Emma's Creation

She wasn't supposed to be beautiful, but she was.

Not in the way of children, not in the way of innocence. Her beauty was unsettling, precise - symmetry too perfect to be natural, skin too flawless to belong to chance. She was a blueprint given breath.

She was staring at the girl's lips, the faintest curve playing at the corners. Not a reflex. Not a glitch in muscle memory.

A smile.

The first, but not the last.

Behind the glass, Emma opened her eyes.

And the world, though it did not yet know it, would never be the same.