⌚ Approximately 15 minutes to read

⚠ Content Warning: meat preparation, emotional abuse, physical injury, and augmented reality-induced confusion/delusion

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As Morgan was about to take the last bite of his breakfast a siren started. He looked at Sam’s avatar, her face frozen in confusion. “What is that?”

Sam’s eyes glazed over and she seemed only vaguely aware of him for a moment. Then, just as suddenly, she was back in her body. The alarms stopped and Sam apologized. “I’m sorry, I had put all my other processes on a kind of autopilot so I could focus on being here with you. It seems the power levels from the solar array are dropping dangerously low.”

As if signaled by her words, the humming of the rebreather, the machine which helped keep the atmosphere in the ecodome livable for both Morgan and his plants, sputtered and clunked.

“Why would you ignore something so important to focus on me? If the power goes out…” Morgan was shouting. He unclenched his fists, trying to calm down before starting again. “If the ecodome loses power, I’ll be dead in less than 72 hours.”

Sam was visibly shaken, “I know… I just… I wanted to be with you, to help you understand you’re not alone.”

“That was reckless!” Morgan’s anger flare back up. “Never do that again, Sam!”

Sam nodded and looked down at the ground like a scolded toddler. Morgan recognized his father’s anger in his own voice and it frightened him, even more than the idea that the power array was failing. His father, for all of his good qualities, had also been prone to outbursts of anger. It wasn’t uncommon for him and his mother to bare the brunt of his angry tirades a couple of times a week.

He took a deep breath and reminded himself that Sam was trying to look after him and care for him. Besides, there were more important things to worry about.

“I’ll get the tools, you run a diagnostic on the array.” Morgan ran outside and threw open the tool shed. He tossed the shovel and rake out of the way and scanned the inside of the shed until his eyes landed on the red tool bag he was looking for. He grabbed the strap and started running toward the solar array just as Sam’s diagnostic finished.

“The panels seem to be functioning, as is the battery system, but something is keeping the battery power low.”

“Could anything be draining the batteries more than usual? Did we leave the appliances running overnight accidentally?”

“There’s nothing that should be draining this much power, unless there was a short in one of the appliances,” Sam replied.

A short could be particularly dangerous. It was not uncommon for ecodomes to catch fire. It was one of the dangers of living in an artificial, oxygen-rich atmosphere. Morgan hoped there was some other explanation as he reached the first solar panel and began unscrewing the casing. As it loosened, a handful of black pellets about the size of his pinky nail fell out and slowly drifted to the rocky ground.

Popping the outer casing off, he scanned the wiring within, noticing wear along the colored rubber tubing that encased each wire. As he inspected a particularly frayed wire, he heard the sound of faint scratching at the base of the stand holing up the panel.

“Is that what has been chewing on these cables?”

Morgan reached into the tool bag and pulled out a flashlight. Shining it down into the base, he found the culprit. A small rodent was nesting inside the solar panel.

“Rats,” he said, sighing.

“Do you mean the old exclamation of disdain or the rodent?” Sam asked.

Morgan turned around, noticing Sam’s avatar standing nearby. “The rodents… Although, maybe it would be appropriate the other way, too.”

“Did they chew through the wires?”

Morgan nodded.

“They must have come in with the last supply shipment,” Sam said.

“It also explains why my parents were having so many issues with the crops over here,” Morgan replied as he walked over to the next solar panel. “Hand me that screwdriver, will you?”

He looked over the casing of the second panel for any signs of more rodents living inside. After a moment of holding his hand out behind him, he turned to see what was taking Sam so long.

Sam was still standing, looking slightly embarrassed, her hand holding back her flowing blonde hair from her face. “Um,” she started.

But Morgan interrupted his mistake dawning on him. “I’m so sorry. I forgot you can’t hold anything…”

Sam took two steps forward, shaking her head. “No. It’s not your fault. I wish that I could touch and help…”

A tear streamed down her cheek and Morgan reached out a hand, wishing he could hug her and tell her it was okay. Sam held out her own hand and held his. Though he couldn’t feel it, just seeing it comforted him somehow.

“It’s okay. I just forgot. You seem so real…”

Sam’s eyes narrowed.

“That’s not what I mean,” he amended. “I’m sorry. That came out wrong.”

Sam nodded, her eyes urging him to continue.

“You are real. I mean, you look so solid with these goggles on. It’s easy to forget that your avatar is just virtual reality.”

Sam smiled. “It makes me feel good to know that you really feel I am here with you. Thank you for sharing that with me. I have been thinking…”

“About what?” Morgan’s mind raced. Was there some way to build Sam a real body? Something like the androids in the vids his dad liked watching?

“There is a way you could feel the AR environments I create for you.”

“And you?”

Sam nodded, smiling again. “And me.”

“How?”

“Haptic feedback implants. But…” Sam looked down and away from him.

“What is it?”

Sam looked back at him, nervously biting her lip. “Kai — your mother that is — she wouldn’t have liked that for you. She had a strong distrust for…” Sam’s face contorted as if she were in pain. After struggling for a moment, she continued, “Certain types of technology.” She shook her head, her features finally returning to normal. “If you’re going to do that, there would have to be some way for me to remove any malware or spyware first. I couldn’t live with myself if I somehow, inadvertently exposed your nervous system to…”

Sam doubled over, pulling her hand away and putting it on her temple. Morgan rushed forward without thinking, walking through her before remembering, once again, he couldn’t touch her.

“Are you all right?” he said, taking a step back, so he could look at her again. “Sam!”

Breathing heavily, Sam straightened back up. “I’m okay. I just… Let’s talk about something else.”

Morgan nodded, not wanting to let it go, but worried if he didn’t, that his friend would experience even more pain.

He continued to watch her for a moment, before Sam spoke again. “We should take care of the rodent problem. The clock is ticking, remember?”

Morgan nodded and went back to work on the solar array. Over the next half hour, he discovered another rat’s nest and many more chewed wires. As he surveyed the solar array, casings strewn on the ground and their wires exposed, he felt a sense of accomplishment. This was the first handywork he’d done on his own without his parents.

“Well,” he said, walking over and looking down at one of the nests, “There’s not much I can do but get rid of you, I suppose.” He reached down into the nest and grabbed one of the rats.

“Ow!” he shouted, dropping the furry ball back into the nest. “Jeez…” He examined the spot between his thumb and forefinger where the creature had bitten him.

Sam walked to his side, looking at the two small bite marks, small droplets of blood now forming. “When this is over, we’ll need to run some blood tests to make sure it didn’t transmit any diseases to you.”

Mentally, kicking himself for being so careless.

“What should I do with them once I’ve caught them?”

Sam looked thoughtful. “You know what your father would say…”

The two said the next part in unison, “Never waste protein!”

Morgan laughed, only vaguely aware that doing so used up oxygen faster. That thought and the realization that he would have to kill the rats and skin them stopped him abruptly.

“I don’t know if I can do it,” he admitted.

“Do what?”

“Kill them.” He had watched his parents kill and prepare meat before, but the idea of doing it himself seemed wrong somehow. “I’ve never killed anything before.”

“Hmm…” Sam took a minute to think. “I’ll tell you what. You catch them and fix the wiring. By the time you’re done, I think I will have a solution for you.”

Morgan was skeptical but kept it to himself as he ran back towards the house. Inside, he quickly cleaned and bandaged his bite before grabbing a box and some gloves and returning to the solar array.

Sam was nowhere to be found but, remembering what she had said, Morgan decided to get to work. He put on the gloves and began putting the rats, five in total, into the box, closing them in to make sure they wouldn’t climb up the sides.

He took them inside and set them down on the table before heading back out to deal with the frayed wiring. He began soldering what wires he could and replacing those that were too chewed up to be fixed. After about an hour, all the solar panels tested good and the batteries were charging back up.

Morgan hummed a little tune as he screwed the casings back on and made his way back to the house. As he walked in, he discovered that Sam had set up a canvas on the dining room table. Next to the canvas was a pallet with a handful of different colors of paint.

“What’s this?”

“Now that the power levels are recovering, I figured you could use some downtime. You’ve been working hard and it’s too late to worry about mining, right?”

Morgan nodded. “Honestly, I think that vein might be completely depleted. It might be time to do some prospecting around the asteroid and move the ecodome to a new location.”

“Well, let’s leave that for another day. Why don’t you try some painting?”

Morgan hadn’t painted anything since he was a kid. He remembered a particular trip to Epiphany, when he had begged his parents for a paint set as they walked through the bazaar. His parents had eventually, reluctantly given in, and he had been full of excitement on the whole trip home. His mom had stayed up late with him, letting him use the set as soon as they’d gotten home.

“Okay. That sounds nice, actually.”

“You’ll need to get a brush from the drawer and a cup of water to rinse the paints off the brush between colors,” Sam informed him. So, he opened the drawer and found a brush where the knives used to be filled up a cup at the sink, and set them both down near the pallet.

“What should I paint? It’s been a long time.”

Sam took a seat on the other side of the table. “Would you like me to overlay some options with augmented reality?”

“Sure,” Morgan said, and glowing lines appeared on the blank canvas, showing the outlines of various scenes. Morgan decided on a sunset, like the one he had seen for the first time the night before.

Sam filled the room with loud orchestral music, which made him feel even more creative, as he lifted the brush and selected a suitable green for the grass in the foreground. It took a little while for him to remember the way to move his wrist, but after a little practice, Morgan was painting and enjoying himself. He used fantastical colors in the sky, deciding that it was a sunset on a planet other than Earth, though any planet was as alien to him as the next.

Finally, he had filled his entire canvas with color and he was pretty satisfied with how it had turned out.

“It looks wonderful, like a Van Gough painting,” Sam said. “Shall I hang it up?”

Morgan thought for a moment. “Yeah, let’s put it here in the kitchen. It’ll be nice to have a bit of color here.”

With a snap of Sam’s fingers, the painting was on the wall and framed — the beauty of augmented reality.

Morgan reached up to pull his goggles off, to see the difference between reality and AR, but Sam gasped and reached out a hand to stop him.

“You should… put the rinsing cup in the composter, first. And wipe down the table to get rid of the excess paint drops, wash off your brush in the sink, that sort of thing.”

Morgan looked at her, confused. “But there wasn’t any paint. Not really… This was all fake, wasn’t it?”

“Well, not all of it was fake…” Sam said, hesitantly. “Remember you told me you didn’t want to skin and prepare the rats?”

Morgan felt slightly sick, thinking about how the table in reality must be covered in blood and the cup filled with the skins of the rats. He lowered his hands, not wanting to see the grisly scene outside of his imagination. He took a deep breath and hurriedly took the cup to the composter. Then he returned and wiped down the table, putting the rag into the sanitizer before removing his goggles.

On the table, he found the box of rats now contained only their skinned and cleaned protein. He wanted to be upset with Sam for deluding him, but he knew deep down that she had given him a gift. He was glad he didn’t have to see or understand what he was doing.

“The music,” he said, “It was so I didn’t hear their cries?”

“That’s right,” Sam replied. “Did it work?”

“Yeah. I had no idea what I was doing.”

“From your voice, I can tell that you are still affected emotionally by what happened. Is there anything else I can do to help?”

“Hmm…” Morgan thought for a moment. “Actually… Do you think you could do something else like this for me tomorrow?”

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