Chapter Text
007n7 can admit that he's relatively immature. He's twenty-three years old, he's old enough to know that about himself by now. He's an adult after all, he has his own job and attends university. He's old enough to know by now that someone his age shouldn't be bothering people online- and he should also know that purposely going out of his way to bother people on some random forum he found is not what anyone his age should be doing. 007n7 should be working on the essay he has due in the next few days (it's due tomorrow night, though he's deciding to ignore that fact for now), or maybe even start picking up some more shifts at the gas station he's employed at. He does need the money, especially because his fridge is starting to look pretty depressing- no way he can survive off two bottles of mustard and an incredibly old jar of pickles.
Though of course, 007n7 was not doing anyone his age should be doing. As necessary as those tasks were, and he knew they were pretty damn important for his future (and his wallet- he really cannot afford to call out on anymore shifts), 007n7 was instead doing something that benefitted nobody. Especially not himself- the only benefit was maybe ten minutes of amusement, or less if he got banned relatively quickly this time. 007n7 was of course rage-baiting on the forums again. With how often he's been doing this lately, 007n7 can admit this has become his brand new nightly ritual. He hops onto his computer, browses the forum website he uses, and then clicks one at random that appears relatively easy to irritate- most of the time, his endeavor is rather successful and he's banned in under an hour. Sometimes he's left in heated discussions which go on for hours (and in circles, mostly due to 007n7 himself).
The usual kind of forums 007n7 chose to torment tended to be centered around niche interests- those were always the best, as those using the forums were often more "stuck up" about what they enjoyed. One little piece of misinformation, or just one slightly negative comment could spark the funniest argument that'd keep 007n7 entertained for around three hours. And this forum? Oh, did he hit an absolute goldmine tonight. It was the dorkiest looking fan-club for an admin 007n7 never really cared to learn about. The two had never met, and 007n7 never felt inclined to learn anything about him. The guy seemed lame- especially from what he was reading in this dumbass forum, and honestly, most of what he was seeing was painfully cringe. 007n7 was pretty sure he saw self-insert fanfic someone wrote about the guy. 007n7 didn't have to think too hard for this one, even obvious rage-bait would likely work here.
Wasting no more time, 007n7 began his reign of terror upon these innocent fan-girls (or boys, whatever these losers were):
"dude, honestly, i think telamon is the worst admin. sorry not sorry LOLOLOL"
As soon as 007n7 posted that comment to the forum, he got about seventeen different responses- all of which telling him to off himself in varying ways (most were incredibly graphic, which made it even more funny to him), though just censored enough to get past moderation. The bait was successfully taken, and now all 007n7 had to do was continue the argument:
"lololol is he paying you guys or something?? how much robux are you getting for defending his honor LMFAO. sorry somebody finally spoke the truth"
Annndd.. sent. Around thirty comments rolled in this time, all of which were bashing 007n7 and calling him all kinds of names- one or two noted the clear rage-bait, telling the other users to simply ignore it, though those comments were drowned out by the angry mob forming underneath his original post.
Unfortunately, 007n7 wasn't allowed to bask in the glory of his chaos for very long- turning towards his door, he watched as it slowly opened. Ugh, of course he shows up now- just when it was starting to get good. 007n7 swiveled in his chair, watching as his roommate finally entered the room.
"What's up, Noli? You got any food? I am starving!"
"... fucking fatass..."
"'Yo, I fuckin' heard that, asshole. Did you bring food or not?"
"Does it look like I did?"
"Whatever man, fuck off."
Opting to ignore his shitty roommate (and unfortunately, his best friend since high school- how he and this guy managed to stay friends that long was beyond him), 007n7 turned back towards his computer screen. During his short conversation (can it even be considered a "conversation"- all they did was exchange profanity) with Noli, the comment section had seemingly died down- maybe they finally learned to ignore him. Which was like- not what 007n7 wanted. Clicking on the text box to start working on another comment to reignite the fire, he heard Noli shuffling around behind him. Whatever that guy was doing wasn't his problem- or well, that's what he thought for the first few seconds he heard the walking.
After ignoring Noli for around ten seconds, his entire PC promptly went black, leading to 007n7 gasping very loudly in horror as he scrambled to turn it back on again. Nothing. Oh god, that thing costed an actual fortune. What does he do now?? Sell his body parts?? Sell Noli?? He'd have to sell Noli, no way he'd- 007n7 was interrupted from his panic when he heard the man beside him snort, causing 007n7 to look at him and- oh, this asshole unplugged his PC. Now why'd he do that?? 007n7 was clearly busy, and Noli was clearly bothering him. Why'd he let him panic over it, anyway?! At the very least, Noli could've said something. God, what an ass.
"Why'd you do that? It's not funny, I seriously thought my PC fucking died. What do you even want?"
"Dude, what do you mean? Did you forget? God, you're actually so stupid."
"Oh, fuck off. I didn't forget shit. I didn't have anything to do tonight."
"So you didn't promise me just the other night that'd you work on the c00lgui?"
Oh yeah, that promise. 007n7 had forgotten, which honestly, wasn't the biggest deal in the world. He could probably just tell Noli he had worked on it, not like the guy studied the coding that much. Flicking his hand, 007n7 pulled up the c00lgui. The small, red box floated midair between the two, glitched code emitting from it as the text across the screen frequently flashed and glitched- tiny errors popping up every now and then. The word "C00LGUI" was spread across the top, with one little smiley-face inside the first "0". It was added solely because 007n7 thought it was funny, and also because Noli thought it made the thing look stupid. So, it of course stayed- mostly just to spite his friend. As soon as it popped up, Noli leaned forwards, studying it for a moment or two, before sighing (rather loudly) and straightening up again. Crossing his arms, he looked rather pointedly at 007n7- ugh, of course he realized. 007n7 quickly flicked his hand again, putting it away again.
"Sev, you did literally nothing. It looks the exact same as it did last week."
"It's literally so different, just keep looking at it. You didn't look hard enough or somethin'."
"You're so lazy it's actually painful. Work on the thing, 'cause you said we'd finally get started at the end of this week. We already picked the spot, and I've been monitoring the admin activity around it. It's been pretty quiet lately, and honestly, I don't think it'll be this quiet again ever."
007n7 almost wanted to call Noli on his bullshit, the area they picked to start was literally just some pizza place. No bigshot admin would ever go there on the daily- plus, it wasn't like anybody there could even consider standing up against the two of them. But, he knew that Noli was kind of right- he's been lazy as hell for these past few weeks, and he's honestly hit an awful roadblock with this thing. It was hard to come up with the code, and he knew it'd have issues in the future, his skill was still to low for something like this- the code was janky, and he's tested it out some himself. The teleporting worked when it wanted to instead of when 007n7 needed it to work. And also, the shitty clone situation- those things sucked. None of them really did what he needed them to do- they were more of some lame decoy, rather than the actual army he envisioned originally. The entire thing sucked- only half of what he wanted even worked. He opened it again though, leaning back and regarding it with an awfully unimpressed stare.
Sighing, 007n7 finally responded to the other,
"Fine, I'll work on it. It'll be done by tomorrow night or whatever. Just get out of my room. I need to focus, or else I'll end up fucking up the coding more. And I don't want this shit backfiring, 'cause then I'll look like some fuckin' loser to those nobodies."
"Yeah, yeah. Whatever, Sev. Just do it. I'll look over it tomorrow and make sure it's not an utter disaster. Get some rest after you're done."
007n7 didn't respond, listening as Noli exited his room. After hearing the door softly shut behind the other, 007n7 finally opened up the code of the GUI. Scrolling through every line, 007n7 picked out some mistakes and busied himself with correcting them. It was slow, agonizingly boring and tedious work. Lots of the scripting had been done lazily, having been done with hopes to get Noli off his back for another week- and 007n7 wasn't exactly fond of his past self over this. Had he done it properly sooner, he wouldn't be cleaning up the past errors of his shittier, dumber self (as though some of this coding hadn't been done last week). His fingers tapped at the screen, editing and erasing anything nonsensical or unneeded to the final product of the GUI. He worked throughout the entire night, hadn't even felt his eyelids drooping until his head finally slammed into his desk, knocking over the cup of water that'd been sitting there for the past week.
By the time Noli found him the next morning, he was slumped over his desk with the c00lgui hovering above him- sequences of code relatively polished and new.
Something functional.