It dragged across the frozen game, clicked on the address bar, and typed with horrifying speed:

He closed the laptop. He didn’t open it again for three days.

Panic sparked in Leo’s chest. He stood up, his chair scraping against the floor—a sound that felt deafening in the absolute stillness. He walked to the window. Outside, the parking lot was a tableau. A kid on a bike was tilted at a 45-degree angle, his scarf a rigid flag. A bird hung in the sky like a paper ornament.

Leo looked down. His keyboard was covered in a thin layer of frost. And his ninja? Still frozen. The shuriken had never landed. The robot had never died.

The site was a digital speakeasy hidden in plain sight. The URL was a scramble of letters that looked like a math worksheet. The background was a dull gray. But the list of games— Run 3, Shell Shockers, Fancy Pants —was a treasure chest. It was the last day before winter break. The teachers had given up. Leo had not.

Leo stumbled back. The cursor blinked again. Then the entire screen went black.

“Dude, your ninja’s about to clip through the floor,” whispered Marcus from the next computer.