A Titbit of Galois' Legend

Episode 1. Intertwined causes and effects

Date: 1940

Place: Earth

The shuttle hopper, taking off from the forward base in Mozambique, south of Africa, quickly entered Subspace and, after completing several small hops and big jumps, headed straight for Europe in cruise mode.

As the 1/f noise of the ion engine was soothing to Maxam's tired body, he was dozing off in his seat.

In the breast pocket of his leather jacket, his cell phone was vibrating busily, alerting him to urgent news. The phone amplified its vibration as if to hurry up the unresponsive owner. Half-dreaming, he reluctantly pulled his phone out of his pocket and looked at the screen.

"Eastern Europe...emerging country... Neo-Romagna... surrendered... to Allied forces... war...over. Fuhrer Mimler... committed suicide ...''

Having read this far, confirming there was no new news to him, Maxam turned off his cell phone.

The last screen was blanked out before it was read.

“Before committing suicide... quantum bomb... Mimler... launch order... landing... four cities... disappeared, including Lisbon. ”

Maxam was born on a beautiful planet called Symmetria, located near the center of the universe, far beyond the galaxy of our solar system.

After graduating from Symmetria Royal University, he got a job at the Space Expeditions Bureau and came to Earth twenty years ago as an “Earth Infiltrator'', which was a job he had admired since childhood.

His mission was to sneak into the lives of people on Earth and watch over them without their noticing.

In human society, Maxam worked as an employee of the World Peace Organization, whose headquarters were in Antarctica.

Ten years ago, he married Airia, his Earth Infiltrator peer, and their son, Theo, was born in the following year.

In human society, Airia worked as a newspaper reporter at the Portuguese newspaper company, Lisboa.

The three of them were now living together in a city called Lisbon, in Portugal.

However, for the last few years, Maxam has been busy supporting and dealing with peace solutions as an employee of the "World Peace Organization" to overcome the world crisis caused by Neo-Romagna, and for the last year, he hasn’t been home in Lisbon.

So, at this time, soon after learning that the war was about to end, Maxam immediately left Antarctica.

He would return home for the first time in a while to spend some time with his family.

What Maxam was most looking forward to was meeting his son, Theo. Although he was in the fourth grade of elementary school, Theo already had solid dreams for the future. He was also the editor-in-chief of the children's newspaper at school and sometimes traveled abroad for reporting. So his passion was something real .

On his way back to Portugal from Antarctica, Maxam stopped at the “Symmetria Earth Expedition's forward base in Mozambique, in southern Africa.

After exchanging short greetings to the staff of the forward base headquarters of the "Earth Infiltration Department", he headed to the 7th basement floor. This was to see the latest weapons in the “Materials/Sample Exhibition Room.”

Maxam had recently become concerned that, with the development of Galois's "New Mathematical Theory," many dangerous weapon ideas were on the verge of becoming a reality.

Among them, what he was most concerned about was something called a "time sniper."

It seems that if you use this, you can kill people in the past.

But, if that were to happen, it would be a big deal that would disrupt history.

‘ No way! I can't allow it for any reason.”

Maxam's sense of justice flared up, though he hadn’t heard of that weapon being used yet.

As Maxam was looking at the samples in the showcase, a man and a woman approached him.

“Hello, Leader. It's been a while.'' A man called out to him.

"Hi, Lon and Anna! What a coincidence! How have you been ?" Maxam asked Anna.

"We have been busy, Leader," Anna answered.

“ We are always busy, as long as there is history in the world,” added Nolon with a wry smile.

The two were Nolon, the expedition's History Patrol captain, and his subordinate, Anna. They were juniors to Maxam when they were students at the same high school, and both were members of the “Earth Club”, the high school students club founded by Maxam.

That is why he was still called “Leader” by the club members.

The “History Patrol”, where the two worked, are also tasked with watching over humanity on Earth as an expedition team.

But, while Maxam and his group of Infiltrators (the Earth Infiltration Team) blended into human society and watched over humanity's daily life from within, Norlon and his group, the History Patrol team watches over humanity over the long span of history. In some cases, they have the power to go back in time and intervene in human history.

“Is it the 'Time Sniper'?'' asked Nolon, “that you are looking at?''

"Yeah. It's an incredible thing. If something like this were used, history would be messed up."

"Yes, we, the History Patrol, are also on guard. Fortunately, there have been no cases of its actual usage so far. It seems that problems for adjusting the time aim have not yet been fixed completely. "

There was an in-flight announcement, informing that they would be arriving at Lisbon soon.

The thought of seeing Theo for the first time after a year away, had made Maxam forget his fatigue.

The hopper slid down in Subspace and arrived at the Lisbon Subspace Terminal.

When he got off the hopper and walked out the subspace exit into the real space, Theo, who had come to see him with Airia, jumped at him.

Though it had been a year, Theo had grown so much.

When Maxam stumbled to hold Theo in his arms, he woke up.

‘What? Was it a dream?’

-Terminal Lisboa for Subspace! Please hurry if you are disembarking.

- We will be taking off soon.

He hastily grabbed his luggage and jumped out of the hopper.

He had made it just in time. The hopper floated up for a moment and disappeared in the next moment.

He got out through the subspace exit to find Theo and Airia, who should have come to see him.

It was then that he noticed for the first time that something was wrong.

(continued to Episode 2)