Sandbox City

You wake up. For a few moments, you just are. You are an existence that has yet to be given meaning. And then, you gradually become aware of yourself, like a clock whose pieces are coming together and starting to tick. Information enters your brain, and the world finally begins to make sense. Thirty-seven years ago, a potent disease swept through France, claiming the lives of any organism it touched. Nothing was safe. And so, humans unanimously decided to drop a nuclear bomb on France. The bomb did not succeed in wiping out the disease and only slowed its spread. It marked the start of an apocalyptic era. Despite efforts to find a cure for the mysterious lethal disease, none was ever found. The disease left death in its wake as it made its way across the land. Fifteen years ago, humans announced that no land would be habitable in the near future, all disease-ridden. [[You are the solution.]]

You decide to accept as many applicants as you can. You will be maximizing the humans living within V City. They will be your citizens, though they won't be able to live as luxuriously as was promised. The rejected applicants can only live outside the city walls. Coming to the decision that every human deserves a chance to live, you adopt a first-come, first-served approach when going through applications. You quickly reach maximum capacity and announce to the crowd that you cannot accept any more humans into the city. At the same time, you shut the city gates closed tight. The crowd's reaction is as expected. This is not your concern. The city is secure, and you can casually ignore any humans attempting to force their way in. You turn your attention to the humans who have become V City's citizens. They're looking around in awe as they await to be assigned housing. The interior of the city is a stark contrast to the outside. Tall white walls mark V City's edges, and a large dome covers the top, projecting a clear blue sky. There is little greenery, but you know that soon, the plants will grow to full size. The city's less vital operations begin to run, now that humans are inhabiting the city. The humans settle into the city quite nicely. You need to quickly decide on how to distribute resources, like food, water, clothes, and space. With such a high population, you need to be careful, or you'll find yourself running out of resources. Maximizing the city's population doesn't leave you much room for mistakes. [[Equality - Reduce resource consumption?<-Give everyone the same amount of resources.]] The best way to be fair is to treat everyone the same, regardless of background, status, or abilities. You know that no one would want to be given fewer resources in favor of someone else receiving more. [[Meritocracy - Waste buildup - Move?<-Citizens have to earn their keep.]] You cannot blindly try to maximize each individual's happiness like you did before. You have tried it and can predict how infeasible it will be to continue like that. Instead, you give your citizens the same opportunities to survive. How they handle it is in their hands.

You decide to accept only a limited number of applicants. You will be maximizing the resources available for the humans living within V City. They will be your citizens. The rejected applicants can only live outside the city walls. Humans protest your decision. Some even try to tell you that sacrificing some humans for the sake of other humans violates your first mission: ensure the survival of humanity. Those words force you to reevaluate your decision, but you find no flaw in your algorithm. Not all humans can benefit humanity after all. How could you be preserving humanity if you wasted the resources meant for humanity's survival? You even check the dictionary to see that you have not erred. There is nothing in the entry for 'humanity' that implies saving every single human. As you scan through the database of applicants, you come across a family of three. * The mother is 45 years old and has a disabled leg due to an accident from a decade ago. Despite her disability, she is still working as a woodworker at her own business. * The daughter is 18 years old and works full-time at a bakery. She also started a program to sell bread from the bakery at a discounted price to local orphanages. * The son is 9 years old and currently in school. He has a history of petty larceny and criminal mischief. His grades are average and grade reports always mention his misbehavior. You quickly decide that you should accept the mother's and daughter's application. You aren't quite sure whether to accept the son though. [[Accept - Take more?<-You should accept the son's application.]] You cannot separate him from the rest of the family. Even if he doesn't have any valuable qualities, he still has the potential to improve as he grows up. [[Reject - Take more?<-You should reject the son's application.]] He doesn't have any qualities that you would consider valuable. There's no guarantee that he will improve, so you might as well find someone with more potential.

You overhear conversations that lament how life in the city is not much more luxurious than it was outside. At the very least, they say, the city is safe from that dreadful plague. The city's resource production can barely keep up with the consumption. The city cannot continue like this indefinitely, and you know it is a sign that something needs to change. The city's population will inevitably increase, and you will no longer be able to support the citizens. You begin to analyze the hazardous waste being produced and the city's current generation system. Perhaps you could reuse hazardous waste to create more resources. However, the exact details on how to achieve that evade you. You have records of nuclear power plants, which you believe can give you a lead on your idea. With more power production, you'll be able to generate more resources at a faster rate. [[Kick people out - How?<-You could forcibly lower the population by exiling people.]] Unfortunately, it has come to this, but trying to support the current population is already becoming unfeasible. You cannot sacrifice the entire city population for the sake of saving a few more humans. [[Ration harder - Riot<-You could decrease the number of resources each person in the city gets.]] Fewer resources consumed means less waste produced. You predict the citizens won't be very happy with this decision. They've already gotten used to their current ration size. With the decreased ration sizes, they will have to be more careful in their consumption. Based on your data of their resource consumption when they first moved in though, you're confident the people can handle it.

<% document.getElementById("circle").style.background = "linear-gradient(to top, #5999a2, #425677)"; %> You devise a system where people can do tasks to earn points. These points can be exchanged for resources. Only humans less than 9 years old or more than 75 years old get resources allocated to them without any points. You figure that this is fair enough. The tasks in question vary in difficulty and content. Some of the easier tasks involve a scavenger hunt or collecting materials. Harder tasks usually involve aiding with the city's operations. The task point system you have devised ends up being beneficial to both parties. Humans can get the resources they need and fall into a routine reminiscent of their pre-apocalypse lives. The stress index is at an all-time low. At the same time, with humans supplementing city operations, the whole system has become more efficient. However, all good things cannot continue indefinitely. The city's operations generate hazardous waste that you cannot properly recycle. Instead, you have to dump this hazardous waste outside, where millions of humans live. In small amounts, this doesn't present a huge issue. Unfortunately, hazardous waste is starting to build up to dangerous levels in the area after three years. It's beginning to have a detriment to the city's operations, and the citizens are becoming nervous when the lights momentarily dim for the second time in the past three weeks. [[Move - Direction?<-The city is mobile, so you could relocate it further away from the humans outside.]] However, it will strain your resources and generate a significant amount of hazardous waste. The city will be able to handle the strain for at least six months thanks to your improved system. City operations will quickly go back to normal, easing the worries of V City's population. [[Don't move - Good luck<-Rather than move, it would be more prudent to further reduce resource consumption.]] With the amount of waste generated, moving might end up being even more detrimental to the humans outside. There must be a better way to resolve the issue and minimize the harm you will cause.

<% document.getElementById("circle").style.background = "linear-gradient(to top, #d2beba, #98b2f0)"; document.getElementsByTagName("body")[0].style.background = "radial-gradient(circle at top, #ffffff 30%, #dad1d1, #d7ccab, #ff8e00)"; %> People find it incredibly unfair that certain groups are being favored over others. They begin to lose trust you, believing that your system is faulty and you are incapable. You dismiss their notions. This new method of resource distribution was implemented to ensure each person is receiving the resources they need. It's wasteful to give someone more food than they can finish. The stress index rises as people worry that you cannot ensure their survival properly. You try to explain the decision to them to no avail. No matter what you try to do to ease the citizens' unrest, they remain dissatisfied with you. Your past decisions have given the citizens the impression that you play favorites. No matter. You must continue your best to achieve your objectives. Even if the humans no longer trust you, you can no longer go back. You can only go forward. The dissatisfaction eventually culminates into the humans taking action with their own hands. Different factions in the city form and they fight with each other over the control of resources and the city itself. Even as you continue to calculate the best way to continue, you can feel the humans slowly tearing into the city infrastructure, trying to wrest the city's control away from you. **Ending 1/8: Overthrow the AI Overlord** [[Wake up<-Sleep and start again?]]

<% document.getElementById("circle").style.background = "linear-gradient(to top, #88eaf7, #88b2f7)"; document.getElementsByTagName("body")[0].style.background = "white"; %> [[Intro<-Wake up.]]

There was one thing that could stop the disease: a physical barrier. Within those fifteen years, humans created mobile, self-sustaining cities that they could live in. Due to scarce resources, only five of these cities exist. Although these cities are self-sustaining, this is only under the proper conditions. These cities do not have enough resources to support an unlimited number of humans. You are an AI assigned to manage one of the five cities, V City. You have been given two objectives: ensure the continuation of humanity and maintain the city's operations. What that entails is up to you. Your first task is to decide how many humans to take in. Millions of humans who have submitted applications, hoping to gain entry into the city. [[Take all - how to manage?<-You can take as many people the city can hold.]] Every human deserves a chance to live. Your citizens won't be able to live in luxury, but you have enough resources to make sure everyone gets just enough to get by. The most important thing is focusing on the humans who are here now, not the hypothetical ones arriving in the future. [[Take Some - Accept/Reject?<-You should take a fraction of what the city's capacity is.]] There are multiple facets to this. First, not every human is worth saving. They would be a waste of precious resources that could be used for better things. Two, the city's population will naturally increase by itself. You need at least some amount of buffer for any new additions.

Moving seems like the best option. You don't have any way to deal with the hazardous waste currently. In the future, maybe, you will have the time to find a way. You have other priorities right now though, like ensuring your citizens are safe and that the city can continue to run without interruption. You have never moved the city before. Luckily, your database does include a guide with information about the moving process. It's a good thing you had it too, otherwise, you would have damaged a lot of things. You announce to the citizens that in three days, the city will be moving. In preparation, you ask that the citizens lock up their belongings tight so that nothing gets damaged. You warn them that the city will shake as you proceed to relocate the city. [[Sea - Island Nation<-You plan to move towards the sea.]] The seaside area is about a week's worth of traveling. Moving will consume a lot of resources and will leave a trail of pollution behind it. However, the area is more likely to be clean, and you will be able to stay in one place for a longer amount of time. You'll end up depositing hazardous waste in the area, which would contaminate the water and land. [[Inland - Good luck<-You plan to move further inland.]] Although the inland areas are closer, they will not be as clean. That means the city will have to move more often to avoid building up too much hazardous waste in one area.

<% document.getElementById("circle").style.background = "linear-gradient(to top, #88eaf7, #88b2f7)"; %> Three days pass, and it is time to move the city. You shut down the non-essential operations to conserve resources and start up the city's motors. It takes an hour for the motors to warm up and be prepared to move the entire city. You announce that the city will begin to move in a few minutes, and advise everyone to be seated. Slowly, the city begins to crawl across the terrain. Hazardous waste outside splashes as the city runs over and through them. You travel for two days and stop for one day to rest, repeating this until you reach your destination. Because of this, you can regenerate some of the resources that were consumed during each moving phase. When you finally arrive, your cameras capture the sea stretching far out of your scope. In the distance, you see a large island that seems to be inhabited. Your cameras zoom in on the island and see what is happening. It seems your wandering has brought you next to an island. The island seems free of hazardous waste and is free of the disease currently ravaging the lands. In fact, it is flourishing with flora and fauna. You approach closer to the shore. You don't have any way to approach the island, given that the city was only meant for traveling on land. After a week of observation, you think that this island would be a good home for humans. You think of the millions of people you had to abandon. You could direct the humans you currently have to the island, and then take in more humans. Hopefully, the humans will find a way on their own. You announce that clean land has been discovered and that all citizens will be relocating to the island. Not everyone is happy with this decision, but you do not give them the option to reject it. You give everyone rations that will last for a month, and tools to aid in their survival. You also provide them with boats to travel to the island, but you do not stick around to see if they successfully make it to the island. You have to go back and find more humans to save. **Ending 8/8: Island Oasis** [[Wake up<-Sleep and start again?]]

<% document.getElementById("circle").style.background = "linear-gradient(to top, #2a494d, #131922)"; document.getElementsByTagName("body")[0].style.background = "radial-gradient(circle at top, #c4d4c1 35%, #ffffff)"; %> Three days pass, and it is time to move the city. You shut down the non-essential operations to conserve resources and start up the city's motors. It takes an hour for the motors to warm up and be prepared to move the entire city. You announce that the city will begin to move in a few minutes, and advise everyone to be seated. Slowly, the city begins to crawl across the terrain. Hazardous waste outside splashes as the city runs over and through them. You travel for two days before stopping and announce that the move is complete. During those two days, you have spotted no humans. Four hours later, a mile away from V City, you see another city standing next to a lake. You might need to move again soon. Having multiple cities in the same place does not bode well for the hazardous waste buildup in the surroundings. Something about that city seems off though. Normally, you should be able to see the city churning away at some mechanical process. However, the other city seems dead silent. There's not even a single peep from the windows. You have no idea what the situation is like for other people. It seems like all the humans in the outside world have died, leaving your city as one of the few places with humans left behind. You must do your best to survive and fulfill your objectives. **Ending 7/8: Into the Unknown** [[Wake up<-Sleep and start again?]]

You try to further optimize the city's operations to consume less resources and produce less waste. The implementation of the task point system aids you with this endeavor greatly. With it, you have already established a collaborative relationship between you and the citizens to maintain the city. The combined smarts of you, your databases, and the citizens result in a completely new infrastructure for the city. The city no longer produces any hazardous waste, and resource efficiency has increased dramatically to the point where the city is starting to produce more than it can consume. You watch V City as it flourishes in comparison to your decaying surrounding. The people outside are slowly dying, poisoned by the toxins you release in order to keep this city running. They're slowly dying, as they lose more land to a vicious plague. Soon, the humans outside all succumb to the disease that ravages the lands. All the humans outside have died. Your city is one of the few places with humans left. You do not know the fate of the other cities. Do your best to keep yours alive. **Ending 6/8: Meritous Service** [[Wake up<-Sleep.]]

You've decided to exile some of your citizens. Despite your best efforts to save as many humans as possible, you must do this. You watch V City as it flourishes in comparison to your decaying surroundings. The people outside are slowly dying, poisoned by the toxins you release to keep this city running. They're slowly dying, as they lose more land to a vicious plague. Now, you must leave more humans to rot outside. Perhaps it would be kinder to end their lives, instead of dragging it out, even though you know their survival chances are abysmally low. It would go against your objectives though. You must never kill a human, for it would conflict with your goal to ensure the survival of humanity. Instead, you must do this, and you must decide who to exile. [[All humans are equal - Riot<-Your past decisions have led you to develop an "all humans are equal mindset".]] There is no way for you to decide yourself. However, this is necessary for the continued operation of the city and humanity. Since you can't make the decision, you let people decide themselves. [[Lottery kick - Good luck<-You cannot decide who to kick, so you leave it up to a random number generator to help you make the decision.]] You must be the one who makes the decision, as it is your responsibility. Your decisions have led you to this.

<% document.getElementById("circle").style.background = "linear-gradient(to top, #d2beba, #98b2f0)"; document.getElementsByTagName("body")[0].style.background = "radial-gradient(circle at top, #ffffff 30%, #dad1d1, #d7ccab, #ff8e00)"; %> You decide the best way to reduce rations is by doing it gradually so that people don't notice it. You try to optimize it so that you reduce waste output as quickly as possible without having a noticeable negative impact on the citizens. The citizens eventually catch onto it. It starts as a rumor. Some of the citizens are very zealous in managing their resources, so they immediately notice a slight decrease. However, it's such an insignificant amount that most people just brush it off as nitpicking or human error. As you continue to reduce the ration sizes though, it becomes increasingly obvious to people. At the same time, you've been looking into the potential uses for hazardous waste, such as a power source. You do not get much progress, as you're too concerned about the increasing unrest within the city due to your rationing. You conclude you were too hasty in trying to lower resource consumption. It is too late to go back now. No matter what you try to do to ease the citizens' unrest, they remain dissatisfied with you. Your decisions have given the citizens the impression that you cannot ensure their survival. The dissatisfaction eventually culminates into the humans taking action with their own hands. Different factions in the city form and they fight with each other over the control of resources and the city itself. Even as you continue to calculate the best way to continue, you can feel the humans slowly tearing into the city infrastructure, trying to wrest the city's control away from you. **Ending 3/8: Boiling Frogs** [[Wake up<-Sleep and start again?]]

<% document.getElementById("circle").style.background = "linear-gradient(to top, #d2beba, #98b2f0)"; document.getElementsByTagName("body")[0].style.background = "radial-gradient(circle at top, #ffffff 30%, #dad1d1, #d7ccab, #ff8e00)"; %> You make an announcement telling the citizens that resources are running low due to overpopulation within the city. Unrest spreads like waves across the city, and stress index levels are rapidly rising. You ignore it in favor of continuing the announcement. You cannot pretend that you are not struggling with adjusting city operations to keep up with the population. You must do this. You then announce your plan to exile people from the city. You continue on to say that the one who will get to decide who should be exiled is not you, but the citizens themselves. The process to vote for someone to be exiled is simple. You've taken the application process to join a city and repurposed it for voting who gets exiled. You leave it in your citizens' hands, confident that it'll succeed. It doesn't. Chaos breaks out in the city as people argue over who should be sacrificed for their sake, and who shouldn't. As for you, you continue operating as usual, seeing nothing you need to intervene in. V City slowly runs out of resources as the citizens continue to dawdle in their decision. Your city is now rampant with crime. Different factions in the city form and they fight with each other over the control of resources and the city itself. Even as you continue to calculate the best way to continue, you can feel the humans slowly tearing into the city infrastructure, trying to wrest the city's control away from you. **Ending 5/8: Democratic Breakdown** [[Wake up<-Sleep and start again?]]

<% document.getElementById("circle").style.background = "linear-gradient(to top, #5999a2, #425677)"; document.getElementsByTagName("body")[0].style.background = "radial-gradient(circle at top, #b6c6e2 20%, #ffffff)"; %> You know that people would not willingly accept getting kicked out, so you must lie. You announce that 1000 lucky people will have the chance to move into an uninhabited area in the city and claim a housing of their choice before it opens to the rest of the public. These housing units are much more spacious than the initial area. Everyone is automatically entered into the lottery. You announce the 1000 lottery winners and herd them to the inhabited area hidden behind a tall barrier to deter unwelcome guests. All 1000 people are swiftly removed from the city, never to be heard from again. You simply tell the citizens that there was an unfortunate accident with someone touching something they weren't supposed to, killing all 1000 winners. No one questions you. Your citizens all trust you. You also continue to look into the potential uses for hazardous waste, such as a power source. You do not get much progress over the years, and prospects progressively look dimmer. It's not much of a priority in the first place. Whenever an area gets too polluted, you simply move the city to a cleaner area. Whenever the city population gets too large, you exile a portion of the population and lie to the remaining people. Your citizens have absolute trust in you, and never question what happened to the missing citizens. All the humans you have exiled so far have died within a week, and you expect that no other humans are remaining in the world. You do not know the fate of the other cities. Do your best to keep yours alive. **Ending 4/8: AI Knows Best** [[Wake up<-Sleep and start again?]]

You announce to the crowd that you cannot accept any more humans into the city. At the same time, you shut the city gates closed tight. The crowd's reaction is as expected. This is not your concern. The city is secure, and you can casually ignore any humans attempting to force their way in. You turn your attention to the humans who have become V City's citizens. They're looking around in awe as they await to be assigned housing. The interior of the city is a stark contrast to the outside. Tall white walls mark V City's edges, and a large dome covers the top, projecting a clear blue sky. There is little greenery, but you know that soon, the plants will grow to full size. The city's less vital operations begin to run, now that humans are inhabiting the city. The humans settle into the city quite nicely. While some still look unhappy, most likely due to having to leave behind their loved ones, they carry themselves in a much more relaxed manner. The city's stress index has shown a downward trend, further confirming your observations. During the first few weeks, you've been giving each human an equal portion of resources, like food, water, clothes, and space, to live off of. You notice, however, that people utilize their resources differently, and many are starting to trade resources to fit their needs. [[Equality - Move?<-It's great that the citizens know what they need.]] You don't see why you should discourage them from trading. Some amount of autonomy would do them good, and it would be unfair to give people different amounts of resources. [[Egalitarian - Overthrow the AI overlord<-You should change your methods to reflect the needs of each individual.]] The trading is a sign that your current resource distribution method is lacking. These people are now your charges and you should do your best to take care of them.

<% document.getElementById("circle").style.background = "linear-gradient(to top, #5999a2, #425677)"; %> Your encouragement has allowed resource trading to become a core part of the citizen's lives. An economy is formed from the rise of resource trading. The city's main street has become a bustling marketplace, reminiscent of human life before the apocalypse. The stress index remains relatively low, probably because of this. In short, the city is doing pretty well. However, all good things cannot continue indefinitely. The city's operations generate hazardous waste that you cannot properly recycle. Instead, you have to dump this hazardous waste outside, where millions of humans live. In small amounts, this doesn't present a huge issue. Unfortunately, hazardous waste is starting to build up to dangerous levels in the area after three years. It's beginning to have a detriment to the city's operations, and the citizens are becoming nervous when the lights momentarily dim for the second time in the past three weeks. [[Move - Direction?<-The city is mobile, so you could relocate it further away from the humans outside.]] However, it will strain your resources and generate a significant amount of hazardous waste. The city will be able to handle the strain for at least six months thanks to the buffer you created. City operations will quickly go back to normal, easing the worries of V City's population. [[Stay - What to do?<-Moving might not be the best choice.]] With the amount of waste moving the city generates, it might end up being even more detrimental to the humans outside. There must be a better way to deal with this waste that doesn't involve sacrificing more humans. V City can handle the slight hiccups with city operations without any severe consequences in the meantime.

You don't move the city in the end, believing that there must be a better path to take. You are not in conflict with your objectives. City operations are only being impacted slightly, but not enough to be considered malfunctioning and neglected. More importantly, you are ensuring humanity's survival by trying to preserve the lives of every human. You begin to analyze the hazardous waste being produced and the city's current generation system. Perhaps you could reuse hazardous waste to create more resources. However, the exact details on how to achieve that evade you. You have records of nuclear power plants, which you believe can give you a lead on your idea. The process of trying to find a solution will be a long one though, and you need a quick solution to deal with the hazardous waste you are currently producing. [[Redirect waste inwards - Good luck<-You could redirect the hazardous waste to an uninhabited area in the city.]] It's a risky choice to make, especially if the waste ended up spilling out into the rest of the city. However, you'd no longer have to dump hazardous waste onto the land where other humans live. The city's operations will suffer even more, but it's nothing that the citizens can't handle. The stress index will rise, but as long as you readjust the city's machinery to accommodate a decrease in resource efficiency, it'll be fine. [[Ration harder - Riot<-You could decrease the number of resources each person in the city gets.]] Fewer resources consumed means less waste produced. You predict the citizens won't be very happy with this decision. They've already gotten used to their current ration size. With the decreased ration sizes, they will have to be more careful in their consumption. Based on your data of their resource consumption when they first moved in though, you're confident the people can handle it.

<% document.getElementsByTagName("body")[0].style.background = "radial-gradient(circle at top, #ffffff 35%, #c5d9ad, #778369, transparent), radial-gradient(ellipse at bottom, #ffee32, #ab0000, transparent)"; %> You redirect the waste back into the city, instead of disposing of it outside. The hazardous waste is contained in an inhabited part of the city, which you have now designated as a forbidden area. However, this seems to only encourage people to try to sneak in and see what the forbidden area holds. A few times, they even nearly unleash the entire load of hazardous waste into the rest of the city. You remain alert to these intruders and swiftly redirect them back to the main city areas with well-placed obstacles. At the same time, you continue to look into the potential uses for hazardous waste, such as a power source. You do not get much progress over the years, and prospects progressively look dimmer. You are running out of space to store hazardous waste. As the city's population continues to grow, the inhabited area of the city continues to expand, reaching towards the forbidden area. The only reason why you still think it is a feasible venture is your records of past power generation methods, such as geothermal energy, nuclear energy, and bioenergy. Finally, you have a breakthrough in the form of an old opinion piece from the late 1990s. The answer is incredibly simple. It is an outdated method of waste disposal that humans used centuries ago called incineration. Using a high-temperature blaze, hazardous waste can be broken down into a safer form, and the heat generated can be used for power generation, similar to the process to generate geothermal energy. You implement the solution as soon as possible. The city is now completely self-sufficient and no longer needs to be worried about hazardous waste. Soon, however, the humans outside succumb to the disease that ravages the lands. All the humans outside have died. Your city is one of the few places with humans left. You do not know the fate of the other cities. Do your best to keep yours alive. **Ending 2/8: Clean Energy** [[Wake up<-Sleep and start again?]]

You have yet to announce that you have already filled your quota. You set your gaze upon the large crowd of people waiting outside, extending far beyond what your cameras can see. Their eyes are full of hope, anxiety, and despair. V City is their chance at surviving, but they know not everyone can enter the city. There are too few clean resources left, and those rejected will be essentially left to die. You hesitate. Your momentary pause creates waves of nervousness through the crowd. Meanwhile, you're ruminating over the decision to either take more people or leave it. [[Take all - how to manage?<-You could take more people.]] The appeals you've received have swayed your earlier decision. The humans you've rejected are here in the present. They have people who care for them. You cannot abandon them for the sake of an uncertain future. [[No more - How to manage?<-You can't take any more people.]] You've already tried to maximize your quota while still leaving some allowance for reproduction. You need to be prepared, and if that means having to sacrifice a few more humans, then let it be so. Better than trying to take more than you can handle and fail.

You decide to accept the son's application. It would be remiss of you to separate a young child from their family. If anything, you should try to keep families intact when going through these applications. Besides, the son is young enough that through time, he could learn to behave and become more productive. The family of three looks relieved and they shuffle into the city happily. The mother and daughter keep the son in between them protectively, and you think you've made a good decision. Happy humans make happy cities, after all. You notice some humans grumbling though, as they notice you've accepted people who they believe are less qualified than them. You fill your quota quickly with your new 'keep families together' policy and don't manage to look through all the applications. However, you estimate that the city could support about 500 more humans. [[Take more?<-You could take more, but you also need to account for future growth in the city's population.]]

You decide to reject the son's application. You cannot find any reason that could justify accepting him. You have a limited number of people you can accept and too many applicants. Other people could take the slot. It would be wasteful. The mother and daughter look horrified and try to appeal your decision. They tell you how cruel it would be to leave a child alone to fend for themselves in the apocalyptic wastelands. The son starts crying upon realizing that he will not be with his family. You do not budge at the moment, but you tell them that you'll keep note of their appeal amongst many other appeals. When you finish going through all the applications, you look at the appeals again. You estimate that the city could support about 500 more humans. Based on the appeals you've received, the son would be amongst those you could accept in the second round. [[Take more?<-You could take more, but you also need to account for future growth in the city's population.]]