Chapter IV – Plan of Action:
It had been nearly two weeks since they had started ETO, and nearly all of their free time had been spent trying to catch up to the top players and have a shot at facing The Reaper. Most of them didn't have any trouble with the arrangement, but Asuna found it particularly hard to manage.
She was still managing to get all her schoolwork done, albeit barely, so at least her mother wasn't cracking down too hard on her yet. Even so, she was quickly running out of excuses as to why she had to go out every night.
I wouldn't have been so bad if they weren't on such a timetable, but a few days earlier, Agent Nishiyama had informed them that there had been another pair of fatalities. A gamer in the south side of Toyko had killed their spouse and then taken their own life. Though it had not been publicly linked to ETO, Asuna and the others all knew better.
"Asuna?"
"Hm?" she instinctively replied, coming back to reality.
She and Kirito were sitting across from each other at a table in the Dicey Cafe. It was their fist and likely only night off from diving into ETO, but she still couldn't think of much else. Asuna had barely touched her salad, but Kirito had already polished off the burger he'd ordered. Now he just sat there looking at her with an aura of concern.
"What?" She asked.
"You were a million miles away for a minute there." he replied. "You've barely touched your food."
"Just missing the days in Aincrad."
"Wait, for real?"
Asuna smiled ruefully. "It used to feel so hard... being surrounded by all that death and danger; but at least there we were the best, we could face down anything that came our way. Out here, the death and danger have somehow remained, but now we're playing catch up."
"You're thinking about the other two deaths?"
Asuna was silent for a few seconds before she finally nodded. "And however many more will suffer in the time it takes us to figure this all out."
"We're doing everything we can. Try to think about all the people we'll be saving instead of those we've lost."
"Were it so easy." she replied sullenly.
"Is that really how you think of our time in Aincrad?"
Asuna looked up, a questioning expression on her face.
"You said that you missed the days in Aincrad, but how many died before we were able to clear that game?" Kirito asked.
Asuna's face darkened ad many bitter memories flooded back for a moment. "More than I care to count."
"Do you blame yourself for their deaths too?"
"A few... ones that fought and died beside me on the front lines... but for the most part, no. We fought as hard as we could, we did everything in our power, and eventually we won."
"It's no different now. We may not be forced into it like before, but we're still doing everything we can. With everything that's happened over the past few years, sometimes, to me at least, it feels like we never really left Aincrad."
Asuna squeezed Kirito's hand gently. "Thanks." she said.
Kirito couldn't help but awkwardly blush a little. "You're welcome, for whatever it was I said that helped."
"Nothing specific, just being here and talking with me was all I think I really needed."
"Always." he replied with a smile.
Asuna looked down at Kirito's hand in hers. Sometimes it felt like they were so in sync that they shared the same brain, but other times...
"Kirito?" she said quietly.
"Yeah, what is it?"
"I need you to promise me something."
Kirito hesitated before responding, the look on Asuna's face was the same one she had worn when they had their fight before the seventy-fifth floor boss. He had the instant sinking feeling that he had somehow done or said something wrong or stupid, though he couldn't for the life of him figure out what that was.
"Uhh... what is it?" he asked cautiously.
"No more going it alone, I need you to promise me."
"What are you talking about?" Kirito asked, more than a little puzzled. "We're all in it together this time."
"But you didn't know that when you agreed, and you never even thought to ask me what I felt before you accepted the job."
"Wait, are you saying that you would have turned him down?"
"No, that's not it, I... just want you to care what I think about big decisions. We're partners, even if we're on the same page, we should still make the decision together."
"I was the one that released the world seed, I have a responsibility to-"
"You're also the one who married me and adopted Yui; you have a responsibility to us as well!"
Asuna let go of Kirito's hand and they both sat in silence for a few moments.
"Look, I'm not going to stop you from trying to do something that means so much to you." Asuna took a moment to consciously soften the tone of her voice. "That burning determination is one of the many things I love about you. I just want to be part of the process, as a partner should be."
Kirito was silent for a few moments more before he finally met the gaze of the woman he loved.
"Okay," he said. "I promise that I won't go it alone anymore."
Asuna took his hand once more and squeezed it tight. "Thank you." she said, leaning forward and giving him a light but loving kiss.
"We're not interrupting anything are we?" Klein's voice snapped Asuna back to the world around them causing her to quickly retreat back to her chair.
Neither Kirito nor Asuna had noticed that Klein, Liz, and Sinon had arrived at their table with heir own food a moment ago.
"N...no." Kirito stammered. "We were just-"
"Going a little overboard with the PDA?" Liz interjected.
Kirito slumped back into his own chair with a grumpy scowl. As far as he was concerned, he and his girlfriend should be free to kiss whenever they damn well pleased. He was about to shoot back a retort when Liz's phone starting going off.
She flipped it up and instantly a sad look shrouded her face. "It's Silica again."
"We can't keep ditching her forever." Asuna said, "She's already getting really upset with us."
"Well we also can't bring her along," Sinon replied. "Agent Nishiyama was clear, no one outside of our group can know about it."
"He needs our help, we should be able to field the party we see fit." Kirito rebuked.
"I don't dispute that," Sinon stated. "The problem is that we're on his payroll and using his tech, we kinda need to play by his rules."
Liz sent a quick text back about heading to bed early and turned off her phone.
"Well that still leaves us in a rough situation, if we can't bring Silica along, it leaves us one party member short." Klein noted.
"There's not much we can do about that." Kirito said. "Silica, Leafa, and Agil are out; that means no dice IRL and I sure don't plan on exposing anyone digital to ETO when we still don't know what the effects are."
"I'm sure as hell not letting Yui in there." Asuna insisted. An involuntary shiver ran down her spine when she remembered the fate of the astronomy teacher on their first quest. "I know that Alice would come in a heartbeat, even thought Miss Koujiro is keeping her crazy busy; but you're right, we don't know how this would effect her."
"My thoughts exactly, though I imagine there's going to be hell to pay when Alice does figure out we've kept all this from her."Kirito agreed. "As it stands, I think we're doing fine as we are."
"Okay then hotshot, do you think we've got what it takes to down this Reaper guy?" Klein pressed, plunking down in a seat next to Kirito.
"Honestly, it's hard to say." Kirito replied. "None of the footage online has been that great quality, so it's hard to get a sense of his fighting style. I don't think there's any way to find out short of actually taking him on."
"Man, I was never any good at getting any rest before a big fight, I don't think I'll be sleeping much tonight." Klein moaned.
Kirito's phone now cut into the conversation; the caller ID listed it as Agent Nishiyama.
"Hello." Kirito answered.
"I'm sorry to intrude, I know I gave you all the night off."
"It's okay, what's up?"
"I need everyone to come back to the lab right away, Argo just heard of something going on in ETO that may give us our first real clue into this mess. We'll fill you all in when you get here."
"Okay, everyone's still with me; we're at the Dicey Cafe."
"No surprise there, I'll send Agent Shirai to pick you up right away."
"Looks like our night off just got cancelled." Kirito revealed as he closed his phone.
"For real!?" Liz exclaimed. "This work schedule's going to drive me mad before anything in the game."
Liz's comment got her a few awkward looks.
"I didn't mean to..." Liz sighed. "I'm sorry, I shouldn't make light of things. I'm just really tired."
"I get it, we all are. It's okay." Klein assured her.
Liz looked around the table and everyone else nodded.
The group quickly paid their bill, scarfed down their remaining food, thanked Agil, and headed outside to meet Agent Shirai. The ride back to the lab was full of speculation on what was to come, but no one managed to guess anywhere near the heart of the matter.
Argo had beaten them all back to the lab and now sat at the head of the same giant table they had found themselves seated at on their first day at the lab.
"Since Argo managed to find this one out, I'll let her brief you." Agent Nishiyama stated.
The mousy young lady looked more than a little awkward at the head of the table, but she managed to tough it out.
"As you all know," she said "the other day another couple died in relation to ETO. It turns out that tonight their guild, Eternal Quintessence, is holding an in game memorial for them."
They had all been to more than their fair share of memorials before. Many in Aincrad, and again with their friend Yuuki had passed, both in game and in the real world.
"Their guild has invited any players who wish to pay their respects to attend the ceremony this evening."
"And you want us to crash the ceremony?" Kirito asked, directing his gaze to Agent Nishiyama.
"Hardly anything so base; besides it's not technically crashing if there is an open invitation." he pointed out. "This is the first chance we've had to speak to people directly associated with one of the ETO victims. It could give us invaluable insight into what's causing all of this."
"He's not wrong." Sinon pointed out.
"That doesn't make him right." Kirito countered. "These people are mourning the loss of two close friends, it would be seriously disrespectful to go poking around at a time like that."
"I'm not crazy about the idea either," Asuna interjected. "Still, if this can help us figure out how to save more people, shouldn't we at least try?"
"Yeah... I suppose." Kirito finally relented. He looked around at everyone else who nodded their assent.
"So, what do we need to know?" Asuna asked.
"As I mentioned, the guild is called Eternal Quintessence." Argo reiterated. "Azra and Astora were co-guild masters; they were also husband and wife IRL. Their guild is understandably torn up over this with their new acting GM Sindoval trying to keep things together. For the moment though, they have suspended all guild activities until after the funeral."
"So how did they know that these two were the victims?" Klein asked. "Not too many people give out their real life info."
"A close real life friend of theirs IRL is also in the guild; Tetsu. He was the one who informed the guild what happened and would be most likely to have the kind of information we're looking for."
"The memorial is being held in the South Church in Arkham city." Argo continued. "Very few combat events take place there, and it is one of the only locations in the world where PVP is not allowed."
"So here's the plan." Agent Nishiyama summarized. "We head over there right away and pay our respects first. Then we start discreetly asking around about anything strange that happened leading up to the death of their GM's. If anyone can get time with Sindoval or Tetsu, that's priority. Any questions?"
The room stood silently affirmative.
"Okay then, let's dive in."
Hey everyone, thanks for reading! :)
I thought for a long time if this was the right way to go with the story. See I'm not a big fan of time skips and I had originally planned to write the whole story of their first two weeks in ETO doing some quests learning how the game worked, that kind of stuff. However as I went on and on with that, it felt more and more like filler that was keeping me from getting to the meat of the story that needed to be told, so here we are. Hopefully scrapping all that and picking up here was the right call, I guess we'll see.
In other news, I'm almost done the first draft of an SAO short story about Asuna and Yui that is unrelated to Fractured Code and I hope to have a polished version of it up in a few weeks. I'm also about halfway done the first draft of chapter 5 so I'm hoping to have that up a few weeks after the short story. Chapter 5 will be about the length of this chapter so I'm hoping that's a reasonable enough timetable.
Once again, thank you all for reading, please feel free to leave any comments or critiques and I will see you all next time. :)