If I told you it was the 24th of February and I gave you time to think about what holiday we were currently observing, could I rightly say I've piqued your interest? No, no. Take your time. I promise you'll be as surprised as me.

None the wiser? Now you know how I felt when Asuka got her claws into me!

I can say this with complete and utter confidence: one thing I never expected to be doing in Aincrad was observing "National Tortilla Chip Day", of all things. Yeah, 'cause apparently that's a thing, and I feel justified not having known that. I mean, come on. It's a crunchy snack you eat at the cinema, for crying out loud! Why the hell would you need a holiday for it!?

Yet here I stood with an honest-to-goodness sombrero on my head and a bag of Elise's specially made tortilla chips in my hand. I looked like a right muppet!

"Asuka… I look a right pillock." I admitted, eye twitching.

Her eyes had gone the way they usually did when she saw something delicious, high in calories, and damaging to my wallet. Add to that the fact the virtual world was very forgiving on a lady's waistline and you arrived at a demonic combination that meant nothing but bad for me and mine.

"Dude, she has got to go."

Arashi stood at my flank. He was ever the supportive figure who never balked even when facing down a charging Minotaur with horns dropped or axe raised! Yet here, before Asuka and her amassed sombrero's and cake-shaped eyes, he looked frightened.

"... You know something? For once, you and I are in full agreement."

Asuka, though, heard nothing. She was still making a fuss of our hats, even as she adjusted the long ponchos draped over our dejected frames.

"Aww, I think you both look adorable! All you need is one of those little curved moustaches!"

"... Asuka, what the fuck have you been smoking!?"

Ah, poor Arashi. You had to love him, poor bastard. The guy was as blunt as a spoon and about as intelligent as one to boot. His mouth was like to lead him to have a severely shortened life-span, if he didn't learn to watch it. Asuka, you see, had a mean streak a mile long.

"This-" and he pointed towards the circular hat upon his head "-is not a good look for me. I look at things - go RAAAAGH! - real loud, and they run the other way. If I show up to Tank in a poncho with a bloody sombrero on my head and tortilla chips in my hand, I'll be mobbed by players and monsters alike!"

I suddenly pictured Arashi swimming in a sea of players demanding to know where he got the chips, with monsters snapping at his heels all the while, and I had to admit to some laughter.

But Asuka would have none of our antics today. This was her gig and she was running with it.

We spent the whole day - yup, the whoooooole day - down in the Town of Beginnings handing out bags of tortilla chips whilst calling everyone "hombre". When Arashi, however, said to hell with this shit in Mexican Spanish, that was when we learned to our detriment that Asuka spoke the parent tongue fluently. We also learned, to our collective fear, that she was seemingly blessed by Kayaba bloody Akihiko himself to never turn orange! When she smacked Arashi upside the head for swearing in front of children - they shouldn't even be playing the game, the little ingrates! - we never saw hide nor hair of a purple protective barrier, never mind a message prompt asking if we wanted to whisk her away to prison. She just assaulted us and nary a bleeding reprimand!

"Hax!" I called. "Hax!"

"Stop ruining tortilla day!" She called back.

Either all this was a terrible dream or we'd all gone stark-raving-mad! But suffice to say our desire to join the front-line community and catch up to those who were currently advancing us through this death game had effectively gone for a burton today. Instead, Arashi and I tried in vain to hide from a mad-woman with an unhealthy interest in tortilla chips, of all things.

I wish I was joking.

When we came across Shiro, Ryne and the twins returning to town from some errand or another, Shiro waved Asuka over.

"What did you go and do that for!?" I demanded.

"I'm sorry?"

"You will be with my boot up your ass!" Arashi bellowed. "That moody mare's gone off the deep end and what do you go and do!? 'Oh, hey, Asuka. We're over here!' You can go bite me!"

His imitation was actually rather good, I had to admit. Not that I would. I had a little thing called a survival instinct, for example.

We ran so fast Red Rum himself wouldn't have caught us on his best day! By the time we hit the forested area just outside the Town of Beginnings we thought ourselves rather safe, at least until I turned on my «Searching» Skill and my green-eyed gaze picked her out.

"That's it, I'm killing her." Arashi declared. "No more ponchos, no more sombrero's, and no more crazy people!"

"Look, you-"

"Hey, you two!" We heard a voice whisper. "Up here, quick!"

Looking up into the branches of the tree overhead we saw none other than the white-haired head of Raixas looking down on us. It was like seeing a heavenly angel, his white hair a halo of divine radiance atop his head, and for the first time ever I was happy to see the little guy! Hell, I could have kissed him. Because I knew that the little white-haired wonder had a «Cloak of Hiding»!

"Hurry up!"

We scrambled up the tree trunk as quickly as we could and nestled onto the branch beside him. Safely up beside him he shushed us both and proceeded to drape his «Cloak of Hiding» over us all. It was as if he had enveloped us in his angelic wings. Okay, I'll stop with the angelic references, I promise. We didn't speak, so I could only guess as to why Raixas was hiding out here, but I had a notion it was for similar reasons to our own. I couldn't tell you how long we sat there, the three of us in silence, but I was pretty sure all three of us were praying to any God that would listen to deliver us from the stupidity that was this day.

Next year, if I wasn't dead, the 24th of February would be a very good day to disappear for.

"Raxias, if I ever give you a hard time again, remind me of today." I said.

"Noted."

"... I'd rather we burn this from our memory, if its all the same to you two." Arashi insisted.

"... I can live with that."