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Irrational Numbers
N
The very first thing that anyone noticed about 8919 was that peculiar birthmark, the colour of a faint blush, that sprawled across his face. It began under his chin on the right side- that is, if you were stood facing him, your left. Almost like a hand in shape, but somewhat cruder, it would not have been difficult to imagine the hand of another human being cupping the firm line of his jaw, thumb sweeping across his cheek, running along the socket of his eye, and leaving that pinkness behind it like the skin wanted to remember where it had been. It ended in finger-like streaks, forking at the edge of his ear, two beneath it and two above, with almost circular blotches nestled in his hair line.
By comparison, the birthmark made all other features unremarkable, not merely on his person, but in his immediate vicinity. To have such a distinguishing feature in a place such as that was to be made permanently a point of interest. To be a point of interest in a place such as that was to be instantly disapproved of. Regardless of the fact that he could not control it, the birthmark forced 8919 to be outcast, to be different. Even if his hair was cut in regulation style and length; even if it was a boring brown; even if his eyes had no particular sparkle or clarity of colour; even if his height was average, his build average, his clothing the same standard issue grey jumpsuit, he stuck out from the rest like a dove in a net full of pigeons. Not a single person failed to notice that.
Perhaps this was where they went wrong with 8919. In their eagerness to prevent rebellion, they created a rebel.
It began with little rebellions: Being a minute late, or so, to the occasional check point; sighing at automated devices, like the alarm; occasionally allowing his attention to wander and for his eyes to lose their focus whilst he stared at a crack in the wall. These things went on, seldom punished, but noted. One day, it would be "8919, we ought to have a chat about your happiness", and the next "Why don't you try to integrate more with the others?" The wardens within the four white walls of the institution seemed as ill-equipped to understand him as the other numbers.
His nights were restless, body writhing amongst the regulation, white, cotton, daily changed sheets that stuck to warm bodies like a layer of film, binding limbs together in awkward, uncomfortable ways that only added to restlessness. Some nights he slept, dreaming in blurred visions on the cusp of reality of people that spoke like they were underwater. People with eyes far too large for their heads, glazed over, with pupils shrunk to narrow tunnels of blackness inside consuming circles of dull iris, blown so wide that 8919 could stand at full height within them. He dreamt of mouths stitched close with the barbed wire that ran along the fences. He dreamt of women and children, mouths stretched so wide the skin tore and the tendons on the jaw snapped, revealing the milk-white bone beneath, screaming silently.
Some nights, there was no sleep, merely the sheets and the walls and the sound of the wardens in the corridor. Without a single light, the nights became infinities of blankness, only the alarm, abrupt each time it sounded. When 8919 didn't sleep, he thought. Thinking was a dangerous thing.
"Belief." He'd asked the warden one day, tugging on his sleeve patiently. "Tell me about belief. I don't understand it."
"Belief is an abstract concept, 8919. Don't ask stupid questions. You're 17 and old enough to understand how childish things like belief are."
There was no pattern to the sleeping and the wakefulness. It seemed random, three nights in a row without a single dream, then a week's worth, then a night without then another dream and the three days without. Surely the computers had registered his erratic REM sleep? The certain and the uncertain, the tangible and the abstract, began to melt together, confused in the lack of sleep.
8919's fist curled around a stem of wire within the fence. There must... There must be something more, of that, there was no doubt. His flawless, clinically white teeth cut into the flesh tones of his lip. The wardens could not give him the answers that he desired. He needed a confident.
By comparison, the birthmark made all other features unremarkable, not merely on his person, but in his immediate vicinity. To have such a distinguishing feature in a place such as that was to be made permanently a point of interest. To be a point of interest in a place such as that was to be instantly disapproved of. Regardless of the fact that he could not control it, the birthmark forced 8919 to be outcast, to be different. Even if his hair was cut in regulation style and length; even if it was a boring brown; even if his eyes had no particular sparkle or clarity of colour; even if his height was average, his build average, his clothing the same standard issue grey jumpsuit, he stuck out from the rest like a dove in a net full of pigeons. Not a single person failed to notice that.
Perhaps this was where they went wrong with 8919. In their eagerness to prevent rebellion, they created a rebel.
It began with little rebellions: Being a minute late, or so, to the occasional check point; sighing at automated devices, like the alarm; occasionally allowing his attention to wander and for his eyes to lose their focus whilst he stared at a crack in the wall. These things went on, seldom punished, but noted. One day, it would be "8919, we ought to have a chat about your happiness", and the next "Why don't you try to integrate more with the others?" The wardens within the four white walls of the institution seemed as ill-equipped to understand him as the other numbers.
His nights were restless, body writhing amongst the regulation, white, cotton, daily changed sheets that stuck to warm bodies like a layer of film, binding limbs together in awkward, uncomfortable ways that only added to restlessness. Some nights he slept, dreaming in blurred visions on the cusp of reality of people that spoke like they were underwater. People with eyes far too large for their heads, glazed over, with pupils shrunk to narrow tunnels of blackness inside consuming circles of dull iris, blown so wide that 8919 could stand at full height within them. He dreamt of mouths stitched close with the barbed wire that ran along the fences. He dreamt of women and children, mouths stretched so wide the skin tore and the tendons on the jaw snapped, revealing the milk-white bone beneath, screaming silently.
Some nights, there was no sleep, merely the sheets and the walls and the sound of the wardens in the corridor. Without a single light, the nights became infinities of blankness, only the alarm, abrupt each time it sounded. When 8919 didn't sleep, he thought. Thinking was a dangerous thing.
"Belief." He'd asked the warden one day, tugging on his sleeve patiently. "Tell me about belief. I don't understand it."
"Belief is an abstract concept, 8919. Don't ask stupid questions. You're 17 and old enough to understand how childish things like belief are."
There was no pattern to the sleeping and the wakefulness. It seemed random, three nights in a row without a single dream, then a week's worth, then a night without then another dream and the three days without. Surely the computers had registered his erratic REM sleep? The certain and the uncertain, the tangible and the abstract, began to melt together, confused in the lack of sleep.
8919's fist curled around a stem of wire within the fence. There must... There must be something more, of that, there was no doubt. His flawless, clinically white teeth cut into the flesh tones of his lip. The wardens could not give him the answers that he desired. He needed a confident.
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Experimental fiction. Woo!