| The Tale of the Quiet Librarian | |
|---|---|
| Season 4 , Episode 6 | |
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| Air date | November 5, 1994 |
| Written by | Susan Kim |
| Directed by | David Winning |
| Episode guide | |
| Previous The Tale of Cutter's Treasure |
Next The Tale of the Silent Servant |
The Tale of the Quiet Librarian is the sixth episode of the Fourth season of Are You Afraid of the Dark?, as well as the Forty-fifth episode in total.
Cast[]
Midnight Society Cast[]
- Jodie Resther as Kiki
- Daniel DeSanto as Tucker
- Ross Hull as Gary
- Raine Pare-Coull as Betty Ann
- Joanna Garcia as Sam
- Jason Alisharan as Frank
Story Cast[]
- Shannon Duff as Laurie Napier
- Aaron McConnaughey as Jace Ellman
- Anna MacCormack as The Quiet Librarian
- Jory Steinberg as Carla
- Justin Borntraeger as Brian
- Sonny Ricci as Timmy Ryan
- Jenelle Job as Natalie
- Evan Evans as The Security Guard
- ? as Mrs. Hurley
Intro[]
The night begins with Frank walking into the circle with Tucker. As Frank is walking in he‘s holding Tucker‘s head. Tucker is gasping for air and complaining that it's not fair because he weighs like 200 pounds more than he does.
As they come in Kiki asks him to shush and to be very quiet, though Frank claims he isn't hurting Tucker (though it's obvious he is) she still tells them to just shush and be very quiet. Then Gary, Sam and Betty Ann all arrive too. Betty Ann asks Frank what he's doing? and Kiki says she wants everyone to be really quiet. Everyone begins to be really quiet and Tucker says Hello! and Frank releases him from the headlock.
Kiki, then says if everyone is settled then just listen. Sam asks her what they're listening for? Kiki says "Silence, total silence". Gary says it's impossible, because absolute silence doesn't really exist. Sam says yeah because there is always something making noise. Kiki smiles and says exactly and she and everyone all sit down.
Kiki, sits down on the Storyteller's Chair. She explains that when grownups want it quiet, there's no way. Because there's really no such thing. But what if there could be total silence? What if you could stop every sound, every buzz and every breath? Gary says you can't because where there is life there is sound. Kiki says to say that another way. If you take away sound, and you take away life.
Kiki, throws in the midnight dust to make the fire more intense while she submits her story for approval of The Midnight Society. She calls her story, "The Tale of the Quiet Librarian", and begins her story.
Story[]
Kiki tells the story. The story first takes place in a public library. A teacher is leading a elementary school class to the children's section. In a further part of the library, a young boy around 6 or 7 years old named Timmy is playing noisily with a small green bouncing ball. Then he accidentally bounces it all the way downstairs.
Timmy walks downstairs to retrieve his ball without the rest of the group noticing. The room is cluttered full of old books, carts and packages and other inventory supplies. The ball bounces all the way to the end of the room, to the bottom of an old door. Also underneath the door from the crack at the carpet, a purple light glows out. Timmy, moves a box off of the cart in the way of the door. The he crawls through and walks over to the door to get his ball back. He mistakenly knocks it into the room behind the door that says "Quiet Reading Room". When Timmy reads what it says on the door, suddenly the old fashioned door knob opens the door itself and a purple light flashes out. He screams at first then his voice goes mute and then he suddenly disappears. He unintentionally released an evil spirit.
Next, we see a class being dismissed at the sound of the classroom bell. Just as they’re about to leave, their teacher tells them she has assigned the class to all work together in groups on their history assignments. One girl named Carla complains with disgust. Because she has found out she has been paired up to work with a boy named Barry Evans.
The other girl named Laurie Napier who‘s a brainiac finds out she has been paired up to work with a jock named Jace Ellman, who she has a slight attraction to and thinks he’s kind of cute. Carla feels bad for her warning her that he’s arrogant and conceited, but Laurie doesn’t think so.
Meanwhile, Jace's friend Brian feels bad for him. Because Jace reveals he’s paired up with Laurie. Jace also think she’s kind of cute, but Brian feels she’s a cold, snobby geek. Later on in the hallway during class change Jace is laughing as he listens to Brian making fun of Laurie. Just so happens they almost bump into Laurie and Carla who hear what they're saying and she is offended and really mad. Jace tries to shake it off, by saying I see we'll be working together. Laurie now realizing her friend is right about him is mad and cold to him saying 'wow I feel lucky'.
Next in the library, we see a teenage girl named Natalie. She walks through the isles with her younger sister who’s loudly singing out the Alphabet Song. Natalie tells her sister not to wonder away too far. Then she organizes some books on a cart to find the one she needs. Suddenly, a little distance away the door knob to the Quiet Reading Room begins twisting and making a knocking noise. With curiosity, she looks over at the door opening and the purple light flashes at her. She screams, goes mute and then disappears.
Next we see Laurie reluctantly working with Jace on their assignment in the library. Laurie is working hard, while Jace is just sitting around not doing much. She coldly gives him a list of books they need for their assignment and asks him to go to the basement to find them. He tells her to try and lighten up, and not be so bossy and cold all the time.
He goes to the basement with her notebook with the list of books they need. When no one is looking he puts on his reading glasses and finds the exact books they'll need. He then sees a green ball bounce over to him, curious where it came from he looks over to the book shelf cart and is about to look through it to the door. Then suddenly he unexpectedly bumps into the librarian Mrs. Hurley and they both startle each other, and he heads back upstairs forgetting her notebook.
He meets Laurie at the photocopy machine, and she’s surprised to see he wears glasses and smiles realizing maybe they're not too different after all. However he takes them off and denies wearing them. Next we see them back at the table, Jace is still a little nervous and jumpy from the weirdness that happened in the basement. Laurie is cold and insists, since she is the smart one she should do all the work. Jace decides to kill time by playing with an irritating sound effects toy that gives off laser blasts and siren sounds, like one of the toy guns from the 1980's. This really annoys Laurie and many other people sitting nearby them. She gets mad and takes it from him, giving him a mad look and tells him to stop. He gets mad at her for treating him like a kid and he storms off and leaves.
Outside the library, she catches up with him and demands he give her books back, he says he found them and they're his books which he needs to do his report with. She says it's their report and their teamwork just isn't working out, and one of them has to do it. Mad he hands her the books and tells her fine do it, he didn't want to work on a team anyways. Then a little later as school ends, Laurie realizes her notebook isn't with the books in her locker and realizes Jace still has it. She finds Jace with Brian at football practice and asks him where her notebook is? He remembers and he tells her he forgot it in the library basement and they agree to meet later at 7:00 pm to go to the library and get it back.
When they meet at the library at 7:00 pm the doors are locked. Seems neither of them knew that the library would close at 7:00 pm. Laurie gets upset and mad because without her notebook, she'll fail the assignment and she's never failed anything before. Jace decides to try and make it up to her for not being such a good teammate on their group assignment, and to break into the library through one of the windows. Though she objects, because it's illegal and dangerous he insists on doing so to make it up to her. After trying several windows that won't budge they're about to give up. Then suddenly an upstairs window opens.
They climb up the wall pipe and both carefully climb inside. Laurie puts her bag down and it just drops to the floor. Suddenly she points out that the photocopy machine has disappeared. The library looks very different inside all the computers and the television and VCR are gone as well. They hear a strange noise which is the clicking of the door in the basement in and it startles them. Jace wants to just leave, Laurie still needs her notebook. He takes Laurie down to the library basement and it's changed.
The basement is dark with no lights on, Laurie finds an old lit kerosene lamp and carries it to light their path. There are a lot less books than before, and the room is much neat and cleaner. Also the path to the Quiet Reading Room, is now clear to be seen and has nothing in the way. Jace and Laurie go over to the door, and look at the old vintage calendar on the wall. The calendar says it's 1910. Jace doesn't believe it at first, saying it's phony. Then Laurie picks up the old key off the hook near the Calendar and unlocks the door to the Quiet Reading Room.
The room has many small shelves of old books in them covered in thick dust and spider webs. Then moving in closer, they find a long table. The table is just coated in flour thick dust and spider webs. Under the webs are many books, kerosene lamps and children lying with their heads down, as if they’re sleeping. Jace and Laurie are horrified with what they're seeing. Two of them, in old-fashioned clothing, wake up and resume reading, another child is just waking up. Also, Timmy and Natalie who just disappeared a few days ago are reading to and then they both look at Jace and Laurie and open their mouths to screams but no sound is heard. Laurie screams to and they both run out terrified.
Then at the end of the room, Laurie thinks she can see the librarian Mrs. Hurley there and she calls out to her. Turns out it's not Mrs. Hurley. Instead, it's a creepy-looking old woman in a black dress and purple tinted sunglasses. The woman is the Quiet Librarian, a vengeful spirit of a very strict and abusive librarian who hates any noise and traps it into her small magic box. Also she locks away any disruptive people into the quiet reading room, using it as a prison. She coldly tells them when approaching slowly. "No talking in the library; there is room for two more!", she states. They both scream and hide by the bookcase.
The Quiet Librarian approaches them and Jace asks her who she is. Then she opens her wooden box in front of him and it glows purple and suddenly it steals his voice; he’s now silent and can't speak, but he has found his answer. She laughs loudly but diabolically. Laurie grabs Jace and runs away, then they barricade the door with a bookcase. They then realize all the windows are locked, and all the phones and fire alarms (much less anything modern) is gone too and they can't call for help. Then they can hear the Quiet Librarian at the door stating "Silence is Golden!".
When she forces her way in, Laurie screams and they duck down and hide. They crawl away to hide from her and accidentally knock something over. The Quiet Librarian opens her box and steals the sound of the noise coming from the object falling down. Due to him being mute, Jace hand signals for her to run and hide upstairs. Hearing the noise of her footsteps, the Quiet Librarian follows her. Laurie hides inside a book section and she’s so scared and nervous that her heart is pounding. The Quiet Librarian follows the sound of her heartbeat.
Jace then plays the wind up phonograph in the basement, in an attempt to lure the librarian over to him. Furious of the loud music's sound, the Quiet Librarian goes to stop it. She catches him and tells him she'll teach him a lesson like she does to all the noisy children, saying that her reading room is so peaceful, and he'll get to like it no time. Jace grabs some records and runs for it, as he has an idea.
She corners him flashing the purple light at him and he smashes each record hoping the noise would make her go away, but every record smashed she steals the sound of it breaking every time. She is about to close in on him and send him to the Quiet Reading Room like her other muted prisoners. Then Laurie comes by and tries to tell her to leave him alone. Then the Quiet Librarian uses the magic box on her and steals her voice too.
Then Laurie takes out Jace's noisy 1980's sound effects toy and constantly plays one irritating siren and blaster sound after another. This of course really irritates the Quiet Librarian. Laurie and Jace pass the toy back and forth to each other. It would seems the sounds are playing too fast to be captured, and The Quiet Librarian is getting really annoyed and keeps asking them to stop, at first pleading but then getting really angry. She screams to Jace and Laurie that "children who make noise in the library must be punished!", not realizing the fact that it’s she who will be punished instead.
Then Laurie throws a small statue at the Quiet Librarian. She reacts in pain, dropping her magic box on the floor. Laurie tries to take it but it won't move. Then all the constantly, irritating and blaring siren sounds cause the box to overload and a beam of violet light flashes out. "NOOOOOOOO!", the librarian shouts. All the faces of all the people she captured over the years are freed from the box. There is some screaming and then the sound of a heart pounding in the background is heard.
Then next the sound of a person is heard walking down the stairs. The person is a Security Guard, who’s mad and he asks them what they're both doing there. He examines what’s left of the Quiet Librarian which is smoke, black ashes and her glasses. Seems that when the box overloaded, it destroyed the Quiet Librarian, charring her into ashes.
They are relieved to both have their voices back, they both just say that they've found the missing children, who now have their voices back as well. They take the security guard to the basement and show him where the hidden door behind the bookcase is. The Guard is shocked to find it because the room hasn't been opened for many years.
When the door is opened, Timmy and Natalie both exit with their voices restored and feeling shocked about what happened. The security guard is shocked because the Quiet Reading Room is like a tomb inside being so old, dirty and dusty. The security guard asks them to stay put while he goes off to make a report about it. When he leaves they hear the laughing voices of children and figure out that the spirits of the other trapped children are finally free.
Soon, a group of police officers are investigating the library from top to bottom, Laurie tells Jace no one is ever going to believe them, and she says that they make a pretty good team after all and Jace agrees. A police officer returns Laurie's notebook to her, which she’s thrilled to get back. When they leave the library they happily agree to work together writing their assignment
As they leave the library, the camera zooms into the portrait on the wall. The portrait is of the Quiet Librarian. The portrait frame reveals that her real name was Mercy MacGregor and she was the Head Librarian from 1895 to 1910. Implying she vowed that her library would always remain silent one way or another and would haunt the library after she died.
Ending[]
Then Kiki ends her story. Frank tells her it was a cool story. Sam agrees, saying that she never knew that silence could be so creepy. Gary declares their meeting closed and puts out the campfire. Kiki then mentions that she has some library books to return, and wants to know if anyone will go with her? Betty Ann mentions that it's way past closing time. Kiki says she’s going to just drop them into the night slot and then asks if anyone will go with her? Nervous about libraries from the story nobody wants to go. They all just quickly head off for home. She begs for one of them to go with her and just meet her by the corner but no one does. Then she smiles hinting that she was just kidding about having to go to the library; and goes home to.
- Shannon Duff, who portrayed Laurie Napier is the older sister of Kerry Duff. Kerry Duff appeared in the Season Seven's episode "The Tale of the Night Nurse" as Nicki.
- Shannon Duff would later star as Allison Baldwin on the PBS Kids show Kratts' Creatures in 1996.
- Justin Borntraeger who portrayed Brian, had previously appeared in the series before. He made an uncredited appearance in the episode "The Tale of the Hatching" as Kit.
- DJ MacHale has said he thinks the scene where they discover the other kids is one of the most chilling scenes in the series.
