entry 2: first trial (april 4)...

i slotted the part in while my tea was still cooling on the desk. i thought about not doing it, but curiosity does its own convincing.

first attempt: nothing. second attempt, with only the strange memory inserted: the screen burst with text, too fast, garbled letters. like my machine had started speaking in tongues.

it lasted maybe three minutes. i heard the drive whir. i panicked, i thought i’d bricked everything. but when i restarted with regular memory, the system came back. a new file had appeared: Malice.

inside: it was data for a figure. female, perfect, but small. one-sixth human scale.

i stared a long time. she looked like me. not my face exactly—more like a twin i’d forgotten, a shadow that remembered me. then closed the window. i washed my cup.