Balance Is Everything

Chapter One

It was January 19th, 2198, Friday. May Rose was getting ready for school. She had already eaten her breakfast, gotten dressed, brushed her teeth and all that, now all she had to do was get her shoes on and get in the Exer-Tubes*. She got in, making sure not to conflict with her mother and farther schedules, and slid her way to school. It took her a total of 0.78 seconds to get there. She walked into her math class, and started doing a worksheet that had just been assigned to them. She was extremely smart, but had refused to skip a grade. She wanted to be a usual teen. A 14 year old. She looked across the room, and pondered at the balances above people's heads. They ranged from $20 to $300. She had $36.90. That was pretty average for a teen in her world. She heard a faint *ding* above her head. She was earning money? A quick glance up proved herself correct. But it wasn't just a couple of dollars that her parents had decided to give her, no, it was millions. Like, millions. He rebalance went from $36.90 to $26,780,706.90. Her classmates were whispering around about it. She'd just gained $26,780,770. That's crazy!
"Congrats!"
"Where did you get that!?"
"I'd give anything for that kind of money!"
"Will you give me some?" May panicked. What was she supposed to do!? More importantly, how on earth did she get that much money!?
"Miss? May I use the bathroom?" She croaked.
"Of course." Angelina, her teacher, said. May ran down the halls and went straight into the restroom, pulling out her phone.
Mom! How did I just earn $26,780,770!?
Honey, we're all safe. I know you earned that, and more.
More?
May, your great- great- great- great- great- great- grandfather was a millionaire way back in 2020. We just uncovered his fortune.
May paused before responding. She only had her parents. She had no grandparents alive, no aunts, uncles, or cousins, so they got all the money.
Ok. Makes sense.
Good. Listen sweetheart, all the money goes to you. Some went to your personal account, the stuff that showed up above your head. Some, however, went into your private account. Honey, we don't have millions.. We have trillions.
Many nearly dropped the phone. Trillions? Her small, little family had trillions?
Didn't you say he was a millionaire? How can we have trillions?
He had property that was worth a lot less back then, and he had some pretty valuable artifacts. We will discuss more when you get home, okay?
Okay.
Love you.
Love you to mom. See you after school.
May walked back to class, and sat down in her seat. Students whispered a little, but Angeline was always a strict teacher on talking. May answered some questions, but she was definitely eager. Eager for the day to be over. She finished her math class and ran to her next class. No one but her class saw her absurd number until lunch time. She sat in the back, hoping not to draw to much attention. She drew attention.
"That's May? May Rose? But she has millions!"
"I know I know! Something happened in the early side** of math class. Gained $26,000,000."
"Is she gonna share?"
"Who knows?"
That was the thing in Mays world. Money, status, and power were everything. Money gave you status, and Money and status being what gave you power, May realized that she would quickly have all three of the of those things in her high school. The rest of the day was sort of a blur. She remembered shards of P.E, and flashes of English. Before she new it, she back home, rushing to meet her parents.
"Mother!" May called out.
"Ah! There you are. Come on, the family needs to talk." Mays mother, Cindy, said. May sat down with her parents, and started asking.
"What are we going to do?" She asked.
"Well," her mother started. "We're just going to have to hope for the best. My only concern is the new candidate. You know, the one that everyone used to shun, but now really likes? Elen Cregway?"
"Oh, yes." Mays fathers face darkened. "Her new law. She's only 14!"
"She's doing what she thinks is right." Cindy said.
"Mom? Dad? What is this new law?" May asked. A reasonable question.
"Well sweetheart, the new law suggests doubling taxes for people who are extremely well off, and then lessening the taxes for the poor. She seem to think that that would stop our problems with society, but no one seems to see that this would cause the one thing we've been trying to fix. Zamboli***." Her mother explained. May nodded her head slowly.
"Oh." She responded. "I get it." After the family meeting, they had dinner that was bought to them by the Exer-generator****. When they finally got int9 bed, May couldn't help but feel like her life was destined to doom.

*these day, everyone travels everywhere by Exer-tube, which is basically a tube that you stand in, and it brings you to your destination.
**There are two sides of classes, the early side, where you do worksheets and are graded on them, and the late side, where you get lessons based on your classes average score that day.
***Zamboli is a huge system that was abolished back in 2125. It made everyone's pay level double, taxes triple, and usually resulted in homelessness and starvation overflowing the cities.
****The Exer-generators are machines that make food, clean, do the laundry, and babysit children.
*****Int9: when a writer messes up when writing and has to have it pointed out.