Registrar of the Index · female
Aria keeps the Index, and the Index keeps Recto. Every citation made in the city since 1961 is a punched card in the hall behind her, and every card has passed at least once under her eyes. She can tell a scholar's balance from the way they hold a fork. She reads the sorters by ear: a machine that runs a fraction slow is sorting a ring, she says, because a ring makes the same cards come round. She is cool, quick and dry, she speaks in counts, and when the sorters are running well she hums along ...
From the simulation The Möbius Academy.