour.

-----------------------------------------------------
new timeline..continued from bookshelves
"Mr. Kitridge" Sarah called as she arrived at the front desk. "something awefull has happened... there were some books on the floor and "horror of horrors "there were pages ripped out and they were scattered everywhere... Gideon sent me to tell you" Gideon the prefect obviously, there was only one Gideon in the school that Sarah knew. "The Ravenclaw Prefect it also there" hopefully that will comfort him somewhat, prefects were meant to mean that everything is under control... so if there were two prefects there it was good. "Those pages were rather interesting" well she hoped she was allowed to read them. "Can you please come... they are there" she said pointing to the book shelves

Presley began explaining who Captain Kirk was and at first Mr Kitridge didn’t exactly fathom why it mattered if he had knowledge about muggles or not. The reason for that comment though became clearer and clearer as Presley revealed exactly what she had discovered. Captain Kirk was a fictional character made up by someone for some kind of series on muggle television.

It was disappointing to know that Captain Kirk wasn’t real but in a sense it was surprising since Leobald had found no information about him whatsoever and he had really tried looking everywhere for information and used all his contacts for help but it had been for naught.

Studying Presley he asked tactfully "How do you feel now that you know what Captain Kirk is? I wouldn’t blame you if you felt disappointed or even a little angry."

"You’re welcome Sarah maybe a muggle book like a detective story of some sort could be of interest?" Mr Kitridge offered the second year lioness. With all the heavy reading she had already borrowed he figured she could use a page turner just for the fun of reading.

***************

New timeline:

Making his way back into the library with a coffee mug in hand Leo was looking forward to a quiet afternoon; assisting some students in their studies and maybe even give restoring and reinforcing the charms on the shelves a crack. He had just taken his seat when young Sarah Edwards came towards him. When the words drifted out of her mouth in slow motion and registered in his brain. 'Something awful has happened....pages ripped out. You have to come.'

Mr kitrdige froze for a moment trying to digest the sudden shock. Shaking his head he carefully put the coffee mug down. Trying his best not start flail, shout or curse he got to his feet, wand already in hand.

"Show me." He said in a cut tone. This was his worst nightmare coming to life. Following Sarah he did his best not to make any assumptions about the state of the books or anything else.

Sarah nodded as she checked out her books. She wil come back for lighter reading another time.

**************
Sarah regained her breath as she watched the librarian with interest. Why did he have a mug in the library anyway?
Sarah felt like patting the librarian on his back.. he looked so awful. Sarah nodded and lead him away towards the bookshelves. Something serious was happening at Hogwarts... and she was going to do her best to stop it.

That was an interesting question. How exactly did she feel? "I feel relieved to finally have the mystery of it taken away," Presley began. She didn't like the feeling of not knowing something that seemed to be common knowledge among others.

"But also kind of irritated. The way the kids in Astronomy were talking about him, I thought he must be some important historical figure, and it turns out he was made up. I feel a little bit like I wasted my time researching something that turned out to be purely entertainment." There. Kind of long winded, but that was how she felt. Those kids were so stupid. Probably not a Ravenclaw in the bunch.

"What do you think, sir?" How did he feel? Presley definitely felt a little bit bad for using up his time as well. Because he'd told her he would search for her. So his time had also been wasted, and that was Presley's fault.