The city of Acirema was serious about its free speech. Each citizen had five words a day, and damned if anyone knew how the count was kept. But kept it was. Tongues of rebels hung by hooks like Peking-style roast ducks; golden-glazed grease dripping their final forbidden words onto the counter. Kainan walked past the displays, swallowing his revulsion. He knew too many whose they could be. A silent and useless revolution.

The marketplace stank of heated woks. Oil hissed prospective customers to come hither. Hands ruffled through produce, feet shuffled. Cars honked, bicyclists beeped, dogs barked, and still the people were starved for voice.

“Bread?” one vendor shouted.

“Two loaves!” said another.

Children stopped to stare, reminded by their parents to hush. The young and old were the hardest to keep obedient to the new laws, the former because consequences were too abstract and the latter because memory was unreliable and some had lived before the time words had become currency. How wasteful, Kainan thought, though both men who’d spoken wore smiles.

From January to May, Kainan had saved 755 words. His mouth and mind felt heavy with their purpose. His own mother had forgotten the sound of his voice. He meant to remind her, remind them all, except then the new law came.

“Words Reset. Every Day”

Not even those who had struggled in silence to save were grandfathered in. Kainan was lucky, he knew men and women who hadn’t spoken in a decade, tens of thousands of words shrunken to five. Quantity did not equal quality, but these were so little; too few to do any good with.

“Please,” Kainan whispered. His voice cracked from disuse, “say those things.”

One more remained, one final most powerful thing. He spoke, his words fluttering out like spires piercing through the city’s fog. Making ripples in puddles slick with gasoline and reflecting rainbows.

The word itself never mattered. It was the silence that was wanted and won.