Chapter 3 - The Digital Parasite
The phone screen flickered to life, casting a sickly blue luminescence across Clara’s exhausted face. Within seconds, the viewer counter in the top corner began to spin wildly: 100... 1,000... 5,000. The digital locusts swarmed the live feed faster than oxygen could fill Clara’s burning lungs. The chatbox scrolled past at a dizzying speed, a toxic waterfall of heart emojis, cynical jokes, and demands for more tears.
“Look at him cry, so authentic!” one anonymous user typed.
“She’s probably faking it for clout, drop the kid!” another comment flashed across the bottom of the screen.
Clara felt a wave of nausea rise in her throat. She wanted to hurl the device against the tiled floor and shatter the lens into a thousand pieces, but Leo’s small, frantic breathing kept her frozen. The police officer stood motionless like a statue of modern tyranny, watching the engagement metrics climb with professional detachment.
“You see, Clara?” the officer said softly, leaning down just enough for his voice to remain off the main microphone. “The public loves a tragedy. They consume despair like breakfast cereal. You are feeding the beast, and the beast is finally satisfied.”
“This isn't life,” Clara whispered, her eyes burning as she stared into the glass lens of her phone. “This is a sickness disguised as progress.”
“Progress requires fuel,” the officer corrected, tapping his badge. “Your son’s emotional output just pushed us past the neighborhood quota. Congratulations. You have earned another twenty-four hours of biological freedom.”
Before Clara could process the grim victory, a sharp, piercing alarm echoed from the officer’s wrist device. The glowing red light shifted to a violent, pulsating amber. The numbers on the screen did not stop rising; instead, they inverted. The system had detected artificial suppression.
“Wait,” the officer muttered, his professional composure cracking for the first time. He tapped frantically at his glowing interface. “What is happening to the feed?”
Clara pulled Leo closer, watching the officer’s face pale beneath his short beard. On her phone screen, the viewer count froze dead at 99,999. The chat box stopped scrolling entirely, replaced by a single, bold red banner that covered the entire display.
May you like
“System override detected,” a metallic automated voice boomed from the supermarket's overhead speakers, drowning out the hum of the aisle. “Target designated as prime anomaly. Execution of protocol zero has commenced.”
---
