A message appeared on every screen in the world. Hi, I just found out what happens if you don't. I was playing Monopoly with my friends Neva, Ziv, and Jai when something weird appeared on my phone. Just one word in black text. Hi, Ro. You're addicted. Neva called out. Play board games like a normal human. I tried tapping the screen desperately, but nothing worked. Then the apartment rumbled and the TV flickered to static before showing the same message. Hide. What the heck? Jai said, turning hisphone toward me. His screen showed the exact same thing and so did Nevas. When Ziv checked the TV, it displayed the same word in classical font. I walked to the balcony from Ziv's 14th floor apartment and looked down. In the neighboring towers, people were standing frozen, staring at their devices. Every visible screen had that same white background with black text. This was global. I guess we don't have anything to call the cops with," she asked. We stood stood there confused when Nevaspoke up. "Should we do it?" she asked. "Do what?" Ziv replied. Hi, hide where? I don't know, she said and started exploring Ziv's apartment. I don't care if I look stupid. It could be a warning. She settled on the sliding closet in Ziv's room. I'll do here unless you think there's better. I'm going to close the door soon. And if you're all really my friends, you'll join me. Jai went first, saying, guess it's good to be safe, right? I followed reluctantly. Andfinally, Ziv joined us, sliding the door closed. How long do we stay in here? Ziv asked. 5 minutes? Neva said. We sat in stillness when powerful knocks thundered at Ziv's door. "Hey, Ziv, you there?" A muffled voice called. "I have this weird thing on my phone. It says, "Hide TV, same thing. I don't know what to do." My neighbor, Merror, Ziv, "I should probably get it. You said 5 minutes?" Neva insisted. Suddenly, the knocking stopped. Everything stopped. I feltsomething real. Like, there was a presence right outside the closet. The static stunned my ear. Then it passed. When I checked my phone, HD E was gone. Did you feel that? Neva whispered. Ziv slid the door open with shaking hands. He went to answer Merror while we stayed in the living room. I checked Twitter and found confused posts worldwide. But Ziv stood at the door too long. I pressed against the peepphole, completely frozen. "Everything all right, man?" I asked. "She's she's" Hecroaked. I looked through the peepphole and saw saw sirra in the hallway. She looked like she'd been skewered. Blood was everywhere. Then my phone buzzed again. The word appeared on the TV, too. We had to hide again, but this time we knew it was real. Whatever killed Mera was coming back. We can't assume we have the same amount of time, Ziv said. If you keep picking the same spot, eventually it catches up to you. We split up. Jai and Neva went under the bed. Ziv squeezed into the laundrycloset, and I took the utility closet, but my door wouldn't close properly, so I had to grip the handle and hold it shut. The silence came again, complete and terrifying. Then I felt a light tug at my door. I kept my grip firm but didn't overpower it. Finally, it stopped. We all survived. My phone showed great time afterward. But something felt wrong, really wrong. "Hey Neva, how'd you know we should have stayed in the closet for 5 minutes?" J asked pointedly. Her face showedannoyance. "It was a guest." "You guys were lucky I was here." As they talked, I started feeling overwhelming suspicion about Ziv. When he tried to calm everyone down, I could swear I saw him concealing some inner smile. "Wait, Ziv, you tried to kill me," I said suddenly. Anger hit all of us like a flood. We turned on each full of rage and paranoia. Ziv grabbed a knife from the kitchen as we surrounded him. I was certain that all three of them were traitors. "Break time!" Neva said,showing us her phone. "It's breaking us." The rage wasn't ours. Whatever was controlling this was flooding us with artificial anger during break time. The fury faded and we all apologized, ashamed, we tried to find news on TV and found a soccer stadium where everyone had been torn apart. A news anchor was hiding under his desk when suddenly every screen cracked and shattered. The message now read, "Seek, it's the screens." I realized we need to find a screen that still works. I searcheddesperately and finally found Ziv's phone under the monopoly money showing smile l. You have to smile, I screamed. We all forced wide grins until the message disappeared. But then came the worst one. Point to sacrifice with a timer counting down from under 2 minutes. All right, Ziv said. So what? We talk it through with the time we have left. Neva smiled softly. I just have you guys now, so forget this, she said, pointing to herself. I flipped the board on this nonsense. Jai pointed to himself, too. You know what? I flippedthe board, too. If there is a hell, Ziv said. Maybe we dodge that bullet. He pointed at himself. With seconds left, I had an idea. I sprinted to the door and pointed at Meera's body in the hallway. We didn't know what we were dealing with until she died. Her sacrifice gave us a chance, I said, looking up as if speaking to whoever was controlling this terror. And we've probably lost a lot of humanity since then. So, sorry and thank you. My friends pointed to saying, "Sorry and thank you," as their likelylast words. "House rules," I said as the timer hit zero. Nothing happened. Instead, Zib's phone just read, "Good game!" before returning to his normal home screen, we sat back down at the Monopoly board like nothing had happened. Moving robotic, "I think it was my turn," I said slowly. I rolled the dice and moved my pee. Everything felt surreal, like we were still part of some cosmic game we didn't understand. "Do you want to buy it?" Neva asked about the property I'd landed on. Ithought about it for too long, wondering if our choices still mattered or if we were just pieces being moved around by something much larger than ourselves.
