(MUGRAT) Rutgers students jump into busses

A mystery fever that causes unsuspecting Rutgers students to leap without care into the paths of Rutgers vehicles while mumbling incoherently about “free tuition” has gripped the University’s five New Brunswick campuses.

Since the first incident on March 19, more than 100 Rutgers students and three visiting high schoolers have launched themselves into oncoming vehicles owned by the University, Rutgers vehicular manslaughter attorney I.B. Sued said.

“We don’t know what to do,” he said. “I mean, like, we really, really don’t know what to do. We’ve enrolled the bus drivers in a Hollywood stunt-driving class. And we’ve told students to use crosswalks, but they just screeched at us and walked into traffic.”

The University’s methods have been largely ineffective to date — the number of traffic accidents is increasing exponentially as time goes on, and so far the only result of the driving course is the “super sick” wheelie one bus driver pulled while turning onto College Avenue on Thursday.

University health experts have not been able to figure out how the virus spreads or why it causes students to act as if they have been listening to My Chemical Romance and Fall Out Boy.

“It’s probably something to do with the human body,” said Icell D. Rugs, a researcher in the Department of Zombie Prevention. “Honestly, there’s not a lot left to look at after someone gets hit with 15-ton bus.”

The department issued a statement recommending bus drivers to attach “super-fluffy” pillows to the front of their vehicles to better preserve evidence. The measure has not decreased the incident rate, but students are now far more comfortable during the collision.

Despite Rugs’s bleak view of the situations, most students do survive the accident, to the University’s chagrin.

“Someone’s put it into their heads that they’ll get free tuition if we hit them,” University President Robert L. Barchi said. “How can the school be expected to pay for all these students?” 

Some students have speculated that the virus is just Rutgers trying to cover up a visceral student reaction to the 328 percent tuition increase the University announced March 18.

“I can’t afford a 328 percent increase,” Rutgers School of Subterfuge senior Alexa Crown said while waiting halfway between the College Avenue Student Center and Scott Hall bus stops, mumbling the words "free tuition" to herself. 

To combat the rumored effects, the University has advised students to avoid looking at their term bills.

"Just don't look," Barchi said. "When paying their term bill, students should close their eyes, plug their ears and scream, ‘lalalalalala.’"

The epidemic has taken its toll on the bus drivers as well.

“They’re everywhere. I can’t eat, I can’t sleep. All I can do is wait for when one of them will jump out at me,” EE driver Vladimir O’Toole said while peeling a student off the front of his bus. “It’s gotten so bad that RUPD told us not to call them when it happens.”

On March 20, bus drivers received a statement from the Rutgers University Police Department instructing drivers to “call someone else” whenever one of these incidents occurs.

Drivers have been calling Zoomer instead. O’Toole said they arrive more quickly than RUPD and that he would call them instead of 911 the next time he was in trouble.

Students have called for the abolition of crosswalks around campus, favoring instead the adoption of a policy encouraging students to cross the street without any social barriers, such as looking both ways before crossing.

“No student should be persecuted for living the life they do,” said Dewey Weakman, a School of Jaywalking first-year student. “The University is not doing enough to stop these buses from attacking these students. We must take back the roads.”