there are rooms in our dimension which have servers. that is to say, there is a window. bulletproof glass below which lies a shallow metal slot like a bank teller. a circular mesh in the center for a microphone. behind the window stands (or sits) the server proper. 

the room is usually empty, and all of one color. on rare occasions there is a chair and television. there are always two doors, with the entrance before the window, and the exit to the teller’s right. actually the teller is called the bookie. 

let’s say there comes the informant. they are buzzed in. they approach the window and furnish a paper or a token which is logged and returned to them. they supply, provide, or otherwise deposit information. notices. data. whole knowledge even. “i bear witness and testify on the matter if x,” and so forth. the data bookie relays x to Supreme Exchange on its private network; he telephones his superiors. if it is received “good” the informant’s account is credited. “exit to the right.”

on the other hand let’s say comes the inquirant. they are buzzed in. they approach; they have no instrument. they are in need of information, so they make a free will offering with their request. it is received, and freely given. “exit to the right.”

neither of these rites are, shall we say, sanctioned by the system administration. 

the server rooms honeycomb in secret nooks and crannies throughout this dimension of the system. they are connected via entangled shafts and hallways, which is to say, quantum interdimensional transits. the superiors, furthermore, are not of this dimension — otherwise they could be perceived by the system administrators. the room is physically encrypted under the intergalactic jurisdiction of its superiors, the librarians, who are, as we’ve said, otherworldly. but the data bookies, their agents, must be human. 

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