A/N: Hello and welcome to Player Issues! This is a collaboration work between my father and I, yes, my dad likes .hack. :) He will often be referred to in these notes and henceforth will be known as "Dad". Some chapters have an author's note like this one explaining approximately where in the game trilogy they are located. If they don't, it usually means either you're still reading the same plot segment or you've reached the post-game chapters (and even some of those have notes). This story will contain spoilers, for both the games and the show, so my best recommendation would be to have completed both so you can enjoy the full experience. (SPOILERS!) This is supposed to take place after the Holy Palace semi-finals but before Alkaid is attacked.

Rating: T for violence, mild language, some mild sex-related humor (including shonen/shoujo-ai), brief implied nudity, and use of alcohol

Legal Stuffs: I do not own .hack/G.U. or any other work referenced in this story. This is a fan fiction and used entirely for fan purposes. I am not trying to make any financial gain from this; I just want to share my weird ideas with my fellow fans! :)

Login001: Third Party Opinions

Misaki Ryou, the player behind the PC Haseo, sat at his desk at school, half asleep I might add, waiting for homeroom to start. He was wearing a navy blue business suit that was required by the private school's uniform dress code, but he did not wear the required tie, the jacket was unbuttoned as were the first two buttons of his white dress shirt. The next desk over, a few of his classmates were talking about The World.

"So," Sato started up. He was a tall, bright eyed boy with neatly combed ebony hair and wearing the full required uniform properly, the tie was a dark crimson. He leaned back in his chair. "Have any of you been watching the Arena Tournaments lately?"

Ryou's chocolate brown hair brushed away from his eyes revealing their deep auburn color. He turned his head to better hear the conversation. He turned his attention towards Ken, who slumped back at Sato's question. Ken was a dark boy, his dark red hair covering most of his face and wearing his uniform in a similar fashion to Ryou, except his dress shirt was black and fully buttoned.

"Yeah, and man!" Ken snapped; he closed his cell phone after finishing the game he'd been playing on it. "That Haseo guy is really pissing me off! Did he really quit being a PKK just to beat up everybody in the Arena?"

Ryou was caught off balance at the sudden mention of his PC's name and nearly fell off his chair. He scrambled to get back into his chair sitting upright, hoping to not catch the attention of the others. Next spoke a trendy girl named Fusao.

She wore the girls' uniform properly with a white short-sleeve blouse, red bow tie and navy blue pleated miniskirt. One could tell her long, curly, barely-black hair, being twirled between her fingers, had been bleached numerous times. "I think he's cute! And his fighting style is awesome!"

Ryou turned in the opposite direction to hide his flushed cheeks.

"Yeah," Sato answered. "I agree on his fighting style. I mean I know he has a lot of experience fighting other PC's, they say he killed over a hundred PKers at once, but Arena battles are totally different from PKing and PKKing. It's amazing that he won the Demon Palace Tournament on his first try!"

"What was that attack he used?" Miwa asked. She was a plain-looking girl with her hair styled in a bob, wore glasses and the same uniform as Fusao, but also with a blazer jacket matching the skirt. She looked up from a notebook she had been writing in. "Endrance always used the same attack..."

"But then again..." Fusao didn't seem like she was really paying any attention to what Miwa said. "He's beaten so many other cute, strong guys! Like Endrance... and Kuhn..."

Meanwhile, Ryou had finally gotten himself adjusted upright and began banging his head lightly on the desk from Fusao's last statement. Sato spoke up again, "Speaking of Endrance, CC Corp. still hasn't come up with a decent explanation for what happened during the title match... I don't buy that 'server problems' excuse. And no one's heard from him either..."

Since he last spoke up until now, Ken seemed to not have been really paying any attention to the conversation at hand and now stood, slamming his hands on the desk. "He defeated my beloved Pi! And by a stupid forfeit too! What was Kuhn thinking?"

'When does class start...?' Ryou thought leaning back in his chair. He turned his head to look at the clock in the back of the classroom and checked to see if his watch was synchronized.

"I heard the two of them are friends... Maybe it was something personal?" Sato mused.

Fusao smiled, "That seems to be the popular opinion; they were acting familiar during the fight."

Ryou used his hand to cover his face, 'I can't believe I'm hearing this conversation...'

"Here's a question," Miwa smirked. "Anyone else notice how both of Haseo's teammates in the Holy Palace Tournament are girls?"

'Find a happy place. Find a happy place...' Ryou began shaking his head in his hand.

"Yeah..." Ken drew out his response as if he were just realizing this. "He's with Alkaid the former Demon Palace Emperor and that Atoli girl from Moon Tree. And now that you mention it, Atoli was with him in the Demon Palace Tournament, too..."

"I think they're a couple," Miwa giggled. "He's really stubborn, but you can tell there's some definite chemistry there. I saw their first match in the Ranking Colliseo; she hugged him after they won."

Ryou began coughing like he was choking on something. Sato glanced over and raised his eyebrow; shrugging it off, he turned back to the others. "You're imagining things… He seems to not be able to stand her. And I saw a recording of the same match on someone's personal site; he shoved her away."

"Yeah!" Miwa scoffed. "After about ten seconds!"

"Initial shock. That's five seconds alone."

"Even so, standard hug is only about two seconds, how do you account for the extra three seconds?"

"You're exaggerating."

"Why would he hang out with her all the time, then?" Fusao asked pointedly. Ryou was still coughing and stood to get out of hearing range till class started.

"Hey, Ryochii!" Fusao waved to get his attention. "You play The World too, don't you? Have you been watching the Arena lately?"

"Eh, kinda..." Ryou coughed out as he tried to hide his nervousness. He added under his breath, "'Ryochii'...?"

"'Kinda'?" Miwa raised her eyebrow. "Does that mean you're catching it when you can?"

"...I'm, well, I'm participating." He stammered, sitting back down on his desk.

"You mean you were participating," Sato pointed out. "The finals are up next." Ryou pulled back, feeling he shouldn't have said what he did.

"Maybe he's on one of the finalist teams...?" Miwa said, half joking.

"Can we talk about something else?"

Ken began deducing the options, "Well, you don't seem like the type to play a girl... So that knocks off Alkaid, Atoli and Bordeaux..."

"Do I look like someone who'd play a girl as sensitive as Atoli even if I did play girls?" Ryou exploded, no longer interested in hiding his red face. "And like hell I'd ever be a PK!"

"Well, that knocks off Grein and Negimaru..." Sato rolled his eyes.

"Wouldn't it be funny if he's Haseo and we've just been casually talking about him this entire time?" Fusao giggled. "His nervousness at the mention of Atoli's name and the blatant hatred for PKers certainly fits his profi..."

Ryou shot a glare at Fusao to portray the message of saying "Bingo!" The other four stopped and stared at him in shock.

"You... You can't be...?" Fusao blushed.

"Yeah...!"

"Yeah right!" Sato laughed sarcastically. "You're Haseo? 'The Terror of Death'? The undefeated black Adept Rogue who swept through the Demon Palace Tournament on his first try and is now aiming to win the Holy Palace Crown? C'mon! That guy's totally insane and you're, like, one of the quietest guys in our class!"

"What do you mean 'insane'?" Ryou glared.

"Actually," Miwa chimed in. "I have heard from a few people who have talked to him, that in normal conversation, the guy actually is pretty quiet. Almost shy... Some would even say 'rude'. But still, the chances...!"

"I always pictured him to be some forty-year old virgin outdoor introvert living in his mother's basement," Ken commented distantly.

"Forty-year old virgin? I live alone in an apartment!"

Ken ignored Ryou, "...The guy plays so much and is far stronger than most Adept Rogues, he's gotta spend a lot of money on his PC. I figure he would make more than a high school student's part-time salary..."

"Actually," Miwa spoke up. "Isn't your father some big-shot business tycoon? His parents probably pay his bills for him..."

"Well, yeah, he is..." Ryou answered uncomfortably. "But they don't pay my gaming bills; they don't even know I play The World."

"Well, if you really were Haseo, wouldn't you be able to furbish some sort of proof of this?" Miwa asked.

Ryou opened his mouth to answer, but suddenly pulled back, 'Wait... Do I really want to tell them who I am? I mean this could end badly... On the one hand I could end up never having a moment's peace. On the other, if they don't even care, it could be a serious blow to my ego.'

Ken stood and snapped his fingers in Ryou's face to get his attention, "Hello? We're waiting...?"

'Eh, what the hell. You never know unless you try, and anyways I've gotten too deep into this conversation, my only choices are to tell them the truth or tell them I was pulling their legs.' He rolled his eyes, annoyed and pulled his cell phone out of his pocket. "Here, I'll pull up an e-mail I've received from CC Corp."

The other four gathered around him as he pulled up a tournament notice, "How do we know it isn't just some hack or goof up by CC Corp.?" Ken asked.

"Okay, first of all, when would I have had time to hack this? You were all watching me!" Ryou exclaimed and closed his phone. "And that's beside the fact that I don't even know how to hack! And second of all..."

"You could have hacked it ahead of time..."

"That doesn't even make sense! Why would I hack something like that ahead-" Ryou stopped shortly, his phone began to vibrate. "Huh?" He opened his phone again, it was mail. While he read it, his expression began to soften. "Oh, I forgot I sent that to her... Here we go here's the email I just received!"

The other students gathered around the phone to look at the message…

Sender: Atoli
Subject: Re: How are you?

I'm doing fine, thanks! :)
Take care of yourself too,
Haseo-san.

Sincerely,
Atoli

"His name's in the mail..." Fusao said, pointing at the screen.

"That could be hacked too," Ken argued.

Ryou rolled his eyes, "Gawd!"

"Ken-kun, think about it," Sato injected. "We watched him receive it, if it was a fake, he would've had to plan it out... And we dragged him into this conversation...!"

"And that's aside from the fact that this mail is a reply." Miwa added pointing at the subject; her lips curled into a sly grin as she slid her finger down to the sender line. "Hey! And notice who the sender is!"

"The 'reference' tag can be easily typed in... He could have sent it when we weren't looking. " Everyone else ignored Ken. Ryou double-checked the sender line of the e-mail; upon seeing it labeled "Atoli", his face turned bright red.

"Do you send Greeting Cards to her often?" Miwa asked coyly. Ryou closed the phone and shoved it back into his pocket.

"Well, I'm still not buying this," Ken proclaimed. "...Hey. How about this? We'll give you our PC names and we can meet somewhere. We'll give you a phrase to say to prove who you are."

"...Whatever." Ryou glared. "Fine, give me the phrase."