Rosetta

A banquet at the regency was not to be missed, especially for an enshrinement.

Fervent loyals regaled their regent with cheers at the sight of the opened tins and unsealed pouches on the repurposed tablatures.

Yes, the cybersiege had been a humiliating come-down for all humanity, but the Unwired States of America was ascendant after decades of digital war had devastated economies and restructured nations into tribal brands along commercial and institutional lines.

The cybersiege crippled communication continuity, and past information might have been entirely lost, if not for the act of enshrinement, and if not for a very lucky find. A singular item recovered amid the polished metals and polymers of the Device Age.

In a mostly ruined building, the Rosetta had been found. Its simple interface was unburdened by programs and protocols. Its operation was independent of complexly stored and channeled electrons. The Rosetta transcended the technologies of the cybersiege that had left the world teetering into a darker age.

The thin blue lines of the Rosetta revealed a storage capacity that, though limited, was easily accessed. Inputting information in the Rosetta was simple and fast—so much better than etching words on the dulled plastics, metals and glass of the Device Age. The Rosetta was light, portable, and, if properly cared for, robust in a way that could carry forward the totality of enshrinement for a thousand years.

As the loyals clapped and hooted, the regent, bedecked in mantles of unmatched finery, held his hands aloft and silenced the room. The enshrinement began with the pledge to the rebranded Unwired States of America.

Weathered and wise, the regent commanded their unwired attention as he spoke, “Loyals, we gather this night to enshrine. To commend what we have newly wrought for all and for all times. We must not forget or repeat the mistakes of the past and we must boldly go forward.”

With that displayed the Rosetta for all to see and read the venerable words written loopily on its cover: Rosetta Brooks ~ Stonefield Elementary

And then in the great hush that followed, he opened the spiral notebook and lifted the sacred Bic to begin the enshrinement, speaking as he scribed: We the People, in order to form a more Unwired Union…