The Before Short Story Series. Part 1 - Иван Перепелятник

the whole planet had to be made at the level of the UFN. The executive power state machine in each country was reduced to a minimum, and somewhere, in countries with a population of up to 1 million—there were more than 100 of them—it was completely abolished. Legislative activity was redirected to PAX. The function of finalizing and approving the legislative framework was the UFN prerogative. AI was involved in the development of overall standards, as well as laws meeting the interests of particular peoples and their unique needs, which reflected ways of life and certain territorial life conditions dating centuries back. It was only due to PAX that various models of a new legislation future impact on a particular region were developed, by way of analysing a huge array of data and requirements, predicting their effect and bringing draft laws to perfection.

This was another unique advantage of the cluster quantum computing system—the impartial study and analysis of huge databases, terms and requirements for the formation of an ultimately verified legislative framework in the interests of citizens of the Federation.

The judicial system had also been fundamentally updated. Collaborative, joint cooperation of an individual and PAX within relevant functionality allowed to significantly reduce the administrative staff of the judiciary, reduced the probability of judicial errors to minimum. Of crucial importance was successful contribution of the new system to fulfilling the mission of the penitentiary system—the number of crimes committed, both economic and criminal, was significantly reduced. To avoid punishment had become difficult, if at all possible.

Citizens of the United Federation of Nations supported the new political structure—the approval rating of the government activities reached beyond 80%.

Peace had set on the planet! After tens of thousands of years of wars and fight for survival, civilization, having overcome the crisis of regeneration, was finally ready for new worthy achievements, relying on the intelligence of PAX which was always ready to protect from mistakes.

The system of delegates election to various levels of government representative bodies had been also deeply revised. Region—city—district—republic (in cases where the size of the territory implied appropriate need)—country—United Federation of Nations. At each of the five levels, those citizens of the Federation who were directly related to it, to the particular level, became the electors. Thus, citizens living in a certain area, for example, in a large megapolis, chose their representative to the district administration, which was accountable to the electors of such a district. Further, representatives of the district administration chose the head of the city administration, which was in its turn subordinate to them. And so on, up to the Secretary General of the UFN, whose elections were held every two years during the General Assembly. No one else used the word *power anymore to describe the functions and work of the administration responsible for the implementation of programs to improve the welfare and well-being of the citizens of the Federation. Everyone did their job responsibly.

If a situation developed in a way that a citizen or a group of citizens considered an administrator as improperly performing his work, and the assessment of his activities to be unsatisfactory, in such a case anyone could initiate appropriate proceedings with PAX. The system, in turn, conducted a study of all the facts related to the circumstances stated by the citizen and made a decision on the expediency of passing a vote of no confidence to the employee. The final decision on the issue of dismissal of the employee was made by citizens, unless, of course, the administrator violated any legislative norms. If an offence was noted, such an administrator was automatically removed from his position and could never apply for any elective office or work for state authorities.

Such *conflict situations were extremely rare, since PAX was pre-evaluating in detail all possible candidates for compliance with the entire set of requirements for work in civil service. And to mislead PAX was, to say the least, not an easy task at all.

The election procedure itself was no more complicated than ordering a sandwich in the Food app on the communicator. The digital passport or otherwise Tracker was responsible for the unique authorization and identification of a citizen. Some people tried to fraud its operation, but, it should be noted, such efforts were not crowned with anything good for them.

The whole administrative system was working in a simple and straightforward way, as two times two makes four.

Before: Interview

‘You know,’ Thomas objected irritated, sipping coffee from a small golden cup, slightly setting aside his chubby little finger, ‘they are not miracles and magic that our department does write about.’

‘Do you really think so, my dear Thomas?’ The thick lenses of Jasha’s round-rimmed glasses were adding an even more expressive look to her large eyes.

‘That’s right, Jasha! For more than 100 years, we have been telling our readers about innovations that are changing the world, and not about charlatans who are trying to cash in on it. An encyclopedia of techno-scammers is already bursting with an endless series of this kind of fraud.’

‘Dear Thomas, Bild has been writing for 200 years about what is of interest for our readers, what excites them, what will interest them tomorrow or what should concern them now and today. We write about life! We write about everything! This is the first.’

Jasha got up from her chair at the head of a long table, where various representatives of the publishing house were sitting: special correspondents, editors, copywriters, assistants and a Bild lawyer watching with interest the next drama deploying at the morning briefing.

‘Secondly, Thomas, it’s not for me to tell you that breakthrough technologies, real innovations, engineering art are akin to magic. All that we do not understand, what we cannot explain, causes us to be wary of suspicion. But that’s exactly what our job is, Thomas, my dear friend and colleague, to understand such stories. To understand them