The Professor’s Secret

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In Professor Riveras eyes, I was always a quiet one, a wallflower who never spoke up in class. I was far less favored than Gabrielle, the charming and outgoing junior student from the neighboring research group.

To force me to change, Professor Rivera set a bizarre rule: during lab meetings, presentations had to exceed eighty decibels, or hed refuse to sign off on my thesis.

The first meeting, I bravely read my report aloud, but he scoffed at my trembling voice, then turned around and handed my research data to Gabrielle.

The second meeting, I came prepared with throat lozenges, argued with Gabrielle with all my might, even pounded the table in my fervor, just barely managing to overshadow her.

To my surprise, Professor Rivera simply tossed my thesis into the trash, coldly calling me "ill-mannered, like a fishwife," and threatened to delay my graduation by a year for "reflection."

During that time, I barely scraped by, fixing phone screens under an overpass.

By the third meeting, I remained silent throughout. Instead, I simply played a silent surveillance video on the projector.

The entire room fell into a deathly hush, because on the screen, Professor Rivera was engaged in something utterly indecent with Gabrielle.

"Turn it off."

Professor Riveras voice was softer than the hum of the air conditioning.

No one moved.

On the projection screen, he had Gabrielle pinned against the edge of his desk, his right hand slipping beneath her white lab coat. Gabrielles head was thrown back, her mouth half-open as if gasping for air, but the video was silent.

Twelve people sat in the meeting room, twelve pairs of eyes fixated on the screen.

"I said, turn it off."

Leather shoes clicked on the floor, one measured step after another.

I didn't move.

He walked to the projector and unplugged the data cable.

Vince, a senior grad student, kept his head down, while Ava, a senior peer, was engrossed in her phone. Gabrielle sat in the front row, her fingers nervously twisting the hem of her skirt.

Professor Rivera turned around.

"Its AI-generated," he declared. "I trust everyone here can tell the difference."

No one responded.

He looked at me.

"Skylar, where did you get this?"

"Library Annex B corridor surveillance, October 17th, 9:13 PM."

"Who authorized you to access the surveillance footage?"

I didn't answer.

He chuckled.

"Unauthorized access, fabricating video, publicly displaying it in an academic setting," he said. "Skylar, that's defamation."

"That's the truth."

"That's a crime."

He pulled out his phone and dialed in front of everyone.

"Officer Jenkins? Its Professor Rivera. Can you send two officers to Room 706yes, a student is playing an AI-generated, explicit video at a lab meeting, defaming a faculty member."

Gabrielle started to cry then.

"Professor Rivera," she whimpered, "if this video gets out, how can I ever show my face again?"

"Don't worry," Professor Rivera patted her shoulder. "A fake cant stand up to scrutiny."

Two campus security officers arrived. Professor Rivera pointed to the items on my desk: "Take her USB drive and laptop. That's evidence."

"Those are mine."

"These are your tools of crime." He pocketed the USB drive.

A female officer approached and took my laptop.

I cast one last glance at my peers, all of them looking down.

"Vince."

His shoulder twitched, but he didn't look up.

"Ava."

She pretended to organize her notes.

The male officer tugged my arm. "Come on, student, let's go."

I stood up.

As I reached the door, Gabrielles voice drifted over.

"Skylar, I don't know why you hate me so much. But doing this, you're only hurting yourself."

I turned to look at her.

I walked out.

First floor of the administrative building, a windowless office. The officers told me to wait.

I waited for four hours, going to the restroom once with a female officer accompanying me inside.

At 11 PM, the door opened. A man sat down, his name badge reading "Dean Peterson, Student Affairs."

He opened a folder.

"Skylar, do you understand the implications of your actions today?"

"What implications?"

"Illegally obtaining surveillance footage, publicly displaying a video suspected of being deepfake and explicit, and defaming your advisor. Any one of these is grounds for disciplinary action."

"That video is real."

"Our technical department has issued a preliminary assessment." He flipped through the documents. "Conclusion: Traces of AI generation detected, deepfake not ruled out."

"They finished the assessment in ten hours?"

"Professional team, highly efficient."

I stared at him. "Have you seen the video with your own eyes?"

He didn't answer.

"Sign a statement of facts," he pushed a paper toward me. "Admit to an operational error, playing the wrong file. The university will treat it lenientlya written reprimand, no permanent record."

I looked down at the paper. The main body was already typed out for meadmitting that due to emotional distress, I mistakenly played an AI-generated video at the lab meeting, causing damage to the reputation of Professor Rivera and Gabrielle, and expressing deep apologies.

The blank space at the bottom awaited my signature.

"What if I don't sign?"

"We'll proceed through formal channels. Academic committee and internal affairs will get involved. The outcome, I won't be able to control."

I stood up and walked to the door.

"Skylar." He called out to me, then hesitated.

"Do you have any other copies?"

"Following an investigation, graduate student Skylar is found to have, on October 23, 2024, during a lab meeting, unauthorizedly obtained campus surveillance footage and publicly displayed a video suspected of being an AI-generated deepfake and explicit, severely damaging the reputation of Professor Rivera and Gabrielleher student status is immediately suspended pending further proceedings."

The hearing lasted less than forty minutes.

I sat at one end of the long table, facing five peopletwo department heads, two professors from the academic committee, plus Dean Peterson.

Professor Rivera wasn't there.

Gabrielle was.

"Since September, Skylar has been messaging me frequently," her voice was small. "At first, it was just about research topics, but then it became more."

She handed her phone to Dean Peterson.

The screen displayed a series of chat messages:

"How dare you take my data?"

"Do you really think Professor Rivera cares about you?"

"I have leverage over you; youd better be smart."

"I didn't send those."

"The records are all here." Dean Peterson passed the phone around the committee.

"Chat logs can be fabricated."

"You also said the surveillance footage was real," Gabrielle looked down, wiping tears. "But the technical assessment says it's fake."

Dean Lewis, sitting in the middle, took off his glasses.

"Skylar, I understand you have grievances with your advisor, but no matter how serious, it shouldnt be handled this way. Professor Rivera is a key faculty member in our department; his academic reputation affects the entire program's development."

"So whatever he did doesn't matter?"

"You can voice your concerns through proper channels," he put his glasses back on, "not through such extreme means."

After the hearing, Dean Peterson handed me a stack of documents.

Student status suspended. Lab access revoked. Email frozen. Dorm room to be vacated within three days.

"What about my experiment data? The ones on the server."

"Research output generated with lab resources belongs to the research group. Your access has been terminated."

"I did that work."

"Follow the rules."

I went back to my dorm to pack.

As I was carrying out the last load, Ava leaned against the hallway wall.

"Professor Rivera held a meeting after you left," she whispered. "He made us sign a joint statementall present confirmed that the video was blurry and the content unrecognizable during playback."

"You signed?"

She wouldn't look at me.

"Everyone signed."

I walked out with my suitcase.

"Skylar," she called after me.

"Hmm?"

"Why didn't you sign that statement? At least you could have stayed."

"Because it was real."

She paused for a few seconds.

"But no one cares if its real."

That night, I dragged my luggage to the underpass. My phone-screen-repair stall was still there, the folding table and plastic stools stacked in a corner. I set them up and arranged my tools.

My phone lit up. Mom's number.

"Skylar, the university called home. Are you causing trouble there?"

"I'm not causing trouble"

"They said you defamed your professor! Are you crazy? That's your advisor!"

"Mom, please listen"

"Listen! Your dad and I put you through grad school, is this how you repay us?"

"That advisor, he"

"Advisor or not! If your professor has an issue with you, you fix it, don't stir up trouble! What if you get expelled? Where do we put our faces?"

"I haven't been expelled."

"It's only a matter of time if you keep this up! Apologize to your professor, you hear me? Kneel, write a confession, just settle this!"

"Mom, in that video"

"I don't care what video! You apologize!"

The call ended.

I squatted under the underpass, watching car lights drag long streaks across the pavement.

The first customer was a middle-aged man in a hard hat, his phone screen cracked with a single line.

"How much for a screen protector?"

"Ten bucks."

"Cheap. I'll take one."

"That semantic segmentation paper of yours, Professor Rivera published it."

Vince sent a message, followed by a link.

I clicked it.

"Research on Semantic Segmentation Algorithm Based on Multi-modal Feature Fusion." First author: Gabrielle. Second author: Professor Rivera. Corresponding author: Professor Rivera.

My name wasn't there.

My phone vibrated again. Vinces message: "What are you going to do?"

I didn't reply.

I finished applying the screen protector and collected ten dollars.

That evening, I went to the university's academic integrity committee website, uploaded all my original code records and local version logs, and spent two hours writing a complaint letter.

Three days later, an automated reply: Your complaint has been received and will be forwarded to the relevant department.

Five more days passed, no news.

I called the academic integrity committee.

"Case number JB20241028-007."

"Please holdthis case has been transferred to your department for processing."

"Which department?"

"Your department. The School of Information Engineering, the Departmental Academic Committee is responsible."

Head of the Departmental Academic Committee: Dean Lewis.

I closed the webpage.

Business dwindled after 9 PM.

A pair of high heels stopped in front of me.

Gabrielle. Beige trench coat, meticulously made up, a stark contrast to her unadorned appearance at the hearing.

"Long time no see." She squatted down to meet my gaze.

"Here to get your screen fixed?"

She smiled, took an envelope from her bag, and placed it on the folding table.

"Professor Rivera asked me to give this to you."

A settlement agreement. Party A: Professor Rivera, Party B: Skylar.

Content: Party B admits to playing an AI-generated false video due to emotional distress, causing severe reputational damage to Party A and Gabrielle. Party B voluntarily withdraws all complaints and issues a public apology.

Compensation: Party A will pay Party B fifty thousand dollars for emotional distress and assist in contacting an advisor at another university.

"Fifty grand?"

"That's a lot," she tilted her head. "How much do you make fixing screens here in a day? A hundred? Two hundred? Fifty grand is enough for you to work for half a year."

"Your name is listed as the first author."

She blinked.

"The results of a research group, the authorship is the advisors prerogative."

"I wrote the code, I ran the data."

"Resources you used in the research group, the output belongs to the research group." She stood up, brushing dust from her knees. "Skylar, you no longer have student status. What good is having your name on a paper to you?"

She pulled out her phone from her bag, found a photo, and held it in front of my eyes.

A lawyer's letter. The words "pursuing criminal charges" were crystal clear.

"Skylar, what have you gained by causing all this trouble?" she leaned down, her voice soft as if comforting me. "Discipline, suspension, sleeping under a bridge. What was it all for?"

I looked at her face.

"What was it all for, for you?"

Her smile froze for a moment.

"What did you and he get? Authorship? Publication opportunities? Anything else?"

"You"

"You know you're not the first, right?"

That was a guess. But her pupils contracted slightly, clearly illuminated by the streetlights.

Her lips moved, then she ultimately composed herself, all emotion gone.

"Sign within three days, or the lawyer's letter goes to your home."

The click-clack of her heels faded into the distance.

I folded the agreement and tucked it into the bottom of my toolbox.

My phone lit up. An unsaved number.

"Are you the one who played the surveillance video at the meeting?"

"Who is this?"

A long pause as the other person typed.

"My name is Cecilia. Five years ago, Professor Rivera was my advisor too."

"I shouldn't have come to you."

Cecilia sat on a plastic stool, cradling a cup of soy milk she hadn't touched.

Short hair, a faded gray hoodie, she looked about six or seven years older than me.

"How did you find me?"

"It spread all over the university forum. The posts were deleted several times, but screenshots remained, and someone posted your location in the comments."

"Why did you come?"

"Because I saw your nameand I just knew." She finally took a sip of soy milk. "It was exactly like me back then."

"Exactly like what?"

"That video is real, isn't it?"

I didn't speak.

"No need to answer." She gave a bitter smile. "He did the same thing to me five years ago. I was in my third year of grad school, half my thesis written, and he brought in a junior student. Very compliant, very obedient. Later, my data was given to her, and when I confronted him, he said I wasn't capable enough."

"Then what?"

"I got held back for two years. The second year, he made me switch to an obscure, unwanted field and start from scratch. I couldn't afford to waste any more time, so I dropped out."

"Did you report it?"

"I went through all the internal channels, and it just vanished into thin air. I even wrote to the Department of Educationnot a single reply."

"Why?"

"No evidence." She set down her cup. "No surveillance, no recordings, nothing but my word."

I pulled out my phone and accessed my cloud drive.

The folder was empty.

The activity log showed that last Friday at 3:17 AM, someone logged in remotely using my account and cleared all backups. The login device was a desktop computer.

A lab computer.

"They blocked all your escape routes," Cecilias voice was soft.

"Why did you come to me?"

"Because I've regretted it for five years," she said. "If someone had stood with me back then, maybe things would have been different."

She stood up, leaving the untouched soy milk on the table.

"If you still want to fight this battle, find me anytime."

She left.

The traffic on the overpass gradually thinned.

I sat on the stool and started to pack up my tools.

I rummaged to the very bottom of the toolboxan old phone.

This was my test phone for screen repairs, used to check touch sensitivity and fingerprint recognition after applying a new protector. It was linked to the same account as my main phone, syncing automatically.

I pressed the power button. The screen lit up, 11% battery.

I opened the file manager. In the sync records lay an MP4 file, synced on October 12ththe day after I copied the video from campus security.

I opened it.

The silent footage brightened. A corridor view, Professor Riveras office door ajar, the outlines of two people perfectly clear.

I turned off the screen, gripping the phone tightly.

A beam of headlights swept over.

A black sedan pulled up across the road, engine still running.

The drivers side window rolled down.

He got out, crossed the street, and pulled up a plastic stool to sit.

"How's business?"

"How did you know I was here?"

"Some of my students are your customers." He crossed his legs. "That thing Gabrielle gave you, did you sign it?"

"No."

"Skylar, Ive been teaching for twenty years. Smart students take the money and leave. Unsmart ones" his gaze swept over the old phone by my hand, "insist on hitting a brick wall."

He stood up and brushed off his pants.

"The lawyer's letter will be sent the day after tomorrow. Defamation charges with civil damagesguess the amount?"

He leaned down, his face close to mine, the streetlight casting his shadow over me.

"Whatever you have, I'll take. What I can't take, I'll make sure you have nothing left."

The sedan merged into traffic, its taillights disappearing around the bend.

I looked down at my toolbox. The old phone screen faintly glowed through the gaps in my tools.

11% battery. One unscheduled backup. A number for a woman who dropped out five years ago.

I pulled out the old phone and plugged it into my power bank.

Then I sent Cecilia a message.

"You said you regretted it for five years. If you could do it againwould you dare?"

Two minutes later, she replied.

"You found a way?"

"I have."