Balbina Jacobs tenderly kissed her slumbering daughter upon the forehead, the child’s angelic face and gentle, rhythmic snoring instilling a sense of profound tranquility within the young mother.

With great care, Balbina uncoiled a translucent cylindrical tube from a side compartment embedded within the metallic frame encasing Euthalia’s dual-tiered sleep chamber.  She then ever-so-delicately pressed the suction-cupped summit of the rubbery hose to the toddler’s temple, a softly whispered beep letting her know that device was indeed properly connected.

Holding her breath, Balbina stood slowly, careful not to make a sound as she made her way over the hypnosphere terminal on the far side of the room. After mulling it over for a moment, Balbina managed to remember that the previous evening she’d allowed Euthalia to enjoy an entertainment-based program set at an amusement park and featuring several popular children’s characters from contemporary fiction.

In keeping with the agreement she’d made with her husband, Balbina entered a new five digit code upon the terminal’s keypad, initiating an educational program which was meant to improve her offspring’s arithmetic skills through some sort of algorithmic sequence embedded within soothing neural transmissions.  She’ll be a genius in no time, the handsome salesman had promised upon Balbina’s reluctant acquisition of the expensive unit, purchased with an overextended Dominion Credit License the previous month.

As the hypnosphere sprang to life, Balbina departed the room swiftly, yawning animatedly as she readied to retire for the evening herself.

***

Draco Jacobs was still awake as his wife entered their modest home’s unimpressive master bedroom. He was perusing a recently-published periodical distributed by the Dominion’s Public Relations Bureau, the Jacobs Family budget no longer allowing him to ‘waste’ any thallars on his favourite digimags such as Pro Streamball Weekly or Semele Quarterly.

"Is she asleep?"  Draco asked coldly, refusing to look up from his pamphlet.

"Yes dear," Balbina replied, a hint of sarcasm infiltrating her tone.  "She’s dreaming of addition and subtraction tonight, don’t worry . . ."

"Good," Draco stated firmly.  "Maybe she’ll be able to add up all of our debts soon, let me know how many years I’ll have to serve in the labour camps to get us out of this mess . . ."

"Is that all you can think about Draco?"  Balbina asked, aggressively. "There’s more going on in our lives than owing a few thallars to the mensces you know . . ."

Draco ignored his wife’s foolhardy remark completely, engrossing himself in an article outlining the Dominion’s successful colonization of former Nadiri satellite states.  He looked up from the pamphlet briefly as his wife undressed and draped herself in a see-through chiffon robe, the thin blue fabric revealing the outline of a firm, finely-toned figure that Draco immediately found himself desiring.

The unemployed factory worker cleared his throat as he haphazardly tossed his brochure aside, springing to life as he gazed seductively into his wife’s green eyes, her classically beautiful face now a mask of solemnity.

"How about we work on getting Euthalia that sibling we promised her?" Draco asked, invitingly.

"I’m tired," Balbina replied, unambiguously.

"Okay . . ." Draco said, defeated.  He immediately shut off his bedside electolantern and issued a formal ‘Goodnight’ to his spouse of five years. Within a matter of seconds he was snoring loudly, a lifetime of arduous manual labour having produced an ‘automatic sleep’ control function within the thirty-year-old southerner’s biological mainframe.

Balbina loitered at the foot of their baron-sized bed for a moment, allowing the man she still (more-or-less) loved time to journey further into the comatose state she knew he’d remain in until morning.  The devoted homemaker grabbed a pillow from atop their well-worn mattress and proceeded to return to Euthalia’s room at the end of the hallway, wading through the murky darkness like a lumbering, marsh-dwelling predator.

Upon reaching her daughter’s room Balbina immediately deactivated the hypnosphere, an adorably meek groan emitting from Euthalia as her suspended consciousness was suddenly left to its own devices, the iota hose detaching itself from her temple and falling to the ground, limp.

Balbina quickly typed in the code for a dream sequence set in an unknown tropical location and featuring dozens of athletic-looking, scantily-clad young men tending to guests’ every conceivable whim, sensual or otherwise.  She rushed over to the half-occupied sleep chamber to retrieve the now-surging tube, abruptly fastening it to her own forehead and climbing into an unoccupied top bunk, her nose mere inches from the room’s clay ceiling.

Quickly ingesting a powerful sleeping pill, Balbina laid perfectly still, her eyes shut firmly as her thin mouth curved upwards into a genuine smile, her first and last of the day.