Tarensa Rokei Cultural Archive
The Tarensa Rokei Cultural Archive is a massive library, museum, and storehouse complex located deep within Bunker Primus. In keeping with the founding mandates of the Manifold Conservation Society, the Archive serves as a repsitory for data, artifacts, and books regarding the various cultures of the Manifold Sky setting as a hedge against the extinction of these cultures.
Purpose / Function
The purpose of the Archives is to collect materials about, and promulgate the knowledge of, the various cultures of the Manifold Sky setting. While deeper portions of the Archives are sealed behind increasing levels of security to prevent theft or desecration, copies of written materials, microfilms, and some of the more common items (i.e. replica oar-marker) are provided for perusal in a public library space. Researchers and those expecting to go on official missions abroad (i.e. diplomats) are admitted into the private portions of the Archives in the interest of fostering better cross-cultural understandings at their destinations.
Architecture
The grounds of the Archive are three-dimensional in nature, with security increasing with each inward shell.
The walls, floor, and ceiling of the Archive are ten feet of pre-stressed concrete lined with lead and field-proof cages to secure the facility against both impacts and various electromagnetic spectra; this is as much as defense against unauthorized remote RadNet access as it is against any military attack. The support members all around the Archive float on oil-filled cushions to dampen any effects from seismic activity - this despite the fact that Bunker Primus, being located in the Dorsal Tesseract, is not generally subject to large earthquakes. The large doors spaced around the structure form sally ports which, in the event of an emergency, can be sealed away from the rest of Bunker Primus, forming a bunker within the bunker. Since all of this is located in an underground space, citizens in the surrounding residence chambers don't generally see the brutalist outer aspect of the Archive as a building.
The public-accessible portions of the Archive are richly-decorated to showcase the multicultural influences of the Manifold Conservation Society, with an uncharacteristic abundance of warm-colored paints, woven wall coverings, and wood-veneered furnishings. As one pushes deeper in, these niceties are replaced with more academic - and then more clinical - surroundings as the pieces require more specialized conservation methods to maintain. The administrative facilities at the core of the Archives buck this trend; these spaces are accessible by the halls of the Society's Administrative Council directly above the Archives and are furnished like a more traditional office space.
One notable effect of all the architecture which has gone into protecting the archives is the all-encompassing silence of the place. Unless someone is listening to audio recordings - for which the staff strongly encourages headphones - visitors report that they can 'hear a pin drop' in the Archives.
Defenses
Though the Archive is the target of occasional heists looking to 'liberate' its artistic inventory, the bigger security threat to the Archive comes in the form of various iconoclastic groups or those otherwise looking to eliminate evidence of historical misdeeds. Human religious groups like the Daughters of Misfortune and some radical adherents to the cult of Zevtwill are famous for their irreverence of others' cultures in specific contexts. The process of vetting foreign guests has significantly reduced the danger of incidents.
The Garbage Man, especially, represents an existential threat to the Archives, being capable of traversing dimensions at will and a powerful part of a group bent on overturning history. No possible solutions to this latter risk have been forthcoming, but, as of the year 10,000 AR, the Garbage Man has thus far not attempted to infiltrate the structure - that the administrators are aware of, anyways.
History
Tarensa Rokei was a Society citizen and, as Rostrans are often wont to do, a prolific world traveller. She was inspired by the late Eqai Voiranoi, whom she briefly met in her youth, to later join the MCS Bureau of Outreach in continuance of her curiosity about the world and its cultures. The Grand Archives, which had existed in some form since almost the beginning of the MCS itself, were posthumusly named for her in recognition of her extensive academic contributions with regards to Manifold anthropology.
Tourism
While the public-facing portions of the Archives are free for Society citizens to visit, foreign visitors are largely not permitted unless they somehow contribute to the Archives. This contribution can take the form of monetary support, whether for the facility or for missions associated with it, but unique cultural artifacts of all types are more prized in this regard. If physical examples cannot be provided, recorded evidence or well-sourced reports will suffice with approval of the archivists' editorial review board. In any event, even the most respected foreign contributor will be fully searched and vetted before being allowed to access the deeper portions of the library and, with only a few exceptions, are never permitted into the administrative core under any circumstances.
Alternative Names
Grand Archives
Type
Library
Parent Location
Owning Organization
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