The phone screen glowed, a stark, digital red. Not a hoax. Not a joke. A countdown. 15 days, 3 hours, 27 minutes. My breath hitched. The air in my dorm room, usually a comforting cocoon of stale coffee and code, felt suddenly thin. I rubbed my thumb over the slick glass, half-expecting the numbers to shimmer, to glitch, to vanish. They didn't. They just… ticked. Slow. Unyielding. A silent accusation in the quiet hum of my laptop. It couldn't be real. But my stomach twisted, a familiar, cold knot.