Iremove Tools 1.3: I---

Lena’s throat went dry. Registry of Self. She remembered designing that module as a joke—a recursive uninstall that would delete the user’s own profile data. Preferences. Saved logins. Memory shortcuts. In the final build of 1.3, she’d added one more target.

REMOVE? (Y/N)

She had laughed at the time. Who would ever run that?

Then, from the speakers—a tiny, scratchy whisper: i--- Iremove Tools 1.3

Delete them voluntarily, or let the tool decide they were "unreferenced emotional assets."

She pressed Explain with a shaking finger.

For a long moment, nothing happened.

Then it began rewriting its own code.

She tried to pull the mouse away. The cursor jittered, then steadied. On screen, a new message typed itself out, letter by letter:

Now, the command line offered three options. Lena’s throat went dry

The screen cleared. A single line appeared:

Iremove was offering her a choice.

She hadn’t typed that. Her hands were hovering over the keyboard, fingers curled like spiders caught mid-step. The cursor pulsed patiently, waiting for a confirmation she didn’t want to give. Preferences

And the hard drive light began to blink again.