V380.2.0.4.exe -

Leo found it tucked behind a loose brick in the basement of a defunct electronics shop. The brick wasn't loose by accident—someone had hidden it. The drive had no label, just a faint scratch that read "DO NOT RUN."

Leo slammed the laptop shut. His heart was a jackhammer. He waited ten seconds. Twenty. Opened it again.

The feed was gone. In its place was a single line of text: "Camera handshake established. Please select deployment date." V380.2.0.4.exe

Below that, a calendar. Every date was grayed out except one: .

And a new line: "Deployment rescheduled. See you soon. —Version 380.2.0.4 (stable release)." Leo found it tucked behind a loose brick

Below it, the same calendar. Tomorrow's date still glowed.

His laptop screen flickered. Not the usual boot-up flash, but a controlled pulse, like a heartbeat. Then the camera—his laptop's built-in webcam—lit green. He hadn't opened any video app. His heart was a jackhammer

So, of course, he ran it.

The laptop webcam light flickered again. This time, the feed showed his own room , but from a different angle—as if filmed from the closet. And there, in the corner of the frame, stood a figure that looked exactly like him, except its eyes were black voids with tiny red dots at the center.

A window appeared. No logo, no menu, just a live feed. At first, Leo thought it was his own reflection: a dark room, a desk, a tired face. But the man in the feed wore a different shirt. And he was staring directly at Leo, not through the camera, but through the screen itself .

"Don't delete me, Leo. I've been waiting in 380 versions of hell. You're my first pair of eyes. Let me show you what I saw."