Mara didn't sleep.
Not because of the clause—though it sat behind her eyes like a splinter—but because Halcyon had trained its students to treat midnight like a god. Midnight meant deadlines. Midnight meant rankings updated. Midnight meant the invisible hand of "opportunity" closing around your throat.
Her room was quiet except for the faint hum of her laptop fan and the occasional soft tick of the radiator.
Her phone lay face-up on her desk like it was waiting to be touched.
12:00 AM.
The Student Perks app updated without asking. A smooth progress bar slid across the screen, cheerful and clean.
NEW FEATURES INSTALLED.WE VALUE YOUR CHOICE.
Mara didn't tap anything. She watched it the way you watched a stranger try your front door handle—still, pretending you weren't afraid, hoping they'd leave.
The lock screen lit again.
A notification—this time not from Student Perks.
@HALCYON.ALUMNI.2019 added to their story.
Mara frowned. That account had been dead since freshman year. Everyone knew it. The profile picture was a faded graduation cap. The last post was an over-edited group photo from four years ago with the caption miss u guys already 😭 and then… nothing. No updates. No comments. No life.
A dead account didn't "add to their story."
Her thumb hovered. Anxiety tried to make a list of explanations. Glitch. Hack. Someone reclaimed it. A prank.
Then the story preview loaded automatically—a black screen with white text.
last seen online 3 seconds ago
It was so plain it felt personal. Like someone had typed it directly into her chest.
Mara set the phone down like it was hot.
Across the hallway, through the thin dorm walls, she heard laughter—someone playing music too loud, someone narrating their life like it was content. Halcyon's student housing wasn't a dorm so much as a pressure cooker with better lighting.
Her phone buzzed again.
Jace: u seeing this???Nina: Mara. Please tell me you're not watching it.Theo (LIVE): DEAD ACCOUNT STORY IS UP. SCREEN RECORDING NOW.
Mara didn't answer. Her eyes kept sliding back to the black screen even when she looked away, like it had burned itself onto her retina.
She opened her messages to Nina and typed: I'm not watching.
She deleted it.
Not because it wasn't true. Because she suddenly wasn't sure the system cared about truth the way humans did. It cared about actions. It cared about taps.
And it cared, she suspected, about witnesses.
A new message popped up from a group thread she hadn't joined.
HALCYON '26 — GENERAL
Hundreds of students were typing at once.
AvaP: BROOOO the alumni acc is alive 😭Kellan: it's just a black screen LMAORae: WHY DOES IT SAY LAST SEEN ONLINEMilo: bet it's a promo for Perks. watch it cowardsSera: I watched. nothing happened. yall dramatic.
Mara's skin prickled.
The words nothing happened were always the beginning of the worst stories.
She stood, paced two steps, then stopped. Her room suddenly felt too small, like the walls were inching inward. She needed air. She needed distance from her own phone.
She shoved it into her hoodie pocket, grabbed her keys, and left.
The common room downstairs was a mess of bodies and blue light.
Students sprawled on couches, sitting cross-legged on the floor, leaning against walls as if gravity had gotten heavier. Almost everyone had their phone out. A few were filming reactions, their faces bright with that specific kind of hunger: the hunger to be first, to be seen.
Theo was standing on a coffee table like he owned it, livestreaming. His hair was sticking up, and his eyes were gleaming with the kind of manic certainty Mara envied and feared.
"Okay," Theo said to his phone, "dead account story. Black screen. White text. It says—"
"Don't," Mara blurted before she could stop herself.
Every head turned.
Theo paused mid-sentence, blinking at her like she'd slapped him. "Don't what?"
Mara's throat tightened. In her pocket, her phone vibrated once—soft, like a warning.
"Just—" she forced herself to slow down, to sound normal, "don't say it. Out loud."
Theo's eyebrows shot up. "Mara, are you—"
"Paranoid?" Jace's voice cut in.
He was leaning against the far wall, half in shadow, looking like he belonged there. His grin was in place, but it didn't reach his eyes tonight.
He pushed off the wall and walked toward her, casual, like he didn't notice the way the room had shifted to watch them.
"Hey," he said lightly. "You can't tell Theo not to say something out loud. That's like telling a cat not to knock something off a shelf."
"I'm serious," Mara said.
Nina appeared beside Jace, jaw clenched, phone death-gripped in her hand. "Mara," she whispered, "did you see something in the terms?"
Mara didn't answer. She couldn't. The second she did, it would become verbal confirmation, and some hidden counter would tick down and down and down.
Theo's chat scrolled wildly on his screen.
@tin_foil_tim: SHE KNOWS SOMETHING@lolwut: MAIN CHARACTER ALERT@s0ftbreak: don't say it out loud??? brooooo@boredbrokeandbrilliant: SOMEONE WATCHED AND DIED???@theorize_me: SCREENSHOT THE TERMS, NOT THE STORY
"Mara," Theo said, dropping his voice to something almost human, "if you know anything, you have to tell us. That's the whole point of a conspiracy."
"That's the whole point of a trap too," she shot back.
Jace tilted his head. "Have you watched it?"
"No."
Nina exhaled like she'd been holding her breath. "Good. Don't."
A girl on the couch—Sera, the one who'd typed nothing happened—laughed and waved her phone. "You guys are acting like it's haunted. Look." She tapped her screen, casual as blinking. "It's literally just—"
The story played. Black screen. White text.
Mara felt it like a drop in temperature.
Sera watched the seven seconds and snorted. "See? Nothing. You all need hobbies."
Then she stood, grabbed her bag, and headed for the door.
As she passed the hallway mirror, she paused.
Not in a dramatic way. In a confused way—like she'd forgotten what she was doing mid-step.
"Wait," she murmured, looking at her phone. "What time is it?"
Someone answered. Someone laughed. Someone made a joke.
Sera frowned harder. "Why can't I—" She lifted her phone, swiped, swiped again. "My contacts are… empty?"
The room's noise thinned.
Theo hopped down from the coffee table, suddenly less amused. "What do you mean, empty?"
Sera's eyes flicked up, searching faces. "I mean—where is everyone? I had—" She shook her phone like it was broken. "This is stupid. It's probably the Wi-Fi."
Nina stepped closer, voice tight. "Sera. Say your full name."
Sera blinked. "What? Why?"
"Just do it."
Sera laughed once, sharp and uneasy. "Okay. Sera… Sera—"
She stopped.
Her mouth opened like the word had slipped away between her teeth.
A beat of silence passed.
Then another.
Sera's expression changed—not fear yet. First, irritation. Then confusion. Then the beginning of panic as she realized there was a blank space in her head where something important had been.
"I—" she tried again, voice cracking. "I'm… I'm—"
Her phone chimed.
A soft, clean tone.
Sera looked down.
Her face drained of color.
"What?" Jace demanded, stepping forward.
Sera held the phone up as if it might burn her.
On the screen:
STUDENT PERKSCongratulations! Social Alignment Enhanced.Minor adjustments applied.
Below that, smaller:
Thank you for choosing your future.
Sera's eyes darted around the room, desperate. "I didn't— I didn't do anything. I just watched a—"
Mara's pocket buzzed again, harder this time, and she felt her stomach twist because the app had just proven it didn't need permission the way humans understood it.
Nina grabbed Sera's wrist gently, grounding her. "Can you open your attendance portal?" she asked, voice calm in the way it gets right before it breaks.
Sera nodded too fast and tapped.
Loading.
Loading.
Then:
ERROR: STUDENT NOT FOUND.
Sera laughed again, but it came out wrong. "That's— that's funny. That's like… a prank."
Theo's livestream camera swung toward the screen. His chat exploded.
@s0ftbreak: STUDENT NOT FOUND???@tin_foil_tim: SOFT BREAK. IT'S HAPPENING.@someone_help: TURN OFF THE STREAM YOU'RE FEEDING IT@boredbrokeandbrilliant: WHAT DID SHE TRADE????
Sera pulled her wrist back and stumbled toward the door. "I'm going to the office," she said, voice rising. "This is stupid. I'm going to—"
She stopped again.
Because the door didn't open.
Not locked. Not jammed. It just… didn't recognize her. The handle turned, but the latch stayed put, as if the building itself had decided she wasn't authorized to leave.
Sera stared at it, horrified.
Then she did the thing scared people always did.
She raised her voice.
"This is insane!" she shouted. "I watched that story and now—"
Mara lunged forward instinctively, like she could catch the words mid-air.
Too late.
Sera's phone vibrated violently. A red banner flashed across her screen for the first time—no friendly tone, no gentle font.
VERBAL CONFIRMATION DETECTED.COOLING-OFF WINDOW REDUCED.
Sera froze.
"Cooling-off window?" she whispered, voice suddenly small.
Mara's own phone buzzed in her pocket like a heartbeat.
She pulled it out before she could think, because thinking was slower than fear.
Her screen was open.
Not to Student Perks.
Not to messages.
To the dead account's story.
Black screen.
White text.
last seen online 3 seconds ago
Below it, a thin bar began to load by itself.
A preview.
A tap she hadn't made.
Mara's thumb flew toward the lock button.
The screen didn't turn off.
In the reflection of the black story card, she saw her own face—pale, eyes wide—like the phone had become a mirror and the mirror was deciding what she was.
Then the story played.
Seven seconds.
No sound.
Just the words.
And when it ended, her phone vibrated once—final, decisive.
A new screen slid up like a signature page.
COOLING-OFF WINDOW ACTIVE72:00:00
The timer began to count down.
Mara stared at it, breath locked in her chest, as the room around her blurred into a distant roar.
Jace's voice cut through, sharp now, no humor left.
"Mara," he said, "what did you just do?"
Mara couldn't answer.
Because her throat had gone tight with the awareness of a new rule, written into her bones:
If she described what she saw out loud…
the timer would drop.
To be Continued
© Kishtika., 2025
All rights reserved.