DISCLAIMER: I, the author, do not own nor am I affiliated with Bandai Games, TokyoPop, or Project .Hack. This fiction is written purely for entertainment.
.Hack:Requital
The field was a desert type and thus was bleak and barren. A few outcroppings of rock jutted out of the ground here and there across the landscape. They had long suffered under the scorching sun. Some of the rocks beared runic symbols carved onto their sides, evidence that someone had been there at some point and at some time long ago.
At the center of this miserable environment appeared a series of magical golden rings. There were three of them and they were visible only a moment. In their wake stood a lone figure that had not been there before.
The Player Character MitchR was a Blademaster, a class of warriors that wore heavy armor and wielded single-handed swords. MitchR was no exception and sported a particularly large and jagged blade at his side.
His body was encased in silver armor with ball-shaped guards on his shoulders. Down both sides of his armor were dual green stripes in decoration. No helmet was upon his head and his short black hair wisped slightly in the wind.
MitchR surveyed the field before him with stern eyes. Black lines of face paint decorated his cheeks and gave him an even more intimidating glare, but the desert seemed to pay no mind to its newest visitor.
High in the sky above him orbited a mysterious background object known as "The Giant in the Sky". It consisted of four streamline shaped aerial vessels that vanguarded a massive humanoid monolith with its arms spread wide. Between these vessels the Giant slowly rotated.
Most players upon first sighting the Giant would gawk upon it. Eventually they would shrug it off; it was after-all only a background element that could be seen in many fields from the Delta Root Town of Mac Anu. Of course there were always some players that just had to know more.
Legend stated that long ago the sprites built the Giant and were transporting it to a place. Some fate befell the crews and ever since the aerial fleet and its cargo have wandered across the sky, lost for eternity in the heavens. He had even heard that there was a way to actually visit the ships themselves and fight some monster, but MitchR cared little for that.
He was a Debugger in the employ of CC Corporation, purveyors of both the ALTIMIT Operating System and the Massively On-line Role Player Game The World. To that end he and others sentried the cyber world of the game and removed any anomalies from it.
While one might not think that a very difficult or demanding job, policing the data streams of The World was a full time job that required the use of two teams, working day and night.
Coded and created by a German and based off an epic poem by a cultist, "The World" operated in ways no one could fully understand. Normal running of the system involved the processing of hundred of mystery executables in the background. The game created and deleted so many files autonomously that it was a wonder CC Corp. had ever allowed the game to be played at all. Removal of these mystery programs meant failure of the entire system and for whatever reason a policy of ignoring these mystery applications had prevailed.
The cost of this selective "blindness" was that the game would from time to time create useless Non-Player-Characters and have them wander throughout the game. They might hide in a dungeon or even walk around a Root Town. These NPCs would have random attitudes, levels of intelligence, and so forth. It was the primary job of the Debuggers to remove these unwanted Artificial Intelligences.
The Azure Knights and the Green Knights had long patrolled The World in their efforts to provide a stable playing environment. MitchR was a member of the Green Knights and though not a senior member, he had deleted his share of AI's. Lately the game seemed to be on a surge of junk creation and he had been dispatched to investigate the field of Delta Raging Vengeful White Devil.
His eyes detected no apparent data corruption. The sky background was intact and the desert seemed normal. He reached into his inventory and produced a small item called a "Fairy's Orb". Use of it caused small yellow icons to appear on his mini-map, showing him the locations were monster were likely to appear.
MitchR took off at a brisk pace and made his way across the burning sands to one of these icons. Ahead of him a large golden symbol appeared. It was runic and rotated slowly in place. This was the standard way in The World to encounter monsters.
The background story claimed that using runes drawn on the ground, humans could trap monsters inside these portals. Unfortunately the magic wasn't very stable and if another human came into contact with these portals the monsters could break free.
The Blademaster came ever closer to the portal. Suddenly a flash of light took place and the symbol glowed intensely. A mystical sound byte played and the portal disappeared revealing a monster called a Mu Guardian. The monster was a hovering metallic armor with long blade arms.
It swiped at MitchR, but he did nothing to avoid the blow. His status menu shook and blinked red a moment as hit points were deducted from his character.
"This one seems normal enough," the Debugger commented.
Again the monster slashed at him and again hit points were deducted.
He gave an annoyed look in reply.
The Mu Guardian raised both blade arms and began backing off, preparing for its next assault. MitchR took the moment and removed a magic scroll from his inventory.
He unleashed the spell with a monotone voice, "Wood Tornado."
Leaves and swirling winds unleashed themselves upon the monster. The Mu Guardian rocked back and forth from successive hit point loss and continued backing away. The Mu Guardian was weak to the Wood element and the particular spell was especially useful against it.
With the Wood Tornado trailing off MitchR finished the kill with a quick slash from his sword. The animated armor fell to the sand, darkened in color, and finally disappeared into thin air.
The Debugger sighed.
Two monster portals later and three kills later found MitchR in a bored, almost sheepish mood.
"Why does it always have to be at the deepest level of the dungeon?" he asked himself aloud and resigned to heading towards the icon on his map resembling a down arrow. Every field in The World was composed of an open area with monster portals and then an interior, usually a dungeon composed of multiple basements.
MitchR plodded his way towards a large open roofed stone temple that revealed a long series of steps heading down, silently grumbling along the way. He fidgeted with his sword and generally did little to hide his annoyance. It was not as if anyone else was around. Standard CC Corp. procedure was to lock down any suspicious fields.
He was about to begin walking down the steps when he stopped dead in his tracks with a startle. Just off to his left hovering gently in the air was a figure he had never seen before.
It was a small sleeping girl, dressed in a red and pink dress. Her light pink hair drifted in the wind as she floated in place above the ground. Strangely enough her hair had two almost flower petal like streaks on both sides of her head. He estimated she could be no more then seven years old in appearance and her complexion was very pale.
"I've never seen an AI like this before," the Debugger remarked and took another look upon her. She was definitely a unique creation.
He shrugged, "Well sister, it's time."
His fingers flicked the buttons to bring up his Command menu and he used his controller's directional pad to move the bar over the "Debug" command.
The little girl's eyes opened.
"Huh?" MitchR blurted out in surprise and accidentally pressed the "Cancel" button instead of "Debug". The menu flashed out of existence from the corner of his screen.
He could see the little girl's fiery red eyes focus on him and her expression changed to that of utter hate. This too took him by surprise, but it was not fear that swelled to life in him. It was amusement.
MitchR smiled and took a hold of his sword, "You don't like me much, do you little girl?"
She continued to float there, glaring at him.
The Debugger scoffed and slashed out with his blade attacking the girl.
The message "Miss" appeared before him.
He brought the blade to bear before her again and again, but each time the game reported that he had missed.
Finally he lowered his weapon and stared back at the little girl.
"You're a tough one, eh?" he taunted.
Pressing the button brought up the "Action" menu once more. He moved the D-Pad to "Debug" and pressed the execute button.
MitchR's character thrusted his free hand forward. Inside his palm a ball of energy was generated. It grew more and more powerful with every passing second.
"Eat this, little girl!" MitchR said with a grin and unleashed the ball of energy.
It raced towards the girl, arcing and sparking as it traveled. Inches from her it suddenly slammed into an invisible wall and squashed upon it, exploding its energy away from her. The wall remained visible a few seconds after the blast, a shield of joined light green hexagons forming a barrier before the girl. Then it was gone.
MitchR dropped his arm and took a step back. His mind raced for an explanation. His mind raced for an idea of what to do.
The little girl smiled.
In the heavens above the "Giant in the Sky" stopped revolving. The aerial fleet itself halted in place and the ancient magical field that held the monolith aloft dissipated. Like a rock the Giant fell to the desert sands and slammed into the ground with a force so strong the entire field shook.
Sand filled the air and temporarily blocked all sight. As it settled back down to the ground, the Giant was visible half buried on its side, one arm still reaching for the sky from which it came.
MitchR's jaw dropped at the sight of it and he remained silent and still.
A soft voice asked, "Where is mother?"
MitchR turned back to the girl.
"Where is mother?" she asked again.
The Debugger's face turned to complete confusion, "What?"
Suddenly there was a piercing sound, like that of a water droplet falling from a leaky faucet and landing in the sink. The screen became full and static and the field seemed to destabilize.
MitchR took another step back from the girl.
A loud rumble sounded from where the giant had landed and a powerful explosion followed. From the carcass of the monolith bursted a new figure that surged out from the ground.
The newcomer seemed to be made of stone. It resembled a large stone stick figure with long and skinny appendages. Its face was round with three notches for eyes in a triangle layout. Some sort of large stone halo connected to the rear of its head and broke only in one place, otherwise completing a full circuit.
This stick golem stretched its arms out wide and a torrent of energy flashed about it. Slowly the figure glided down to the ground until finally the stumps for its feet made contact with the ground.
MitchR needed no further incentive and rapidly pushed the series of buttons to bring up the Command menu and select "Debug". His free palm once again held a growing ball of energy and he wasted no time in directing his arm in the direction of the stick golem.
Frantically he urged his "Debug" skill to complete, "Hurry! Hurry!"
Spinning like a top the golem closed the distance between them and whacked the Player Character with one of its long arms.
The previous monsters had dealt him minimal damage and MitchR had not felt the need or the urgency to use any type of recovery item or spell to replace his lost hit points. In comparison the one attack he had now suffered at the hands of the stick golem had reduced his hit points to less then one-third.
He was about to heal himself when a message flashed before him and then stayed hovering over his head. The message read, "Protect Break".
"Protect Break? What is that? What kind of status effect is that?"
The little girl was still glaring at him. Her smile was gone, but her voice was still soft as she asked again, "Where is mother?"
He looked back to her and shouted, "What are you talking about? What is wrong with you?"
The little girl finally lowered her gaze and closed her eyes. She spoke one final time before disappearing into thin air, "Skeith. Data Drain."
MitchR flinched, "What? Where are you going?"
From behind him came a sound that could only be described as energy charging up to capacity. He turned back around in time to see the stick golem pointing its arm back at him.
Around the golem's wrist was some kind of data graphic that resembled a large plus symbol or cross hair. The lines of this plus symbol were bending down until they pointed directly at MitchR.
Too late the Debugger tried to use a curative spell to replenish his hit points. Even if he had, he was not certain his fate would have been any different.
From the arm of the stick golem to the center of his chest came a data stream of garbled alphanumerics. Upon contact he felt the greatest headache he had ever felt in his life and MitchR cried out in agony. The pain lasted only a moment before being replaced by numbness throughout his body. The Player Character fell sprawled to the ground, limp as a rag doll.
MitchR tried to move his body, his real body, the one holding the controller and sitting in front of his computer terminal. He was tormented to find that he could not and slowly an overwhelming feeling of sleep overcame him.
His words came out slow and drunkenly, "W-w-what is happening t-to me- e?"
The stick golem lowered its arm and faded away, as did the rest of the field. As did the rest of his consciousness.
The man known as Robert Mitchell slumped face down at his computer desk. A woman co-worker walked by and seeing his status, tried in vain to wake him up. She shook his shoulder thoroughly to the point where the man fell completely out of his swivel chair and onto the carpeting.
It was then she realized that he had not fallen asleep.
Then she screamed.