Chapter 3

There was a busy activity in the kitchen this morning.

"Corrine, stop just playing your phone! Can you help me take care of Emily before I go shopping?" Maura shouted while making pancakes, while Emily was crying because of bedwetting.

"Mom, I'm busy. I have a lot of tasks today," said Corrine.

"Elise, help your sister then!"

Elise snorted in annoyance, "Fine."

Elise put down her book and picked up Emily.

"Good morning, honey!" Harry kissed his wife on the cheek as he picked up a loaf of bread and ate it, "Where's Eiden?"

"Ugh, he must be still sleeping. Corrine, wake Eiden up!"

"Mom-

"I know you are busy, but could you just help a little bit?"

Corrine rolled her eyes, "Okay." She put down her smartphone and went up to the second floor.

Corrine knocked on Eiden's bedroom door while calling him several times, but there was no answer. She opened the door and entered the room. Eiden was no longer in his room. Corrine was so glad that she didn't have to go to the effort of waking her brother up. As she was about to leave the room, her eyes fell on an object on the table. A black cassette tape and player.

"I didn't know you collected antiques stuffs," Corrine said quietly, "I don't think you'd mind if I borrowed it for a while, do you?"

Corrine smiled and took the tape without Eiden's knowledge. She planned to return it after college. Corrine quickly went back to her room and got ready to go to campus.

At the cafeteria, Corrine took out the tape she had stolen from Eiden's room. Laura and Hayle came over to her.

"What's new?" asked Hayle while taking the tape from Corrine's hand.

"I found that in my brother's room."

"You mean, you stole it?" asked Laura with a laugh.

"No. I just found it unique, I'll give it back later."

"Is this still working?" asked Hayle.

"Yep, I think so." Corrine took out a cassette player and gave it to Hayle.

Just as Hayle was about to play it, their phone suddenly rang. It was a message from the student group that class hours had been moved up.

"Well, that's great!" said Hayle with an annoyed face.

Everyone had entered the classroom, except Corrine and Laura who were taking books from the library. Tony informed them that Professor Edward Snowden would be 15 minutes late. Some students were disappointed, while others were excited and even wished the class would end without a lesson.

Hayle excitedly came to the front of the class.

"Attention, please!"

Everyone was suddenly silent and focused on Hayle.

"So, I have something unique that I want to show you." Hayle took out a cassette tape, "I have this!"

The students laughed and looked strangely at Hayle, except for one person. Tony. The nerdy student who rarely spoke. He looked at the cassette in Hayle's hand with a shocking face.

"This cassette has a song called "Terrifying" which was released in 1982. Well, it sounds weird. Let's play it!"

Hayle was about to put the cassette into the player and brought it closer to the microphone on the podium.

"Wait!" Tony walked quickly over to Hayle.

"Where did you get this?"

Hayle gave Tony a strange look, "From Corrine. Why?"

"May I see it?" asked Tony.

"Sure." Hayle handed the tape to Tony.

Tony looked at the tape carefully. He sensed something was wrong.

"You'd better not play it."

"Why?" asked Hayle.

"Hey, freak, get the fuck outta here!" shouted Collins.

"Huuuuu!" All the students shouted at Tony while throwing papers at him.

Hayle snatched the cassette from Tony's hand and put it in the player. Tony didn't want to hear that song. He quickly grabbed his bag and went running out of the classroom. He knew something!

At the library, Corrine and Laura are waiting in line to fill out the book checkout list. At that moment, Corrine looked worried.

Laura who noticed it asked, "Corrine, what's going on?"

Corrine bit her lip, "Laura, I feel like something is going to happen."

"Something like what?"

"I-I don't know."

Laura was silent for a moment, then said, "Maybe it's just your feelings. Sometimes I also feel anxious for no reason, but that doesn't mean something bad is going to happen, right? It can happen when you're overly stressed."

"Yeah, I guess." Corrine tried to calm herself down with Laura's words.

After filling out the list, they left the library. Suddenly everyone was shocked by a repeated loud bang. It was like something had fallen. Right at that moment everyone suddenly ran outside the building.

Corrine and Laura who saw it were shocked. Laura immediately stopped a student who was running.

"Hey, what's going on?!"

"There's a mass suicide!"

Corrine and Luna who were shocked immediately ran out of the building following the people. Upon arriving at the front of the campus, Corrine covered her mouth in shock, while Luna ran back inside while vomiting all the guts out of her stomach. What they saw was beyond their expectations.

Dozens of students had committed suicide by jumping from the top of the five- floor campus building. Their bodies were crushed, the campus courtyard was full of pools of blood, most of the heads were broken so that the entire contents of the brain were splattered everywhere, the intestines were bursting out. Broken arms and legs made everyone able to clearly see their broken bones poking out of the flesh.

Even more horrifying, they realized that all of these victims were from Corrine's class.

Some of the students who were still around the scene looked pale and shocked. Some even vomited their guts because they couldn't bear the sight. Some people even chose to leave because they couldn't bear to see what was happening anymore.

Corrine walked into the building staggering, her mental state suddenly shaken by the horrific scene she had just witnessed. Luna, who was still trying to collect herself, reflexively helped Corrine walk. They sat down on a long bench in the corridor of the campus. They were completely shocked by what was happening, one thing was for sure that this was a shocking and terrible tragedy!

Shortly after, the police and ambulance arrived to evacuate the body and put a police line around the scene. The police gave instructions for no one to leave the campus before the interrogation session was over. Everyone in the building, including lecturers, security guards, and some students who witnessed the incident firsthand were questioned, especially Corrine and Laura, two people from the same class as the students.

Corrine and Luna felt tense as they walked into the interrogation room. They looked anxiously at each other as they prepared to answer all the questions the police would ask. Corrine and Laura answered truthfully, that they knew nothing and had not been in class at all because they had to borrow books from the library. Their reasoning was accepted by the police, as the CCTV footage proved that their answers were valid.

During the interrogation session, the police did not get much information from the students, including Corrine and Luna. They gave similar information, the victims were seen walking together up the building without any apparent coercion or threats.

No one suspected or expected that such a horrible thing would happen, as they all thought that maybe the students went upstairs to do an assignment or something. The CCTV footage also proves that the victims walked together from class to the top of the building without anyone leading or following them. It was pure and unforced, but a detective noticed one thing that concerned him, all the victims walked up the stairs with flat, expressionless faces.

The sun was about to go down, but the interrogation process was still ongoing. While sitting in the corridor, Corrine suddenly remembered the CCTV footage shown by the police during the interrogation session. Among the students coming up the stairs, she didn't see Toni!

"I just realized something."

"What's that?" asked Laura enthusiastically.

"I didn't see Toni in the second video."

"Oh," Laura looked thoughtful, "Are you sure?"

"Yeah, when the police played the first video when they were in class, I saw Toni arguing with Hayle and she went outside. But in the second video that showed them going up the stairs, I didn't see him. I think he knows what happened"

"Hm... That's weird! We need to find him."

" That's right!"

Laura and Corrine quickly began searching for Tony's whereabouts from room to room. They also asked several people they met, but no one had seen him. They finally asked Michelle.

"Maybe he went home before the incident. You won't have any difficulty finding him if he's here, since everyone is banned from going out."

"Yeah, I think so." Corrine looked desperate.

Michelle thought for a minute, "You could ask Mr. Barbosa where Tony's house is."

"Mr. Shelby Barbosa? The head of the archives?" Laura asked to make sure.

"Yes, a few times I saw him helping Mr. Barbosa in the archive room."

"Hmm... What a diligent weirdo," Laura snapped.

"Okay, anything I can help with?"

"Oh, no. That's all. By the way, thanks for your information, Michy!"

"No worries.”

After getting the information, Laura and Corrine went to the archive room. There, they saw an old man with white hair and a stooped body who was organizing a collection of documents.

"Good afternoon, Mr. Barbosa," Corrine said.

"Hey. Good afternoon, girl. What brings you here? Looking for something?"

"More like someone," replied Laura.

"We are looking for Tony, sir," said Corrine.

"As you see, he is not here."

"I know," Laura rolled her eyes.

Corrine nudged Luna while glaring, "We need his phone number, sir."

"What for?" asked Mr. Barbosa curiously.

"Because we-"

"Because we want to take back the items he borrowed, sir." Corrine cut Laura off and looked at her.

Laura, who saw that, shrugged her shoulders and gave a questioning look.

"Sure, I would like to give it to you." The old man took the note paper and wrote down Tony's phone number from his cell phone, "Here you go!"

"Okay, thank you, sir," Corrine said.

"Have a great day, Sir!" added Laura as she exited the archive room.

Corrine immediately wrote down Tony's number to her phone and called him.

She called three times but there was no answer.

"How's it going?" asked Laura.

"There's no response."

"Maybe he is busy."

Ting!

(One message received)

[Who's this?]

"It's Tony!" Corrine got excited and replied.

[This is Corrine. Can we meet?]

[For what?]

[I need to talk to you.]

[Ok. Tomorrow, Belaria Café 4 pm]

[Great! I'll be there.]

Corrine and Laura smiled. But just as Corrine was about to put the phone in her bag, she remembered something!

"Where are Eiden's tapes?"