12 May 2078
Bright rays of sunlight pierced the dull haze of the spring sky, pouring liquid gold onto the polished roofs of automobiles, then slipping lower, down to where the icy crystals of skyscrapers grew from the murky desert sidewalks, hitting countless panels of glass before fragmenting and fading into nothingness. The pale morning sun had appeared over the huge imperial city of Libertionne.
Tiberius Crown, reclining on the leather seat of his Mercedes, was looking out the window. His eyes were blind to the thousands of virtual billboards that floated by: “Superfast breakfast cereal – any flavor!” “Superslim – lose three kilograms per day, no artificial ingredients!” “Young? Successful? Rich? Impotent? Our formula will bring back your erection in just a few days!” “Viagra. Improved formula – your boyfriend will be ecstatic!” “Lonely? At the Club Lady Safo we guarantee that you’ll find a girlfriend”… But Tiberius’s thoughts were far away, in the rector’s office of Libertionne State University.
Why is she calling me in first thing in the morning, on the day of exams? Tiberius wondered. We could talk later today – I have so few students in the history department, and I’d be free in two hours. He suddenly realized that he had been sitting in a traffic jam staring at a poster aggressively pushing a sexual stimulant that guaranteed multiple orgasms no matter where you applied it (“It’ll put Adam and Eve back in the Garden of Eden”). Tiberius annoyedly poked at the button on the plasma screen. The glass obediently went dark, hiding the street from view, but now along the edge crawled a blinding, scarlet line of advertising text. After a third unsuccessful attempt to turn off the advertisements, he remembered that the previous day he was supposed to renew his monthly payment subscription; now he would have to look at the crawling text until the end of his ride. Cursing quietly, he opened the window, then chuckled. It used to be that people would pay money to get something; now we pay not to get something.
A traffic jam had formed on the air route. Hundreds of thousands of cars, aligned in a multicolored ribbon, obediently waited their turn, their lacquered sides glinting in the light. Down below on the sidewalks, which were growing dark in the shadows of the houses, there were practically no signs of life except for the occasional ambulance or police car.
“Switch to manual control,” Tiberius grumbled.
Now dive down a hundred meters, and you’ll be hurtling along an empty road, all alone…
“Sorry, sir, that’s impossible,” a woman’s voice emanated from the speaker, polite but completely disinterested. “Today is Friday, and you may only use manual control on weekends.”
“Damn! I completely forgot.”
“Sir, you have broken the law. Under Article 13456, Clause 561, profanity is deemed an administrative offence. Would you like to pay the fine now?”
“What the…” he stopped himself in time.
“Did you want to say something, sir?”
“No, no, nothing.”
“As you wish, sir.”
“But this can’t be – I’m not allowed to say anything out loud in my own car?”
“You can, sir, but according to…”
“That was a rhetorical question,” Tiberius interrupted, irritated, “and yes, transfer the money from the card right now.”
He wearily leaned back on the seat back. No, I have to pull myself together. My lack of self-control has just cost me two hundred dollars. And it’s a good thing I swore in my own car. How much would it cost me at a lecture? Probably a thousand – a third of my salary. But wait, he chuckled. I still haven’t commented on Adam and Eve, or their fall from grace that led to the creation and development of mankind, right up to the peace and happiness that exists today. I wanted to. But that joke would cost me six years in prison, or a mandatory course of therapy and psychology, which could be worse Or have they already increased the punishment for propagandizing heterosexual love? Seems that something like this was in the news recently. I need to find out from that idiot woman. Feeling happy that at least in his thoughts he could express himself, in his own car, as he chose, Tiberius already wanted to ask a question, but he didn’t have time. The car quickly and smoothly descended down to a huge granite staircase, where a multitude of students were ascending and descending.
“We have arrived at our destination, sir. I will go and park; have a good day.”
“I hope you spend a long time looking for a parking space,” muttered Tiberius as he clambered out. The fury on his uncontrollable tongue, as usual, was redirected toward the innocent car. With a quick, long stride he walked through the archway of Libertionne University, where the inscription “Unity, tolerance, freedom” was written in huge gold letters. Looking at his wrist for the time, he remembered that he was forbidden to wear outdated, mechanical watches, and now his wrist was adorned with a modern smartwatch. He spent three minutes leaving the social network Bodybook, then a slew of virtual stores, news items, and advertisements, and finally he saw what time it was.
