It was 3:17 AM, and the progress bar on Leo’s screen read .

It was Leo. Not a stunt double. Not an actor. Him. Wearing the same gray hoodie he had on right now. The on-screen Leo stared through the fourth wall with dead eyes, then pointed to the laptop’s built-in webcam.

Leo tried to close the player. The window didn’t respond. His mouse cursor moved, but the X button was dead. He hit Alt+F4. Nothing. Ctrl+Alt+Del. The security screen popped up, but as he hovered over “Task Manager,” a new line of green text appeared on top of it— inside the Windows shell.

“Don’t watch the unrated cut,” he whispered.

“They cut this because it worked.”