Curiosity In The Isle Of The Cross By Hershel

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There is an intrinsic value to curiosity, one that few can place a price on. Curiosity was certainly at the forefront of the world's greatest inventions, an assertion disputed by few, but when examined closely, there is not a single event of mankind's existence that curiosity did not play a role in. This insatiable desire for knowledge, this undying desire to understand, this basic human faculty is what separates the sentient from the savage. Thus, it is quite an easy conclusion to assume that curiosity is a binary value, one that either glows bright or not at all. Unfortunately, such an assessment is naive at best. If everyone on this Earth possessed such a trait in equal quantities, no man would stand out from the rest. No, the flame
of curiosity is one that varies quite greatly. Every person may have it, but few possess a flame that burns so bright as to block out the rest of the world's distractions. And this is where the story starts to come into focus. This very insatiable desire, this ever present desire, always tends to find its way at the center of such sordid and enigmatic accounts.

Katie Esuriit was a name not widely known, if her death occurred at this very moment, few would shed a tear. In fact, very little of her past was known, even among her closest friends. To most, it seemed as if she had just arrived, blown in by a stray wind to a stagnant town. Yet, it was never her name that seemed to be discussed, something she was more than happy with, but rather her work. While the two were rarely linked by the casual consumer, some of the biggest stories in the nation, particularly pertaining to the unsettling, were broken by her. Such a concession is the way of journalism, as most are never concerned with the name behind the story. And so it was, Katie spent most of her time unrecognized as she rummaged through the rabbit hole, unearthing the dirt that so often riled up socially correct. That was the story of her life, in fact, to the point where she had time for little else. This led to her placing more emphasis on her work, which, in turn, led to a de-emphasis on the normal whims of society. It was quite easy to tell exactly why her life was in a rut, and not all that hard to cure either, but there was no consoling friend around her to do so. And so, on one fateful night, this spiral of of self-destruction became volatile in the least likely of places.
~~~~~
It was hardly akin to the glamour or exorbitance of the office of the celebrated journalists of the nation, but that was hardly why she was here, in the Grand Duchess Library.
Perhaps the search for the mythical eighth novel of Herman Melville, namely the "Isle of the Cross", was not akin to her normal work, but it would certainly be worth her time, if only to pay the bills. At the moment, she was trudging through the most boring part of her job, though her thoroughness in its completion was what set her work aside from the others. Anyone passing by would have seen a a face hidden behind the Hershel Parker biography of Melville's life with long brown locks flowing from the sides of the rather dull book. In fact, her figure had drawn more than a few stares from the few patrons of the city's centerpiece, something the observant brunette was not ignorant of. In fact, even when encased in the fold of a trench coat, a garment from the past of her profession that she so adored, her curves were still rather distinguishable. Long legs gave way to wide hips, and in turn a noticeable backside, which gave way to a full torso which gave way to an unmarred face, her deep hazel eyes finishing off the look perfectly. In her mind, it was the biggest flaw she possessed, even if the attention she drew was flattering. In her line of muckraking, she was hardly interested in an awry gaze, and more than once it had been her downfall. Today, however, something else entirely would befall her, entirely independent of the charms she been
gifted.

As she flipped one of the many pages of the dusty novel, showing just how rarely it had been touched, a stray paper fell out. Now, most would assume such a thing to be a bookmark or a forgotten note to a long-lost lover and dismissed such a thing without another thought. But Katie Esuriit was wholly different from most. The second that note fell from the book, she felt an itch develop inside of her, a longing to know and understand exactly what the paper was, even if its existence was due to nothing more than the most mundane of reasons. She held up the paper in her long hands, manicured nails digging into the fiber as she inspected it. To her surprise, it was a riddle written in the form of a nursery rhyme, something that only served to fuel her desire to understand further. "Higher Floor... there's only one" she said thinking out loud, the wheels in her mind turning before something clicked. With a pace that seemed to hardly befit such a lethargic place, she returned to where the book she was currently reading had been taken from, scanning the shelf with an intensity that seemed to follow her at every turn. An accomplished grin soon spread across her alabaster visage as she spied the color that the poem had so easily given away, pulling down the Prussian Blue Diary that the poem had spoken of and slumping against the shelf of books, eager to continue her journey down the rabbit hole.

She grinned as she saw the note inside, quickly scanning through to see another poem. For some reason, a competitive spirit had awoken inside of her, a longing to engage this mysterious writer in his game and best him. She returned to her spot amongst the various oaken desks of the library, pulling out two slim pieces of parchment and a black pen from her ever-handy leather satchel, an accessory well-worn from the years it had spent at her side. She rapped the pen thoughtfully before diving into the conception of the first note to be left in response.

Three Blind Mice
Three Blind Mice
See How They Mince
See How They Dice
They all ran after the Reporter's Life
Who cut off their tongues,
With a carving Knife
Did You ever see such a thing in your life,
As all for one, and one for life

It's hard to say what came over her, but there was a thrill that seemed to come from such a thing, and she soon began work on the second, leaving the other paper to dry alongside the Prussian Blue notebook, her mind now wholly consumed by the puzzle this whole thing seemed to present itself as. Nonetheless, her pen was soon to the paper once more, this time with a challenge.

Dickery Dickery Dare
Your intellect is quite fair, and that would be thou shall respond now
Dickery Dickery Dare

It was a blatant dare to bring on the games, something that sent a chill through her spine, though she was wholly unsure why such a thing would giver her such a guilty thrill. It was certainly not illicit, the battle of wits that she seemed to be engaging in, but for once, she had found something new to throw time at, something she viewed as a healthy obsession. Perhaps this character would hold her interest for a little while, even if his cryptic scribblings seemed little more than a desperate plea for attention. She grinned, tucking the first note inside of the Prussian Blue diary, returning the book to its place with a shudder. She wondered is the author of these notes was watching her, right then, scanning over her curves and adoring the attention she had given him. She couldn't explain why, but she was quite confident that he would reply with a eagerness that matched her own; call it a reporter's instinct. Then, knowing that the second clue was an obvious reference to the magnum opus of Alexandre Dumas, she headed to the fiction section of the library, carefully placing her challenge inside of the sole copy of "The Three Musketeers". It was with that sole gesture, that invitation to spar intellects, that she found herself now in a game she did not fully understand, a thrill that stayed with her most of the night, leaving her shivering far after enduring the cold of the night as she exited the famed library. The game was now on