Фёдор Громов - Принцесса в коде

The Princess in the code

In a nice place, not far from the ancient city, in a large countryside house there lived a Businessman and his wife, the Beauty. They lived in a house people could dream about. The house was modern with all appliances you could imagine. Even the dishwasher was loaded by the house keeper robot. The only problem they had. They had no children. There was no modern technology to help them. They travelled and travelled around the different countries in order to search the wonder1ful cure. Once they came across an old woman who it was said to be a healer. She listened to them and gave them a bag with herbs. The herbs smelled nicely and a little bit bitterly. She said that they would be happy. There was only one rule: in order not to lose the happiness you would have to take the computers away from their place.

Some time later the businessman and the beauty had got a daughter. She was beautiful and kind, she did not fit much to the time she lived. She seemed to come from another century or mixed the centuries. She loved horses and flowers. She was more interested in books than computers. Her parents and friends call her the Princess. Sixteen years past. The rule given by the old woman was forgotten. What is more, they did not take up her words seriously. They did not believe in fortune telling much and how they could imagine their life without computers in nowadays technological world.

On his daughter’s birthday, on that day when the princess was sixteen, the business man gave her a laptop. He thought it was the right time to teach her to deal with the computer. He thought she had to be and look like others, like a nowadays teenager, not a princess from a fairy tale. The Businessman put off a regular horse riding and catching butterflies, he took his daughter to the computer desk and switched on the computer. The Internet was on and at that moment the princess disappeared. She was not in the room any longer. There was only a flat figure that looked like the Princess on the monitor.

Suddenly, the Businessman remembered that the healer had told him about. Filling desperation and full of grief they rushed to the edge of the village where the old woman lived. Fortunately, she still had been living in her little house. At first, she did not even wanted to talk to them: they did not abbey her, they deserved that, that was their fault! But then, having seen their grief, she said there was only one way to help the girl. She had to wait for the moment when the best Programmer was born. He would be able to help her. However, nobody knew how long it would take and when it would be probably be.

The Businessman and the Beauty were ready to agree. They would do anything to have their daughter back. Coming back home they took the bag with bitter herbs the Old woman had given to them, they made tea as they had been told and they felt asleep.

100 years passed. There was a megapolis instead of the forest on that place where the family used to live. In outskirts of the big city there was an abandoned old house among the bushes with thorns. That was a very, very old house and if people saw it, they were surprised and amazed. But soon they would forget about it and never remembered again.

Once there was a young man in that forgotten place, he came there on purpose to the outskirts of the city because he wanted to test his new invention called the navigator trainers with a processor inside. That was the Programmer. He had just finished his very complicated program that could manage the smart trainers. He had a neutron module on his head. That was just a moment to think about any place properly where he needed to get and the smart trainers carried him to the right destination. Having seen an abandoned old house the Programmer made a route to the house. He thought he had to be there any way. He was curious about the house. And finally he found himself inside it. The trainers worked well.

He certainly took an interest in the house: what it was inside, whose house it was, why he had never heard about that strange place.

When he got inside, he got surprised more than ever. The house was unusually clean, light and beautiful. Walking around the house the Programmer came across the cabinet where there was a very old computer that was still on. He had already seen such a computer in the Technology museum. The Programmer touched the keyboard and looked at the screen. There was a very beautiful, sad girl that looked at him. She seemed to ask for help. The young decided to do something. He sat at the computer desk and started to worked. He dealt and dealt with the computer. He tried and tried different programs. He worked and worked using the old ones and creating new ones. He had been working nights and days. He seemed to be charmed. At last he made an amazing program and it worked out! What a miracle! The young man pressed the button «enter» and at that moment the princess was free. She was in the room next to him.

«How long I had been waiting for you. How long I had been in digital world. How glad I am to see you, the Programmer!» said the Princess.

They left the room together, hand in hand, the Princess and the Programmer. And suddenly, they saw the girl’s parents the Businessman and the Beauty that had been awaken, walking towards them.