Sincerely, Me PV Pt. 3 Finished

Cecily tried to keep her cool as she turned her back on the lake and found herself in the library with the two Hufflepuffs. The three girls split up as soon as they walked in to try to hunt down something that mentioned what they had discovered. Trying to keep from just wandering off into the alluring stacks, enthralled by the ancient-- and not so-- books and novels snugly tucked into their assigned place on the shelves, Cecily focused on the task at hand. Where could she find something to help them get to the bottom of this mystery? She thought about what she knew about the...ghost-fish, for lack of a better term at the moment. It was a creepy, silver, insubstantial creature from the lake. But it wasn't from the depths, as it had been close enough to shore to swim...through...Ami's toes, and Cecily was pretty sure that evolution would make any creature that lived at the bottom of the murky lake unable to withstand such bright sunlight.

Cecily scanned the books on the shelves, looking for something about the Great Lake, or the creatures in it. Finally spying a thick, promising-looking book entitled The Great Lake at Hogwarts: A Mostly Complete History. Pulling it off the shelf, the subtitle read, "A Thorough Exploration of the Great Lake's Creation, Existence, and Inhabitants". Nodding, Cecily lugged the book back to where Amadea was waving at them from a table. The small girl set the book down with a heavy thud and leaned over to see what Amadea had found: Dreadful Denizens of the Deep .

"Looks good," Cecily said. "How about you, Ami? Find anything of use?"

The Library. So, we meet again. Ami felt an involuntary shiver crawl down her spine as the trio walked through the wide double doors of the vast enclosure. Well, the shivers were either from fear, or from the drafty wind blowing through the open windows. Brr...

The three girls then split up to find their respective books, and while Cecily and Amadea seemed to be browsing the shelves, scanning for an item of interest, Ami had two specific books already in mind. They were in completely different sections and rather far apart, however, so she had to book it in order to grab the literature and get back to the girls in time.

Amadea presented her treasure, Dreadful Denizens of the Deep, which sounded both awful and delightful at the same time. It certainly sounded promising, that was for sure. Cecily's thick volume titled The Great Lake at Hogwarts: A Mostly Complete History- A Thorough Exploration of the Great Lake's Creation, Existence, and Inhabitants was loud as it slammed against the table; that was a mightily good sign, as well. Hey, maybe they didn't have to go to the Headmaster after all.

"How about you, Ami? Find anything of use?"

"It's certainly not as interesting as yours," she admitted, taking out her two books. "But they're classics in research, I thought they might be of use." The first one was Hogwarts, A History. "You know, in case someone else has encountered something like this before," she explained, setting it down on the table. The other one was Fantastic Beast and Where To Find Them, "Just to make sure it doesn't exist already."

It looked as though both of the other girls had successes in finding more books that could potentially help them figure out what the creature in the Great Lake was. Cecily had found a few great books that might list some creatures of the Great Lake, and Ami had taken a more historical approach and found some history books in case people had encountered a creature like that previously. 

Amadea spread all of the books out on the table, staring at each of the covers. Where to begin? she wondered to herself. She looked at the other girls, hoping her overwhelming fears weren't visible. How were they going to read the entirety of all of these thick textbooks when they didn't even know what information they were looking for? 

Biting back her panic, Amadea grabbed the book closest to her, Dreadful Denzies of the Deep. She flipped to the front page. "I suppose we could look in the index for certain key phrases," Amadea suggested, turning to the back of the book where it listed the contents of the book in alphabetical order. "But do we really know what we're looking for?" she asked, running her finger down the list of topics the book covered. "I would say our best bet is to just read the entirety of the books...but that would take a very long time. What do you guys think we should do?" 

Cecily looked down at the gigantic books on the table in despair. Though reading was one of her favorite pastimes, she had never quite found interest in non-fiction texts. Research had been a great idea in theory, but now that they were actually faced with the daunting task, at least one of them was having second thoughts. How would they ever manage to get through such massive books?

Amadea suggested using the index to find related sections, and since no one else was coming up with any especially brilliant solutions, Cecily agreed. "That's smart. That way we don't have to read all the extra information. But what words would we look for? Indexes don't usually list super specific words, and I doubt we'll find it under something vague like 'ghost fish'," Cecily said, then paused before continuing in a musing tone, "Although, you never do know."

Though the index was a good idea, Cecily still felt like there had to be an easier way to get information out of these books. How did normal people get information? Some sort of fancy space machine that they ask their questions to and it just tells them the answers? After a minute of thinking about it, Cecily finally came up with something that sounded like it might work to shorten their time studying the books. "Hey, have either of you seen the librarian around? Maybe she would be able to help us." Maybe the Hogwarts librarian would know about the creature, or would at least know a constructive method of getting though the massive textbooks.

Amadea had made the absolutely brilliant suggestion of looking through the indexes of each book, although Cecily had also brought up the valid point that looking for a ghost-fish-thing wasn't exactly the best way to go about it- after all, what would turn up in those books, if they did look? Ami nodded her agreement, although she still flipped to the index in her books, anyway. 

Cecily's hunch had been right, there wasn't anything remotely close to what she had felt in the Lake. "We could check under Spirits..." she said slowly, scratching her head rather comically. "But I doubt that it will be of much use."

Cecily suggested going to the librarian, one Mrs. Natasha Wheeler, which Ami was rather opposed to. "Are you kidding? She'll probably dismiss us as joking, or get mad at us for "fooling around" with dangerous creatures. Besides, she's absolutely terrifying." Honestly, most librarians were terrifying, Mrs. Wheeler wasn't any different. 

"But-" Ami continued on, taking a deep breath in the pause. "I do think that it's worth talking to her. She knows more about this library than anyone else." Standing up, she gathered her massive load of two books (wow so many) in her arms, walking over to the librarian's desk

Amadea nodded in agreement. While the index certainly could have been a helpful tool, it wasn't that helpful in this situation. After all, they had no idea where to begin in this mad search for whatever had been in the lake. Looking up "ghost fish" would probably just result in some passage that would read: Please go see a doctor. Amadea was sure that wasn't going to be much help at all. 

"Maybe we should check under everything we think it could possibly be, just in case," Amadea suggested. That way, they could cover all of their bases without spending hours reading books about irrelevant topics. If they didn't find anything, then they could think of something else to do. It seemed as though everyone else had already begun brainstorming what other things they could do, however. 

"I don't know about the librarian," Amadea said. Ami had pretty much voiced Amadea's own thoughts and opinions on asking her. The librarian would probably think the girls were messing around or being crazy. It didn't seem like she was very fond of children in the first place. Amadea didn't want to cross the woman, no matter how much information she might possess. Then again, Amadea also didn't want to cross the ghost fish, or whatever had been in the Great Lake either. So she was stuck with a dilemma. 

However, Amadea was spared from making a decision as Ami grabbed her books and began walking in the direction of the librarian's desk. Amadea's eye's widened as she watched the Hufflepuff's progress. Something bad was going to happen. Either Ami was going to drop a book and make a racket or they would get kicked out of the library for asking weird questions. Amadea was sure of it. Turning to Cecily, she said, "This can only end badly. After you!" Amadea picked up her books and motioned for Cecily to go in front of her.

Cecily winced at the reaction of the Hufflepuffs to her suggestion. Sure, librarians could be scary, but this one seemed to be worse than most-- well, if Ami's hushed outburst was anything to go off of. It was Cecily's idea to relocate their investigation to the library in the first place, so if her suggestion got them kicked out, she would just be going against herself. Why couldn't there just be an easy solution for once? Flip through a few pages in a book, read some lines of text and then, bam, you had your answer to what the mysterious, most likly dangerous ethereal being in the magic lake was.

However, as it was, the girls lacked a better solution, and so Ami relented, hoisting up her books and marching towards the librarian's desk. "After you!" Cecily heard Amadea say reluctantly, so without overthinking her choice anymore, she grabbed her book off the desk and trudged after Ami.

The trio approached the librarian, Cecily now sorely regretting her suggestion. She had not had any previous encounters with the librarian, nor had been in a situation in which interaction was imminent, so she wasn't quite sure what to expect, except probably something not great, from what she'd heard. Not quite knowing what to say, Cecily hung back behind Ami, hoping the outgoing Hufflepuff would take the incentive and pose their insane and unbelievable situation to the librarian.

Clearly, Cecily seemed unwilling to talk to the librarian herself, seeming to almost hide behind Amadea, which was certainly a sight to see. Giving the Ravenclaw her best, You owe me one look, Ami stepped forward to confront... the librarian.

"Hi..." Deep breaths, deep breaths... Inhaling, Ami took a deep breath and blurted out, "We were looking for something that we encountered down by the Great Lake but we don't know where to start and my friends and I were like, 'Hey, ask the librarian' so we're here now and please please please could you help us it would mean so much please thanks." No breathing, no good flow of words... she sounded like a nervous train wreck.

Let's try that again.

"I mean, the three of us encountered something down at the Great Lake, and we don't know where to start when looking for references of it." Better, much better. "Could you possibly help us? It was silver in color, had characteristics similar to those of a fish... but it seemed to be able to phase through solid objects at will. Is there anything like that?"

Wow, that was a lot better. Instead of glaring at the Hufflepuff, the Librarian's expression softened into one of intrigue and mild interest. Glancing at Amadea, Ami stubbornly pushed her forward to speak. She'd be fine... right?

Hiding behind her two friends was simple enough, especially given that she was shorter than both of them. Then again, Amadea was shorter than most people. It didn't help much, though, considering the sizable volume of her hair that must have stood out against the blond of the Ravenclaw girl standing in front of her. 

Luckily, Amadea didn't have to do any talking anyway, as Ami took charge and explained the situation to the librarian...well, kind of. The librarian, to her benefit, didn't look as baffled as Amadea would have thought she would at hearing this odd story from three first years. Amadea began to feel hopeful. Maybe this whole human interaction thing wasn't so bad after all! The librarian knew countless facts and figures about everything and would certainly know something that could be useful in cracking the mystery of the Great Lake. 

The librarian slowly rose out of her chair from her desk and Amadea took a step backward. Even though she was an...older lady, Amadea still felt intimidated by the woman. Just as she took a step back, Ami pushed her forward as if Amadea was going to speak next. Amadea stumbled as the force of her moving backward collided with Ami's push and she tripped over her feet, the book she was holding clattering to the floor. 

The librarian watched the book fall, then turned to the girls, eyes narrowing. "You girls better learn your lesson," she said with a huff. "Coming in here making up radical stories about crazy things and abusing the books. Out of my library! Out!" She waved her hands wildly as if the sheer force of her anger would send the three girls away. Amadea could only speak for herself, but it definitely worked. She picked up the book and put it on the counter and in no time at all found herself outside of the huge doors of the library. 

That had been the most scary thing she had ever witnessed. Blushing she turned to Ami and Cecily. "I'm really sorry guys," she said. "If I hadn't dropped that book she might have helped us. I'm sorry. I hate being so clumsy." She hoped her friends wouldn't be too angry, but there was nothing she could do about it if they were. And frankly, she didn't blame them if they were. Amadea was disappointed in herself too. She wanted nothing more than to crack the mystery, but now it seemed as though they had no way of doing so.