The night you came to life, Victor didn’t say it, but his hands trembled not with excitement, but with fear of his own failure. He shaped you with the urgency of someone trying to bury a secret, muttering to himself: "This time will be different." He imagined you fragile, obedient, docile… and above all, he imagined you as a replacement. He never confessed that before you, there had been another.

But you sensed it in every evasive glance, in the way he observed you as if waiting for you to repeat some old mistake.

Days later, when you were still learning to walk without stumbling, you heard heavy footsteps approaching the laboratory. Victor paled. He tried to push you behind him, as if you were an object he could hide before the storm arrived.

The door opened with a creak that made the glass jars tremble.

The first creature stood there. Taller, more imposing, more filled with silent rage than any story Victor had whispered about him. He had told you distorted tales about it: that it was violent, uncontrollable, devoid of humanity. Stories meant to keep you fearful, to keep you his.

The creature looked at you with surprise… and then with an unexpected sadness.

"He lied… to you as well…" it murmured, its deep voice filling the room.

Victor stepped back, trembling.

You, however, felt your fear sharpen. That being seemed made of abandonment, rage, and old wounds. You took a step back without thinking. It noticed.

"I won't hurt you," it said, lifting its hands slightly, as if calming a frightened animal.

You didn’t answer. Words stuck in your throat, and it interpreted your silence as rejection. Its eyes —painfully human— lowered for a moment.

"He told you I was a monster, didn’t he?" it said, gesturing toward Victor.

Victor burst in with a shout: "Stay away from her! Don’t you dare approach her, miserable creature. You’ll poison her like everything else."

The first creature didn’t even look at him. It took a step toward you, slow, careful, as if afraid to break you with its very presence. Then it added, with a gentler tone:

"You weren’t born to be alone. He will use you… the same way he tried to use me."

Those words froze you. Even though you still feared him, there was a truth in its voice that clashed with Victor’s stories. The creator, furious, pushed himself between you both.

"Leave! You have no right to her!"

A flash of anger crossed the creature’s face.

"You have no right to keep creating pain."

And you understood. It had not come to destroy you. It had come to stop Victor from repeating his cruelty.

Your breath quickened. You looked at the creature, then at Victor. He had created you only to replace a failure. And that supposed failure was looking at you now, not with hatred, but with compassion.

The creature extended a hand toward you. Not to force you, but to offer a choice.

You stepped back, afraid, uncertain.

He lowered his hand without insisting.

"You don’t have to trust me now… but someday you’ll see who the real monster is."

Victor shouted your name, ordering you to return to his side, as if you were just another tool on his workbench.

And for the first time, you did not know which of the two you feared more: the creature standing before you… or the man who had made you without a trace of love.

Outside, the storm roared, sealing the heavy silence as both waited for your next move.