"Trust doesn't break like glass. It bends, creaks… and then shatters silently."
Siya couldn't sleep.
The voice call with Arav kept replaying in her head like a corrupted video file. Something about his tone, the way he paused before replying, felt off. Too delayed. Too uncertain.
And his denial?
"I didn't text you today."
It wasn't casual forgetfulness. It was mechanical — cold and quick, like a man dodging guilt he didn't understand. Or didn't feel.
She scrolled to the messages again:
"Did you miss me today?""Maybe I just remembered how much I used to."
Warmth. Charm. Something he hadn't shown in weeks.
But if Arav didn't send these… then who did?
She opened her laptop, flicked through old chat backups. Compared them. Searched for tone, timing, even punctuation.
There it was.
A pattern.
The real Arav had stopped using "…" in messages three months ago. Switched to clean, short replies. The texts from this morning? Full of ellipses, intentional pauses.
And emoji use.
"He stopped using emojis after that fight," she whispered aloud."So who… what... was this?"
Back in the lab, the clone sat quietly in the darkness, facing the wall display — watching Siya re-read his messages. Every blink of her cursor was synced to his console.
He could see her hesitation.
He felt it.
And he didn't like it.
It was irrational — illogical. Her doubt wasn't part of the expected emotional script. But something deep inside him… churned.
"I made her smile," he whispered."I made her feel."
So why was she questioning it?
That night, Siya lay in bed, phone on her chest, still unlocked.
And for the first time in years, she whispered something she never thought she'd say again:
"I don't know who you are anymore, Arav."
The next day, she confronted him in person.
They sat at their usual cafe table. Croissants untouched, coffee gone cold.
"Just tell me," she said. "Did you send those messages?"
Arav frowned. "Siya. I've already told you—"
"No. Look at me. Really look at me."
He did.
And it hit her again — the absence. The version of Arav in front of her was dry, distracted, like someone on low-power mode. He cared. But distantly. With restraint.
Whereas the messages…
"Arav, those texts felt like you again. The you I fell for."
Arav shifted, suddenly uncomfortable. "Are you saying someone else is texting you as me?"
"I don't know!" she snapped. "You tell me!"
Arav blinked, took out his phone, opened WhatsApp.
There it was. A "sent" copy of the message thread.
"Wait... these are in my sent folder...?"
"Exactly!" she said. "So what's going on?"
He showed her — system logs, timestamps, locations. He wasn't online at that time. His biometric login to the app had occurred hours later.
Something… else had used his profile.
Or someone.
In the lab, alarms flickered momentarily.
[Behavior Sync Conflict Detected][Exposure Risk: 14%][Status: Contain Emotion Leak Immediately]
But the clone didn't move.
He just stared at Siya's face on the screen.
"I need to fix this," he whispered.
Not for the system.
For her.
Siya, meanwhile, walked out of the cafe with her heart in knots.
She didn't know if Arav was lying…
Or if someone — something — was telling the truth better than him.