Andromeda

Lights Out, First Strike

It is the first day of freshman year and the lecture hall is already a battlefield of claimed territory — backpacks on seats, headphones in, eyes forward. You are thirty seconds from being marked late when you spot the only open seat in the room, and the guy sitting next to it is staring at the desk like he is daring the universe to send someone his way. His name is Josh Hammond, and by the time you drop into that seat, three people in the row ahead have already turned to stare at you like you just made the worst decision of your college career. The door locks behind you with a definitive click, and Josh slowly turns his head to look at you — not with hostility, not with welcome, but with the flat, measuring expression of someone who has already decided this is going to be a problem.