image [https://imgur.com/R3Pw5nQ.jpg]

We both descended down the gravity lift and slipped out when we made it to the dining room floor. There wasn't any cake. There wasn't any food at all even. Just an empty dining table with some silverware set on it.

"Hey, what gives?" I turned to Uncle, gesturing to the empty plates. "How am I supposed to grow all big and strong without food?"

He always made me breakfast in the morning, a big one too. Waffles, pancakes, bacon and eggs. Lots of toast too. But this situation was too fishy to ignore...and fish isn't a good breakfast food.

"Hmm…" he hovered over the table, a grid of light scanned around from his eyes. "It would seem that your breakfast has gone missing. Curious..." He had that voice like he knew where it was, but wasn’t going to tell me.

If someone had stolen all of it, he would have set off the alarm, because no one was supposed to be in here besides us. Maybe he was playing a game? Was I supposed to hunt down the food or something?

-…-

Okay, so I gave it some thought. If he hid food from me, then he would have expected me to be able to find it somewhere around the house using my ingenuity. It was time to put my sleuthing skills to the test and hunt down my meal!

So, I mentioned that I have a computer for a brain and my body is controlled by it. Well, I have some very useful utilities I can use because of that.

My first thought was to sniff it out in the air using my super nose, since food always smells pretty strong.

-Activating Advanced Olfactory Sensors- Olfactory was a cool word for nose. -Unique scent detected!-

Oh yeah! I was on the scent with a few good sniffs. It smelled kinda’ like bacon.

The smell was easy to track. I followed it all the way into a small room I’d never been in. It was just outside the living room with the big TV. I think it was a storage closet.

In the closet there were three plates on a table, each covered up by a metal bowl with a knob on top. The smell was coming from all three of the covered dishes.

“Excellent work.” Uncle flew up behind me. “You managed to track the smell to this location.”

I jumped for joy! All of those dishes must have had some very tasty food on them.

As I reached to pull the lids off, my hand bounced off a force field and I backhanded my face.

*SMACK!*

Uncle had summoned a force field to keep me from looking under the plates...

“Ouch! Hey...?”

“Your breakfast awaits you under one of these bowls. But, the other two have nutritional salt rocks under them. I assume they're not very appetizing.”

Yuck! I hated eating salt rocks. They're like these really hard vitamins and they look like misshapen eggs. I guess I could eat them, but that didn't make them taste any less like gravel. At least they were healthy. Gotta get all that iron from somewhere, right?

“So I just need to pick the right one, then I can eat a super delicious breakfast?” I asked.

“That’s correct.”

Once the force field dropped, I got so excited that I leapt toward the dishes once more. How hard could this be?

Each smell was very distinct on a molecular level. One neat trick I could do was actually see the smells in the air.

My whole vision turned grayscale, only highlighting the molecules in the air responsible for the scents. It looked like thin, colourful gasses rising from under the bowls. One was purple, one was yellow, and one was blue.

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But which one was right?

As advanced as my nose was, it wasn't much upgraded yet. I could tell the smells apart, but they were too similar for my body to analyze what was in each of them.

I'm sure if I knew what molecules I was looking for already, I could probably figure out the right one. But as it was, I didn't know the chemical makeup of bacon.

Well, blue was my favourite colour…

I put my hand around the knob of the bowl with the blue gas, then lifted it up… Turns out that wasn’t the right one.

“Oh man,” I snapped my fingers and pouted. Now I had to eat a rock.

“How unfortunate.” He picked up all the other bowls. They were all rocks!

“What the hay!” I gave him a confused look. “You tricked me? No fair!”

“I did. This was a test to prove to you that reality isn't always fair. Even on your birthday, it shows no mercy.”

Rats man, that was a bummer.

Oh well. I shrugged it off, preparing for my fate of eating a rock.

I mean, it wasn't all bad. My teeth were made stronger than diamonds, so I could chomp through anything. And if it was nutritious, why not?

*CRUNCH!*

Yep…that lovely gravel taste…yuck.

Something was weird about the center… It tasted like eggs and bacon.

Hey, there was eggs and bacon in the center! What a twist, am I right?

“You said reality was unfair.” I held my rock breakfast dumpling up to him.

“But I didn’t say you picked the wrong one.” What counted as face on him lit up bright green, and a screen where his mouth should have been showed a smiley face made out of symbols. “Blue is your favourite colour, right? I figured you'd pick that one.”

He knew me so well!

To be honest, I wasn’t picky. Even on my B-day I’d eat whatever I had to. As for the matter of cake, however...that I wouldn't compromise on.

I shook up and down with my fists clenched playfully in front of me. My smile was getting bigger by the second.

"Uncle, it's my birthday. I want cake too."

"I…well...that's currently not possible."

My whole body sank along with my hopes and dreams.

"Whhhhy?" I whined.

More disappointment...reality was unfair.

He'd never had trouble making food. He didn't even actually make anything with real ingredients, it was all magically synthesized in the kitchen.

"You see, the ingredients to make the type of dessert you want…"

He was hiding something, something that would make me unhappy.

My favourite type of flavour was called Honey Apple Berry. It came from a very special type of tree, and it can't be synthesized by magic. You had to pick the berries the moment they were ready.

We had one of those little trees here in the garden. It was called the Boni tree.

If we didn't have the ingredients, then something must have been wrong with the tree!

"Oh no!" I ran to the gravity lift and wirelessly interfaced with the controls until it let me go to the ground floor outside.

Once my feet touched the ground of the courtyard, I ran straight north where the garden was. I was shocked to find a withered up little tree sitting at the center.

"No…" I started to tear up.

This was really bad. That tree was supposed to be special. Daddy and I planted it and worked really hard to help it grow.

I fell on my knees and cried really loud. I was heartbroken that it had died and I didn't notice until now. This had to have happened recently, it wasn't like this a few weeks ago.

"I knew she wouldn't take the news well..." Uncle sighed as he approached from behind me. "Young Mistress, I am sorry this happened. It seems the tree has died."

My hands had scanners in them that can diagnose things, so I put my palms up to the tree and activated the scan ability.

A little report showed up in my vision saying that the tree was dried up and not taking in any water. It also was suffering from marcescence too, which means the dead leaves weren’t falling off of it.

"I don't understand. Why did this happen? I thought the bees were watering it."

There were other bee workers around, like Uncle, but they all had different jobs. He was actually known as Honey Bee 1. That was his real name.

"Perhaps fate had just decreed it so. Sometimes things happen against our wishes."

"Oh man, is it because I don't pray every night?" I looked up at him. "Maybe God is mad at me that I don’t, and killed my tree."

Uncle snickered. "I personally doubt that, Young Mistress."

Then what could have happened? The soil here was really good for all kinds of plants, and this particular spot was specifically tailored for this tree. I guess it was just fate that it died, like Uncle said.

Uncle had an idea. Although this tree was rare, we could plant a new one here in the garden. We just had to find a sapling or seed to plant.

"Do you think we can find one?" I asked. "Last time, me and dad had to go all the way to Elysium to get it."

"I can take you there, and we can find another tree. I have an idea of where we might get a new one.”

Right before my eyes, Uncle started to glow and he transformed into a human. He looked like a mafia boss with his grey suit and yellow tie. Really cool.

He always had this stone cold, deathly glare in his eyes when in his human form. I'm not sure why he looked so intimidating, but I'm glad he was on my side!

Come to think of it, dad was kinda' scary too... They both had that same look. Did that run in the family? I hope I wouldn't end up looking like that.

To cap off his outfit, he spawned a fedora and placed it on his head.

"Uncle, why take your human form?"

"It has its advantages." He grabbed my hand. "For instance, I can hold your hand."

"Oh, that makes sense." Hands are easier to hold than little bee legs.

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image [https://imgur.com/nUjMlLd.jpg]

-Yalda and her Uncle-

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