🌑

You keep moving and catch up to the denser crowd, hoping to lose yourself in it. But you also lose sight of your followers. You try to reestablish your network connection, but your terminal only returns an enigmatic error code: 4304, which directs you to a log file.

2254-05-31 14:28:04 Aydan > I can't reconnect and I have no idea why. I'd probably be cut off from you too if there wasn't a physical cable between us.

2254-05-31 14:28:05 ÆON > I can do nothing on my end either. It is...unpleasant.

The crowd cover only lasts until you exit the building. Then all the smaller groups comprising the cluster split off in too many directions, leaving you surrounded by the second-year group, now surrounding you on three sides and closing in on you.

Then you feel a connection--three local devices connecting to your terminal with no input from you. A second later, a piercing static hiss fills your ears. You instinctively cover them, but the sound is not external. A white light fills your vision, brighter than the sun, very painful to your eyes. Closing them does nothing to stop it.

A technopathic attack on the surface, you haven’t experienced such a thing before but you’re sure of it.