Author's Note: Hey, guys! obscureuser here! I was rewatching the anime, along with other series, and I just kinda had a "What if..?" moment. I mean, I get those moments in my head all the time, but I never really act on them. If I did, I'd have a heck of a lot more than two stories in my list. What made this one stick out to me was a video, that I can't remember the name of, about the human mind.

The story takes place during and after the "Blue Eyed Demon" episode. I'm sorry for being a little vague, I just don't wanna ruin the ending. I think it'll make for an interesting twist. I'll see you guys at the bottom!

Floor 74

Asuna and I ran up to the boss room as quickly as the system would allow. Damn it! Why the hell did they just rush in?! We warned them about taking on a floor boss! Their health was full going in, but if they were even half as tired as they looked, they wouldn't have stood a chance! If the players are fatigued, then they're bound to make careless mistakes.

We made our way up to the entrance and looked inside to see The Gleam Eyes was standing above about a dozen players wearing the armor of the Aincrad Liberation Force. All of them were trapped on the far end of the circular room, many unable to stand. Those who could either helped the injured ones stand or stood in a battle position, hoping to stall the boss's attacks.

"Hey! Are you guys okay?!" I called inside, just in time to see the standing goat-looking creature slash at a small group of them. "What are you doing?! Hurry up and use your teleport crystals!"

"We can't! They're not working!" One of the ALF members called back.

"T-there's never been a trap like this in a boss room before!" Asuna declared from my right. She brought her hand up to her face in shock.

My mind flashed back to the trap on floor 27, an image of Ducker holding up his blue crystal showing ever so clearly.

"The Liberation Force will not suffer the shame of retreat!" Corvatz shouted, hoping to regroup his subordinates. "Fight! We must fight on!" He pointed his sword at the boss.

"You idiot!" I muttered under my breath. Damn it, is he trying to get himself killed?

"Hey, what's going on?" Klein asked as he ran up. "What the hell?! Why are they still in there?!" His hands turned into fists after his outburst.

"Their crystals aren't working, they can't get out," I answered as calmly as I could.

"Then why haven't you gone and helped them?!"

"If we rush in and attack, we might be able to open an escape route, but it's really risky."

Another flashback came to me, this time, of each Black Cat as they fell. First Ducker, then Tetsuo, then Sasamaru, and finally, Sachi. All of them, gone in an instant. And you couldn't do anything.

"Everyone! Charge!" Corvatz commanded. In the next second, his last able-bodied men went in for an attack.

"Wait! Stop!" I screamed. The Gleam Eyes met the brigade's hopeless charge with a breath attack, followed up by an overhead slash with his blade. The ALF members went flying in all directions, except for Corvatz. He ran back to the boss in a rage.

As if swatting a fly, Gleam Eyes swung at him and sent him flying in our direction. He stopped about three meters in front of us.

"Hey! Hang in there." I ran up to him and tried to get an idea on his condition. Shit, he was hit pretty hard.

"Come on! We're gonna get you out of here," I told him, trying to calm him down. "Klein, help me!"

Corvatz's helmet shattered as Klein picked him up from the left. We were able to get him close to the entrance before he started coughing.

"Asuna, get a healing crystal! He looks pretty bad."

"Got it," she responded as she opened her menu. We set him down just outside the room before checking his status.

"U-Unbelievable..." Corvatz choked out his last word before shattering into tiny shards of data. I looked behind me to see Asuna with a pink crystal in her hand, ready to use it. Now, she was squeezing the prism, only to shatter it a second later.

Suddenly, an ear-splitting scream came from inside. One of the Liberators was stuck in front of the boss, completely unarmed, and was frantically crawling away from the creature. When he finally stopped, the Gleam Eyes raised his sword above his head, preparing to finish him off.

"I-I can't take it anymore!" Asuna cried out before charging into the room, rapier unsheathed and ready for battle.

"Asuna!" I drew my Elucidator and ran in after her. Klein quickly followed suit.

Damn it, I was hoping we wouldn't have to come to this.

Once she closed the distance, she unleashed a 5-hit skill into Gleam Eyes's back, just in time to stop his attack on the other player. Before she could begin a second attack, the goat-human hybrid turned his attention to her and knocked her to the ground. He raised his sword overhead to strike at her again, but I was able to get there just in time to meet his blade with mine. The collision was just enough to change the direction of his strike a meter away from Asuna. When the tip of the Elucidator reached the hilt, I turned back to check up on her.

"Get outta here!" I commanded. She nodded in response, then jumped out of the way. Off to the side, Klein and his guild mates were getting the surviving Liberators out of harm's way.

Damn, that was too close.

As the Gleam Eyes charged a breath attack, I swung at his back with a Horizontal to get his attention back to me. Now the real battle started.

He turned back to me and began dealing a series of slashes from different directions, barely giving me enough time to block them. We swung back and forth at each other, trying to break the other's defense.

Man, at this rate, I'll have to use that extra skill.

I blocked an overhead swing with the broad end of the Elucidator, then watched my health bar steadily diminish.

Forget it! This is gonna take forever! I can't hesitate anymore!

"Asuna! Klein! Listen, keep him off of me for ten seconds!" I said after dodging one of the boss's strikes.

They gave me a nod and thumbs up, then began their distraction.

Not wasting an instant, I opened my menu and began digging around for the unique skill.

Menu/

Character/

Skills/

Dual Wielding: Activate

Alright, now that that's activated, I gotta find the other sword.. there it is!

"Okay, I'm ready! Switch!"

Once Asuna switched out, I began running towards the Gleam Eyes. While parrying his initial strike, I reached to my back with my left hand for the hilt of my second sword: the Dark Repulser.

With one blade in each hand, I jumped up and gave him a double upwards vertical to his face, then landed back down. In retaliation, the boss brought his sword down in another overhead strike, only to have it blocked and repelled by my two blades.

Damn, he sure does love those overhead strikes. Well, here goes... all of your secret training's prepared you for a time like this. Let's see what you got!

"Starburst Stream!" I screamed the name of my most recent unlock for the Dual Wielding skill and watched as the system took over my motions.

Double horizontal, downwards 'v', upwards 'v', thrust right, thrust left.

Shit, it's not fast enough! Faster...

My arms listened to my command, steadily gaining speed and striking power.

Still not fast enough!

Much to my surprise, the Gleam Eyes grabbed the Elucidator in mid-swing and nearly stopped the skill dead in its tracks.

Sorry, boss, not good enough.

Releasing a war cry, I brought the Dark Repulser back around for a final thrust, just in time for the boss to sink his blade into my left side. We both stood still for a moment before the Gleam Eyes shattered into a million blue particles.

Congratulations! The usual message read.

I couldn't even close the Last Attacking Bonus window, I was so drained. When the post-motion delay finally wore off, all I could was let the swords fall and black out.

"Kirito! Kirito! Wake up!" I heard a distant voice call out to me.

I sat up with beads of sweat running down my forehead and a rapid thumping in my chest. The place was dark, save for a few beams of light running through a nearby window.

Where am I? How long have I been out? Where'd everyone go?

A pair of hands rest on my back and right shoulder, followed by a head of short hair.

"Hey, Kirito, are you okay? You look like you were having a nightmare. You started kicking around, then saying 'faster' over and over again. If I didn't know any better, I would've thought there was somebody you couldn't get your mind off of," the same voice said, this time much closer.

"Oh yeah? And what's that supposed to mean?" I turned and asked the girl lying beside me.

"Oh, nothing," Sachi answered, "Well what were you dreaming about?"

"I'm not too sure... The last thing I remember was soloing a boss, but I was using two swords instead of just one. I thought the system didn't allow anyone to equip two weapons at the same time?"

"Really?" She giggled and laid back down on the mattress. "Well, it was all probably just in your head. You've been spending too much time in the field, why don't you take a few days off?"

"Because we need to get stronger to be on par with the clearing team. Enough about that, let's just go back to sleep." I laid back down under the covers and put my arm around Sachi, bringing her closer.

"*yawn* Hey, Kirito, we're all going to make it out of here, right.?" She turned onto her left side and faced me.

"Of course, I won't let anything happen to you, or the other Black Cats." I moved my hand to her cheek, then up to tousle her hair.

"Okay, I trust you," She responded with a smile. "Goodnight, Kirito. Thank you again for letting me stay in your room."

"The pleasure is mine. I'll see you in the morning. Goodnight, Sachi."

I'll protect you guys with everything I've got. Nothing but the best for them.

Before I knew it, drowsiness had taken over me once more, and I'd fallen back asleep.

Author's Note: Hey, guys! So there you have it! I'm sure some of you actually enjoyed the short story while many more wanna rip my head off for writing something so random. Well, I figured I'd write something kinda okay at one point or another during my time on this site, so I just thought I'd get that energy into a work (while having a little fun) that isn't established. I guess my biggest reason behind this is my fascination of how the mind works. None of us remember our dreams very well, so what if we had both the most heart-wrenching and uplifting moments in our lives, but didn't remember them because they were merely a dream? Man, I need a life.

I don't know, I think I'll just leave this as is. There really isn't very much ground to go over from here, as my impression on Sachi living in Aincrad is already being put into a different story of mine. I guess let me know what you think in the review section. I'm making solid progress on Beater and the Black Cats and Down the Dragon's Nest, for those of you who know me for those stories. I'm hoping to get an update out of each of them fairly quickly. Well, don't forget to give some feedback, whether through PM or Review, on anything you liked, disliked, or have any questions about.

Until next time, obscureuser out!