hacked // a newtmas au

00.002

Everyone was talking about the purchase at school. Actually everyone was talking about it in the town, on the news, on the bus, everyone everywhere was talking about it. Newt jogged his leg as he tapped his pencil on his desk. Jorge had been silent on the issue which made the whole thing even more alarming. He was never one to be quiet, but now he was refusing to speak.

The teachers had a hard time getting a hold on everyone that day. It was like absolute chaos hit every adolescent in the town and in a way it kinda did. The servers went down almost immediately after the announcement was released. Newt hadn't been able to talk to the rest of the garage for almost twelve hours, it was almost sad how crazy he was going without them.

"You play right?" tier nine kid suddenly asked him.

"Yeah," Newt said, trying to keep the shock out of his voice that the kid was actually acknowledging him.

"What the fuck is up with this?" He pulled at his hair. The game was this kid's entire personality, it being down probably was making him have some weird sort of identity crisis.

"Why would they just shut it down?"

Newt rose his shoulders in a shrug. "I couldn't even tell you."

"It's stupid," the kid stuck out his bottom lip and crossed his arms, making him look way younger than he actually was.

Newt gave him a half nod of agreement before looking back down at his phone. He didn't know why not being able to talk to the garage was freaking him out so much. He missed Kilee's constant stupid comments and the fact that they were just there. He knew he could always text them and at least someone would reply. Now that wasn't an option anymore and Newt felt his chest tighten just thinking about that.

"They have to turn it back on soon," the kid piped up again.

Newt nodded again.

"They're gonna lose money if they keep it off, plus why would they buy it just to turn it off?" Newt was now convinced that the mildly irritating kid was just talking to himself but using Newt to make it look like he wasn't. "It just wouldn't make sense!"

"They'll turn it back on," Newt replied.

"They better, it took me so long to get to the level I'm at," the kid said matter-of-factly. Newt could not possibly care less.

"Are you a two hundred?" Newt asked, feeling satisfaction when the kid frowned. Two hundred was the highest level someone could be, it was also near impossible to reach. You had to beat every stage, every easter egg, every hidden secret. Only Jorge himself was a two hundred. Everyone else barely scraped one hundred besides a few groups that got up there but Newt had never heard of anyone getting over one seventy.

"Well no- but I'm close!"

Newt gave him a fake smile. I bet you are.
What tier nine kid didn't know was that Newt, along with the rest of the garage, were dusting one fifty. They were good, really good, but they played it out of fun. Some players had logged times of a couple thousand hours, they treated it as their job. Newt played it because it was fun, because it was his safe place.

The rest of the school day was torture. Newt couldn't text the garage during lunch, he couldn't update them about the stupid things he managed to encounter in a day in his shitty high school. He knew that Kilee would have laughed about the guy who fell asleep and the kids behind him shoving as many pencils as possible in several different spots of his shirt without waking him up.

It wasn't until that night, until a full twenty four hours later that the game opened up again. Newt knew immediately because his phone absolutely blew up with texts from the garage. Newt couldn't stop the sigh of relief that left his lips as he wrapped his blanket tighter around him and squinted at his lit up screen.