“I am so sorry, Mr. Scribe; I promise to update the system according to your specifications!”

Janus and I both turned, but we couldn’t see who had spoken.

Janus sighed and rolled his eyes. He handed me the harp and strode off.

“Give me a moment while I tell Ms Skimmer where to go,” Janus said as he disappeared from the shelves.

I looked over the harp. It wasn’t scratched or scuffed despite how it had ended up in the chute. Whatever polish it was coated with was terrific.

“Well, I would have had all this sorted if your Class was more popular.” A young woman’s voice could be heard getting closer and closer.

“I’ll have you know that as the Head of the Musical Archive and Bard Class Department, I could have you fired, Ms. Skimmer,” I could hear Janus reply curtly.

Janus as his new guest, Ms. Skimmer, soon appeared, and as Janus cooly strode over to his desk and sat down looking rather peeved, Ms. Skimmer, a short gray-first woman, walked over to me and placed her hand over her heart, looking apologetic. Her large mouse ears flicked back and forth nervously.

“I am so sorry, New Candidate, for the mix-up. I had set up all of your information plus the 3 552 different musical instrument courses to allow you to conduct your musical training courses on the go. As there are still 10 523 more instruments that have not yet been installed, I will be providing regular updates to the program to allow you to continue training remotely, no matter what instrument you choose,” Ms Skimmer explained.

“Woah, ok, that is amazing; thank you so much,” I replied, accepting the new tablet she held for me.

“Yeah, yeah, yeah, just go already; you made my job more difficult than needed. You’re always buddy buddy with Clive from the Opera Class. Do you think I don’t see the googly eyes you give him? To think that my Candidate would suffer because of your incompetence!” Janus said indignantly.

“Janus, please, stop,” I said, walking over to his table. “ She did update the system.”

“With only 1/20th of a vast number of instruments that should already be on file! I have spent the last ten years submitting a total of 100,000 reports on new, old, and relic instruments and the care, education, and art of playing them, and she only intends to log in 13,000. Get out of here! I don’t want to see your skinny face!” Janus said, and a tentacle whipped out of his body, snatched a cushion, and threw it at Ms Skimmer.

“Hey! I’m sorry, but you’re such a grouch! Fine, I’ll try my best to log at least 15 000 by the end of this year, but I doubt you’ll have anyone to see your stupid instruments, seeing how low the signup rate is for this department,” Ms. Skimmer said, and stuck out her tongue, “ Stupid Octopus.”

“Stupid Mouse,” Janus cursed back.

“Hmph!” Ms. Skimmer said and turned; then she winked at me “ It’s alright; the guy’s a bitch to everyone. Just let me know if there is a specific instrument that’s not uploaded, and I’ll get to that one first before any other instrument.” Ms Skimmer added it and disappeared amongst the shelves again. 

“I wouldn’t be such a grouch if some people did their job. Anyway, enough about weaponized incompetence; let’s go through the tablet now that there is something to go through,” Janus said and beckoned me to hand it over. 

I gave him a handout and happily sat down, resting the harp on my lap. I didn’t have my usual belt with the strap that I used to keep it tied to my hip. However, I’m sure I could make do with one of the hair ties in the vanity kit in my pocket. 

“Alright, here is the app you need to use to log in to your attendance,” Janus explained, setting the tablet down and showing me a little blue button with the words “LOG” on it. He tapped the button, and a checklist appeared, “ So you click attendance over here and click check-in,” he said, and the screen had a little bouncing check mark for a second, and then the attendance tab was crossed out, signifying that I had checked in for the day.

“That’s really straightforward forward,” I smiled, glad I didn’t have to call in and talk to him daily - I could tell that it would end up being a problem as he would probably be drowning in heaps of books and instruments that needed to be salvaged. 

“Great, I’m glad you are following. This app over here is where you are in your progress,” Janus explained and showed me a brown icon with a white leaf. He clicked it, and it took us to a digital logbook. There were areas for adding pictures, music, and even audio, as well as space to write out what was happening.

“Each tablet comes with a stylus,” Janus explained and pressed a little button on the top. A small pen-like black stick popped out, and Janus started using it to select things on the screen. 

“And here is the good part - your musical classes.” He grinned and pointed to a green button with a bit of musical note on it. Janus clicked on it, and suddenly, an app that listed many instruments opened! Janus clicked on the first one, an accordion, and instantly, a song in accordion began to play, and the app asked if I would like to start studying now.

“So you see how easy it is to use? Without the Music app, you’ll be stuck out there learning to play all sorts of strange music and won’t be able to practice to hone your talents,” Janus said proudly. “ And don’t worry, I have been matching instrument to book for many years; you have a wealth of information at your finger times,” Janus explained proudly. 

“Wow, this really is amazing. So, where would I start if I wanted to learn to play this harp?” I asked, patting my harp fondly.

The smile on Janus’ face faded a little. “ Well, I think it would be fine to follow along the mezzanine article series, however…” Janus said and got up, his tentacles flying out again as he walked, checking shelf after shelf for what he was looking for.

After several minutes, he returned with an old dust book in his hands, a small handheld vacuum, and hand held blow-drier in two of his tentacles.

“Give me a moment,” Janus said, and as he tuned the page, one tentacle blow-dried the page while the other vacuumed up the air, effectively getting rid of dust without applying moisture to the pages. 

“Ah ha, here we are,” Janus said, placing the book down, facing me. It was a page on the care of relic harps that we made during the Bone Wars, a period just after the Great Collision. “A Bone Harp. The Harps were made from the Bones of fallen warriors. As you know, many of the early colonizer pirates captured and killed other less combat-ready beings and turned them into food, clothes, and tools. Many species, such as ManKind, Birdkind, FelineKind, Insectoids, and Oceanoids, were unable to access tools, and they ended up using their martyr brethren’s bones in order to fashion weapons only they knew how to use in order to fight back. This proved to be highly effective, especially since colonizer pirates such as the Leeches could not tell the difference between the dead weapon and the living carrier and would often attack the weapon instead of the carrier as the scent of the weapon was usually left behind instead of the one bearing arms, confusing them and allowing for the rebels to fall back and live to fight another day.  

So what you have here is a relic of that time, a bone harp made from the bones of a fallen Butterfly. The sounds it will produce will be sharp and ringing, as the purpose of this harp is to instill shooting pain into the listener or sweet, lulling, haunting serenades that draw the listener into a deep sleep, depending on the desired mode of attack. Once the victim was asleep, they could be easily slaughtered, and this is how troop after troop of pirates were finally put into their grave,” Janus read, and then sat back and put his hands together in contemplation.

Finally, he said, “ So what you have there is not just an instrument, it’s a weapon. And based on what I’ve read,” He said as his other tentacles suddenly shot out and returned, lying out book after book after book on his table. “ It is untuned, unpolished, and also unplayable in the state it is in right now. You will need to gather these raw items, “ Janus said and tapped on an open page in one of the books “ In order to make a suitable tuning fork for a start. No other tuning fork will do as you need the same vibrational structure as the one that was made to tune a bone harp, and you will need these items. “ Another tentacle pointed at another page in another book. “ In order to polish the harp so that it can be restored. Right now, the polish is still holding, keeping it scratch-free and in tack, but where you are going, in the rain, the mud, and the rocky environments, they will slowly erode what’s left of that polish. You will need to restore it regularly if you hope to be able to play it,” Janus said and sighed. “ Honestly, it sounds like a lot of trouble. I feel like I must insist you leave it behind here. I can tend to it when you embark on your studies,” Janus said, leaning forwards and crossing his arms, looking at me sternly.

I grabbed the harp and held it close to my chest. “ I-I’ll try my best, I’ll gather all the materials you tell me to, and I’ll care for it the best I can; please let me keep it,” I said, shocked and surprised that he suggested that I leave it behind. 

A smile spread across his face. “ Alright, I trust you. I’ll update your log book with the list of ingredients you need, and I’ll ask the gear department to pass you a carry-on bag to store the harp safely. You definitely need something waterproof to keep it nice and dry on the road. 

After you have gathered all those materials, I’ll send you my scans of the instructions on how to make the tuning fork and the polish, and then you can start the restoration process. Only after these two things have been done can you start practicing them. Be warned: do not practice playing the harp around people. You must be somewhere far away and high up; at least you break someone’s eardrum with the piercing sounds of the harp,” Janus warned, leaning back and uncrossing his arms.

“Alright, let’s now go through the more boring stuff, like your cooking major’s app, among other things,” Janus said, and his tentacles scooped up all the extra books and put them away, leaving only the tablet again on the table once more.