"Everyone, please put your phones away so we can start today's lecture. Yes, that means you, Arlo." Professor Sarah Cassidy called out towards the teen boy in a strained voice. He didn't even seem to pay her any heed. Just what had gotten into her students this morning? Usually she could barely get them to keep their eyes open for the dreaded 8AM Biology 101 class, but now they were all abuzz and not even bothering to hide their blatant smart phone usage.
She ran an exacerbated hand through her shoulder-length auburn hair before sliding it down to massage her protesting emerald eyes. She really didn't feel like dealing with this today. Freshmen always had this side to them, but she had assumed the worst was behind her now that they were a couple months into the university's fall semester.
"Haven't you seen the news, professor?" Asked her star student, Zoey, as her ever-curious azure eyes suddenly bobbed up and peered at Sarah through black-rimmed glasses.
The blonde ponytailed 18 year-old was bubbling with excitement, a stark difference from her usual reserved self. Despite her quietness in class, she burned with a passionate fire during her field hockey games, earning her quite a bit of respect with the upperclassmen. Sarah was impressed by the girl's ability to balance her studies with her exercise, rewarding her with a fit build despite her bookish nature.
That said, Zoey was still very shy when off the field and tended to hide her ample curves under unassuming, baggy hoodies and regular blue jeans. Sarah knew that all the nerdy science boys in the class wanted to get into her pants, but none had the guts to actually make any progress.
Sarah remembered when the guys used to chase after her in college - her full endowments easily caught their attention. Even though she was almost ten years older than her freshmen students, she could still spot many of the virile young males ogling her. She was flattered but not stupid enough to do anything with a student. She had tenure to think about someday.
"The news?" Sarah blinked, having zoned out for a second. She did remember hearing some sort of babbling newscaster on the radio during her morning commute to campus, but had quickly changed the channel to music to wake herself up. "I'm sure whatever it is can wait until after class. We have a lot to cover on cellular structure before the exam next week. So if everyone would please-"
"Here! Look, Cassidy!" Zoey's friend Diana suddenly ran up to the podium, phone in hand, with her long black hair billowing behind her. Diana was the opposite of Zoey in class, but she, too, was quite popular with the guys. No doubt many of them found a certain exotic sexiness from her Japanese ancestry.
She was rather proud of her body, which she apparently maintained through yoga, and today she was showing it off as usual. She wore tight black yoga pants under a thin blue blouse, through which a black, lacy bra was slightly visible that did its best to boost her modest chest.
It was hard to say "No" to Diana, so Sarah glanced at the screen in her student's hands with a defeated sigh. The video playing had some text that indicated it was a live feed. A handsome, smartly dressed young man holding a "Channel 5" microphone was quickly relaying updates in an excited voice. He gestured around the beach behind him with dramatic, readable motions.
"We are now receiving reports that the Coast Guard has finally located the impact site of the large unidentified object that crashed into the water a couple miles off the coast early this morning," he said, his hand up to his ear as if listening to an earpiece.
Sarah recognized the beach as one just outside of the city. It was where she had lost her virginity during her first college spring break... and also had been the last time she ever had sex in the sand. Big mistake. She involuntarily shuddered at the memory.
"I-um-what... can you repeat that...?" The reporter's tone changed suddenly and he quickly turned from the camera with a grim expression. "What do you mean they lost contact...? Hey is this a joke? We're live here...I can't... okay, okay! Cut the feed... cut-" Just then, the man's panicked voice was overtaken by a cacophony of terrified shrieks. The camera jerkily turned to the right to see further up the beach to capture the source.
Sarah felt her hand absentmindedly reach up to her agape mouth. Diana's grip on the phone began to shake and other students in the classroom let out loud exclamations of shock.
"Yo, what the FUCK!?" Said a man's voice from behind the camera, as suddenly an impact sent it tumbling to the sand below where it continued to record the horrific action. Emerging from the turbulent shoreline were hundreds of floating, translucent pods. They were similar in shape and size to hot air balloons but with the major differences being that they were seemingly composed entirely of some sort of mottled, flesh-like substance and had long, draping tentacles languidly dangling from the bottom.
They gave off the impression of being gigantic flying octopi. It soon became clear that the swaying pink tentacles were not just cosmetic. A twenty-something blonde woman was standing next to a man whom Sarah assumed to be her boyfriend. Both had their phones out and were excitedly recording the happenings going on behind them, apparently more concerned with their followers than their safety. As such, they didn't notice the writhing mass of tentacles suddenly lurch towards them from above.
In a flash, the tendrils wrapped themselves around both of their waists and violently yanked them up into the air. The man yelped and dropped his phone in a useless attempt to wrestle with the powerful bindings. The woman screamed and kicked her legs, but impressively managed to keep recording.
That's some serious dedication, Sarah mentally mused.
Several more tentacles from the floating pods continued to rapidly scour the beach, grabbing more and more of the scattering crowd as they lazily floated along the sand.
Each person was reeled in and unceremoniously dumped into the transparent orb at the top of the creature... or at least Sarah thought it was a creature. As a biologist she was familiar with many forms of life but this thing was completely alien to her. The captives inside of it quickly began to flounder around, crawling over each other in an attempt to tear at the walls to escape. But no such luck. Sarah felt a chill roll down her spine from witnessing their helplessness.
After a few minutes, the main wave of the alien balloons had almost entirely drifted out of the camera's view, seemingly headed towards the city. However, some of the creatures apparently decided that they were finished. Their collection sacs were nearly bursting with struggling captives. The curves of their bodies pushing against the membranous walls of their prison and gave it a grotesque, bumpy appearance. Without warning, a viscous, orange fluid suddenly began to gush up from the base of the sac and engulf the frantic people within.
The commotion died rapidly down as if everyone inside the liquid-filled balloon had gently drifted off to sleep. A bead of cold sweat dripped down Sarah's forehead. She was momentarily worried that she had just witnessed dozens of deaths, but then she noticed small bubbles visibly rising from some of the captives - a sign that they were somehow still able to breath, perhaps? As a human, she was deeply disturbed, but as a scientist, she couldn't help but be curious about this logic-defying spectacle.
She didn't have long to study the scene, though, as the mysterious balloons slowly began to drift back out towards the ocean. As they began to sink into the depths, it looked as though the bathing suits and other clothing items of the slumbering humans were slowly beginning to dissolve away in the liquid.
Though it was hard to tell from this distance, Sarah thought she saw one woman's newly exposed breasts being squeezed against the sleeping face of the man next to her, but then the waves covered the rest of the creature and it was gone from sight. The beach was now eerily quiet as the only sounds were the rolling waves and the cawing of birds from above. But the idyllic peace did not last long.
Another scream snapped Sarah back to her senses. This time it was not coming from the phone. She didn't realize she'd been staring into empty space for some time now as Diana had already run towards the chaotic school hallways. Shouts and panicked yells could be heard all over the campus as several faculty members' attempts to restore order were met with futility.
"P-professor Cassidy!" Sarah felt like things were speeding up from slow motion as she noticed Zoey tugging on her white lab coat. "W-we should go! Everyone's freaking out outside! What's going on, professor!?" The look of fear and confusion in her eyes tugged at Sarah's heart, but for the first time she didn't have any answers for her.
