Dedication: Happy 79th Birthday, Dad!

Warning: Sexual situations.

Photocopies are not the same!

Paternity Insurance available!

"Scratch-and-sniff 4D porn so realistic you need to install anti-viral wetware and shower after."
--Interaction Week

"This sim is so good I left my real partner so I'd have more time to play."
--D.S., Bangkok

"I had a problem with the sim, but paternity insurance covered everything. Thanks, Simugazm™!"
--R.T., Athens*

*R.T.'s 1024 "children" now live happy, fulfilling lives in I Can't Believe It's Not Reality™.

*****

"It's all over the news sites this morning. I just saw it on aljazeera.net and even bbc.com. How could you!?" Bruce threw down his Allf?n™. and clenched his fists. His face made his revulsion plain.

"You're such a cliché! It's just like a, like a sexvid. You really liked 'A mule, 4 boys, and the Sistine Chapel,' remember? You loved it, especially that bit with the big candlesticks. I didn't like it, but I watched it with you." Rick reached for Bruce, but his hand stopped a few cm shy of his partner's shoulder.

"That old thing is only 2D. It didn't reach out and stroke me!"

"Sim isn't real, that's why they call it sim."

"They all have the same birthday, you know. Good luck paying for a Kb of presents, all different, each October," Bruce snapped. He drummed his fingers on the credenza. He looked out the window. The sky was so blue today it reminded him of the sky in the ice-age sim at the Smithsonian. He felt an arm around his shoulders. He liked Athens, but there were plenty of other nice cities.

"I know you're thinking about leaving," Rick said. "Don't. We can work it out. It was an accident, no, a mistake. I didn't think all the artifacts, uh, kids would be generated. No one ever thinks it's going to happen to them, until, you know." He moved around to face Bruce. "Look. We'll go to that new Malaysian restaurant by the park, then take a long walk. I think the poppies are near their peak. We can forget this ever happened."

Bruce looked out the window again. "No, I don't think so." He paused. A zeppelin glided past in front of the towers, moving in stately silence. "Let's play it together. And come October, I'll help you choose the presents."

The End