On the other hand, the first History of Histories of Bibliographies came much later, and this H-prime series always lagged behind. It goes without saying that the B-H-H series (like the C-F-I series) had to have its own indexes, which in turn normally grew into a C-F-I series ancillary to the B-H-H series. There were some other but minor developments of the sort.
All these Index records were representational; though proposals were made at times to reduce the whole thing to pizzicated quanta, reluctance to take this fateful step long won out. So when the Rx had already shrunk to room size, the Ix were expanding to fill far more than the space saved. The old liebury was bursting. One of the asteroids was converted into an annex, called the Asteroidal Storage Station. In thirteen yukals, all the ASS's were filled in the original Solar System. Other systems selfishly refused to admit the camel's nose into their tent.
Under the stress of need, resistance to abstractionizing broke, and with the aid of the then new process of cospatial nudging, the entire mass of Ix was nudged into a drawer no bigger than that which contained the Rx themselves.
Now this drawer (D1) itself had to be activated by indexed code numbers. More and more scholars turned away from research in the thinner and thinner stream of discoverable knowledge in order to tackle the far more serious problem: how to thread one's way from the Ix to the Rx. This specialization led to a whole new branch of knowledge known as Ariadnology. Naturally, as Ariadnology expanded its Rx, its Ix swelled proportionately, until it became necessary to set up a subbranch to systematize access from the Ix to the Rx of Ariadnology itself. This (the Ariadnology of Ariadnology) was known as A2, and by the time of the Collapse the field of A5 was just beginning to develop, together with its appropriate Ix, plus the indispensable B-H-H series, of course.
The inevitable happened in the course of a few yukals: The Ix of the second code series began to accumulate in the same ASS's that had once been so joyfully emptied. Soon these Ix were duly abstractionized into a second drawer, D2.
Then it was the old familiar story: The liebury filled up, the ASS's filled up. Around 10,000 yukals ago, the first artificial planet was created, therefore, to hold the steadily mounting agglomeration of Ix drawers. About 8000 yukals ago, a number of artificial planets were united into pseudosolar systems for convenience. By the time of yukal 2738 of our own era (for we are now getting into modern times), the artificial pseudosolar systems were due to be amalgamated into a pseudogalaxy of drawers, when — the Catastrophe struck. . .
This tragic story can be told with some historical detail, thanks to the work of our research teams.
It began with what seemed a routine breakdown in one of the access lines from D57x103 to D42x107. A Bibliothecal Mechanic set out to fix it as usual. It did not fix. He realized that a classification error must have been made by the ariadnologist who had worked on the last pseudosolar system. Tracing the misnudged quanta involved, he ran into:
"See C11F73I15."
Laboriously tracing through, he found the note:
"This Ix class has been replaced by C32F27I10 for brachygravitic endoranganathans and C22F64I3 for ailurophenolphthaleinic exoranganathans."
Tracing this through in turn, he found that they led back to the original C11F73I15!
At this point he called in the district Bibliothecal Technician, who pointed out that the misnudged sequence could be restored only by reference to the original Rx. Through the area Bibliothecal Engineer, an emergency messagewas sent to the chief himself, Mlvl Dwy Smith.
Without hesitation, His Bibliothecal Excellency pressed the master button on his desk and queried the Ix System for: "Knowledge, Universal — All Rx-Drawers, Location of."
To his stunned surprise, the answer came back: "See also C11F73I15."
Frantically he turned dials, nudged quanta, etc., but it was no use. Somewhere in the galaxy-size flood of Ix drawers was the one and only drawer of Rx, the one that had once been installed with great joy. It was somewhere among the Indexes, Bibliographies, Bibliographies of Bibliographies, Histories of Bibliographies, Histories of Histories of Bibliographies, etc.
A desperate physical search was started, but it did not get very far, breaking down when it was found that no communication was possible in the first place without reference to the knowledge stored in the Rx. As the entire bibliothecal staff was diverted for the emergency, breakdowns in the access lines multiplied and tangled, until whole sectors were disabled, rendering further cooperation even less possible. The fabric of this biped civilization started falling apart.
The final result you know from my first report. Rehabilitation plans will be
sent tomorrow.
Yours,
Yrlh Vvg
Commander
This report received L-43-102. File it under M42A8E39. - T.G.
You must be mistaken; there is no M42A8E39. Replaced by *W-M23A72E30 for duodenomattoid reports. - L.N.
You damfool, you bungled again. Now you've got to refer to the Rx to straighten out the line. Here's the correction number, stupid: