Snippet #2088771

Anna paused again as she heard someone else walking up behind her. She bit her lip to steady herself, to keep from hiding and making sure whoever it was wasn't really paying her much attention. She waited impatiently for the light to be on, to see who was coming up behind her. She winced slightly as the light went on, then turned around to see where the sudden voice had come from. She wasn't one of the humans she had met earlier, so maybe one of the dolls. Still, she looked to the twins. They'd know.

And, sure enough, they did. She hid a sigh of relief; it was another of the dolls, who the twins introduced as Mallory Grace. She smiled a little and nodded at the other doll, then glanced around the library. Maybe it was one of Adalee's favorite spots, but she couldn't see herself spending much time here. Not because she didn't like to read, but because she was lousy at it. No schooling since she was little meant she had forgotten what many of the words looked like. It wasn't like it was necessary for her to read much with her way of life.

She let the twins talk to Mallory, and instead kept her attention on the library. Even if she didn't read, she knew enough to know what a large colletcion of books this was. Even when she had broken into that one library, it didn't have nearly this many books. Of course, it didn't help that that particular library had been tiny, but that was far from the point. She glanced back to the three dolls curiously. This huge library...for one old man? How did he have time to collect all of these books and make living dolls? Either he didn't get much sleep, or he had help, or the books weren't all for him, but for his dolls, too. So did the dolls read, too? Maybe; at least, she assumed it was possible. Everything else seemed to be possible for them; they got bored, needed to move around, seemed to have all the same emotions...perhaps she just needed to assume in her mind that they were like humans, rather than the dolls she knew. Rather, humans that had been locked up all their lives and wouldn't be able to live out in the real world without some kind of help.