On the plane back to New York.
Beyond the window lay a pitch-black sky. But John’s mind had never been clearer.
The dawn roads of the Bronx, the bus stops of Queens, the George Washington Bridge with cars lined up endlessly.
The commute, the roads stretching from the center to the outskirts, had always been like that.
The price to be paid at the end of that line was time. The one thing he had never wanted taken from him, yet the thing he had always been deprived of.
John looked back on what had happened that day.
“Do you really think he can pull it off?”
It was a question with neither a clear subject nor object, but Jake understood it perfectly.
“There’s something I realized while I was dispatched to MIT. It’s hard for people like us to understand, but inside that place there are practices they take for granted.
Once Seoha makes a judgment, that’s the end of it. No one asks, ‘Is it possible?’ The topic moves straight to ‘How do we do it?’ I never saw anyone challenge a conclusion he reached.
“Why do you think that is?”
“Trust created by repeated results, I suppose. The fact that he has never been wrong silences everyone else.”
“Hmm…”
John looked out the window without another word.
He had thrown it out there with bravado, but there were more than one or two things to worry about.
“Once we start this, there’ll be no turning back.
It’s close to political suicide. If it fails, my career ends that day, and even if it succeeds, the rest of my political life won’t be smooth. Billions of dollars in public funds, citizens’ data, and the enormous social costs that will arise in the process.”
“Are you considering withdrawing it?”
“It’s not that I haven’t thought about it. But you see, Jake.”
“Yes.”
John turned his head and looked Jake straight in the eye.
“As mayor, I can’t help thinking that leaving this city as it is would be far too cruel a decision. This city is structured to sacrifice the lower-income class in order to maintain its splendor.
Someone has to break this chain of evil. Of course, we won’t be able to do everything. But I believe we at least have to create a breathing space for the citizens.
And…”
A pleased smile appeared at the corners of John’s mouth.
“You said it yourself, didn’t you? That Seoha can pull it off.
If it’s something that is certain to work, then all that remains is the decision. If I avoid a board like this, what could I ever hope to accomplish as a politician?”
Jake thought for a moment, then took out his laptop and opened it.
“We’ll have to devise the strategy carefully.”
“Of course. The key is money. If we try to rely on the Department of Transportation’s meager budget, this project won’t even be able to start.”
“Then where are you planning to bring the money in from?”
John smiled, showing his white teeth.
“Isn’t there a perfect place? A department that takes twenty percent of the budget every year.”
Jake’s mouth fell open.
“D-Don’t tell me!”
A money pit. A place where no matter how much money was poured in, it never showed. And yet, it was spending that could not be avoided.
“We need to shift the frame.
From now on, this isn’t transportation policy. It’s ‘time welfare.’”
“Do you think you can persuade the council with that?”
John shook his head.
“The council isn’t who we need to persuade.
Do you know how much time New Yorkers spend commuting each day? It passed the level of mere inconvenience long ago.
If giving that back to the citizens isn’t welfare, then what is?”
Jake’s mind began to race.
“I think it’s possible. We can build enough logic to win the debate.”
Even after that, the two continued talking for a long while.
Concrete figures, expected attacks, and the arguments to counter them were calmly piled up one after another.
“That should be enough. You should get some rest too.”
The lights inside the plane dimmed, and the passengers fell asleep one by one.
For the first time in a very long while, John dreamed of his childhood.
His mother, who had passed away without even being able to go to the hospital because she had no health insurance, waved to her son as if delighted to see him.
When John woke, he quietly wiped his wet eyes with the back of his hand.
“Mother, that’s something I still can’t accomplish. But I’ll try, one by one, starting with what I can do.”
* * *
New York had always been a city accustomed to change.
A place where trends changed faster than anywhere else in the world. All kinds of news broke in real time and new issues poured out, but most of them evaporated before a single day had passed.
This time, however, was different.
During the morning rush hour, the same sentence repeatedly appeared on subway screens and the electronic billboards at bus stops.
[New York City Officially Announces “Time Welfare” Initiative]
On the giant billboard in Times Square, Mayor John’s face appeared in huge size.
It was footage of him holding a press conference in front of City Hall.
“Since I first mentioned the concept of time welfare, opinions have poured in from all sectors.
I know. This was not a term you were familiar with. When people think of welfare, they usually think of money or systems.”
John looked over the reporters and the audience.
“It isn’t realistic, you’re dressing up a transportation problem as welfare, and on some broadcasts I even heard people ask whether I had dementia.”
Hahaha!
Everyone burst into laughter at the joke from John, who was usually so solemn.
“What I am going to give you is neither money nor free meals. Today, I wish to speak about something far more valuable and precious than that.”
John paused for a moment.
“Everyone, did you read a storybook to your children last night?
How long has it been since your family gathered together for dinner? What about leisure, such as exercise or games? Have you sufficiently soothed your weary body and mind with rest? If you want to change jobs, do you have the time to learn a foreign language or a new skill?”
The citizens hurrying through Times Square began to stop one by one and look up at the screen.
John looked straight into the camera and spoke.
“We must pay the price for all these things with only one kind of asset. Something everyone possesses equally. Time.”
“But New York as it is now consumes this fairest of all resources in the most unequal way. Some helplessly have their time eaten away in congestion, while others enjoy efficiency above it.
The ‘time welfare’ I advocate is a declaration that we will return to you that precious resource that has been taken from your lives!”
His speech was less a prepared piece of rhetoric and closer to a cry he had pressed down and held in for twenty years.
People could be seen nodding throughout Times Square.
Office workers in suits on their way home, young people looking at their phones, even cleaners sweeping the streets. John was a politician who understood the sorrows of ordinary people better than anyone.
‘I want to spend more time with my children…’
‘When did my family stop talking to one another?’
‘It’s already been years since I met up with my friends.’
Everyone listening to his speech was thinking similar thoughts.
Clap, clap, clap!
Amid the murmuring, applause began to spread.
And at last, it transformed into a massive roar chanting John’s name.
* * *
Several weeks passed.
Project Oracle—City Hall had started calling it that—had still not been formally launched.
However, John’s creative campaign was receiving explosive support from New Yorkers, and it was expected that he would soon be able to secure the council’s consent.
Seoha was attending school as usual.
He took classes in the morning, and during lunch he met Theo and Sri for a meal, as he always did.
“Are you still not making progress on recruiting more people?”
Seoha asked the two of them while eating pasta.
“It’s underway. We’ve gotten far more résumés than expected.”
“Really?”
These days, Seoha’s face was appearing in the news almost every day.
[Mayor John’s Gambit, and the Young Brain Behind It]
[Even Silicon Valley Is Watching: The Potential for Project Oracle’s Private Expansion]
“But you’d better not get your hopes up too much. Sri has been giving the assignments lately, and somehow I think his reputation is even worse than mine was.”
“Cough, cough!”
Sri, who had been eating lamb curry, hurriedly grabbed his water glass.
“I’m being wronged!
All I did was have a light conversation on topics we commonly deal with!”
Theo shook his head and snorted.
“I guarantee he’s pickier than I am. But it’s not like I don’t understand. We need people who can contribute immediately.
What happens if we hire ordinary people? It might take them years just to catch up with the work the team has organized so far. Of course, once Oracle starts operating in earnest, it’ll get even harder.”
“Haa.”
Sri sighed.
“These days I’ve been looking for people on Logia too, but there aren’t many who stand out.”
“Huh? Sri, you use Logia too?”
Seoha asked, looking at him as if surprised.
“After the patch, the messenger and community functions were strengthened, so it’s good for mathematicians to manage their networks. Before, people only had simple conversations, but these days they comment on problems, and discussions branch off from there.
I hear some people are even setting up private threads to exchange proof sketches and ideas.”
Theo nodded.
“That’s right. It’s half turned into social media.
A giant forum for mathematicians? About ninety percent of it is brats who like showing off.”
“What rank are you, Sri?”
Seoha casually threw out a sensitive question.
Sri hesitated for a moment before answering in a small voice.
“…Fifth.”
At present, Logia remained under Seoha’s dictatorship.
Even if he never logged in again for the rest of his life, his first-place position was guaranteed. Some were even saying he should be placed in the Hall of Fame and removed from the rankings.
After him, Theo had long defended second place with a score close to one thousand points.
“Hahaha!”
Theo laughed heartily.
“For someone who isn’t even a math major, that’s not bad. I know the guys in third and fourth too.”
Seoha tilted his head.
“What kind of people are they?”
“One is a Caltech master’s student who ranked first at the IMO a few years ago. The other is someone in Elijah Cronen’s lab at Princeton.”
Sri pouted.
“What the hell, they’re both monster-level geniuses!”
“No need to worry. They’re not the kind of guys who’d join our team anyway.”
Seoha, who had been busy with many things, had completely forgotten about Logia’s existence.
“Ah! The inactivity penalty deadline is today.”
Theo hurriedly took his laptop out of his bag.
Tap, tap, tap.
“Huh?”
His hands stopped above the keyboard. Then he brought his face closer to the screen.
“You’re not fifth, Sri.”
Sri flinched and leaned forward.
“What?”
“Did he move up?”
Without a word, Theo turned the laptop screen toward the two of them.
[1st: Yu Seoha / SSS / MIT / KR / 3243.9]
[2nd: Theodore Lanford / S+ / MIT / US / 999.7]
[3rd: Julian Lambert / S / Caltech / FR / 997.1]
[4th: Im Sujeong / S / MIT / KR / 996.9]
[5th: Daniel Brown / S / Princeton / US / 996.5]
[6th: Srinivasa Krishnan / S / MIT / IN / 995.8]
.
.
“Aaagh! I got pushed down!”
Their faces contrasted sharply. While Sri clutched his head in despair, Theodore looked as though he had seen something interesting.
And Seoha’s eyes were fixed not on the ranking or the score, but on Sujeong’s affiliation.