Chapter 28The Ledger Was Never Meant to Add Up

The Liberty Mask closed his five fingers, and everything on the altar began to slide towards him. Even the buoys pulled taut, pointing inwards.

The supply crates moved first. There were twelve of them, stock from the makeshift sheds on the island, and they had been stacked around the outer edge of the altar, stacked neatly, corner against corner. Their bottoms dragged white marks across the stone, and all twelve white marks ran towards the middle. The crates struck one another with a dull sound, and when the striking was done, they were hauled onwards again. The green numbers in the cracks of the stone tipped over too, jumping upwards one square at a time, and halfway through the jump they were sucked down. Not one square fell back where it had been.

The buoys in the harbour were tied to mooring lines. The lines rose taut from the surface of the water, several of them as straight as threads just drawn. A buoy left the water by a finger’s width, dropped back, and was hauled up again. Each time it left the water it rose to the same height, once, and once more, counted.

The light on people was moving as well. From a shoulder, from the back of a hand, from the edge of the dog tag on a chest, a single line, so fine it could hardly be seen, was drawn off towards the altar. Andrew looked down and saw the line on the back of his own hand pulled out from his knuckles, stretched dead straight, all the way to the centre of the altar. The lines on the others were stretched the same way.

The Liberty Mask stood at the centre of the altar, the tip of his foot on the scored line, not an inch off. He did not move. His hands hung at his sides, the knuckles bent at a fixed angle. Even the tags in the seams of his own joints pulled taut, pointing inwards, and several drew back and lay flat against the joints, as though an invisible thread were slowly winding them back in.

“All of these, other people paid for on my behalf.”

The Liberty Mask’s voice came from the altar and dropped straight onto their ears, and dropped, and did not echo. He pressed hard on ‘paid for’, pressed down on it, and read the line out like the total of a column of figures.

Qingluan’s silk shawl was pulled dead straight. The long cloth stretched from her shoulder all the way to the altar, and the points of light on it came loose one by one and flew towards the torch. Her body leaned forward an inch, and her rubber soles squeaked on the stone. When the first point of light left, she looked down at the end of the shawl and said, “It’s eating our light.”

She reached out to catch it. Her fingers closed, and there was nothing inside. The second point of light flew off, and she reached again, and again it was empty. Twice she reached to catch it, and all she caught was air.

The five of them were hauled across the whole harbour. Underfoot was that flattened sea, its grid lines lit, the water under the lines a greyish white; it did not give when they stepped on it. No one took long strides. It was the grid drawing back, one square at a time pulled out from under their soles. When it reached the edge of the island, the grid lines broke off against the stone, and they were hauled in through the gap in the old star-shaped wall. Jaewon’s white shoes dragged a grey mark across the stone, and the fuzz on their toes was worn flat for a stretch. The satin toe of Swan’s left shoe did not leave the ground; her right trainer edged forward step by step, and the tread of its sole pressed a few greyish-white prints. Mitsuki’s blade did not move, its back against her right forearm. Her heel scratched a very short line across the stone, and when it was drawn, stopped again. Andrew’s left knee sounded first, once, muffled, old. He did not bend the leg; if he bent it, it would sound first. The hammer in his right hand was dragged forward and down, its head, that length of steel girder, turning towards the altar. The handle turned half an inch in his palm. He gripped it and twisted it back.

The formation had broken up. The five of them no longer stood in a row; they had been hauled into a cluster, less than a step apart. The mooring bollards on the island’s quay all leaned forward, the worn bright ring at the top of each one facing the altar, bright and very clean.

The altar lay inside the old star-shaped wall. The stone was greyish white, with fine grass growing in the cracks, and the beam of light rose straight up from the middle of the flat ground, through the night clouds; behind the clouds nothing could be seen. Wind poured in towards the middle from all sides, poured into every collar, into every cuff, and was drawn off by the beam, drawn off fast; not one breath of it stayed. A corner of Andrew’s jacket flew up and was pulled back down against his back, and the skin under the cloth tightened several times.

※

The Liberty Mask swept the torch sideways in a full circle.

The torch was shaped like a missile, and from its tail trailed a string of green and red numbers. The numbers came loose from the exhaust flame and wound into several circles in the air above the altar. The circles wound tighter and tighter, so tight the middle could not be seen, and all that was left was a grey, spinning mass. That was the arms whirlwind. The things in it were all the same size, all with the same round heads, no points and no edges, and on the base of each one was printed a number. There was a smell of new paper in the wind, faint, gone at a sniff. They circled the altar, and at a certain height, suddenly, batch after batch came down over them. The sound of their landing was dull, once, and once more, like someone in the distance striking a row of empty iron drums.

A stream of numbers still hung on the Liberty Mask’s shoulders, sinking, and when it sank to his waist it stopped. He did not turn his head. His face was a verdigris-green mask. From this far away, there was no telling whether it had eyes. There was no shadow under his feet. The root of the beam of light rose from beside his feet, and a ring of stone was lit, but the place where he stood was empty.

When the first batch came down, Swan was already standing at the very front. She raised her left wrist, and the flat ring on it opened; hexagonal scales of pearl-white and platinum spread out layer by layer and spread into a shield. The face of the shield was thin, so thin the stone behind it showed through. The first round struck it, and the scales cracked apart one by one, the fragments tumbling down into the cracks of the stone, where a patch of fine grass was pressed flat. One blade of grass was snapped by a fragment, and the break was white. The stiff collar of white feather pieces stood dead straight. Her feet did not give ground; her right trainer stepped on the fragments, and stepped again.

She said, “Sorry, this round I’m not giving way.” Her voice was level, her sibilants very clean.

Mitsuki was half a beat behind the shells. She squeezed through a gap between the others and moved up beside Andrew, the straight blade slanting along her forearm, point down. She did not look at Andrew; her eyes stayed on the torch. The plain white wide sleeve on her left shoulder filled with wind, billowed once, and lay flat again. When the second round came, she struck, and the band of light on the blade slashed sideways and met the shells. The band was jarred into breaks, one stretch lit, one stretch dark, and the dark stretch took a beat before it lit again. Each time her blade came down, the band had to stop for a moment, stop at the point, before it travelled back along the edge. She did not stop, and struck again. The crescent-shaped mark under her left eye lit up to the cheekbone, and held.

※

When the sanction order came down, there was almost no sound.

Five verdict rings pressed in from above. Their rims were thin and white, with a row of very fine writing along the edge, so small that Andrew made out only one word: ‘Tag’. All five came down together at the same speed, and each fitted exactly over the move one of them had just won back. As they came down, each carried a very fine ringing with it, the kind of ringing a wire makes when it is pulled tight. When the ringing was over, the rims were fastened to them, fastened tight, without a gap.

Andrew counted once. One, two, three, four, five. He counted the people, and he counted the rings. It was a habit from roll call: what you counted had to match the list, and if it did not match, you counted again.

The first fitted over the stalled command ring. The ring above his left forearm turned half a circle and stopped. It stopped in the wrong place, the fine line on the ring stuck at one point, not moving at all. Once stopped, the ring looked a little flattened, as if someone had pressed it from above. The moment the command ring stopped, Andrew’s left arm went heavy, and the whole forearm dropped with it.

The second clamped the throat that could make no sound. Qingluan’s sound rings lit one ring after another, and at the third ring, stopped. She opened her mouth, and the shape of her mouth was right; the sound did not come. Her hand still gripped the end of the shawl, and the points of light leaked out between her fingers, leaked very slowly, and when they had all leaked out, her fingers were still closed. The shawl hung down and became an ordinary piece of cloth; only the part lying over her shoulder still had a line of light that had not gone.

The third fitted over the wrist that was folding back into a flat ring. The scales on Swan’s left wrist were about to open when they were drawn back in, into a flat platinum ring against the wrist bone, pressed very tight. She glanced at the ribbon on her left foot, its broken end pointing down, the fraying on the satin pressed flat. She did not look at her own wrist. Her gaze stayed ahead, on the torch, and her lips pressed together once.

The fourth: the straight blade Poxiao was held down in its sheath and could not come out. The point of Mitsuki’s blade had just left her forearm when the ring pressed down and held the blade back, pressed it back into the sheath along her forearm. She had no sheath. Her sheath was her own forearm. The band of light along the blade flickered once and went out.

The fifth: the violet core of the broken microphone earring went out. The point of electric violet at Jaewon’s right ear flickered once and went out. Where it broke, it was dark; only a stub of silver was left, its edges blunt. Jaewon’s shadow print lagged half a beat before it swayed after his body. Jaewon’s right hand was still moving, the fingers flicking once; that was the beat, but no sound came out.

As the rings closed, a white price tag was pinned on each of them. The tags were very light. They landed on shoulders, on wrists, on chests; one landed on the dog tag on Andrew’s chest and covered exactly the blank space where nothing had been engraved. Each tag was printed with a number, and after the number there was a small symbol, on everyone’s. The numbers had not finished jumping; they climbed across the face of the tag one place at a time, reached a certain point, paused, and went on.

When a tag settled on a shoulder it was very light, so light you would think it weighed nothing. But then the shoulder sank, and only then did you know that what it weighed was a number. No one reached up to take theirs off. Each of them kept their head down, looking at the one on them, for a long time.

The number board at the edge of the altar jumped one place and jumped back. The number it jumped back to did not match the one before it jumped; the digit that was missing, no one made up.

The five of them were still breathing. Their breath came out white and scattered in the wind as soon as it left their mouths.

To get your breath back, you had to pay first. No one could afford it.

Someone tried to stand up straight, and the knees went first. It was Mitsuki. Her left knee pressed against the stone; she pushed herself up, got halfway, and her knee bent again. The blade lay across her chest, the band of light along it going out stretch by stretch.

The Liberty Mask raised his hand and gripped the torch. Its exhaust flame shortened at once; the numbers stopped jumping out and only lit one place at a time at the tail. In a seam of his joints a tag knocked once and gave a very small papery sound. He stood at the centre of the altar, and his voice dropped straight down from there: “Want to stand up? Pay first.”

※

Andrew stared at his stalled command ring. The fine line on the ring stayed where it had stopped at half a circle and would not move. He drew his left hand back and closed the fingers one by one, and in his palm a screw pressed into the skin.

M6. The afternoon it was taken out of the prosthetic’s joint, at the clinic door, the veteran had put it in his palm and said three words: “You keep it.”

He remembered the pharmacy corner. Cold white lights, the chiller humming against the wall, the shelves running all the way to the end, every box of medicine in every slot with a small handwritten label. Along the top of the shelves hung a row of price tags, each number followed by a small symbol. There was no one behind the till; on the counter a notebook lay face down, a pen across its edge. The mat at the door was wet, and the wind outside came in through the gap in the door; the tags knocked against each other once and came apart. The veteran stood at that end of the shelves, picked up a box of medicine, turned it to look at the side, and when he had looked, put it back, very gently, label facing out, lined up with the boxes beside it. His right leg came down, and the joint of the prosthetic struck the floor with a knock. He did not look back. Andrew stood at the other end of the shelves, both hands empty. His box had been put back the same way, lined up in its place.

Tonight, neither of them had paid.

He had seen that person crouched on the steps counting money. Counted three times, and the three counts were different, and that person did not look up. That day he had been carrying a bag of bread, standing across the street, watching from the other side of the road. That person’s fingers were spread, counting note by note, counting very slowly.

He remembered that form too. It was a procurement form for a substitute, the paper thin, the words ‘Substitute Procurement’ printed across the top. What was signed for was a substitute leg. It was a tube, a connector and a foot that could only press down. The cheap kind; the form said cheap, and he had known it when he signed. The approval box held his name, the strokes pressed harder than any of the writing above, the ink coming through the back of the paper in a few small dots. He had brought the pen himself. Its cap had come off once, and he had wrapped a turn of tape round it, and the wrapped part was thicker than the rest. The veteran’s name was written on the line above, and he had read it letter by letter, and every letter was right. When he had signed, the pen rolled to the edge of the table. He reached out and pressed it, pressed twice, before it stopped. The date was printed in the top right corner of the form, a very ordinary number; he did not try to remember it. Outside the window it was raining, the rain slanting, a few trails of water running down the glass, and at the window frame they broke off.

Later he had gone to that building once. Five floors, no lift, twelve steps to a flight. At the building’s door was a row of letterboxes; he counted them, twelve slots in all, and four of their lids were open. Beside the steps was a patch of squares drawn in chalk, trodden down until only a few grey lines were left. He did not crouch to look at it. He stood at the foot of the building, looked up and counted the windows, and when he reached the one that was lit, he stopped. The door was iron, and a sheet of paper had once been stuck on its glass; the paper had been torn off, and only a ring of glue marks was left. He did not push the door. Wind came out through the gap in the door, carrying damp. He stood there until the street lamps came on, then turned and walked away.

It was not that he could not make the account add up. It was that this ledger had never been meant to let him. The sentence took shape in him, very slowly. So slowly that his hand moved first.

He let go of the Hammer of Liberty.

The hammer was his. Its head was a length of steel girder from a transmission tower, taken down and recast, the weld seam at the break still there, hard to the touch. The handle was steel, and he never thought about what temperature it was. After long gripping, the calluses of his palm had pressed into the handle and pressed out a shape. He had held this hammer a long time, and every time it came down, the force was his own. When something had been snatched from him, he had let go, and the thing had fallen, and he had bent to pick it up. Putting it down of his own accord, this was the first time. The hammer dropped, landed on the stone, and sounded once. A white mark was left on the stone, its edges very even, the kind of even that comes from a ruler pressed down. He did not pick it up.

His right hand was empty. He held it out, palm up, towards Mitsuki beside him. There was nothing in the palm, only sweat, and in the white of the beam the sweat had no shine.

Mitsuki turned her hand and gripped his.

She did not look down at his hand. Her eyes were still on the torch; only her fingers moved once in his hand. Her fingers slid in between his, locked, tightened, then eased off a fraction, eased just enough to take the strain. Her hand was cool and dry, with hard skin on the knuckles worn by the hilt. The force came straight in from her palm in a single line, with nothing extra, and once it held, it did not move again. The pad of her finger pressed the web between his thumb and forefinger, not hard, a pressure already tested.

He spoke. His voice was low, the breath drawn out long.

“It isn’t that he can’t make it add up. It’s that this ledger won’t let him.”

Jaewon’s voice came from beside them, half a beat behind the beat.

“They can lock the moves, but not this hand.”

The three of them no longer each made their own moves; they passed their strength on, and took up what the others passed to them.

Jaewon opened his mouth and let out a high note. His voice could not reach that height; it only went as far as the middle stretch, bright, on the thin side. Jaewon’s Adam’s apple moved once, and the sound came out of his chest, a little slower than his mouth. The sweat at his temple ran down along his jaw and was gone at his collar. This note was borrowed. The band of light on the shawl was drawn across from Qingluan’s shoulder, all the way to Andrew’s wrist, holding the note up. The note cut in along the band, passed through the hand that was being held, and pushed up into Mitsuki’s straight blade. The blade was pushed upwards, slid out of the sheath along her forearm, its point to the sky. The fine grass in the cracks of the stone all stood up, trembled once with that note, and fell back.

Andrew could tell the weight of each strand of force. Jaewon’s note was very light, but passing through his wrist it was hot, hot enough to go hard, and it reached his palm half a beat behind the beat. The end of Qingluan’s shawl lay across the outside of his wrist; its light was scattered and could not be grasped, with only the weight of a single thread. Mitsuki’s hand was cool, her force straight, running along one line. His left hand was damp, the screw in the palm stuck there by sweat. In his right, three strands touched once at his wrist. They did not collide; they were staggered, staggered by half a beat, and each went on its way. His left palm pressed on the thread of the screw, pressed it into the lines of his hand, printing a few white rings. He could count them.

Mitsuki turned. With the straight blade out of its sheath, she turned and in one stroke cut through a length of red tape wound round Swan’s right ankle. That length of tape had been dragged up out of the cracks in the altar stone; the pull across the stone had kept hauling at it, and it had wound round once, wound onto the side of the shoe, onto the ankle. The edge was very light. It did not touch the skin of the ankle; it touched only the tape. The stroke made no sound, only a very fine sound of something passing, so fine you would have to be pressed to the stone to hear it. The blade went past the side of the shoe, and the tape broke into two pieces, sprang apart and landed on the stone. The two pieces still kept the shape of the ankle, empty in the middle. Swan’s right foot drew back half an inch across the stone, and the hole in the toe of her trainer showed, with greyish-white stone dust inside it.

Jaewon threw himself sideways to take the barrage coming down at Andrew. The shells struck his shoulder, his back, and the shadow print on the back of his jacket lagged half a beat before it pressed forward after his body. Where he was hit, it went white, and the white marks slowly faded; he did not rub them. He did not step back. In the same second, Swan’s left wrist was still folded, that platinum ring not opened. But in the cracks of the stone there were still her scales that had shattered earlier, one hexagon, two, turning up, reaching in from the side, a few of them bracing in front of Andrew. They had shattered in the first round; the verdict had never fixed a move to them. The scales turning up raised the dust in the cracks, and the dust fell on Andrew’s army boots. The outer heel of his boot was worn thin in one spot; the dust fell on that spot and stayed. The scales were cool, cooler even than Mitsuki’s hand, so thin they had almost no weight. When they met the shells, it was the sound of pieces of porcelain knocking together.

The verdict rings were still pressing. What they went looking for was those moves, and what they found was something else. Mitsuki’s blade was in her hand, Andrew’s hand was being held, Jaewon’s note was still climbing, running back along the band of light to Qingluan’s shoulder and scattering from her shoulder into every hand. The rings did not recognise it. They were still turning, turning very slowly, counting out the last beat.

When the first ring split, the sound was very light, like a fine thread snapping. The second cracked open from Qingluan’s throat, and a little white light leaked from the crack, very thin, too thin to catch. The third circled round Swan’s wrist bone, got halfway, and stopped. The fourth pressed onto the back of Mitsuki’s blade, stopped, and split open at one corner. The fifth tightened round Jaewon’s broken stub turn by turn, tightened to a certain point, and loosened by itself. Each time a ring split, the number board at the edge of the altar jumped one place, jumped back, and did not match.

Andrew’s command ring was above his left arm, and the end of the fine line at last moved one place.

The verdict rings could pin down each person’s own moves, but they could not recognise borrowed strength, and one after another they split apart.