Welcome back to another episode of: Will he own up to his mistakes, or will he use another lousy excuse?

Yeah, well this time it's because I have a new job that makes me work more hours than previously so the free time goes the bin.

And the answer is: another lousy excuse!

For real though, apology #63538 about having such a crappy upload rate. Maybe one day in the future, I'll actually develop a schedule for this. Thanks to everyone who sticks around to read these, the thought of it really keeps me going :D

Nothing else to add, so enjoy.

I DO NOT own Sword Art Online or its original characters.

Hey everyone, come to the home base in Coral Village on the 22nd floor if you're available. There's quite a special person here, especially for one of you in particular.

"Huh, someone special eh? Well, it wouldn't hurt to just walk around the corner and find out who it is before I log off. C'mon," Sinon stated as she reached out her hand to help Toran up from his sitting position. While Sinon was interested in this 'special' person, Toran didn't really have as much enthusiasm. He didn't really think it would affect him that much, but boy was he wrong.

It took them no time at all to reach the base that was just a few blocks from the pier and as Toran swung the door open, he saw someone who looked painfully familiar. Sitting on the sofa a few feet away from him was a tall, slender girl with big emerald eyes and short maroon-colored hair tied up in a ponytail. All that at first glance may have seemed pretty ordinary, but when he saw what kind of hair clip she had in her hair, it all suddenly hit him like a truck. After being momentarily speechless, he finally got the words out.

"T-TAMAKI!?" He shouted out of shock. The girl, who was just looking elsewhere, sat bolt upright and swung her head around as soon as she heard it because it was a voice that she would never mistake, even if she hadn't heard it in years. Despite this, as she stared directly into his eyes, she could hardly find the words, and tears very quickly started to fill her eyes.

"T-Tobi…?" She stuttered as she put her hand over her mouth to try and stop herself from crying but it was already too late. As she lost to her emotions, she ran over to him and tackled him over in a hug as she cried. "TOBI!" Toran himself was at an absolute loss for words. It felt like an eternity since he resigned himself to never being able to see his family again but here was his cherished older sister who was hardly acting her age, as always, and he was only barely able to contain his emotions.

"I…I can't believe it," He said as he reciprocated Tamaki's hug on the floor while she wept. Sinon was all sorts of confused and also a little bit jealous at that moment but Kirito was quick to keep her from jumping to conclusions.

"This is Tamaki, Toran's older sister in real life," He informed her as she quickly understood the intense wave of emotion. Poor girl hadn't seen her brother in almost four years so she was able to forgive her new boyfriend for showing affection for her.

"I-I-I Thought I'd n-never see you again," Tamaki cried into his arms as he caressed her head. He was able to retain a little bit of decency regarding his emotions, unlike his sister.

"I…I was sure I would never see you again either. I'm so glad I was wrong," He said lovingly as the emotions soon started to die down and Tamaki finally let go of Toran and regained her composure.

"I-I'm sorry you all had to see that. I, uh, lost my composure there," She apologized with eyes still a bit teary. Kirito made an attempt to reassure her that she had every right to show her emotions but Toran beat him to it.

"Oh whatever, you don't have to hide the fact that you're a child on the inside," Toran teased wistfully, causing Tamaki to get flustered,

"You're really gonna go there? I don't see you for nearly four years and the first thing you do is tease me? You're so mean!" Tamaki whined as she lightly hit Toran in the chest like a kid. Kirito could only assume this is the kind of relationship they used to have before Toran got stuck in SAO and it was oddly reassuring to see that kind of interaction between them.

"Ok ok, I'll stop for now," Toran said cheekily, causing Tamaki to pout. "Did you introduce yourself properly to everyone?"

"Yes, of course, what am I to you? A toddler?" Tamaki continued to pout and complain. From the side, it seemed quite difficult to believe that Tamaki was the older sibling but it seemed like that was just the kind of relationship they had.

"Alright, well now that's sorted, I want to have a briefing about something with everyone if you don't mind. Toran, you can spend some time catching up with your sis if you want, I'll explain everything to you later," Kirito informed as they all accepted in unison.

"Oh, I haven't introduced myself properly to you yet though," Tamaki remembered as she turned to face Sinon. "As you now know, I am Tobi's, or Toran's, older sister. It's nice to formally meet you," Tamaki said with a bow. Sinon saw this as the perfect opportunity to outshine her so she cleared her throat before speaking.

"Sinon's the name, it's nice to finally meet you. I'm Toran's girlfriend," Sinon greeted with pride. Tamaki very noticeably flinched upon hearing the reveal and immediately turned to Toran with a face of both surprise and disgust.

"Uh, Tobi, how much did you pay the poor girl to say that?" She scoffed, to which Toran looked taken aback.

"Ok wow, that's rude. But alas, there are no lies here. Yours truly managed to actually get someone to like them back. Yes I know, I know, please hold the applause," Toran joked as he waved to a non-existent crowd around them.

"You are such a handful, you know," Tamaki just sighed in defeat, an act that Sinon replicated.

"You can say that again," She and Tamaki shared a momentary laugh to that.

"Well, I won't keep you guys from doing stuff, I'm just…glad to know my brother is okay after all," Tamaki said with another sigh, this time of unbelievable relief.

"You sure? I'm fine with you two catching up for a while if you want to," Kirito double-checked to make sure but was met with the same answer.

"Nah, It's fine. Plus, we'll have plenty of opportunities to catch up once we get you out of here, isn't that right," She turned to Toran and gave him a thumbs-up, which Toran happily returned.

"Sounds good to me," After that, she quickly told everyone that she'll occasionally be around every now and then just to check on Toran and then left with one last goodbye. As Toran waved her off, Sinon could immediately tell that he both looked and sounded so much more chipper than before. This is not to say that he doesn't feel happy around her, but to be able to have the reassurance of his IRL family's safety had an obvious positive impact on him so she mentally thanked Tamaki for that.

"Alright, now we can begin," Kirito said as he cleared his throat. "What are all you're thoughts on making a train raid party?" He asked and looked around to see a couple of confused faces, but he quickly remedied that. "If you're not aware, a train raid party is basically a raid party for the floor bosses but it doesn't take breaks in between floors. It's not something that was common in the old SAO but it was a trend in New Aincrad in ALO. Basically, we just fight as many floor bosses as we can to get to the higher floors much quicker. What are you're thoughts?" Kirito could see that most of them were taking some time to contemplate the idea, and soon after, Silica spoke up.

"Just curious but, did anything happen that caused you to want to do something like this?" She queried, to which Kirito quickly answered.

"Yeah, I got an email from Kikuoka the other day about how the rate at which the floors are being cleared isn't really as high as they would like. Because remember, the whole goal of this mission is to get to the top and get those Medicuboid blueprints off of Kayaba," He reminded, to which some of them actually only just remembered that this was the case.

"Alright well that sounds pretty fair, but how many floors are we talking about here?" Klein asked as he used his fingers to do the math of where they were so far.

"Well, Sinon unlocked the 23rd floor earlier today. But Kikuoka informed us that they were hoping we would be on or at least close to the 30th floor by now. Not only that but on the bright side, all the bosses on the twenties floors are among the easier ones in the game so this would probably be the best time to do this," Kirito explained, and after a bit more thought and process, everyone agreed.

"Yeah, I reckon we could bang out a couple of floors if we all try our best," Toran admitted as he exercised his arms.

"As long as we're not reckless about it, that is," Lisbeth warned.

"Plus, that's not to say we can't go back to any floors we fly past afterward and check out the quests and events there either," Leafa suggested, much to everyone's agreement.

"Alright, so that's sorted then. Tomorrow at exactly noon, don't forget. We'll start out by trying five floors back to back and we'll see where we are from there, any questions?" Kirito asked but everyone seemed to be on the same page with him so he dismissed the meeting and everyone started going back to whatever they were doing. A couple of them stayed online to do some stuff and check out the new 23rd floor but most of them, including Kirito, logged off for the day.

Despite the fact that Kazuto had logged off at the same time as the others and they all woke up together, they didn't really talk much as they had pretty much said everything that was on their mind while having that meeting in Aincrad just before. They did wish each other good afternoons however and all went their separate directions.

Kazuto wandered down to the hospital's garage with Suguha in tow as they logged off together so they may as well go back home together since they live in the same house. He always kept a spare helmet in his bag just in case he needed to take someone with him somewhere so he gave Suguha that helmet while he adorned his own custom one and they went on their way.

They didn't live particularly far from the hospital but it was still a decent drive, about ten minutes or so. Conversations were also hard considering they were wearing thick helmets and the roar of the engine right next to their thighs was loud as ever so Suguha did nothing but hug Kazuto from behind the entire drive. She tried to subtly hold him in a way that had her breasts pressed against his back especially hard but he didn't seem to take any notice, much to her annoyance.

After they arrived back at their house, it was business as usual for Kazuto as he went up to his room to temporarily erase his existence from the world. Suguha meanwhile started running the water for a nice hot bath before preparing her and Kazuto's dinner while the bath filled up. It wasn't anything special tonight, just a simple spicy Karaage on salad so it took no time at all to prepare. Once that was finished, she put it in the oven to keep it warm while she had her bath which was now filled perfectly.

She closed the bathroom door behind her, removed her clothes, and entered the steaming hot bath. She let out a very audible moan as the water felt amazing and let herself fall into a state of absolute pleasure.

During this time, she looked down at her body which was half obscured by her giant breasts which she was convinced had grown even more since she last checked. A little bit of her thought maybe it was time to maybe start taking control of her chest size but then it always came back to the fact that they were the only thing that kept her from feeling inferior to the other girls, especially when it came to affection from Kazuto.

After a fair bit of time though, she started diving into thoughts about the whole government thing they were doing. She remembered how it all started with that strange letter she received one normal day from someone in a black suit and blacked-out shades. It reminded her that her adopted brother was not the same shut-in neet who wasted his days away in his room and spent more time in the virtual world than in the real world anymore.

Well, maybe there was still an element of truth to that, but he was so much more than what he used to be. He could almost be described as a secret agent of sorts considering all the constant government stuff he's been involved in.

She sometimes wondered if it was wrong for her to consider herself too far below him to be able to be a part of his life. She wondered what would have been if he had never put on that NerveGear and gotten stuck in that game for two years, would she have been closer to him? Or even further away?

After thinking about the two-year imprisonment that Kazuto went through, she then thought about Toran as he was stuck in there for almost double that time, the poor guy has been snatched away from reality ever since the original SAO started and still counting. But at least he was finally able to see his sister again, and they were just as close and friendly as they probably always have been.

She remembered back when Kazuto finally came out of SAO, he did nothing but constantly talk about some random girl called Asuna and hardly gave her the time of day, not at least until a while after. At this point, Suguha realized she had just totally lost track of time and quickly jumped out of the bath in hopes that the Kaarage hadn't been burnt to a crisp in the kitchen. After recklessly throwing on enough clothes to not be naked, she swung the door open to save the food only to find that Kazuto was just putting the finishing touches on it.

"You must've really enjoyed that bath to want to stay in there for over an hour," Kazuto laughed as he started prepping the plates. Suguha only stuttered for a reply as her face went bright red. Not only from the fact that Kazuto had just stolen her only real substitute mother role but also that he was looking at her with no pants on.

"I-I thought you were…ugh never mind," She spat embarrassingly as she bolted up the stairs to her room to finish clothing herself. When she returned to the living room, Kazuto had already put the food on the plates and was waiting for her to join him before starting. Suguha was still a little red but was able to overcome the rest of it and sat down.

"Itadakimasu!" They both said with clapped hands before digging in. Kazuto had turned the TV on while he was waiting for her and it was some sort of news channel talking about how the government was apparently almost finished building a ginormous boat of sorts that would host some of its more classified researching.

"Do you know anything about that, Kazuto?" She asked him.

"Not really. I know that Nurse Aki is related to the project and that it might have something to do with future Full Dive technology but other than that, nothing at all. Though I do hope they do some sort of public research event that I could take part in," He replied. Suguha was not surprised at all to know that he had even been told something about it. There wasn't much chit-chat between them otherwise, Kazuto was glued to the news story about that boat so there wasn't much room to talk. Suguha just went about finishing her dinner in silence then, and it wasn't until she was just about finished that he suddenly started another conversation. "Hey, Sugu?"

"Yeah, what's up?" She answered curiously. He all of a sudden seemed a little nervous or something, especially since he sighed deeply before continuing.

"There's this…decision that I'm dealing with at the moment and there's a question I need to ask you," He sort of mumbled but still audible enough for her to hear without issue. "What am I to you?" Immediately upon hearing the question, Suguha choked on her last spinach leaf and had to take a moment to heave it back out before replying.

"W-What kind of question is that!?" She somewhat yelled in reply as she coughed a few times as per the choking aftermath.

"It's just something I need to know as I'm going through a big decision at the moment," He informed, but she was quick to answer.

"I mean, y-you're my adopted older brother, what else is there to say," She confirmed as she wiped her face, which had started to go a little red again. The next words didn't help either.

"So is that everything I am to you? Just want to confirm because If that's the case then I guess that's a little less I have to worry about," He said with a relieved sigh, but Suguha just became more confused.

"Wait, hold on, can you explain what this is about first?" She demanded in confusion.

"Well, how do I put this…I don't want to keep ignoring the feelings of those around me. So I'm going to start treating everyone else as equals to Asuna if you know what I mean. I just thought I'd ask just in case, but if that's fine then I just gotta deal with the others then," He seemed to relax after saying that but in Suguha's mind, her entire mental state just exploded.

"W-W-Wait, wait, wait, wait. You're…what?" She stuttered like a broken record due to the countless amount of errors she was experiencing in her head.

"I just want to start treating all the girls who have helped me throughout my life a bit more fairly, so I'm going to have a talk with Asuna about it. That's why I just want to make sure who I need to start caring more for and whether I mean something else to you that isn't family," He explained as best he could, but there was no helping it. Sugu's brain had melted into nothing. She slammed her hands on the table.

"I…I need to…" That was all she could say before she just couldn't handle the pressure and ran as quickly as she could up to her room and slammed the door shut before locking it and curling up into a ball on her bed.

It didn't take long before Kazuto was knocking on it and asking if she was okay but she blocked it out because she couldn't take it right now. She needed to understand what her own actions just were before she did anything and she was in no state to do that, so she just blocked everything out and waited until she deemed herself capable of rational thought.

Meanwhile, Kazuto decided that he had somehow done or said something wrong and, despite Suguha not listening, said he would wait for her to come out and then apologize. It seemed like no matter what he did, he was incapable of treating everyone he cared about the way they wanted him to.

"Maybe this was all just a bad idea," He told himself. "Besides, I should really have that talk Asuna before I do anything anyway" He sighed as he went back downstairs to clean up the dinner's aftermath.

It didn't take him too long, but it would've been nice to have the help of Suguha, who remained in her room the entire time. He couldn't blame her though, he had gone too far a bit too quickly and paid the price for it.

Once the clean-up was done, he turned on the TV to see if there was anything worth watching but that amounted to nothing so he turned it off again and walked up the stairs towards his room. He briefly thought about attempting to knock on Suguha's door again but he didn't want to push any more boundaries than he already had. So, despite it still being relatively early, he went to bed and used the silence to think about different strategies for the raid tomorrow.

Did anyone else get the feeling that this chapter was very wall-of-texty? I did when i was editing it before publishing. Sorry about that if so, my way of writing consists of slamming the keyboard while being lost in my own world.

When is Kazuto gonna have that chat with Asuna man, he be taking his sweet as time :D Thanks for all the follows/favourites/reviews!

pls excuse any and all spelling/grammar mistakes, there's always that one little red line that escapes my view.