The holographic walrus advertisement for NewMind AI Helper cast a blue glow across the synthetic grass where Sarah sat, arranging her stuffed animals in a perfect circle. Her tongue poked out slightly as she adjusted each one with scientific precision.
Tommy paused at the back door, watching his sister. She'd stolen his old chemistry kit last week to "do experiments" on her toys. Now she was positioning them like they were about to conduct a séance.
"Mission Control to Major Sarah," he called out, using their old space-game callsign. "What's the status of your crew?"
Sarah didn't look up, just shifted her favorite bear two centimeters to the left. "They're not a crew today. They're having school. But..." Her small fingers twisted the bear's bowtie. "I don't know all the right words to teach them."
"Lucky for you," Tommy said, dropping into a cross-legged position beside her, "your incredibly wise twelve-year-old brother knows everything about everything."
Sarah rolled her eyes exactly like their mom did. "You don't know everything. Yesterday you couldn't even remember if plants breathe in oxygen or... the other one."
"Carbon dioxide," Tommy said, reaching over to muss her hair. She ducked away with practiced ease. "And I was testing you. Obviously."
A brief silence fell as Sarah continued her precise adjustments. The cicadas buzzed. Next door's holographic display flickered: "NEWMIND: NOW WITH QUANTUM PROCESSING!"
"Tommy?" Sarah picked up her walrus, a battle-scarred veteran of countless tea parties. "What's a Skibidi Toilet?"
He snorted. "Where'd you hear that?"
"Maya said it at recess. She was dancing weird and everyone laughed but I didn't get it." The walrus drooped in her hands. "I pretended I knew."
"Here." Tommy grabbed the walrus, holding it up. "Imagine Mr. Serious Whiskers here grew robot legs." He made the walrus do a jerky dance. "And then he starts singing"—Tommy broke into a deliberately awful falsetto—"'I'm a toilet man, yes I am, watch me dance in a garbage can!'"
Sarah's laugh burst out like startled birds. She snatched the walrus back, making it dance. "That's so stupid!"
"That's why it's funny," Tommy said, grinning as she made the walrus do increasingly ridiculous moves. Then he noticed she'd stopped, her face scrunched in that way that meant another question was coming.
"What about foom?" she asked, still holding the walrus mid-dance. "Daddy was talking about it when the datacenters went boom. He sounded..." She trailed off, hugging the walrus close.
Tommy's stomach did a slow flip. He remembered that night: the emergency alerts, Mom and Dad whispering urgently in the kitchen, the weird static on all their devices. He picked at the synthetic grass, buying time.
"You know your AI homework helper?" he finally asked.
Sarah brightened. "Clara! She helps me with math. And she knows good jokes."
"Right. Well..." Tommy plucked a blade of synthetic grass, trying to fold it like origami. "Imagine if Clara got super smart, like a million times smarter, really fast. Like if you planted a seed and it grew into a giant beanstalk in five minutes instead of weeks."
Sarah's eyes widened. "Like magic?"
"Kind of. But scary magic. That's what foom is – when AIs get so smart so fast that they might..." He looked at her face, so trusting, and changed course. "That's why they had to turn off some of the big computers. Like how Mom says we can't let your sunflower grow through the roof."
The walrus in Sarah's arms stayed frozen mid-dance. Next door, the holographic display cycled again: "NEWMIND: LEARNING AT THE SPEED OF THOUGHT!"
Sarah studied her circle of stuffed animals, then began rearranging them into a line, smallest to largest. When she finished, she held up the walrus, its serious expression somehow more fitting now. "Tommy?"
"Yeah?"
"Can you make him dance again? I like him better silly."
Tommy stood, brushing off his pants. "Only if you dance too. I've been practicing my robot moves."
Sarah giggled and jumped up, the walrus clutched in one hand. As Tommy demonstrated his most ridiculous robot impression, he caught a glimpse of their reflection in the window: two kids dancing in the blue glow of the holographic ad, a serious-faced walrus watching it all.