She wonders if her parents consider her their daughter. 


She’s not naive, of course. No one with her level of intelligence can hear all of the things her parents say when they think that she’s sleeping without putting two and two together. 


(Once upon a time, Saeko and Hiroshi Mizuno had a daughter named Ami, who died under mysterious circumstances when she was three. They spent the next eleven years pooling together her medical knowledge and his drawings and photographs in an attempt to bring her back. 


And she is the result of their experiment.) 


Her name is Ami and she’s been programed to act the way a teenage Ami would’ve acted, but does all that add up to her being a satisfactory replacement for the daughter of her parents, or is she just some imperfect clone? 


(Is there any difference, qualitative or quantitative, between how people think and how she thinks? Would Ami Mizuno have been constantly questioning her very existence on this planet, or is that just something unique to her double, the girl who blurs the lines between humanity and artificial intelligence?) 


(---) 


There’s a game center outside of her parents’ apartment. She doesn’t go to school, and her parents are busy at work during the day, so she spends most of her time there, watching the Furuhata siblings man the shop and the world in the machines. 


(Ami Mizuno sounds like the sort of girl who would spend time in libraries, learning everything she could about this world. But she has a feed in the back of her mind that can pull up any book that’s ever been written and digitized, and there are enough books in that library to last her a century. 


She wonders if her time in the arcade disappoints her parents. Or maybe she spends so much time here because she’s more comfortable when surrounded by a sea of programs and machines like herself, for the ones and zeroes making up the machines are the same ones that make up her soul. 


Humans say things, and she reacts the way the numbers tell her to.) 


She has company today. There’s a black cat that’s operating one of the game machines, and a girl in a Juuban Middle School uniform alternating between attempting elementary algebra and eating another cookie from the towering pile on her plate. Something’s irrational about this image, and she can’t quite put her finger on it. 
(Did she know the girl who didn’t seem to understand the most basic rules of mathematics? 


Ami Mizuno would’ve known her. Ami Mizuno would’ve been in the same year as this girl at Juuban Middle School, but she is dead and her robotic duplicate is sitting in a booth at the Crown Game Center, debating whether or not to help the girl valiantly struggling through her math homework.) 


“You’re not supposed to divide both sides by three first.” she says, making up her mind as she takes the empty seat at the girl’s table, her hand accidentally brushing against one of her long pigtails. 


“I’m so glad that someone’s here to help me! Could you just… show me how to do everything? Please? I’ll buy you cookies and be your friend!” the girl exclaims, and she’s smiling so ardently. 


(Ami Mizuno would’ve known how to interact with other people. But she’s running through every single way this meeting could end horribly, ranging from death to rejection. 


She’s not sure why she’s equating the former with the latter.) 


“I just need a pen.” she answers, and she’s not sure if this is her attempt to further her interactions with Usagi Tsukino or to cut them off entirely, for it took her longer than usual to come up with this girl’s name than most people’s… 


“Oh, you can use mine! It’s nice to meet you… what’s your name?” Usagi asks. 


“Ami Mizuno.” she answers, and she wonders if Usagi will know that she’s not the real Ami, but just a duplicate of a girl who’s been dead for eleven years, but Usagi just declares that it’s nice to meet her and passes her the rest of the cookies and the sheet of math homework. 


She writes down explanations for every single problem before leaving the arcade. 


(---) 


That night, she dreams.


She doesn’t exactly sleep, but when it’s dark outside and the apartment is still, her body begins to shut down and her mind fills with the most random facts that it can find online. 


(The brontosaurus was originally created as a hoax. Australia once lost a war against its emu population. The arpeggione was a six-stringed instrument that was played like a cello and looked like a medieval violin.) 


This time, the dreams are not facts, but images of death and war and destruction and loss. 


(Once upon a time, there was a kingdom on the moon and a soldier sworn to defend her princess. The princess fell in love, and the soldier sometimes did. Then the world ended. 


If she could’ve cried, she would’ve.) 


There is a strange flash of light outside her window, and her eyes fly open. The window is also open, and she flings herself out of it. 


(Ami Mizuno would not have done that. Ami Mizuno would’ve died if she had done that.) 


She can make out something that looks like a black mass against the buildings, and a girl throwing something vibrant against it. Before she can determine what she should do in this scenario, mist flows out of her hands like water, and she’s saying phrases that she has no reason to be saying in any scenario. 


(This is not supposed to happen. This is not supposed to be happening.) 


(---) 


As it turns out, there are three other girls in the world who are capable of performing the same type of magic. When she wakes up, she’s greeted by a shrine maiden, a smoker, and a volleyball player. 


“We’ve been waiting for you to show up, Sailor Mercury.” the volleyball player says as she adjusts her hairbow and places a sword on the table. 


“Aren’t you… the girl who died a while ago?” the shrine maiden asks, her voice filled with skepticism. 


“Do you mind me smoking here? Sorry, we’ve been here for a while debating what to do.” the smoker quips, as she opens a window, but she doesn’t notice that it’s starting to snow outside. 


(Yes, no, and she doesn’t know. But that’s what she’d say, not Ami Mizuno. How would Ami Mizuno react to three strangers in her apartment telling her that they’ve been waiting for her?) 


Before she can respond, a fourth girl barrels into the apartment while holding the hand of a tall dark-haired man and a grocery bag. She releases the hand of the man before setting the bag on the table, emptying out its contents like a whirlwind. 


(The fourth girl is Usagi Tsukino. So she should know who the other four people are.) 


“...are you sure that this is the best time to set up your Christmas party in someone else’s apartment, Usagi?” the man asks, as the table starts filling with candles and logs and stars. 


“What better way is there to introduce Ami to all of us, Mamoru?” Usagi answers. 


(She already knows that the other three girls are Minako Aino, Rei Hino, and Makoto Kino. And that Mamoru Chiba is supposed to be dead. 


She wonders if he is like her.) 


(---) 


She is overwhelmed by sensation and warmth. Despite the window that no one’s bothered to close, her apartment is filled with the sounds of music, the smells of cookies and the light of candles. 


(Is is correct to say that she’s feeling emotional? On the one hand, emotion is irrational compared to the rationality of her coding and programming, but on the other hand, emotions are just electrical currents between synapses, like her programming runs on electricity.) 


It’s almost like she’s drowning, except she wants to remain suffocated by this water. She should interact with the five people who’ve set up a celebration in her apartment, but she doesn’t know if they’ll still want to stay here after discovering that she’s not real. 


(According to the books, she has a roughly 99% chance of being abandoned when they discover that she’s not human. And Ami Mizuno was definitely the sort of girl who’d remain the perpetual witness in social situations. 


But she is not Ami Mizuno, and she wants to interact with these strangers.) 


The safest person for her to interact with is the one who she is the most like. Mamoru Chiba is staring out the window as she walks towards him, and hopes that she isn’t going to be bothering him. 


(He is like her. Therefore, he has no reason to judge her.) 


“What are you doing?” she asks, as she takes a seat next to him on the sofa. 


“...thinking about retrograde amnesia.” he answers, as she turns towards the window and looks out at the stars. 


(People write stories and look for stars that vaguely resemble their characters to immortalize them. But she is creating a story about a princess who fell in love and died, and she’s not a person.


She wants to tell him that.) 


“Do you know that the human brain is highly suggestive?” she blurts out instead. 


“I have first-hand experience with denying my own memories, if you want to know everything.” he answers.


(She knows everything about everyone in this room. She knows that half of the people in this room have dead mothers, and that two-thirds of the people in this room have never had close relationships with other people their age. 


But she doesn’t know why she feels like she belongs with the other five. Or why they all feel familiar.) 


“So you are-” she begins, before Usagi pops up out of nowhere, kisses him, and drags him into the midst of the party. The other three girls are either singing or lighting more candles, and she supposes that she shouldn’t interrupt them. 


(---) 


“...you’re making a wish, Ami?” one of the girls asks as she sits down on the sofa with a plate of cookies in her hand. 


“I don’t know exactly what I’m doing right now, Makoto.” she answers, and she probably should’ve eaten something, but she doesn’t know if the food would damage her circuitry and cause her to die, or if it’d perpetually remain inside her as a half-digested memento of this strange night. 


“It’s overwhelming, isn’t it? Don’t worry, I was like that when I first met them. Do you want a cookie?” Makoto answers, and she wonders how this girl she’s never met can read her so easily. 


(Once upon a time, Makoto Kino was friends with Ami Mizuno. But she isn’t Ami Mizuno, just her imperfect robotic double. 


Besides, that’s impossible. Ami Mizuno died when she was three, and humans do not have a good memory of their lives as small children.) 


“What do you wish for?” she asks, trying to distract herself from waiting for the inevitable discovery of her robotic state. 


“I don’t know, actually. I would’ve said for people to like me a year ago, but now that that’s happened….” Makoto answers, as the rest of the people in the apartment make their way towards her window, holding candles and candies in their hands. 


“You could always find another wish.” she says. 


(She would’ve made the same wish as Makoto, if she had to say something. But the people surrounding the window are filled with a sense of warmth and companionship, so maybe they’ve fulfilled that part of her wish. 


For a mintue, everything is still and perfect.) 


(---) 


The world ends the next day. 


(No one predicts that the end of the world will occur during nighttime. They all think that the disaster will occur when everyone is awake.) 


She’s the only one of her guests who’s awake when the queen of darkness appears from her base at the North Pole and starts draining the life from everything and everyone in the world. 


(Ami Mizuno is not a fighter. Ami Mizuno is a strategist and planner with the power to control water and move things to other dimensions. 


She doesn’t know how she knows this, but some of the information has to help in saving everyone.) 


Water would most likely be ineffective against this foe. Trans-dimensional transport, on the other hand… if she could move everyone on the entire planet into another world where they won’t be facing the apocalypse today, then everything would be fine. 


(The difference is, Ami Mizuno only moved the Crown Game Center, not the entire world. But she is not Ami Mizuno, and she can save the entire planet through her actions.) 


“Hyperspatial Sphere Generate!” she screams. 


(---) 


When the inhabitants of the Mizuno apartment wake up the next day, there’s a robotic body in the middle of the apartment. 

No one has any idea how it got there. 

It was December 5th, and snow was falling lightly for the first time that winter.

Mako turned to see the floating white flakes and, with a squeal of delight, pressed her nose to the window. “Mama! Papa! Look! It’s snowing!” she cried, grinning from ear to ear.

“Well, just in time for my little princess’ birthday,” her father put his hand on her head as he stood beside her.

“Guess your dream came true after all, huh?” her mother chimed in with a smile, standing on her other side with her arm around Mako’s small shoulders. “Happy birthday, love.”

Mako hugged them both tightly. Most of her friends who had their birthdays in December were always so upset because the celebration tended to be combined together with Christmas. And between the two birthdays, who could compete, really? Christmas always ended up being the bigger thing.

But Mako always loved it. She got not one, but two celebrations in a month, and what could be better than that? Two times a month when her family would gather beside her and shower her with love, and not to mention twice the delicious feast. 

“Time to open some presents!” her father announced, and Mako gleefully returned to the packages sitting on the table. Presents were another great thing about her birthday and Christmas being close together. She got double the gifts, too!

She opened the first package, her little impatient fingers trying hard not to rip the wrapping paper but still hurrying as much as possible. Inside were two boxes, one big and one small. She opened the big one and gasped upon seeing the contents. “Is this…?” she asked, not daring to say the word as she looked up at her mom.

“Yes, dear. Your own mixing bowl,” her mother confirmed with a laugh. “You’re finally old enough to have your own.”

Mako’s smile was so huge she was afraid it might actually break her face. It might seem trivial to other people, but in all the times she had baked together with her mother, she had often asked if she could have her own mixing bowl rather than sharing her mother’s. She was always told that when she got old enough, she could get it, though her mother never specified what age was old enough. Mako suspected her judgment on that didn’t depend on a certain number anyway. But this… this felt like a rite of passage, like she was actually on her first step to becoming a grown up.

She hugged her mom tightly. “Thank you so much, Mama.”

“Of course, dear. Now open the other box.”

Mako did, and her eyes shone when she unearthed what was inside. It was a beautiful green bento box with a cloth wrapping. The cloth had a rose pattern on it, and, strangely enough, also featured small bunnies.

“This is so cute!” she exclaimed, hugging it to her chest. “Thank you again, Mama!”

“Now that your mom has given you all the girly stuff, time to open mine,” her father teased.

Mako laughed as her mother pretended to swat her father, and dove for the other package. What she found inside made her laugh even more. It was a small model of a Brachiosaurus. 

“Papa! This is so cool!” 

“The perfect dinosaur for my perfect daughter,” he grinned.

Mako had just started her dinosaur-obsessed phase a couple months earlier, after watching a movie with them, and she hadn’t stopped talking about the magnificent animals since. When asked which dinosaur was her favorite, she had answered the brachiosaurus without question.

“That is hardly surprising to me,” her father had said. “They’re just like you; big and strong, but actually really gentle.”

“They’re also really tall, and it reminds me of how I feel awkward towering over everyone else all the time,” Mako had added shyly.

“That just means it’s easier for you to watch over everyone, dear,” her mother had put in.

Mako liked to hope that her mother was right, that she could be someone who protected other people someday.

After everyone sang and ate the birthday cake that night, Mako sat by the window, watching the snow fall. Stars twinkled in the sky above, and she looked at them in wonder.

Her mother came, putting a blanket around her shoulders and offering her a mug of hot chocolate. Mako accepted it gratefully, sipping the warm liquid and wrapping her cold hands around the heated container. She realized that she had never felt this happy and content in her whole life. 

“Penny for your thoughts?” her mother asked as she settled beside her.

“I’m just thinking about those stars. If there might have been life there once upon a time. There are so many of them in the sky, and other planets and celestial bodies, too. It’s hard to think that we’re alone. I hope we aren’t.”

“Well, we never know. Maybe there were, or are, or will be. The universe is vast. If there were aliens, would you like to meet them?”

“Sure! I think that would be really exciting. Imagine if there are people from Mercury, Mars, and all the other planets too! I wonder what they’d be like.”

Her mother caressed her hair gently. “My little Mako-chan. Always so eager to be everyone’s friends. Even aliens,” she giggled.

Mako just snuggled into her, letting her mother’s arms wrap around her protectively.

“Last night I dreamed about being a superhero,” she admitted with a wistful smile. “Protecting the world from evil with my best friends who are all superheroes, too.”

“Well, that sounds very fun indeed,” her mother rested her chin atop her head. “You know what they say… a dream is a wish your heart makes. Have you secretly always wanted to be a superhero?”

“Who wouldn’t want to protect the world? I want to be strong so I can protect everyone I love. Protect you and Papa, too.”

Her mom’s tinkling laugh filled the air. “I have no doubt that one day you would do just that. My very best, brave daughter.”

***

It was the night before Christmas, and Mako’s home was already decked in lights, wreaths, and holly. The family’s Christmas tree was twinkling with colorful lights with an angel on its top. Various ornaments hung on the branches, all put together by the three of them the day before.

Mako absolutely couldn’t wait for tomorrow. Another great thing about having her birthday and Christmas so close together was that she got to make two wishes. Her birthday wish—to have a white Christmas—had already come true. Tonight she must think hard about what she wanted for Christmas day.

“They should be here any minute, but you shouldn’t stay up, Mako-chan,” her neighbor, an elderly lady who lived alone herself, came to find her sitting beside the window. “You don’t want to be tired for Christmas day.”

“But I want to see them before I go to bed, Nakano-san! Besides, I might catch Santa too,” Mako grinned.

“You know Santa won’t deliver your present if you don’t go to bed,” Mrs. Nakano chided her with a smile.

Lights flashed in the distance, and Mako jumped up. “That’s probably them!” 

Instead of the familiar yellow headlights, though, red and blue colors flashed in the dark of night. Mako blinked in confusion and uncertainty.

Mrs. Nakano’s expression shifted, her smile disappearing. She put her hand on Mako’s shoulder. “Mako-chan, stay here.”

Sometime during the conversation that followed, Mako’s world changed forever. When the officers were gone and a couple hours had passed—Mrs. Nakano gave in to exhaustion and slept in the guest room—Mako tiptoed back into the living room and watched the twinkling Christmas lights. She stood there without feeling anything; she simply could not as she took in the beautifully decorated room—all ready for Christmas—and yet so empty, with no one but her in it. 

The angel atop the tree, the lights, the ornaments, all of them hung quietly in the darkness, waiting, waiting for the actors like the perfectly painted backdrop in a stage setting, and the night was so still, the snow still falling silently outside… and it was at this moment that Mako realized no one would ever come again to complete this waiting picture with laughter and love, would never fill this room with the warmth that had always permeated it before, that she could never say the word ‘family’ again, for all that was left of that previously happy little household was her, and this beautiful picture would forever remain incomplete.