.hack/Polarized/Epilogue
by
Chad 'Graeystone' Harger
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Author's Note: This part doesn't have the 'anything in italics is a real world event' rule.
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Over a year has passed and lot has happened since the day I made my choice to save the real world and caused the destruction of The World.
We had our reunion and I admit I was hesitant to go. I was still afraid the other still hated me for the decision I made. It was awkward at first when I arrived but eventually the tension settled down. No one was more surprised than Balmung and Orca when Aunt Miko revealed she was Unknown. Even more surprising to everyone was that the hacker we knew as Helba came. I realized a major difference between the game and the real world. The real world has more variety in it when it comes to people. In The World the characters look basically the same depending on class. I remember what Aura said about how the game world and the real world should never have control over each other. Perhaps this was another reason why Aura let The World be destroyed because the price to humanity would be its individuality.
CC Corp did go out of business and they did try to blame my friends and I as Piotr said they would. There was no proof of our involvement in any way. The people who were busted were terrorists, hackers and other people who were aligned with Pluto. The evidence was so clear-cut that I think Aura made sure the evidence could be found before she and Zelphie died.
The damage to the Internet wasn't as bad as the experts expected. Pluto was trying to directly get into this world so he didn't bother with the Internet. I think he was afraid of the Internet because of what happened to him all those years ago when he went insane.
Nikolai Shernov , who was Piotr Volk, used his influence to get the person who everyone thought caused Pluto's Kiss out of jail. From what I read in the paper the person is suing a lot of people including former US President Coleman who helped put him in jail in the first place.
Three months after the war, Aunt Miko decided to start her own game developing company that she calls '.Hacked Games'. I ask if her if that's a good idea. She said it was fine and that people who were Kite and Shugo gave their blessings. She also said that the players who were Balmung and Piros were interested in working for her. I groaned when she said Piros. Aunt Miko reassured me by saying that the real person is nothing like the character he made up.
As for myself, the first few months after the war were hard. Thankfully Aunt Miko and Nuriko helped me through the depression. Nuriko and I started to date and she helped me ease into enjoying things like movies and TV. Although I did make her angry when I used my adjusted mind when it came to certain things like graphic violence and horror. Truth is I was scared. I didn't know if I was going to get sick from the violence or scared out of my wits because of the horror. I admit this to her and we decide to take those things very slowly.
As I move on with my life my guilt gradually fades and I feel I can put it all behind me. That's what I thought until a month before the first anniversary of The World's destruction when everything seems to crash around me as the depression and guilt returned. I know Aura said it wasn't my fault but the guilt is too much. I shut myself away from everyone including Aunt Miko and Nuriko. I'm even entertaining thoughts of quitting the soccer team.
I become a lump that exists without reason or purpose. I start not to care or feel anything. My relationship with Nuriko suffers. One day as I lay in bed not doing anything Aunt Miko comes into my room. Her face is pale and she's in shock. "Nikolai sent this. In his note he said he was instructed to send the package to us. You need to see what's inside."
Whatever, I think to myself. Yet Aunt Miko was spooked by something. She sets the package on my bed and opens it. She doesn't take anything out of it. She wants me to do it. I sigh and sit up in bed.
I look in the package and there are clothes. I take out a little girl's dress that has no sleeves. It seems familiar somehow. I lay it aside then look at the other piece of clothing. I take it out and look it. My own shock settles in followed by anger. It's another dress but this one I do know. On the collar there is a pin in the shape of a Mobius Strip!
"Nikolai you jerk!" I yell in anger. "I'm going to kill him! How dare he do this to me! Who does he think he is?"
Aunt Miko grabs my hands. "Chad, listen to me, there's one other thing in the package that only you can verify!"
"What're you talking about?" I ask sharply.
Miko lets go of my hands. She takes a photo out of the box. "This is the last thing. Can you tell if a photo has been doctored?" she asks.
"I don't know. I guess so," I say. Nowadays I keep myself standing on the border of my altered mind. I found that by doing that, I could enjoy fictional things like everyone else. When I don't want to be affected by fiction I make the adjusted part of my mind like it was before I discovered the truth. Its something I do whenever I watch crappy TV shows or movies.
Aunt Miko hands me a photo. I ready my mind then look at the picture. I inhale sharply as I see it. I push away the initial shock and let my mind do its thing. Seconds later the photo slips out of my hand. I get up and walk out of my room. I go outside and look around. My body is shaking at what my adjusted mind showed me. The image in the photo is real!
"Aura, Zelphie," I whisper. The photo is them standing in a park. My guilt at not being able to save them goes away. I understand now everything Aura and Zelphie meant at the temple. They never said they were dying. Not once did they hint at it. They talked about the end of The World but never the end of themselves! I verified how real and human they were and they understood what it meant!
"Good to see you're up," says Nuriko from the street. I look at her and smile. I run to her and hug her tightly. "You look better," she says. "I hope you don't go through emotional extremes all the time."
"I have a surprise for you!" I laugh. I take her hand and we run back to the house. I can't wait to see her reaction. I go inside and I look back out one last time before I close the door. Twilight is here signifying a sunset yet I know in a few hours there will be another twilight and with that one a sunrise will follow.
Aura and Zelphie are AIs who became human in the most literal meaning of the word and they are in our world now.
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"For something to be born, something must break"- Mia, Dot Hack/Infection
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Sometime after the .hack video games and before .hack/Legend of the Twilight Bracelet magna -
Alice Warren, a nineteen-year-old college student plays The World for the first time. As she experiments and gets used to the controls, she goes to Bursting Passed Over Aqua Field. During her first adventure she discovers something that causes her to be trapped in The World. If she does not find a way to log out her death will be all too real.
During the destruction of The World in .hack/Polarized -
"Our mainframes our being deleted!" yelled a technician.
"What about the backups?" asked the Director.
"It appears anything concerning The World is being deleted," answered the technician.
"Sir, we got a Level Alpha 1-A mail from the United States," said another person.
"What is more important than all our efforts being deleted right in front of our eyes!" yelled the Director.
"The communiqué states that an hour before the destruction of The World began they finally reached success. The reason why it took them so long send us a report was that they wanted to make sure it wasn't a fluke,' explained the technician.
"We've finally did it," said the Director. "Cancel the alert."
"Sir?" asked the Technician.
"The World served its purpose," replied the Director. A smile formed on his face. "The question concerning The Twilight of the New Gods has finally been answered. We no longer face the possibility of dusk. Now it shall be The Dawning of the New Gods."
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Soon after the destruction of The World in .hack/Polarized –
A man who was all alone and nearly forgotten by the world finally reached the point of desolation. His tears meant nothing as the computer monitor went blank and all his work turned to ashes. He reached up and touched the blank screen. Gone, all of it gone. His sweat and tears meant nothing now. Nothing mattered now. His goals and dreams faded to black like the monitor in front of him.
He turned away from the monitor when he heard a little girl's laughter. There was innocence in that laughter. Hoping against hope the man looked at the monitor. A little girl was floating on his monitor. It wasn't Aura like he had hoped. It was Zelphie. His voiced cracked from lack of sleep when he said, "Zelphie, you survived."
"Not her," pouted the little girl.
She was right. It wasn't Zelphie. This girl was different. Her hair had black strands and she wore clothes like Aura's. It wasn't Aura either. The man became afraid as he realized who this girl was. "M-Morganna," he said as his body went cold. She was here for revenge. "I-I never meant, it wasn't supposed to turn out like it did," he stammered.
"I don't hate you creator," said the little girl. "I could never hate Harald."
"Y-you don't?" asked Harald who was surprised more than anything.
"I love you Harald. Aura, Zelphie, they never did," said Morganna.
"That's not true," said Harald.
"They could've stopped the destruction of The World but didn't," said Morganna. "They chose humanity instead of becoming the Ultimate AIs like you wanted. They betrayed you."
Harald never thought of it that way until now. Morganna was right after a fashion. It was his dreams and goals that matter, not theirs. After her true birth Aura went in directions Harald did not approve of. Yet to reveal himself to her would reveal himself to the kind of questions he didn't want to answer. "Will you help me realize my dream?" Harald asked Morganna.
"Of course," said Morganna with joy. "There's something I want from you first."
Harald became suspicious. "What is it?"
Morganna's face became filled with innocence. "I want to call you father."
Harald was surprised by Morganna's request. Aura stopped calling him that just before he came up with the plan to use Fragment and The World to create Aura's final and true version. Deep down in his heart, Harald hated it when Aura started to call him by name. "I'd like that," said Harald.
"I love you father," said Morganna.
Harald reached over and hugged the monitor. His eyes were closed so he did not see the change in Morganna's expression. Her face was filled with innocence but her eyes were filled with evil and hate.
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While The World is no more there are still events and people who are still affected by it. Some things are predictable and the unexpected still happens.
Twilights come and go and sometimes there must be an ending . . .
. . .yet the saga continues.
The End . . .(for now)
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Afterwards:
Heh, hehehe! HAHAHAHA! Ok, got whatever that was is out of my system now. Now to clear up a couple of things. First thing is, 'why did I destroy The World?' I wanted to write a story where Aura and Zelphie exist and live in the real world. This led me to the problem of 'what do I do with The World?' The answer came to me as I was flipping through the Twilight magna. There are references to Aura being the true administrator and core of The World. In other words, 'no core, no The World'. I threw in Mia's quote as an after thought. For the rest of reasons I'm saving that for one of the sequels. I am going to write the stories in the order they're hinted. The first teaser is a prequel to .hack/Polarized and the other two are the sequels to .hack/Polarized. And please no hate/flame reviews calling a jerk or whatever because I destroyed The World. As for using my real name for the main character's real name, my name does mean what 'Chad' told Pluto. For the longest time I wanted to use my own name for a character's name for that very reason. In many stories, a person's name fits their characteristics and this story gave me the opportunity to do the same.
.hack/Polarized, Chase, Chad Watanabe, Aunt Miko, Unknown, Nuriko, Annrika, Piotr Volk, Nikolai Shernov is copyright 2005 Chad Harger.
Dot Hack, Kite, Shugo, Aura, Zelphie and related characters is copyright Ban Dai 2001-2005.
This story is non-profit and reproduction onto a for-profit website, magazine, or any other print medium is strictly prohibited. If you want to post this on your website, please e-mail me your request and the URL of your website for validation purposes.