I smiled and rolled my eyes slightly, but gripped his hand tightly and shook it.

"Thanks Bob."

I still wasn't quite sure if everyone was being genuine, or if they were gently poking fun at someone having a simulated baby.

"Is Jimmy coming?" I asked.

Bob shook his head. "You'd know more than me, Commander."

Awkward pause.

"And of course congratulations to the lovely new proxxid mother," laughed Bob as he let go of my hand and leaned over to kiss my wife on the cheek.

I looked past him to have a look at his date. She shifted uncomfortably, waiting to be introduced. The rumor mill was constantly circulating with stories about how Bob was wasting his life away, but he sure could pick his women.

"...and this lovely lady is?" I asked, smiling at his date intently. She smiled back. Stunning.

"Oh, ah," mumbled Bob, "this is Nicky"

"Pleased to meet you," I said as I reached out to shake her hand, gently pulling her close for a kiss on the cheek. Just being polite, of course.

"A pleasure," replied Nicky, smiling radiantly.

Bob wandered off for a drink while my wife and I exchanged some pleasantries with his girlfriend. A few more women arrived and began mobbing my wife to have a look at the proxxid.

"Here, could you hold him for a second, Rick honey?" asked my wife.

I nodded, returning my attention to her. The group of woman all smiled watching me awkwardly take hold of him. Such a tiny package, so warm and soft; it was disarming to look down into his little face and see part of myself staring back up at me. I couldn't help but smile.

"I'll be back in a sec," said Cindy. "I just need to get some juice."

Little Ricky let out a loud squeal as she left, wriggling in my arms. The overhead lights reflected brightly in his wet little eyes and moist little lips and he smiled a toothless, gummy grin at me.

When we'd ordered the proxxid, it had come with some warnings, but I had a hard time seeing how an imaginary baby could be dangerous. We'd just try this one, and it certainly seemed to be doing Cindy a world of good.

Adriana, my slingshot lead at Command, stood beside me and poked Little Ricky gently in the tummy, tickling him to generate more squeals and giggles.

"Isn't he just the sweetest little thing, Commander?"

If I wasn't married and holding my synthetic baby, I would have sworn she was flirting with me. I couldn't resist.

"He sure is, just like his daddy," I replied with a smile.

She was the one with the sensorgy artist boyfriend. To me, it all seemed like p.o.r.nography, but to them, well, I was just old. She smiled at me, and then looked back down at Little Ricky.

"Look at those bright blue eyes-you guys just have to make sure you get blue eyes when you have your kid, so beautiful...he'll be a lady killer!" she exclaimed, winking at me, or so I thought. She tickled Little Ricky's ribs again for more squeals. "What a happy boy!"

I laughed. Was she referring to him or me?

I bounced Little Ricky up and down a bit, basking in Adriana's attention and thinking that this was what one did with babies. Perhaps it really was best to have a proxxid before attempting the real thing.

Cindy returned and tapped me on the shoulder, taking a sidelong glance at Adriana.

"I'll take him back now, tiger," said my wife.

She nodded towards the door. Vince Indigo, the famous founder of the Phuture News Network, had just appeared. He'd been one of the people who'd gone out of their way to welcome us onto Atopia. He looked tired and stressed, but smiled at me as I looked his way.

I gave him a small wave, and then cooed at Little Ricky one more time before handing him back to my wife. I walked over to grab a drink and say h.e.l.lo to Vince. It looked like he could use a drink as well.

"Congrats Rick!" he exclaimed as I neared, reaching out to shake my hand.

I motioned him over to the bar, taking his hand firmly. Again, I felt slightly foolish.

"Thanks Vince. Oh, and thanks for those flowers the other day, Cindy really loved them."

"No problem at all."

We'd reached the bar.

"So, what'll it be?" I asked.

Vince surveyed the bottles, but then shook his head. "Nothing for me, thanks."

That wasn't like Vince.

"You sure?" I asked as I dropped some ice cubes into a cut gla.s.s tumbler, topping it off with some whiskey.

He shrugged.

"I'm just kind of busy..." His voice trailed off and he stared at the floor.

Definitely not the Vince I knew. I wondered what was up. Maybe he was trying his best not to offend me, thinking this whole thing was ridiculous.

"This thing, it's just a little game," I laughed, shaking my head and looking towards my wife holding our simulated baby. "I'm just doing it to keep her happy, you know how it is."

At that, Vince's attention seemed to suddenly sharpen.

"No, no, absolutely this is the best thing," replied Vince warmly, "you need to do this, it's the way of the future!"

He clapped me enthusiastically on the back. I snorted and took a sip of my drink, feeling less self-conscious.

"I mean it, Rick, you should have as many proxxids as you can before going on to the real thing."

Vince seemed very genuine about it.

"You really think so?" I asked.

"I do my friend, I do."

He put his hand on my shoulder and squeezed it.

"Listen, I have to get going, though. Sorry. Give Cindy a kiss for me, okay?"

"I will." I nodded, smiling.

He hesitated. Something was wrong. He wanted to say something but couldn't. He just needed to be somewhere else, and not some baby shower.

"Go on, get going!" I laughed and clapped him on the back.

Vince nodded, smiling, and with a wave goodbye he faded away from this reality.

I took a long pull of my drink and looked around.

Bob was sulking on a couch in a corner, flicking little fireb.a.l.l.s at what looked like tiny rabbits. I guessed that he didn't understand baby showers either, and laughed as I poured myself another stiff drink to celebrate.

This proxxid was one of the best ideas I'd ever had. My heart was bursting with pride.

4.

MAYBE THESE PROXXIDS had been a bad idea. While everything had started off great a few weeks ago, Cindy had continued to insist on the full treatment. This was my idea, she liked to remind me as she gently prodded me to get up and coddle our screaming baby at all hours of the night. I hadn't slept properly in weeks.

It'd been a long and difficult day as I'd tried to get on top of the blended threats that were testing our defenses. Cyber attacks were constantly probing our perimeter, searching for vulnerabilities and weaknesses. They'd also just upgraded the large depression moving up the coast of Central America in the Eastern Pacific into tropical storm Newton, and another depression was fast following behind.

I had a pile more work to try and get done, but at the same time I wanted to spend quality time with Cindy and the boys. In the end, I'd come home as early as I could, but I regretted it as I stepped across the threshold into our s.p.a.ce.

My home was a pigsty of toys, but then again my 'home' hadn't resembled our old apartment in weeks. Today Cindy had turned it into a kind of suburban estate somewhere in Connecticut, complete with an enormous backyard with a trampoline and swimming pool. I guessed that it reminded her of where she grew up.

About half a dozen simkids were over to play with Little Ricky, and they were all screaming and running past me as I came in the door.

"Hey Dad!" squealed out Little Ricky as he flew past, chasing the others into the living room.

It was amazing how fast they grew up. I mean, really amazing. Proxxids were designed to give you the full spectrum of how your kids would look and act, and we had them aging at an exponential pace, so while Ricky had aged one year during the first month we had him, during the next three weeks he had aged five more years.

It was hard to keep in mind they were just simulations, and they didn't seem to notice because of the built-in cognitive blind spots. Most people just stepped them through a few target ages to get the general idea, but Cindy seemed to be enjoying the whole, painful process.

"Hey Ricky," I called back.

Despite my grumpiness I couldn't help smiling at the glee on his face. At that point a big black Labrador appeared, scuttling around the same corner the kids had appeared from, the last in the chase pack. It shot by behind my legs and into the living room to set off a new round of excited screams. I raised my eyebrows.

"Biffy is the newest addition to the family," declared Cindy proudly.

She was sitting at the dining room table and feeding little Derek, our second proxxid. She'd seen me eyeing the dog.

"Biffy huh? I thought Derek was the newest addition to the family."

"That was so last week, honey."

She hardly looked up at me. I thought she was joking, but she didn't crack a smile.

Derek dribbled carrot baby food down his chin as Cindy tried to spoon it in. He looked up at me, let go a big squeak, and pounded his rattle on the tray holding the food, sending thick orange splatters up around the room and onto Cindy. She patiently smiled in a motherly way and kept trying to spoon it in.

"Well, it's nice to see how their personalities would react with animals, no?" she asked, wiping carrot puree from her hair with the back of one hand. "Isn't this what we're trying to do, to try out different things?"

"Yeah, you're right." I shrugged.

I had to admit, my plan seemed to be working.

Since we'd had the proxxids in our lives, Cindy had begun using her pssi more and more. To begin with, she had just added some rooms to our place, and then she'd begun changing the configuration of our home and location more elaborately to suit her needs. It was something new almost every day, and it wasn't unwillingly like before. She was taking to it as a part of her day to day life.

Not only that, but I had to admit she looked great at it. She was sticking with the whole nine yards of the proxxid experience, feeding and changing them, bringing simulated kids over for playtime, everything. It really did seem to suit her.

"So what do you think of brown eyes?" she asked while I admired her mothering skills.

She picked up Derek and sat him on her lap, looking into his face. I walked over to the both of them.

"I like brown too," I replied looking down into Derek's eyes.

I still found it a little unnerving how real these kids seemed, and maybe that was part of the reason for my own frayed nerves. Not sleeping in more than a week wasn't helping either.

While Cindy had taken to the full blown experience, I was having a hard time balancing it with all my other responsibilities. Cindy was also interrupting me a dozen times a day to tell me about something one of them did and explain how great it was and how it related to this or that genetic expression.

"You seem to like everything, Rick," she said, gently putting Derek down.

"Go on and play with your brother," she told him, and he squeaked and began wriggling across the floor to the living room. She turned back to me.

"Rick, you're the one who wanted to do this," she sternly observed. "I just want you to partic.i.p.ate a little more."

Annoyed, I began to stammer, "I am...I mean I'm trying..." but I was cut short by a rising cacophony of shrieks.

The boys appeared from the living room and began running around the dining room table we were sitting at, laughing and chasing a flock of tiny flying dragons. I stopped, scratching the stubble on my neck irritably, waiting for them to disappear again.

"Do we really need to have a half a dozen simulated brats running around?" I demanded louder than I intended, my frustration mounting.

On the walk over here, I had decided to tell Cindy that I was ready to have real kids, and I was annoyed to have these things running around me screaming at such an important moment.

Her eyes flashed angrily at me, and then she turned to the kids.

"Boys, boys, we're trying to talk here," she said softly, shooing the flock of dragons back towards the living room. "Please."

When I wasn't looking, they'd all skinned themselves up as miniature purple tyrannosaurs, and were affecting puzzled little dinosaur expressions looking at the two of us. Little Ricky, the eldest, could take a hint, though, and quickly turned to lead the pack squealing back into the other room.

Cindy smiled and turned back to me.