SAO: Pale Memory

Episode 1

"Alright, sorry about that guys, but I've got to run! GG though!"

"Yeah, GG! Good run! And Sinon, thanks for the lesson! I think I'm getting the hang of it!"

Sinon raised a brow. "Hang of it? Funny, I don't recall you hitting a target, Rimy."

"Well yeah, but I got within a foot of that last guy!"

"And that's your definition of 'getting the hang of it'? Haaaaa…Rimy, do you want your motto to be 'All Shot No Kill'?"

"Well now that you are the one saying it, that motto does sound cool."

"Rimy!"

"Ah…o-of course not sensei! N-next time I'll hit the target!"

Sinon's brow raised another notch at the added title. Sure, she might have one of the older accounts in GGO and she has garnered quite the reputation, but it still trips her up when her 17-year-old self gets attached with the honorific. Her opinion of it usually swung based on her mood.

Today, she felt rather proud seeing Rimy standing all military-straight, afraid to even meet her eyes. "Haaa, at ease Rimy. No need to put stress on yourself. GGO is a game in the end. I just want to make sure that you feel like you are getting your money's worth."

"A-ah, absolutely sensei! I got from ten feet from a hundred-metre target to one in two weeks. Who would complain about that? In fact, sensei is good enough to teach actual snipers!"

"Okay okay, enough with the ass-kissing."

"…SENSEI'S ASS IS ALSO VERY FINE TO KISS!"

"….."

"…Pushing it?"

"Yeah, you pushed it." Sinon smiled all the way as she pressed the KICK button.

"Ah, finally some peace and quiet," Sinon murmured to herself as she dropped into her bean bag chair, loving the sensation of her body sinking into the furniture's irresistible hug. As the chair's folds kneaded the sores in her back, she gazed out of her personal room's window, into the starry night of GGO's world.

As she was on the verge of knocking out right there and then, a ping sounded in both of her ears: the system's notification of a message being received. "Ha, so Rimy still paid," Sinon chuckled at the thought of the funny pervert. "And another lesson next week, anytime?" Sinon was half-tempted to reject him, but in the end, Rimy was a pretty nice guy, perverted thoughts aside. Genuine about getting better too, even if he liked sneaking a glance at her butt every so often. "One of these days I should start wearing a ghillie suit," Sinon thought to herself with a pained look, "I imagine it will cut my lesson requests by 99%."

Pressing a few buttons to open Pros' Road to Pros, Sinon took a second to check her schedule and vacancies, before finding a time slot she liked and inserting Rimy's lesson in. With this, she should be able to pay for next month's subscription with lessons alone. In the first ten days. This whole pro-teaching thing is really paying off.

"Mmm, now to let off that teaching stress before I get the urge to start strangling my next student," Sinon chuckled morbidly to herself as she tried to sink into her bean bag chair once more.

Ping.

"Mmmm….."

Ping.

"Hmmmm…"

Ping.

"AHHH! Fine, you made me do this!" Sinon roared as she pulled out settings to turn off message notifications. Just as she was about to change the option,

Ping. Ping. Ping. Ping. Pingpingpingpingpingpingpingpingping – We have temporarily disabled notifications due to high message frequency. The function will resume when activity returns to normal levels.

"What?" was all Sinon murmured to herself as she pulled out her inbox. Did something happen? Had a big update just been announced? Looking at the first message, Sinon's eyes widened at a familiar name. "Dyne?"

"Hey….Sinon. Alright, I'll cut to the chase. Come out to the main square. There's someone you should see. An old friend of both of us."

Friend? Of both her and Dyne? Sinon was pretty sure her friends would never associate with a sleazy snake like Dyne, but at least she'll check out the photo that he had attached-

"….Oh my god."

Haaaa…hmmmm….haaaa…..hmmmm…

"Are you ready, Mr. Kioku?"

Haaaa…hmmmm….haaaaaaaaa. Done.

"As ready as I'll ever be."

"Now, as the legal representative of my client, I must affirm: are you certain of this decision?"

"Yes."

"Do you absolve the company from all responsibility for the consequences that may come from this decision established to be of your own will?"

Again with the legal crap. "Yes…."

"Do you acknowledge that a failure to fulfil your obligations on that stage will render this deal null and void?"

"Yes! Anything else?"

"…I wish you good luck, kid."

"….Hmph, don't call me that." And with that, he stepped into the light. Luminescent shapes danced across his vision as he felt himself dissolve for a moment, then reassemble the moment after. Before he opened his eyes to the crowds now surrounding him, he heard…

"We would like to make a public announcement."

"No way…," Sinon muttered her breath as she watched from the outskirts of the ground floor crowd, having only received the news just now. Even so, she could see him clearly from her position, thanks to the levitating platform that he was standing on.

Blue white tiger-striped camouflage. Slim blue boots and gauntlets. A helmet that looked like a fusion between a bicycle helmet and a pilot helmet from Gundam. And in his left hand, an ArmaLite AR17 shotgun.

"Pale Rider…." Sinon voiced out everyone's thoughts, as the ten-floors' worth of crowds began to explode into a chaotic buzz, a cacophony suitable for the most intense of gunfights. No one could blame them, because no one had seen that account for over 4 months.

Pale Rider, one of the participants of the 3rd Bullet of Bullets tournament, an out-of-nowhere dark horse who had shot his way to the top of the favourite-to-win ratings by his unique style of acrobatic gunfire. One of the victims murdered by Death Gun and his cruel trick.

A murder that Sinon herself had witnessed.

"Haaaaaaaaa…" A loud sigh drowned out all other noise and thought, to the shock of everyone as they turned towards the target of their attention. For all his fights and interviews, Pale Rider had never once let out a sound. Even at his death, Sinon can attest, he was utterly silent, which she had chalked up to him deactivating the voice setting of his NerveGear. After all, who could remain silent during a heart attack?

Of course, it was still startling to even hear a little noise from that avatar. Add on the fact that he was wielding the shotgun with his left hand….

"Now that I have your attention, I'm sure most of you have guessed that I am not the original owner of this game account," Pale Rider's, or whoever's, voice was deep in the manner that it reminded Sinon of a lake, rather than an ocean. It was also a little hoarse, as if struggling with a new voice. Or maybe, choking from emotion, Sinon wondered as she waited to see if her theory was right.

"The original owner of this account was…Hi….Hisho Kioku. He was my brother." Bingo. And Sinon found no joy from being right. "My real name is Tsuka. Tsuka Kioku. Thanks to the support and assistance of GGO makers Zasker, I have been granted control of my late brother's account. In return for it, I am required to announce the account's change of ownership through this public announcement that you are now hearing."

"And with that, I have fulfilled that obligation. And now, I will announce why I've taken control of my brother's account."

"In his name, I will be winning the 4th Bullet of Bullets tournament."

And with that, the respectful silence that everyone had held promptly shattered into utter nothingness.

As expected, the message boards went crazy. As Pale Rider, or Tsuka, himself had suddenly vanished from the stage immediately after his announcement (perhaps Zasker had not expected that last part), the players turned to the forums and boards to start spewing out their opinions on the matter. Sinon had spent a little over half an hour looking through the mess, trying to get a sense of the public demeanour.

Overall, it seemed that more people was on New Pale Rider's side, supporting him with messages of "Ganbatte Pale Oto-san!", "#PaleBroRises" and many threads wishing that they had a brother like him. Most of that support base were generally casual players who would not participate in BoB, but there were a few professionals who still supported Pale Rider's attempt while promising that they won't go easy on him.

On the other side, many people were doubting his identity, asking for a full release of his and the original Rider's credentials. Others were doubting his goal, calling him insane for believing he could 'get gud' at GGO in three months. Some accused him of exploiting his brother's death for ten minutes of fame. The fact that he got to skip hundreds of hours of grinding by getting his brother's account was also raised often as an indicator of him being a cheater. Many professionals, cocky as always, dared Pale Rider to 1v1 them right now, while their devoted fanbases had already begun outputting several fan arts of their favourites ripping Pale Rider apart.

In other words, the world was spinning normally and Sinon can expect this to blow over by the end of the week.

So why in the world can she not stop thinking about Pale Rider?

"…..you couldn't have saved him, Shino," she told herself, "the murderer was already beside him in real life. Even if you had stopped the Death Gun, he would have been killed anyway." And yet, she still could not let it go.

"…From the way he spoke," Sinon sighed in resignation, "he sounded like he was new to the game."

Maybe he could use a little help.

"….Disregarding that last part, you have fulfilled all that we require you. The account is now officially yours, Mr. Kioku."

"Great. Is that all?"

"…...What I say from now on is outside my role as a legal representative of Zasker….Tsuka, be careful. In the end, it's just a game."

Tsuka shrugged inside. What an unnecessary reminder. "I know, Mr. Tanamura. And thank you, for all your help." Maintaining his polite mask, Tsuka bowed deeply to the lawyer's avatar, before logging out.

Setting the NerveGear onto its stand, Tsuka stared out of his window into the black night sky. Unlike GGO, not a single star was shining on that canvass, courtesy of the lights of Tokyo.

Brushing his hand through his messy hair, Tsuka ignored his mother's calls for dinner for a few seconds to stare at the darkness, before stepping out of his room, his mind already planning the path to victory.

Hey, thanks for reading! You are awesome for getting to this part!

I admit that I am not a really avid fan of SAO, but with the release of Fatal Bullet, I decided to check out the series again and of course, Pale Rider was just awesome in his four minutes of screen time and it was a real shame that he was just used as fodder. Thus, this OC story.

I can't really claim a solid update schedule, as this story was more of a spur of the moment thing.

For canon characters, don't expect most of the cast to appear. GGO is really Sinon's territory. Of course, Death Gun means Kirito will make an appearance. Will he fight Pale Rider? Eh...a tantalizing scenario, but most likely not. Maybe a little friendly practise duel is what I can envision in the near future.

Once again, thank you all for reading!