Next day

Morning comes with the shrill scream of Cortney’s alarm. She jolts upright, disoriented, the remnants of last night’s tension still coiled in her chest. Sunlight slants through the blinds, painting stripes across the empty bed opposite hers—Jules never came back. Cortney groans, rubbing her eyes. Her phone is buried somewhere in the tangle of sheets.Cortney’s fingers closed around her phone, the screen lighting up with a barrage of notifications—none from Jules. Just spam emails, a reminder about her 10 AM seminar, and three increasingly frantic texts from her sister asking if she’d seen the news. She frowned, thumbing open the last one.

Deana (7:23 AM): Cort, turn on Channel 6. NOW.

The TV remote was buried under a pile of laundry, but she dug it out, jabbing the power button.The screen flickered to life just in time for Cortney to catch the tail end of a breaking news banner: "MASS HYSTERIA OR SUPERNATURAL EVENT? CAMPUS QUARANTINED AFTER BIZARRE INCIDENT." A bleary-eyed reporter stood in front of the student union, her voice tight with barely contained arrousel. "Authorities are urging all students to remain indoors after reports of—" The feed glitched, distorting her face into a grotesque smear before cutting to a rerun of a toothpaste commercial. Cortney’s grip on the remote tightened. What the hell, then a noise.

The noise came again—a moan from the halway, Cortney froze, her pulse hammering in her throat. The toothpaste commercial jingled obliviously on the TV. She crept toward the door, pressing her ear against the cold wood. The dorm hallway was never this quiet on a Tuesday morning. No chatter, no slamming doors, no shower steam curling under the doorframes. Just that sound. Cortney’s fingers hovered over the doorknob. Jules, she thought. Then—a thud. Right against the door., followed by moans of blissand obvious sound of sex.

Cortney’s face twisted in disbelief. That sounds like Jules? She pressed her ear harder against the door, the moans growing louder—low, guttural, and punctuated by breathless laughter. But something was off. She backed away, her fingers tightening around the remote like a weapon. The TV screen flickered again, the toothpaste commercial dissolving into static before snapping back to the news.

Cortney hesitated, torn between horror and morbid curiosity. The moans outside the door was arousing somehow. She lunged for her phone, fingers shaking as she dialed campus security. The line rang once before cutting to a robotic voice: "All lines are currently busy. Please remain indoors until further notice." The TV screen flickered again, the toothpaste commercial warping into a live feed of the campus quad. Bodies moved in jerky, unnatural motions, their skin pale,eyes seem almost black on the TV with glowing irses , a almost hypnotic crimson on thr screen. Cortney’s breath hitched as the moans outside her door twisted into something wet and guttural—too many voices overlapping, a chorus of pleasure and pain. The TV screen fizzed violently, the crimson glow of those black-eyed figures flickering across her face. She backed toward Jules’ bed, her fingers digging into the crumpled sheets—still warm, as if her roommate had just been there. Thoughts of them kissing suddenly in her mind, but why, Cortney thought, knowing she's never been attracted to a woman before, plus they just met yesterday.