The Before Short Story Series. Part 1 - Иван Перепелятник

‘Thank you very much, Mr Steward!’ Ayaka slipped down from the seat and made a bow.

‘Very well, Ayaka. Let’s see what Mr Steward has given you,’ Hiromi helped her daughter unwrap her new gift.

In a colourful, vividly decorated souvenir box there were a colour book, a set of felt-tip pens, a badge, a hat with the JR logo, and an authentically-styled paper scroll, rolled into two coils on two wooden sticks.

‘What’s this, Mummy?’ Ayaka picked the scroll by one of the sticks, while the other one fell out of the box and rolled down the carriage floor, unfolding the whole scroll.

‘Right, Ayaka, let’s get it all back together quickly. Roll it back in,’ said Hiromi, unamused.

‘I didn’t mean to.’

‘It’s fine, never mind. Please roll it back carefully. It is the history of Japan Rail company. Read it, Ayaka, and then you’ll tell me what it is about.’

‘Sure, Mummy!’

‘I hope there will be enough to read until we reach Tōkyō. Oh, I wish it were,’ Hiromi picked up the communicator and started scrolling through the news feed of House, a social network. She reached the Haute couture, explained in simple words section…

‘Mummy, I finished,’ Ayaka started rolling the scroll back in.

Hiromi looked at her daughter, slightly surprised, ‘When would she have the time,’ she thought, ‘to read through all of that?’

‘Right, Ayaka. Tell me please what it is about.’

‘This is a story about how Japan Rail started building new high-speed train tracks across the whole country in 2059. They also tell about the PAX system and how it helped make the trains faster yet. Mummy, and what is the PAX? tell me more, please.’

Hiromi found an article about the PAX on her communicator and gave it to her daughter, ‘Here, please, read, Ayaka. I sure won’t be able to remember all the important details. Here you can learn a lot more.’

Hiromi looked out the window. The train was swiftly passing by small towns, the existence of which could only be deduced from the sound barriers installed to protect the dwellers from the noise of trains passing by at 600 km/h. Here and there between the hills—somewhere seemingly soft and yielding because of the green tree carpet, somewhere dangerously sharp with grey-brown rocks, reminding of a seasoned predator’s chisels—majestic stood Mt Fuji. This year it had no snow cap because of the unusual for the Eastern coast of Japan heat that came about in August. Hiromi did like looking at it, one of the main symbols of the country—yet she couldn’t help being jealous, resentful of the fact that it was taking nearly all of Keirou’s time leaving her with so little, and that was almost bringing her to desperate tears from time to time. A little animal park, a number of observation decks, meteorological and seismological stations, a museum, an infinite flux of tourists—requiring several hundreds of employees in high season—all that demanded attention and care. ‘Keirou is finding time for them, for Ayaka, but—unfortunately—not as much for me… well at least the article is long enough,’ thought Hiromi and tried to get those unpleasant thoughts away by immersing herself in an article about the summer 2167 holidays season trends on her tablet.

‘Mummy, I’m done!’ Hiromi looked at her daughter, ‘How could it be?!’ but showed not a thing.

‘That’s great, Ayaka! please tell me what you have read.’

‘So apparently the operation of artificial intelligence on the basis of a distributed quantum computer system, PAX, was started back in the middle of the last century, in 2053. The main developer of the system, Jordan Bensock, is a genius programmer and engineer from the U.S. He is still alive. Today Bensock is the richest man on the planet. His personal fortune exceeds one trillion dollars. Can you imagine, Mummy, Mr Bensock could help make refurbishments in Grandma Yano’s flat! Mummy, let’s write him about Grandma, let’s ask him to help her!

‘We will discuss this a little later, Ayaka. Have you understood, what is— well, how the PAX actually works?’

‘Yes, Mummy. It works just like our brain, like a human brain. Just that when PAX artificial intelligence is operating, it’s more like many many people would be friends.’

‘Sorry, and why friends?’

‘Because when we are friends, we always do things together. When PAX is working, it’s almost like many people—many minds—work together on a same task.’

‘Very well, Ayaka. Do you remember, why we are going to the capital today?’

‘Sure, Mummy. We are going to the Destiny house to learn what I will be doing in the future.’

‘Let me please tell you how everything worked earlier, how your grandparents lived.

The traditions and the culture of our country, Ayaka, are such that for our society the concept of mutual respect—to each other, to the family, to those older than you—is crucially important. In our country it is important to understand that the work that we all do, everyone’s work, is important for everyone. We all are constantly making a contribution to the common good—to the common success of us all—and that we are creating new opportunities for the society—for us all. Before, when people were choosing their life path, they would mostly seek inspiration in their families’ history—so that, usually, the children would continue their parents’ job. A family owning a textile manufacture over tens—or even hundreds—of years, a small grocery, a publishing house, a dynasty of doctors or journalists, and a whole lot of other similar examples—children would often follow in their parents’ steps. And it is not because that was simpler or easier to get going: the problem had many sides to it. A human life used to be much shorter before. Now we live to two hundred years, and before only singular people would reach an age of one hundred years. People had to start developing the skills they would