Chapter 14- If you know where to look.

On the pitch and when training for their matches Survivors RFC played what was in front of them. They stayed focused on the tournament and their next opponents trying to hold themselves together as they took a step forward with each match training as hard as they could then executing as hard as they could.

But today's the day where Yui and I get to stretch our legs outside Carlton House just a little after a morning practice session with the team.

Off the pitch and off line that something was becoming increasingly harder to do for the four former Sword Art Online survivors for many different reasons. Although Scotland was safer territory, they were under more scrutiny too and Kirito was under more pressure for results tried to hit a moving target.

Which was why he had a look of frustration writ large across his normally calm face as he stared at the computer in the government building they were now in.

Every time I close in on untangling the code for the Emergency Tracking System whoever's holding the players changes the rules for it and the English are snapping at my heels.

Hopefully this one will be the last time and at least no-one else has been taken… yet!

He wiped a brow of sweat from across his face.

We're now having weekly video conferences with them and someone who's at the far back of the room that's giving orders keeping their face hidden but… demanding results with more than a few swearwords thrown in.

"Coming out with us Kirito?"

He turned to stare at Asuna.

"Sorry guys I'm going to have to figure out yet another twist with the Emergency Tracking System. Good luck on your research mission though you two."

Shino who was watching had an amused expression on her face even if she had a slight shake of the head.

"I've got that representative match to play in so I'll stay put. Then I'll chill with the rest of the team for the some of the placement matches. See if we can find anyone to fill our two vacant roster spots."

She looked outside.

"You should be fine though. Use… certain people around here will kill me for saying the English version of this, joshiki and don't forget the panic alarms that we've given you. You're in the main zone as it is so there shouldn't be too much of a problem Edinburgh hadn't been attacked in around six months."

Her expression turned curious.

"For what it's worth happy hunting."

Asuna and Yui walked together from Carlton House up the hill towards the Scottish Parliament. It was a nine-minute walk to the Parliament on a beautiful day.

Asuna turned to Yui

"Do you remember when we were back in Birmingham, I asked you to be prepared to do a job for me?"

Yui nodded

"Well it's time for us to time to go and do it."

Yui closed her eyes as they entered the building.

"In what way?"

Asuna nodded as they stepped towards as a terminal

" Felix has been playing the game that he usually plays when he's got a hand tied behind his back and doesn't like it. He can't tell us and it's clear that he wants to. But he's left us free to look which is in the spirit of the rules. So, now's our chance to look and look effectively."

Yui shook her head

"But how?"

"Remember when Felix came to see me last August. He also wanted to see your Grandad given his connections with RECT Progress. "

Yui nodded

"I remember, he let you know about the visit along the lines of killing two birds with one stone."

Asuna eyes narrowed.

She paused

"Hai, I remember him coming out of his meeting cackling with Shouzou which is something that my father rarely does, albeit with a somewhat chastened expression on his face. When we ate at the curry house before we just discussed life in general he'd said that he'd got what he was looking for from papa. In fact, when asked why I he was looking so chastened he looked sheepish

"Just a middle-aged Scotsman being taught a lesson or two in living up to his standards and not without reason! It'll be so great to talk about the project that's being done when it's all over!"

"In any case this is why I've been itching to check the MSPs expenses register. It'll be an accurate trail particularly as Felix being a champion of transparency treats expenses as if he's handling petrol. "

So his claims will be there….

"…But while we were in England they were geo-blocked so we couldn't access them. Besides we didn't want to draw attention to ourselves either."

Yui looked upwards as they headed towards a couple of computer terminals and Asuna took her laptop out.

"No we were warned about that by Shino, even on full diving. Thirty-minute rule came into effect. So I understand. I guess we're in the Scottish Parliament because of extra firewall protection there. Wakarimasu"

She paused

"But are you sure about doing this mama chan? Shouldn't you be talking with Aunt Suguha instead given that she offered to help you with your nightmare after our final pool stage match?"

Asuna shook her head as she powered up her laptop and connected to the internet.

"Not at this time."

Yui pressed further

"But we've got the semi-final coming up."

Asuna stood her ground a frown appearing along her face.

"I'm dealing with it Yui Chan."

Yui raised an eyebrow

"By pushing it down in your sleep, are you sure?"

The ex-virtual counsellor eyes pierced her mothers own ones.

"I hear you murmur mama-chan and I'm really, really worried about you. You think you're doing the right thing by just pushing your past down. But instead, all you're doing is putting up a barrier in your head that when it does break will just hurt you even more."

She pressed further.

"You say you've got your nightmare under control but have you? Really?"

Have I?

A pulse of doubt coursed through Asuna, posts threatening to make their way from her dream world.

I'm not there. I'm really NOT.

The posts made a tactical retreat once again.

"Yeah Yui I have…"

For now,

She patted her daughter on the shoulder.

"But I will speak to Aunt Suguha when the time is right and I'm really sorry but it isn't right yet."

Yui winced and gave a wary look at her mum.

"If you say so mum…"

She took a seat in front of a computer

"Besides you remember I can't hack into computers anymore, not that there's any need to."

Asuna nodded

"I know so we'll have to do it the old-fashioned way. Besides…"

She gave her daughter a soft smile

"Your grandmother is in absolute awe of the work that you've done for her. In fact, maybe you'll become an economist like her when you're older."

Yui grinned.

"She did say I was gifted with numbers and yeah being an economist does sound interesting…"

She paused as she flexed her hands.

"…although counselling interests me too, there's a lot to think about when it comes to that. Anyway, do you have the dates we're looking for?"

Asuna nodded

"Let's try looking for July 2028- March 2029. Between the time I met him and the time that we came to Coventry. "

She put a notebook on to the desk.

"The two other dates to keep an eye out for are when Hasketh was kidnapped and Rika followed him."

Yui flexed hands and punched in the time period then clicked the mouse.

Yui rolled her head as she saw the results.

"There are spikes in travel expenses in June, July and August. Interesting so let's break these results down claim by claim".

Sure enough as the results unfurled there was an immediate give away from the MSP for East Lothian.

Yui glanced at Asunas notes and tapped the screen.

"There's Felixs flight going from Edinburgh via Copenhagen to Tokyo. I can't find return legs though"

Asuna stared upwards remembering what Felix had told her about his travel plans.

"That would be because he paid for it out of his own pocket. Going out there was business. Exploring a bit further was pleasure for him. In fact, he wanted to see Sanga play Giravantz in Kyoto."

Yui nodded and rolled the mouse.

"Fair enough let's follow the trail further."

This time they found Felix had taken another flight going direct from Edinburgh on a direct route to Narita in January 2029 returning seven days later. Something to cause Yui to tap the keyboard again.

"That's four months before the disappearances started."

Asuna suppressed a laugh.

"Hai and believe it or not I remember that flight! We couldn't meet each other that time but Felix teased us with a TikTok style video of him running on a treadmill while he was on it with that wonderful song by The Proclaimers, ' I'm Gonna Be 500 miles'."

Yui eyes widened.

"Is that the song that Papa-Chan cringes at every time he hears it being played?"

Asuna raised her eyebrows.

"Hai that was an infamous moment in Aincrad, when my team led by Muldar serenaded us with it after we'd come back from our virtual wedding. Kir-"

Yui tapped the screen

"Hang on there's more mum! Felix travelled from Dunbar to Leith in Edinburgh and back four times the week before Hasketh disappeared!"

Asuna held her daughter's shoulder.

That can only be because...

"It's where Ymirs offices are. We were supposed to be based there but the decision was made at the last minute to keep us on Scottish Government grounds because the English intervened."

Yui scanned the pages further, blinking.

"Exactly and he's also been to Birmingham too, both by train and by plane. In fact he'd just come back from Coventry itself when he called us to come and help. "

Asuna put a finger to a lip and looked upwards

"So aside from his visits to Japan, Felix's been doing a lot of shuttling around England and Scotland. For shuttle talks?"

Yui rolled her eyes

"Hai, or to arrange them, which must have been why he wanted to see Grandad."

Just then Asunas phone vibrated with an e-mail message from Elaine.

"Hi Asuna, Sorry for not doing that errand you asked me to do earlier. Things have been really busy at the university. I'm rather surprised that you don't know about Yoshida though as he's one of yours! He's also got form in these parts given that he was the…"

Asuna stood bolt upright and snapped her fingers causing Yui to turn away with a wary bordering on irritated expression at her mother.

"What is it mum?"

Asuna showed the phone to her daughter and Yui read over her Aunts message.

"Something I should have expected but…"

Hang on… what's that?

Asuna's attention was drawn to a group of pictures. One of them was of group of people in smart casual clothes looking tired but with relieved expressions on their faces with their names around its frame.

"Hikkurikaeru, I can't believe we passed this on our way in without even noticing it!"

Taking a deep breath Yui squeezed her mother's hand reading the pictures label.

"That's a picture of the joint WHO-ITU Unital Ring Crisis Co Ordination Team. So why so surprised Mum? You told me that it was Scotlands earliest finest hour as a newly independent country!"

Asuna glanced at Yui an amused explanation on her face.

"Because, believe it or not, I've never ever seen this group of people all together before!"

Asuna turned back to the photo.

These were the people who co-ordinated a global support network outside for us while we were trapped inside Unital Ring. Quite a few Sword Art Online survivors in that group who went and did interesting things after Aincrad, not just Internationals.

"Oh yeah there were a few people who couldn't come to that evaluation conference one year after the crisis ended weren't there?"

Asuna nodded as she focused.

Felix is there. In fact, he was one of the first people to raise the alarm after hearing about concerns from a constituent of his who had seen things happen. In fact, someone from the Philippines who I think was part of MMO Today. He helped advise on loo- no assisting people with multiple health conditions who had been trapped there. I think his name was…

Never mind let's see who else is here.

Asuna continued to stare at the picture seeing Yulier in it.

She was called in by our government to provide her expertise along with Koharu who's next to her. From what we've heard the work that group did to help us on the outside is literally a whole story in itself!

"There were so many people there. Weren't there mum?"

Asuna nodded

"Yeah there were…"

Standing slightly further away from the rest of the group was a woman wearing an English and Welsh lapel.

Asuna clicked her fingers staring at the label just below the picture.

"And I've seen you before Aaloka Gupta. Maybe not offline…"

But definitely online right back in Aincrad.

In a second she was back on that floor seeing Muldar and Piranha have their little argument, seeing Yulier have a word with the brash ALF member.

Finally, this makes sense now, more or less!

Yui's staring at me though.

"So now what mum. Who do we talk to?"

She pressed further

"What difference does us finding out all of what's going on actually make for us?"

Good point we know what they're doing. But who's trying to stop them?

Someone with a lot of resources, a lot of power and a lot of high stakes in keeping either the status quo on the Isles… or worse! Just as with whoever's twisting and turning the Emergency Tracking System and brought Sugou in.

Her hands shook as something pressed upon her shoulders. In broad daylight.

This is what Shino and Alice warned me about!

And does it bring an end to do this any closer? We've still got a semi-final to play out. Maybe a final too with things still in the balance.

"We'll deal with the semis first and then we'll confront Felix."

Yui gave her mother another wary look murmuring something along the lines of "…have just dragged her into a call with Aunt Suguha."

Should really apolo-

Just then Kirito called.

"How's your research trip going?"

Asuna took a deep breath

"Well enough, we've got a lot to talk about"

Kirito's voice was also positive. But it contained an edge to it.

"That'll have to wait, we've managed to untangle the algorithm for the ETS and there's a signal close by you. Police including Shino are on their way there now."

A/N What a year it's been whether politically or personally and 2021 promises to be no different. Thanks for your encouragement and patience with these intermittent updates. More to come to next year although I'm doing consultancy work outside of my now part time day job so we'll have to see how things go for the first four months of it. In any case I hope you had good winter festivals (whether Christmas or otherwise) and Happy New Year!