Absolute Beginners
by
Deborah J. Brown

.Hack is copyrighted to Bandai Entertainment. I'm just playing in it.

Author's Note: This is an Alternate Universe fic in the sense that while I'm trying to keep as true to the original storyline as possible, I have something happen that may not be the case in the original story. I like getting reviews here, but in general all response comments will be put on my LJ. (You can find that by following my webpage link in my user information, since the Pit screws up HTML entirely.) You don't have to be a member to comment there, though I do screen all anonymous posts.

Partnership

Sora splashed his feet in the Spring of Myst, annoying the A.I. that lived there and grinning at the feel of chill liquid. "You're supposed to throw a weapon or armor in. Not yourself. Go. Away." The A.I.'s voice was a sour whine to Sora's ears.

"You're getting a personality, aren't you?" Sora answered, gazing musingly into the waters at the teardrop shaped creature. "The Old Lady doing that?" He didn't think it was Morgana, though. The program that controlled The World didn't want anyone around who might be a threat to her position. A vague memory of having broken Aura into pieces while in Skeith's wand came to him. "Aura's work?"

A moment of silence followed his question. "Don't say that name aloud!" it grumbled finally. "Do you want to make trouble for all of us? The Mistress is getting angry at everything. That kid is causing trouble all over the place." Before Sora could ask what the A.I. meant, it added, "And don't ask me. You want to know, go read the boards, if you can figure out how. Go listen in on the Meat People's conversations. Tell you what. I'll up your weapon stats for free if you get me good information."

Looking at his katar, Sora shook his head. "You're joking, right? These things are 34th level. You're just a second level Spring. Besides, you level 'em up, I lose the Death Spell. No way." There was also the fact that he'd won them in one of the hardest dungeon challenges of the time. A race to the bottom of a ten level deep dungeon, no use of healing items except those found in the dungeon and solo. The blades, named for him now, were unique in The World and valued all the more because he'd beaten his own father to the goal. He'd ended up Player Killing his old man for the first time then, when he'd simply had enough of being called a vile, unconscionable, unscrupulous cheat. Admittedly, it was an over reaction. Piros hadn't known, after all, that the character calling himself by his own son's name was really his child. The old man had always tended to over dramatize things in any case, a fact that Sora ought to have taken into account.

Still, it had been hilarious, especially listening to his father complain about the evil Sora in the game at the dinner table the next day. It had gotten even better when he'd had an opportunity to Player Kill his oldest sister some time later. Never did get her Member Address though. No matter how many times I Player Killed her. Big sis is as stubborn as the rest of us.

The A.I. coughed. "I said, I could up your armor."

"No, you can't. This field's set in the daytime. Wrong parameters for upping armor. Besides, I'm perfectly capable of finding you lot and upping my armor and weaponry as I need it. I'm staying in the lower levels for a reason, you know." It wasn't that he didn't want to be higher level. He also didn't want to be killed. At this point, unless he went out and Player Killed a few more, his safest choice was to stay in the low, easy, areas and work his way up slowly. And I can't risk Player Killing. Not unless I figure out a way to control whatever it is I did to that hacker. No. It's safer to take it slow.

The trouble was, the safest choice was also the most boring choice. When he'd been in his own body and this had been a game, Sora had gone for the most dangerous areas he could possibly handle, choosing areas far too high for his level and only lowering his expectations when he'd maxed out the amount of experience he'd gotten from the fights. It was a strategy that had served him better than some felt he had a right to. It was also a strategy he couldn't afford now. Alone, and fully expecting to remain alone, now that he'd broken with A20, death would be final. I miss her, he realized sadly.

Again the A.I. coughed. "You should pay attention," he said. "Look. The rules are the rules, yes, but I can tell you where to find a Spring that can break the rules for you. You'll have to make it through a difficult dungeon to get to that field, but…."

"Why should I?" Sora asked dryly. "I'm safe here."

"You're bored here. You've been sitting with your feet in my Spring, sighing wistfully for the last half hour, Meat People time. That's a long time for us A.I.'s, you know. You get me some really good information that I can pass on to the rest of my kind and I'll give you the keywords to the dungeon, and the codes to get through to the other side. Okay?"

Sora sighed. "Doubt I'll find anything," he argued, getting up. "But…" At least it was something to do.

.oOoOoOo.

The letters on the screen were bolded, italicized and flashing bright red. All by themselves they would have been enough to tell the reader that the one sending the message meant what he said. Combined with the enraged voice over her speakers - very quickly turned off to keep the noise from waking A20's parents - it made Sora's anger entirely too obvious.

¦ALL RIGHT, ALREADY! I HEAR YOU!¦

Typing hurriedly, A20 answered, ¦Uhm… Sora? You okay? You don't have to shout. You'll wake my parents.¦

¦Do you have any idea how annoying getting pinged ten times in a minute is?¦ Both voice and text were quieter this time. Before she could protest that he hadn't answered the first pings, he added, ¦If someone ignores you, don't you think that means they don't want to talk?¦

She sighed. ¦I was afraid of that. Look, Sora. I'm sorry. I was upset. Can we get together?¦

There was a moment of silence and A20 moved her character and camera around the Server area, hoping to spot him. She'd thought about the situation long and hard over the last two days and while she didn't understand half of what was going on, she was beginning to realize the kid was in some sort of trouble. At last the other Twin Blade responded. ¦Meet me in Delta, at the church.¦

It wasn't hard to figure out where he meant. Delta had a peculiar field that contained nothing but a walkway and single building. It was empty of monsters and treasure, but had become a favorite meeting place because of its relative safety. ¦Okay. I'll be there in a few minutes.¦

.oOoOoOo.

Sora watched from the rooftop of one of the buildings near the Chaos gate, then dropped down and leaped through after A20 had gone on her own. A moment later he was standing on the bridge leading to the church, just as A20 was entering the building. He paused, gazing around. The place hadn't changed at all since he'd visited it the last time. The memory made him wince. Fighting Krim and losing to the more experienced player. It was his first real loss in months and it still bothered him. Krim's attitude bugged him too, but he wasn't in a position to tell the man off. For one thing, as far as he knew, Krim hadn't been playing for a while now. No one seemed to even know his name, these days.

With a sigh, Sora walked up the bridge and walked through the open doors. "Okay. I'm here. What is it?"

A20 turned. "Oh, there you are. I wondered if you were going to show up." He searched out the small point of shadow that he'd come to realize was a player's camera, but it disappeared as she shifted her point of view to that of her character, allowing her to look him in the face. It was an oddly comforting gesture, though he doubted she'd done it for his peace of mind. Even if it was less annoying to talk to someone who wasn't looking over your shoulder through the third person camera. Those always made Sora feel uncomfortable, as if he was being spied on.

Moving towards Sora, A20 eyed him. "You're in some sort of trouble, aren't you?" Her voice was as mechanical as ever, giving him no clue as to what she was thinking or feeling. Not for the first time he wished she'd use a microphone, if only to let him hear the inflections in her voice. The little smilies and other emoticons she used were barely adequate to the purpose.

It occurred to Sora that he was worrying over not reading A20's reactions more because he didn't want to think about what she'd said, or what she might be planning. He'd had over a year in the Real World to learn to read the tiny nuances of character reaction during his days as a Player Killer. He really didn't need to hear her real voice to know that she was worried, tense and upset. The question was, had she been upset enough to contact the SysAdmins or was she on her own?

At last he answered, "Who? Me? In trouble? Why do you think that?"

She eyed him and he couldn't help but fidget nervously. He hated serious conversations. Okay, so his situation was serious. It didn't make him feel any better, knowing that. If anything, it made him feel worse. He fidgeted, unsure how to handle this. It was easy to tease. Easy to be the annoying gadfly. It wasn't nearly so easy to be so badly in need of help. Was this why Tsukasa made it so hard to help him? he wondered and decided that there had probably been more to it than just that.

"Item one. Your character piece doesn't act like a normal one." A20 ticked her reasons off by tapping on one of the pews behind her. "You can go places other players can't go. Can express yourself in ways other players can't. You can Player Kill, when the programmers took that ability out of the game last version."

He shrugged. "Bug in the system," he offered. "I probably lucked out."

"No. You knew you could do it. You expected it to work, even though I'd told you it wasn't possible anymore." She watched him so closely, her attention making him even more nervous. He fidgeted some more and finally was unable to stand still another minute.

.oOo.

Sora's antics forced A20 to go back to remote view so she could keep an eye on him. His movements were so quick and filled with nervous energy. He somersaulted from bench to bench, finally ending up sitting atop the chained statue at the other end of the room. With a sigh, she followed him. "Sora…"

"Ping pong. Ding dang dong." A somersault back over her.

"Sora…."

"Cymbals a pair. Cymbals a pair. The old temple monk has got no hair." Spinning on his left hand, longer locks streaming around him..

"Sora…."

"Bingly boingly bingly beep." Cartwheels ending in a spectacular leap that took him up into the rafters and landed him on the chandelier.

Annoyed, she flash mailed him, ¦WOULD YOU STAND STILL FOR A MINUTE AND TALK TO ME?¦ To her surprise, he not only halted, but fell on his backside as if the flash mail had startled him. To her annoyance he started making little whining noises about how much it hurt. "C'mon, Sora. I want to help you. Don't be difficult."

He kept whining. At last, moving her character to stand over Sora, A20 glared down at him. "Stop it. Even if you really felt that, it wasn't anywhere near as bad as getting bit by a monster." She didn't believe he was actually feeling the damage he was taking as if it were real, but she wondered if the same thing that was allowing him to do all those impossible things was giving feedback to his real body. It would explain a lot, though not why he couldn't save the game. "Are you part of some experiment?"

Red eyes blinked up at her. "Two can keep a secret if one is dead," he told her sourly, sitting up and rubbing his back. "Look. You don't need to be involved in all this. If you want to be my partner again, that's fine. I could do with more leveling up. If you want to get involved, though… It's not safe for you." He sat up, brushed himself off and started to leave.

"Wait. Look, I don't know what's going on, but if you go off like this I'm just going to ask elsewhere. Is that what you want? You don't want attention, do you?" A20 would freely admit to not understanding a lot about things but her experience with her brat brothers had taught her one thing about young boys. A skinned knee or bumped head would result in dramatic carrying on and whining. A real problem, such as being bullied, was only notable for utter silence and secrets. "Let me help you, Sora. Please."

.oOo.

Sora sighed to himself. On one hand he wanted and needed help. On the other, his previous experience with A20 made him wonder just how much she could do for him. It didn't help that she was acting like an officious big sister. Finally he looked at her. "You have to promise not to tell anyone." He longed to be looking into a human face, to see real expressions, to be able to tell - at least sort of - what someone was thinking. "I mean it," he added, when A20 seemed to be hesitating. "If you tell someone it could be really bad for me. Promise me. Please."

She hesitated only a moment longer. "All right. I promise." When he stuck his pinky out to her, though, her character stared at it, blankly. "Uhm. What?"

"You promised. Now shake on it."

"Sora."

"C'mon! You promised."

Another moment of silence. "Sora. I can't make my character do the pinky-oath. You're just going to have to trust me. How old are you, anyway?" Her tone was impossible to read and Sora grabbed her hand, pulling the pinky out and around his. "SORA!"

"Swear."

A20's voice almost managed aggravation. "I swear that I will never tell anyone what you tell me. May I break my pinky if I do." It wasn't the version his father taught him, but it would have to do. "How'd you do that, anyway?"

Now it was Sora's turn to hesitate. He started to pace, only to stop when she made a noise that the computer translated as a sharp hiss. "Sorry," he muttered, "I'm scared." He sat down, looked up at her. "A20, I'm in the game. Really in the game. I don't know how. I can't tell why but I'm inside the game and I can't get out." He looked at his hands, turned his eyes down to the marble seeming floor. "Go ahead. Laugh at me." To his surprise though, she sat her character down beside him.

"How can that be possible?"

He flung up his hands. "I don't know. I know who did it to me and I do not want her attention on me, so don't even ask her name. I know that if I get killed in here without someone to resurrect me that that'll be it.. It'll kill me. For real." Annoyed, he shrugged again. "It doesn't matter. I'll find a way out of it. I have to. If you really want to help, keep your mouth shut about the whole thing."

She nodded. "I promised, didn't I?" she reminded him and he wanted believe her. "Isn't there anything else I can do?"

The question made him fidget nervously again. At last he muttered, "I can't read the boards. See if there's anything, anything at all, about a mysterious girl." Maybe if he found Aura and fixed what Skeith had done to her, he could get her help. The Old Lady wouldn't like it, but he didn't care what she wanted. He paused, "Or anything else weird. Listen to the rumors and help me find out what's going on." Even that much was risky and he added, "Don't ask questions. That'll get Her attention. You don't want that." Once again he started to leave but she moved to stand between him and the door. "Isn't it past your bedtime?" he couldn't help asking and was startled by the memory of his sister asking him the same thing. It had been too.

"Here. I got you these." Several small statues appeared in front of him and Sora blinked, startled. Gold grunties. Before he could speak, A20 added, "They raise your hit points. Not a lot, but these are all I've won so far."

Sora couldn't help but swallow. She had to have gone after these recently, just for him, because otherwise she'd have used them for herself already. "I know," he managed to say. "Thanks." Taking the things, he warped away quickly, so that he wouldn't have to say anything else.

To Be Continued….