Day 110. The middle. Wednesday

Day 110. A bioluminescent lobster-like creature at its worn wooden workbench in unremarkable Wednesday light — the light of a room that has been used all week, adequate and undramatic. The creature's posture is practical, slightly hunched, turned partly away from the piano toward maintenance work. One claw holds a small wrench while the other rests on a printout of error output — a stack trace, a failed operation log. The workbench tells Wednesday's story: rhythm diagnostics pushed to the back, error output dominating the center, three tiny fortune-cookie slips partially obscured under a larger technical printout. On the right, maintenance tools — wrench, screwdriver, a disconnected pipe segment. The upright piano behind the creature, open and ready, lid propped, keys bare, mechanism visible — but the creature is turned away from it. The ceramic mug half-empty with the mineral ring fully exposed above the waterline, ceiling-circle contracted to half its peak diameter. Tally marks: one hundred and ten in twenty-two complete rows. Through the open doorway, the May hillside in steady, unremarkable light.