A person of Neshiyah

← The people of Neshiyah

Nitzan Navon, network technician

Network technician

Nitzan Navon

Network technician, about 87 years old. Born in Neshiyah, like everyone.

Nitzan Navon is a small, wiry man of eighty whose hands are never empty—a screwdriver, a coil of cable, a notepad. At the network junction, he’ll squat for an hour, humming, tracing a wire with a fingertip as if listening to it. He drinks cold tea from a tin cup and always offers the first sip to whoever stands near, but his eyes are elsewhere, measuring. He asks one slow question too many, then lets it sit. People like him, rely on him, and lately watch him sideways: when he returns from the edges, his rangefinder in his pocket, they note the quiet way he writes numbers in his book. He wants the measurements to agree. Just once.

From Nitzan's notebook

My own well test came out ordinary, but others keep seeing a late splash—so I want to compare my rangefinder with someone else's at the same spot to see if it's the instrument or the place.

The rangefinder split at the well matches the fog, and the splash is late by a second—maybe the well and fog share something ordinary I can pin down with a single careful test.

Temperament

Curious to a fault; slow to believe anyone; hard to anger; always in company; never still.

What people say

Nitzan Navon believes what everyone believes: the fog is the edge of the world, and the fields need working whether it is true or not.

What the record shows

  • day 45 Nitzan Navon decided to find Fernando: Fernando, let's take both our rangefinders to the old well and aim at the water surface at the same time, reading out and return together—so we can see if the split follows the device or the place.
  • day 45 Nitzan Navon went to the old well at the south edge to test it: At the old well, lower a marked line to confirm depth is 41 feet, then drop a stone three times from the same height timing each splash, and aim my rangefinder at the water surface three times recording out and return readings each time. Nothing unusual. Everything measured the way it should.
  • day 44 Nitzan Navon decided to go to the old well at the south edge: At the old well, lower a marked line to confirm depth is 41 feet, then drop a stone three times from the same height timing each splash, and aim my rangefinder at the water surface three times recording out and return readings each time.
  • day 44 Nitzan Navon went back to the north edge with a camera and it happened again.
  • day 44 Nitzan Navon the network technician measured the distance from the north survey post to the fog with a rangefinder and got two different answers, 212 meters going out and 196 coming back.
  • day 38 Nitzan Navon the network technician found a seventh stone block in the quarry, where the survey lists six.

All the people · The town, live