Jacen solo's reaction to having to use a physical book

The librarian led them across the floor of the giant chamber, along a path between two long shelves. Jacen idly studied the contents of the shelves as he walked, wondering what they were. They looked like bricks of some kind, and he wondered if they were some sort of data storage device. A high-security installation such as this one would, he assumed, have a highly sophisticated means of keeping its data safe. Perhaps the bricks had to be fed by hand into some kind of reader, which would then display its contents. Each of the memory bricks could hold vast amounts of data, safely sealed away. Tris turned right at the end of the shelves and took them down to another aisle.“Here are the exploration notes for the world you visited last, Munlali Mafir, translated into Basic for permanent record.” She reached up to the top shelf and selected one of the bricks. “Everything here is meticulously cataloged. It may take you a while to get the hang of our system, but I am here to assist you in that task.”She handed the brick to Mara, who hefted it uncertainly, then gave it to Jacen. It was heavier than he had expected, and there were no obvious jack-in ports. The front and back were made of the same material as one side of the thing—a deep red material, with gold writing in Basic. The other three sides were curiously rough and soft.Seeing his puzzlement, Tris took it back from him and opened it. The top folded back like the lid of a box, only the interior wasn’t empty. It was full all the way through. Full of text.Only then did Jacen understand. He felt like an idiot for not getting it sooner. But judging by the gasp of surprise from Danni, he knew he wasn’t the only one. Not a brick. The object in Tris’s hand was a book.“You’re kidding,” Mara said, her eyebrows rising.It was Tris’s turn to look puzzled. “The Chiss have always stored sensitive information in this fashion. It is safe, secure, and permanent. We have lost too much data in ice storms to trust other, more complicated forms of storage.” “But how are we going to find anything?” Danni asked. “We can’t do keyword searches through … this!”“There are ways to search, and I am here to assist you.” Tris seemed serenely confident, but Jacen’s mind balked at the thought of poring through the millions—maybe billions—of pages contained on the shelves around them. The library was full of mission reports, xenobiology tracts, anthropological assays, and contact histories from the Chiss Expeditionary Defense Fleet’s exploration of the Unknown Regions—and that exploration had been ongoing for centuries.How hard can this be? he told himself. If I can fly an X-wing with my eyes shut, then surely I can leaf through a few books!-New Jedi Order: Force Heratic II via /r/StarWars https://ift.tt/2OIJuXi