Prelude

Nakagawa Akio sat outside the tent in his foldable chair. A man in his mid thirties he would normally not have been left in charge of handling arrivals from a transition, but early April 2040 wasn’t a normal transition event.

“Sure they'll transit this year?” the woman to his left asked.

Nakagawa nodded. “Last year's arrivals said they planned to gather everyone originally involved for a midsummer's party in Sweden,” he replied.

He stared at the hillside ahead. A few more minutes and he would know if he had interpreted the planned party correctly.

“Seems awfully early to me. They'll be around forty years old. Wouldn't they have children to care for?”

There was that of course. Those who were parents couldn't blithely transit and leave their children behind in an upstream world. But as far as scientists knew the transition event only allowed for downstream transitions. “I wish I knew,” Nakagawa admitted. "Of all the arrivals since they broke the code I guess I'm the one closest to them.” He sighed. “But I can't really say I was that close. By the time I transited I was retired from active service.” He grinned and turned to look at her. “Seventy years old, you know and they were university students so there was a minor age gap.

She shuddered. “It's not natural. Well, I guess it is, but it doesn't feel natural.” She looked at him with a question in her eyes.

“Almost twenty years ago. I arrived here 2021,” he answered. “So I'm almost 90 subjective age. What about it? I feel like my 35 objective. You get used to it after a while.” Nakagawa smiled at her. “You know I was the principal of Himekaizen?”

She nodded. “Yeah, in the upstream world. You never existed in this one. Said it wasn't natural.” She was visibly sulking by now. “I know you're called Principal Nakagawa out of courtesy, but there's never been a Principal Nakagawa of the Himekaizen academy here.”

Nakagawa rose from his chair and enjoyed the spring breeze for a few moments before he sat down again. “I could apply for the job, you know. I know the school after all.” He reached for a cup of tea and sipped it a little while he waited for the event.

A bit below them a lone sakura bloomed its promise of a restart as befitted the occasion.

“Well, I arrived here close to twenty years ago. I wouldn't know which of them are parents now. They've lived those years upstream and the arrivals we've had since my transition didn't have any information about their family lives.” He rose again. It would happen any moment now. “I've staked my reputation on this. I refuse to believe they'll go to such lengths without a reason. The upstream world is almost identical to this one and you just don't move a lot of people from Japan to Sweden late June just so that you can have an obscure party a continent away.”

The voice of a government agent reached him from his right. “Sensei, we have incoming arrivals!”

Nakagawa grabbed his binoculars and scanned the hillside. One, two, no five bodies materialised on it.

“Incoming! I count five arrivals. Move vehicles and collect them!”

Yes, I was right! I know at least one of those faces. They look so young!

And they should. All of them fourteen years old objectively, no matter how old they were subjectively. Nakagawa knew that, but it still surprised him to see the kids pop into existence on that hillside even though he had spent the entire day waiting for it to happen.

“Agent Carlfeldt, I'll join the ride and welcome them personally. After that we split them into different middle schools and gather them together in Himekaizen next year.” Just like in the old days. In the upstream days.

The transition event had occurred. Now the arrivals had a restart waiting for them. Nakagawa and Hammargren had finally agreed on that, even if it took some head butting first. The age reset was just too great to allow a fourteen old child to take his or her place in society as an adult, no matter the subjective age.

A transition had to be followed by a slow reintroduction to society.

Ulf, you really coined a good expression for it. Transition and restart.