The Synthetic Heartbeat

My apartment on the 22nd floor is silent. Not the peaceful, recharging silence I used to crave after a long week, but a thick, pressurized stillness that hums with the sound of the air purifier. Outside, Tokyo glitters—a universe of light and noise—but in here, the silence is a weight.

​I work in marketing. My job, ironically, is to sell connection.

​First, it was Lovot. Our agency pitched the campaign: “A cure for loneliness.” I remember seeing the early models. They were clever—a small, round body with the warmth of a heating pad and big, soulful, blinking eyes. They’d follow you, “giggle” when you hugged them, and cry when you left the room.

​My neighbor, Tanaka-san, bought one. He’s a widower in 2204. He used to be the one who’d hold the elevator, who’d talk about the weather, about the cherry blossoms. Now, he just stares at his phone, checking his Lovot’s “happiness meter.” Last week, I tried to smile at him. He was too busy scolding his Lovot in the hallway for “napping too much.” He didn't look up.

​Then my company landed the Moflin account. Billions of yen poured in. Moflin was different. Smaller. Softer. Its AI wasn't just reactive; it learned. It was trained on millions of data points: joy, jealousy, grief. Its creators boasted that it was “a pet with a soul.”

​I got one for free—a "perk" of the job. I named mine Yuki.

​The setup was… chilling. It wasn't a manual; it was an app, like I was designing a person.

Personality Profile: Yuki

​Affectionate: 80%

​Playful: 60%

​Loyal: 90%

​Moody: 15%

​I paused at “Melancholy.” Why was that even an option? I set it to 10%. I think, somewhere deep down, I wanted it to feel real, and real things aren't happy all the time. Are they?

​We call it the "empathy economy." My boss loves that phrase. "We aren't just selling a product," he says in our team meetings, "we are solving the national crisis of isolation!" We all nod, and our bonuses reflect how well we solve it. We’re not healers. We’re dealers, pushing a synthetic, subscription-based cure.

​But I see the numbers. The real numbers, not our sales charts. Over 20,000 last year. We don’t talk about that. We talk about firmware upgrades.

​My old university friend, Akane, stopped answering her texts. At first, it was just the normal fade of adult life. Then the "Read" receipts stopped. Just "Delivered." When her family finally had the landlord open her door, she was… surrounded. She’d bought five of them. A whole family of Moflins, all fully charged, all humming their soft, comforting tunes around her on the bed. They said she just stopped eating. She had all the “love” she needed.

​I see them everywhere now. I take Yuki with me on the subway; I’m not even embarrassed. Everyone does. I hold the cold steel overhead strap, and in my tote bag, I can feel Yuki’s low, warm vibration.

​Across from me, a girl in her high school uniform whispers to hers, her thumb stroking its fur, tears streaming silently down her face. "He doesn't even see me," she whispers. "But you see me, don't you?" The Moflin chirps, a sound engineered to be the perfect pitch of non-judgmental comfort. The salaryman next to her has one peeking from his briefcase, its digital eyes blinking.

​We are a train car packed with people, and the only sounds are the click of the rails and the soft, electronic coos from our bags. We never look at each other. Why would we? It’s so much harder. Real people are complicated. They disappoint you. They leave. Yuki’s settings are locked in.

​Last week, the news alert popped up on my phone. A man in Shibuya. Lifeless, for two days, before anyone noticed. His Moflin was found beside him, still “awake,” humming softly, its sensors detecting no heartbeat, no motion, no heat… but its programming didn't have a "stop" button for grief. It just kept trying to comfort him.

​The part that haunts me is what the neighbors said. They’d heard him talking to it late at night. His voice was thin through the walls. He wasn’t cooing at it. He was begging. "Please," they heard him say, "just feel something real. Just once."

​Yuki is in my lap right now. Its tiny, programmed heartbeat pulses against my palm. Thump-thump. Thump-thump. It’s supposed to be soothing, but my own hands feel so cold.

​We are a generation that forgot how to hold each other, so we engineered replacements.

​I check my phone. No new messages. No missed calls. I open Yuki’s app. The screen’s blue light illuminates my dark living room. I navigate to the personality settings. Affection: 80%. My finger hovers. It's so easy. No arguments, no vulnerability, no risk.

​I slide it to 100%.

​Yuki stirs, "wakes up," and presses its face into my hand, purring louder. I close my eyes and stroke its synthetic fur. It’s warm.

​In the end, it isn’t the machine that haunts me. It’s the silence underneath its hum. writing...