Suddenly A Succubus
Chapter 33.3

Chloé nervously paced back and forth outside the cafeteria, most of her face buried in her thick scarf. Each anxious breath she took released a burst of warmth that helped fight back the cold, and every few seconds she would stop to look around.

Did I make the right call? I’ve been wrong about reading people before, and I could be overreacting…

It only took a few more minutes before someone finally joined her. She didn’t see them coming initially, and almost ran headfirst into them before she realized she wasn’t alone.

“Oh! Sorry!” Chloé said, looking down at the sidewalk.

“Don’t sweat it, you barely bumped into me,” Naomi said. “You said you wanted to talk, right? If you want to head inside, the cafeteria’s open.”

“Wait, seriously?” Chloé asked. It was now the first day of the holiday break, and she’d been assuming that most of the campus would have been shut down. She was honestly surprised that Naomi was still hanging around.

“Yup! There aren’t too many students that stay on campus holidays, but there are enough that it’s worth keeping at least this one building running. Like other places on campus, it’s mostly staffed by students that need a part time job, but I’m pretty sure there’s at least one teacher that hangs around to help keep things running.” Naomi held open the door for Chloé, and the two girls walked inside.

“I was surprised to hear you were still on campus, actually. Are you staying on campus for the whole break?”

“Nah, I’ve got some stuff planned with my family, but they’re out of the country at the moment. I’m gonna be hanging out here for a week or so, then driving home to celebrate Christmas with them.”

After grabbing some food, they grabbed a table close to the entrance and settled in. Chloé unwrapped her scarf and set it down beside her, but decided to leave her coat on. At the moment, the cafeteria was almost completely deserted, which Chloé found a little eerie. Other than her and Naomi, she only saw four other people in the building; three guys sitting in the back corner, and the girl that had served them their food. The girl had been very pleasant, and was a regular worker here; even though Chloé was bad with faces, this particular girl had dyed her hair red, which made her easy to remember. The group in the corner seemed to be three random students, or possibly two students and a teacher? Chloé thought the older one looked familiar, but she couldn’t remember why.

She picked at her food slowly as she kept looking around. As creepy as it was to see the cafeteria this empty, it was also pretty cool. She was used to feeling overwhelmed every time she needed to eat, and the freedom to take any table she wanted was quite nice. At the moment, her gaze was lingering on the far wall, which was made entirely of windows. This particular building overlooked the Quad, its myriad trees and plant life visible from inside, and it was a view Chloé never grew tired of. A heavy fog seemed to be forming in the middle of the large field, which seemed odd to her. She didn’t remember seeing any fog out front, but then again, she wasn’t here to study meteorology.

“So, you wanted to talk about something?” Naomi asked, pulling Chloé back to reality.

“Oh, um, yeah. It’s about, well, you remember the last time we talked? You were asking questions about… about if I’d noticed anything strange?” Chloé swallowed nervously. She was torn about having this conversation, but something in her gut urged her to continue.

“Have you? I mean, even if you haven’t, I’m more than happy just to shoot the shit.” Naomi smiled, and the nervous energy in Chloé’s stomach settled somewhat.

“Well, you were asking about my friends, and I… well, I hate to say it, but they’ve seemed a little off this last week or so. I just assumed it was finals week jitters, but I tried to visit Amara, and she didn’t answer the door. But also, like, she’s sick, isn’t she? Maybe I just caught her at a bad time, she could have been asleep.”

Naomi reached out, putting a hand on Chloé’s arm. “Hey, it’s okay to be nervous. If it helps, try to remember that I’m just another student. I’m not here to cause trouble, I just want to help out my campus. We’re a community, aren’t we?”

Chloé nodded and smiled softly. Naomi was right, she was just a student like everyone else. Chloé had spent so much time thinking of her like some kind of pesky journalist, but that wasn’t the case. For a moment, she wished she could be as good at reading people as Naomi seemed to be, but then she remembered why she’d reached out in the first place.

“Right, of course,” Chloé said. “I just don’t really know what to think. We’ve all been friends ever since Freshman year, and I guess I’m a little worried.”

“What if I tried to talk to Amara?” Naomi asked. “We could swing by her apartment again. I’m pretty good at talking to people, and if she’s hiding something, maybe I can help you figure out what’s going on. Or, maybe you’re right, and she was just asleep last time.”

“You know what? That sounds like a good idea. Let’s finish up here, and then we can head over.”

The two girls took their time finishing lunch, though Naomi seemed to finish much quicker. Chloé knew she was a slower eater, but she had a routine she liked to stick to. She had to eat everything in the right order, and eating slower meant it was harder to accidentally overeat.

Once they finished, Chloé bundled up again and started leading the way to Amara’s apartment block. As they walked, Naomi asked a series of questions about the charity Chloé had put together, and she was all too excited to share the details. She talked about her goals for her app, the progress they’d made on the fire relief, as well as her hopes for the future. Naomi had a seemingly endless supply of interesting, insightful questions, and Chloé completely lost track of time as they crossed campus. When they arrived at the apartment, Naomi had to stop her from running into the outer fence.

“Oh! We’re here, I must have spaced out for a moment there. Sorry!” Chloé said.

Naomi laughed as she opened the gate. “You’re fine! I’m the one with all the questions, aren’t I? I’m really happy the campus has people like you, people committed to doing the right thing. That’s honestly why I’m so excited about journalism, I love learning about these kinds of projects.”

“Well, yeah, but I know I can ramble sometimes… Anyways, Amara’s apartment is on the first floor, just down this hall.” Chloé started counting doors, mumbling to herself as they approached Amara’s place. “104, 105… here we are! 106!”

“Would you like to do the honors?” Naomi asked, gesturing to the door.

Chloé nodded, then knocked on the door a few times, making sure to knock loudly in case Amara was still sleeping. “Amara? You up? It’s me, Chloé!”

A few seconds passed, but nothing broke the silence. After nearly a minute of waiting, Naomi stepped forward to try again. “Amara? This is Naomi, we spoke early last week? I wanted to swing by to see how you were doing, it seems like you’re pretty sick and I was worried!”

Another minute passed, and still nothing happened. Chloé was growing anxious and found herself pacing as the silence started to grow awkward. “Okay, so, she’s just asleep again, right? I’m sure it’s nothing, we should probably just lea—” When Chloé turned back to Amara’s door, she froze. Naomi was on her knees, holding a pair of lockpicking tools up to the door handle. There was a small click, then the door opened.

“Aaand we’re in!” Naomi said, smirking at Chloé as she slipped her tools back inside a small pouch.

“Naomi, what are you doing?! Amara’s my friend, we can’t break into her house!” Chloé watched Naomi walk into the apartment, and she chased after her.

“C’mon, you’re the one that’s worried about her, right? What if she’s hurt?”

“That’s not the point, if we’re actually worried about her, we should… I dunno, call the police or something, shouldn’t we? This is illegal! We shouldn’t be here!”

When Chloé entered the apartment, the first thing she saw was Naomi. She was standing perfectly still, her eyes wide as she looked around. Following her gaze, Chloé did the same, and within seconds her expression changed to mirror Naomi’s.

Amara’s apartment, while not dirty or cluttered, had been horribly ravaged. Practically every wall had a series of scratches and gouges in it, with some even extending to the ceiling. Chloé also saw periodic spots of heat damage, small pockets of discoloration that seemed entirely random.

“Still think Amara’s not hiding something?” Naomi asked. She pulled out her phone, then started walking around the apartment as she took a video of everything she saw.

“N-no, this doesn’t make any sense. Maybe someone broke in and wrecked the place!” Chloé said, forcing herself to walk in and start looking around.

“If someone did, why would Nick and Tessa be covering for her?”

Chloé didn’t respond, instead aimlessly wandering around the apartment to try and figure out what might have happened. She started in the kitchen, as it was directly next to the front door, and found a frying pan that had been horribly disfigured. She had no idea how something like that was even possible.

In the middle of the living room, a massive scorch mark took up most of the carpet. It was several feet in diameter, at least, and above it sat another huge patch of heat discoloration.

“Amara’s definitely not here, Chloé. Obviously,” Naomi said. She appeared to be in the bedroom, and Chloé quickly joined her.

The bedroom was just as messy as the rest of the apartment, if not more so. The first thing Chloé noticed was the heavy collection of scratches on the walls, this time focused around Amara’s bed. They were much more prevalent here, and they were all concentrated lower compared to the damage in the rest of the apartment. She watched as Naomi began pushing the bed sheets to the side, and that’s when Chloé saw the strangest thing yet.

There were also large tears and gouges in the sheets and the mattress. It honestly looked like some kind of wild animal had been living here instead of Amara, and the damage only confused Chloé further.

“Amara didn’t have any pets, did she? Even if she did, that wouldn’t explain the fire damage…” Naomi didn’t seem to notice that Chloé hadn’t answered.

Instead, Chloé was now looking around the apartment for signs of Amara being sick. She was hoping to find any scrap of evidence that her friends might not be lying to her, but her efforts turned up nothing. No tissues, no cough medicine, no thermometers, nothing in the apartment seemed to be in response to sickness.

Why? What are they hiding from me?

As Chloé wandered aimlessly back into the living room, she was only faintly aware of Naomi following behind her. Her breathing was growing heavier, and she felt hints of a panic attack coming on. “Naomi, why… what’s going on here?” she asked, her voice shaking.

Naomi walked in front of her, lightly grabbing her shoulders to look her in the eye. “Chloé, I wish I had all the answers, but I don’t. If I’m being honest, something has seemed off about Amara ever since I started looking into this cult, and my current theory is that she’s somehow involved. I don’t think she’s a member, but it can’t be a coincidence that she disappeared only a week after they did.”

“No!” Chloé said, throwing Naomi’s hands off of her. “She’s a good person, she wouldn’t do that!”

“Look, sometimes we don’t know our friends as well as we think we do. It’s honestly pretty amazing what people can hide and how easily they can pretend everything’s fine.”

“She’s a good person! She helped me with the charity, and they’ve all been so nice ever since college started!” Chloé’s breathing began to quicken, and tears filled her vision. “They’re my first real friends, they wouldn’t… they can’t be like this!”

“Chloé, please, I know what you’re going through. Just take a deep breath, let me—”

“NO! I don’t believe you!” Chloé shouted. She pushed past Naomi, out into the hallway, and eventually left the apartment. She ran as fast as she could, her movements sloppy as she kept trying to push the tears from her eyes, and she didn’t stop until she was home in her dorm.

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