.hack/REWARD

Oye. I've been so busy with summer school, it's taking me longer to update this story. So just for future reference, expect delayed updates.

Disclaimer: I do not own .hack

CHAPTER 2: OPERATION OLD SCHOOL

-I heard of this really weird field at Lambda: Classic Two Field.

-Yeah, I found this strange monster that wouldn't die, no matter how hard I tried to hit it.

-I saw that thing! It has infinite HP!

Reading the last post on that thread, "DATA BUG" ran through Kite's head immediately. He wasn't too surprised seeing as how the past few days have been a bit strange ever since the Spring of Myst event. He sent a flash mail to everyone on his contact list but no reply. They must have all been busy. He immediately logged on and went to the chaos gate to warp to the area listed. As the three gold rings appeared, the screen became black as usual. Kite sat in his seat expecting the same old type of playing fields with chaos gates and everything. The sense of familiarity vanished as soon as the field became visible.

"HUH?" was the immediate reaction. This was not a three dimensional field, but a simple eight-bit graphic two-dimensional field. Kite examined himself to see a poorly detailed, pixilated, and somewhat cubicle version of himself. He pressed the buttons on his controller to familiarize himself with the new style of playing. His attack was just his arm holding his short sword appearing instantly in front of him. No matter which way his avatar faced, he would always see the front of it with its head turned to the side, and one new trick he could do… he could jump! (I know in the anime, characters can jump around, but I'm referring to PS2 game play).

With only two directions to go, Kite started moving to the right. The monsters were very weak as they could be killed in one hit, but the same applied to Kite's avatar. He discovered this when something hit him from behind.

"Oops. My mistake he of fair eyes. I didn't realize thou was behind me."

"Piros? What are you doing here?"

"I selected a random area and found myself in this very peculiar place. What brings ye here?"

"Actually, I came here because there may be a data bug here."

"Splendid! Another adventure! Let us march on!" Piros exclaimed.

"Wait! Piros! Ahead of you!"

"Huh? AAAAHHHHhhhhhh!" Piros had walked straight down a pit where he died and his avatar disappeared from the screen. Kite examined his status window in the lower section of the screen to see his health meter was replaced with "number of lives". It became apparent Piros just used the last of his.

Somewhere in the far background, a blocky figure was observing the twinblade.

"Boss, this is Phase 1 version 2. The red one has fallen for the bait" Skippy said, opening a window/screen to show the thread he posted.

"Excellent. Proceed as planned Skippy. And be careful not to get hit too many times. You remember what I said about his power…"

"Understood. Skippy out." Skippy cut the link between him and the gift box. He moved further down the level where he would meet with Kite.

The blue haired twinblade got through the field fine with only two lives lost, but he had eight more to go, so he wasn't worried.

"HALT!" came a voice ahead of him.

"Huh? Who's there?" the blue haired boy questioned. A cubic, blocky creature floated down in from of him. It took it's staff from it's side and pointed it at Kite.

"I am Phase 1 version 2. Skippy, the Bringer of Terror!" it said as two-dimensional lightning went off in the background.

"…..ppfft……pfft…." Skippy looked at Kite in question. "Pffffttt….HAHHAAAAAHAAAA!" Skippy jumped. Kite was laughing at him!

"Wha? You1 What's so funny! Answer me now!"

" 'Skippy'?… 'Bringer of Terror'?…HAHAHAAAA!" Kite's pixilated avatar fell backwards.

'It was only a matter of time before someone would start laughing at me…' Skippy thought. "Rrrr… Stop laughing! Prepare to die!" The phase threw his staff at Kite, making him disappear and regenerating back in the center of the section of the level with one life less.

The two battled, 'instantly appearing' short swords versus a large pixilated staff. Skippy was very cautious not to get hit very much fearing the twinblade's Data Drain.

"You cannot defeat me! Prepare for my ultimate attack! RRAAH!" Skippy back flipped, getting into position to attack, but wasn't paying a lot of attention to the land around him as he fell down one of the pits and regenerated in the middle of the screen. As his figure came into view, a shattering glass sound was heard. "Oh crud, what did I do?"

"Heh….DATA…" Kite's bracelet appeared. Even it was cubicle and the sounds it would normally make were replaced with old sound effects from much earlier game systems "DRAIN!" the tendrils of data that would appear were replaced with streams of multi colored pixels, all flowing toward Skippy. As they came in contact, a large red circle expanding in size appeared where Skippy was. The phase had disappeared. At that moment, the field began to static. Everything that was there left its two dimensional state and reverted back to its 3-D self.

"Fool! What were you doing!" the gift box yelled.

"I'm sorry sure, I'll try harder next time." Skippy said, reduced to but a simple cube.

"There won't be a next time Skippy. Because you're deleted!" The gift box pointed one of its ribbons at the phase and it disappeared.

"Well, so much for him. Incubus!" A window with the second phase appeared in front of box. "Is Operation Munch ready?"

"Sir, I'm making final preparations, but other than that, I should have everything ready by tomorrow."

"TOMORROW! I want it done now!"

"Sir…" Fidgeter came up on a second window "If I may, I think it would be wise to continue this process tomorrow. Trying to modify the landscaping and alter gameplay is a very long process for us. Besides, doing it too quickly may corrupt the system which means we won't be able to continue this plan of yours."

"Oh fine. All phases, take the rest of the day off!" Box said, closing all links to the phases.

Kite returned to his desktop to find he had two e-mails in his inbox.

Dear 'The World' User,

As of today, there has been an abnormal error in our system coding in one of our fields. We apologize to anyone who may have experienced problems during this time. The error is now gone, but there may still be faults in the programming. We should be able to fix the bug tomorrow. Thank you

-The World Administrators

The second one was from a fellow twinblade.

H3110.

I f0und 4 v3ry in73r357ing 4r34 7h3 07h3r d4y. M337 m3 47 D3174: Circu14r M4z3 Run. S33 y0u 7h3n.

-50r4

With nothing else to do, Kite turned off his PC and turned in for the night.

"Well? Is it done?" a giant wrapped figure asked at three o' clock in the morning.

"Yes sir. I have completed the layout of the field, and I put in the program you asked." Incubus replied.

"Excellent. Now, go help the other phases. I need this plan to be perfect and that means I need these levels ready at the exact time I've planned!"

"Okay, but didn't you tell us to take the rest of the day off? And we're kinda tired, so…"

"When I said the rest of the day, I mean all of that SPECIFIC day. And once it's midnight hour, it's already 'tomorrow'. Get it? Got it? Good." Gift box said as it closed the link between him and phase 2. "Soon, all will be complete and I shall have total dominance. Soon, this will no longer be some World online… but… it shall…."

"Excuse me sir, but you're talking to yourself again." Incubus said, appearing in a new window.

"Wha? Incu… GAH! When will you guys stop popping in like that!" Box closed the window again and left the room.

NEXT CHAPTER: OPERATION MUNCH

Playing the 'World' two dimensionally is pretty strange. But what happens when it appears in more and more fields? And when Kite is separated from his bracelet, how is he going to get it back if it's scattered all over the field? Find out next time. Until then, see ya.