“Father! The camera, quickly now!”

I pilot my body quickly through the cramped house. Industrial fan blades act as traps in my clumsy adventure through the warren of a kitchen, as I stumble camera first into the living room. I know my daughter's priorities.

“Finally!” Carly snatches up the camcorder and sets it up, angling it at the bathroom down the hall, “Hurry up, we need to film!”

Carly quickly cleans herself up and breathes, before pulling us into view, starting her usual speech, addressing her fellow man.

She gives words of acknowledgement of the bleak world we were living in, then transitions to retelling her mother’s death by the burning phenomenon causing the bleakness, like it was a revolutionary step in her quest.

“Five years our ozone layer has been broken, turning the light above lethal,” She transitions yet again, “But our minds have remained unscorched!”

Carly then shifts to her focal point; Her experiments that have arisen after my wife’s death. She’s been trying to find a way to combat the violent rays produced by the blazing sun, but four years of failures is hard to bear.

She lists all of her projects triumphantly, all having previously left burns along both our bodies. She doesn’t present those to the lens.

“Now, however, I have constructed a truly fascinating hypothesis!” She advances onto her new material, making me sigh, “A mere five minutes outside unprotected can be fatal, but I ask, what would happen if you did the opposite?”

“I have constructed a cooling chamber in my bathroom. An ice bath, insulators, and air conditioning units cover the walls! For this experiment, I will step outside for as long as I am able, then my assistant will cool me in the ice chamber! My hypothesis is that-”

“Carly, can we skip this experiment?”

My words are thrown out by desperation.

“What? Father, no, I have to finish my speech.” She hushes me.

“I just don’t think it’s a good idea to test it out on yourself-”

“If not me, who will?! You cannot volunteer, and we have no one else!”

“Maybe we can find some rats to test on or-”

“All the rats are GONE father, I checked already!”

I look into my daughter’s eyes. She's worn a constant scorn since her mother’s death, as if burned onto her face. A meaning behind it, and the world’s suffering, is all she longs for, even if her corpse, and her father’s mind, the cost.

“...I’m sorry for speaking up.” I say, letting my daughter finish her unintentional suicide note.

I take the camera back into my hands afterwards, following her to the door. I hold my breath and point the lens out the window as Carly steps into the orange abyss.

After four minutes, she turns to me with her confident smile, but it fades quickly. She notices the look I have, and understands that I don’t trust her experiment once again.

I’m correct to give her that final look.