Chapter Three: The Street Written into Being

Su froze. Lin pulled her across the threshold as the bureau collapsed into ash. A wooden case fell from the debris. Inside were the other half of the calendar record and a dried little finger. Professor Fan's physical anchor. A capsule around the bone held a roll of microfilm. Fan had anticipated being forgotten and concealed his findings in the absence his body remembered. The document contained human ash. The official record of the reform had been made from the burned registers of the dead. The paper itself was a grave for thousands. Joined together, the two halves revealed the full line: *Let Su Mi, daughter of the Master of the Calendar, be the First Forgotten.