Natalie followed her father downstairs into the kitchen, she found her mother sitting at the table. Opposite her was Amanda's father. Natalie stopped, surprised, she hadn't expected this at all.

"Hello Natalie." He said. "We haven't actually met, I'm Charles D'kane, Amanda's father."

"I have seen you a few times Mr D'kane." Natalie replied politely. "Nice to meet you."

"Under different circumstances, maybe it would be Natalie," he said. "Right now I have to be the CEO of the Worlds company, your parents have been very busy. We had been hoping to have a bit more time to complete everything, before this all came out."

"It shouldn't have been hidden in the first place," Natalie's mother accused. "You and the company have very neatly sidestepped laws, that were made to prevent railroading like this from happening."

"I'm sorry Tracey, I really am," said Mr D'kane. "It was necessary, you of all people, should know of the strain, our population is putting on the food resources of this planet."

"Why didn't you just open up the colony's, allow more people to migrate to them?" Her father wanted to know. "You Worlds official's made it to hard for anyone, who wanted to leave."

"You held them back, only allowing a select few approved colonists." Mum followed up straight behind Dad. "It's the power hungry fools in charge who are to blame for this, and now? Now? You want to take people away? My daughter is one of them!"

Natalie was unsure of what she should do, her parents appeared to have lost all reason. Mr D'kane didn't look at all ruffled by this though, she notice.

"Why aren't you upset Mr D'kane?" she asked. "Amanda is also one of the ones selected, shouldn't you be a little more concerned?"

This made her parents look at her sharply, and Amanda's father, was startled.

"You didn't know?" She guessed. "It's in the lists of people selected, on the public domain, the list for those that are going first. I'm one of them and so is Amanda."

"No she isn't, she passed her school evaluations, that couldn't be right." He murmured. "I can understand you being bitter Natalie, but Amanda is your friend."

"It's because she is my friend that I'm telling you this now," Natalie said calmly. "Check the lists Mr D'kane, we will wait."

She watched as he turned away murmuring into his wrist unit. Natalie moved over to her mother and hugged her, trying to give what comfort she could.

"Natalie..." her mum said. "I should be comforting you, it's not right, they even took your ability to feel away from you."

"I can still feel Mum," Natalie said. "It's just distant, kinda muted. Sam says it's a good thing right now, keeps me focused."

"Sam has dealt with that program, hasn't he ?" Her father demanded.

"Yes, he has Dad," she told him. "It was the first thing he did."

"It's true, Amanda's name is in the listing." Mr D'kane suddenly said.

"Now your on the same page as we are." Dad said with a great deal of satisfaction. "Not so great to think about it now, is it, Charles?"

"Amanda and I will need information, Mr D'kane." Natalie said. "As much as we can get about the world we will be sent too. Also she will need to be told, as soon as possible, she hasn't been conditioned into numbness like I have."

"Conditioned?" He stared at her. " what are you talking about?"

Natalie sighed, it looked as if Amanda's father wasn't as senior in the company as she had hoped. He couldn't be if he didn't know any of this.

"Sam, send the file you discovered and any related information to Mr D'kane's wrist unit." She ordered.

"This is..., I don't know what to say." Amanda's father staggered back, nearly falling as he read the file Sam sent to him.

"It's totally different now," Mum said to him. "Now you know first hand how we are feeling, but I find I can't feel anything but sympathy for you and your wife, this is something that shouldn't be happening... they are both children."

"Go home, Charles." Dad told him. "Be there for your daughter, there is no escaping this, we tryed, but Natalie is still going regardless of our efforts to keep her here."

"Get us the information please, Mr D'kane Natalie almost pleaded. "We will need it, as much as you can."

They watched as Amanda's father slowly walked out the door, he seemed dazed, Natalie hoped he would treat Amanda fairly. Because up until now, it had sounded like he had done everything but that.

The silence thicken in the room, Natalie became aware her parents were shifting uncomfortably, looking at her then each other.

"I'm hungry," Natalie told them. "Let's have lunch."

"That's a good idea," her mum said, rushing over to the fridge. "How about fried eggs and bacon? With a large slice of toast? Not exactly lunch food, but we missed breakfast."

This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.

"Sounds good to me." Natalie answered. "I'll slice up some fruit for afters."

"I'm not really hungry... " her father murmured. "Be back in a minute, I have to check on something."

With that he was gone, rushing upstairs, almost fleeing. Natalie looked at her mother, to see her holding a bag of bacon so tightly her knuckles were white.

"I'm sorry honey," Mum said. "It's just so hard to understand, we both feel we have failed you."

"You haven't Mum," Natalie told her. "Your both great parents, I love you both so much."

Her mother stood, looking lost, still holding the bacon. Natalie came up to her, took the bacon gently, hugged her mother.

"Go on Mum, you don't have to pretend, go check on dad," she said. "I'm fine, I'll get something to eat, then head to my pod I want to play some more of Freedom."

Once her mother left, Natalie fixed herself a few sandwiches, thinking about everyone else, she then made a load more. Placing them in the keeper, along with a quickly put together fruit salad, she tidied up and went back to the pod.

That had been awkward, it didn't help at all, knowing they were just anxious about her. Sitting by her pod eating her lunch alone, had never bothered her as much as it did now. She shook it off, and entered the pod.

"Sam? Log me into Freedom please," she said, closing her eyes, she waited for the few seconds, it took for the game to load. Opening her eyes she was in the bare house, right, woodworking, as soon as she fed the donkeys.

Natalie walked down to the barn, she could hear the donkeys moving around in their stalls. Picking up the halters, fastened one to the brown donkey's head, leading her out to the pen outside. The excited braying coming from the grey donkey still in the barn, let her know she wanted out as well.

Natalie smile, these little creatures looked so funny, with their long ears. With such big soft eyes, she couldn't see how anyone wouldn't love them. Absently stroking their necks, she wondered what pony's and horses were like. She had only handled donkeys and cows in the simulator Sam had found for her. Though lessons on horses had been touched on, it had been verbal.

A nudge from the brown donkey, reminded Natalie, she hadn't fed them yet. Giving them a last pat each, she went to the storage shed for grain and hay. Making a note of the fact she was running out of hay, Natalie carried a large amount back to the donkeys.

A quick check on the fields, then she went to the woodworking shed. There were a lot of strange looking knives, some kind of chisels, and a large round stone on it's side in a heavy wooden frame, attached to the side of the frame was a couple of wooden paddles, she had no idea what that thing was about.

Natalie called up the file and watched as a carpenter, turned a block of wood into chair parts and then put them together. This was interesting, but she couldn't see any of the tools she had, being used in this file. Reluctantly, deciding to wait a bit longer, Natalie move on to the alchemist shed.

She had quite a few of the Chance Berries stored. It was time to experiment a bit with them. Molly had told her, mixing Chance Berries with healberry juices, would result in a superior health potion. From what she had also learned from the market square, condensing the berries would result into a regeneration potion.

So what would happen if she combined both those results? Alchemy was a very interesting subject. While in the game, which was magical, she could indulge in a bit of creativity.

Very carefully, she started to crush some of the Chance Berries, in a mortar and pestle. She kept at it until she had a liquid with sediment, everything that could be crushed was done so throughly. Next she strained the juices, using a clean piece of cotton cloth, into a beaker.

Picking up the beaker, Natalie looked at the rich purple juice. Setting it aside, she then did the same with an equal amount of healberries. Once she had two beakers that were half full of juice, she stopped. Now she needed a catalyst, Molly had hinted that blueguards, yellowdells and sundaisys, all had different reactions when used as a catalyst.

She decided to first try Sundaisys, she placed a handful into the mortar, and ground them to a pulp. Picking up the Chance Berry juice, she poured it into a small saucepan, added the pulped Sundaisys. Slowly she brought the mixture to the simmer, stirring gently all the time.

Natalie watched the juice change from a rich purple to a pale pink, when nothing more happened, she lifted it off the heat. After examining the juice, she notice the liquid had sediment in it from the Sundaisys. Natalie decided to strain it again, but looking around she only had the two cloths she had already used.

Well it was the same stuff, she reasoned, I'll just rinse them out and they should be fine. She hoped, well in the spirit of experimenting, why not? The juice however changed colour again, once strained though the two cloths. It was now a very rich red colour. Natalie looked at it, the colour was right, in fact it was the brightest red she had seen in a health potion so far.

Carefully, she poured the potion into the little glass tubes, that potions were usually kept in. This batch she had made twelve, but she still had to test them. Natalie pulled out the testing kit, she tilted a potion tube slightly over the crystal testing bowl, allowing a couple of drops to fall into it. Then using the tiny scoop, she sprinkled power from the kit over the potion.

The tiny amount of potion flashed, and turned clear, so far so good. Next Natalie, selected a grey ash like powder, using the scoop again she sprinkled the potion with the grey powder. If it stayed clear or cloudy it wasn't a health potion, it had to return to the red it was before. She watched closely as the potion seem to bubble a little, that wasn't supposed to happen..

It then flashed a brilliant white, which temporarily blinded her. Once she could see again Natalie looked eagerly at the Crystal bowl. The potion was red, a very bright red, almost fluorescent.

----------------------------------------

Congratulations

You have made an above average epic quality regeneration potion, this potion in its current strength cannot be consumed.

Made by an enthusiastic novice, Alchemist who lacks good judgement and has superior luck.

----------------------------------------

Natalie blinked a few times at that notification, did she just get told off by a system notification?

The important thing was she had made the potion, even if she couldn't use it. Natalie cleaned up the work place and carefully stored the potion. Maybe she could dilute it somehow? Also she still wanted to try and mix the two results, the notice however, suggested this might be hazardous.

Natalie check the time, she was surprised to find that it was almost dinner time, that had taken more time then she realised. She logged out, but only to her space, the awkwardness she had felt while around her parents, was making her reluctant to leave the pod.

"What is wrong Natalie?" Sam asked.

"Nothing Sam," Natalie lied. " I just wanted to check outside to see if anyone I know is out there."

"Running from the problems in your family unit, will not fix them Natalie," Sam said.

Natalie sighed, she knew it was impossible to lie to her AI, she wasn't sure why she had even tryed.

"I guess." She replied. "It's just my presence is hurting them Sam, it would have been better, if that company had just taken me away immediately."

"No, Natalie, you are wrong." Sam said. "Loosing you in that fashion would have been far worse, at least this way, they have time to adjust."

Natalie thought about that for a while, then she logged out off the pod. It didn't make any difference, she had to eat, avoiding everyone wasn't going to work. She would just have to live with it and somehow, she too would learn to adjust.