The List That Was a Line of Bowls
When portions are decent, the undercity still has to decide who is next. The answer is not a famous name. It is a bowl already in a hand.
A fictional narrative within Callizto Dark Symphony.
The pot was honest today. No one said portions down. The danger, then, was speed.
A man tried to be next by being tall.
Tam-below’s cousin pointed at a bowl already in a smaller hand. “That’s next.”
The tall man looked for a rule to fight. The stall board said KNOCK FIRST. It did not say QUEUES. It did not need to. The bowl was the queue.
Nim sat because of the knee. Kesh stood because of the walk still in her legs. They ate in the hour that was allowed to be an hour.
A counter from the freight walk passed, saw bowls, did not count them. He had learned kettles. He was becoming survivable.
The child said eight and looked at nine and did not wake it. Curriculum.
Someone asked, because someone always asked, whether the pot was a gift from protection.
The cousin said, “It’s soup. If it were a gift it would have a speech.”
Laughter, toothless, safe.
After, Kesh walked spine 12 with chalk for the unkind gauge. Nim stayed and washed bowls because seeing first and washing second were both chores.
The tall man came back with a bowl of his own, empty, in his hand before he stood near the pot. He had learned a language.
The cousin filled it.
No one wrote a policy.
Policies attracted gateways.
Bowls attracted people.
Node 7, between knock and night, was a city that did not need to win an argument about what it was.
It needed the pot not to go cold too early.
It did not.
That was the whole news.
It would not rank.
It would feed.