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But I suppose, since it's not a double post anymore I can post my other one.
Title: The Spriggan and Titania
Authoress: Neph Champion
Summary: Oberon is not who he says he is. And Kirito and Asuna find themselves once again trapped in a game when the Spriggan completes an unknown quest.
Disclaimer: I don't own SAO.
Pairing: Kirito/Asuna
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Cardinal ran down a majestic hallway, panic in her eyes as she searched for her parents and younger sisters, "Mother!" she called, "Father! Yui! Strea!" where were they all? Against her better judgement, Cardinal found herself slowing. She licked her lip, panting as she slowly looked around. The hallway was completely deserted. "Where is everyone?"
Cardinal would be kicking herself later, for not paying attention the way her father had taught her to. Cardinal never noticed the ominous shadow creeping up on where she was standing. She gasped as she was hit hard from behind, her head snapping forward as the back of her neck, that nerve, was hit. Cardinal had no time to wonder what was going on as she blacked out.
What seemed like several hours later, Cardinal regained consciousness in a strange room with no doors or windows. "Where am I?" she wondered, looking around shaking her head to clear the last of the fuzziness in her mind. There was a keyboard and a holographic monitor, much like the one her father used to keep tabs on Arrun and the other capitals. What was she doing here? How did she get here? And,
where was here?
She walked over and sat down when a chair appeared behind her. Cardinal's fingers began to fly over the keys as she investigated the terminal. What she found was surprising, "This, this is a copy of Alfhiem." She slowly realized. "I need to find mother in this mess if I can."
The first name she looked for was the one that her father used as a pet name for her mother. Cardinal couldn't find it. Next she looked for the name her mother used publicly: Titania. "Mother's in the Floating City." She breathed, bringing up an image.
She even looked like her normal self, other than those delicate wings that didn't look like they'd support a pixy much less her mother. That and her mother would normally never be caught in a dress like that one, no matter how pretty. Cardinal sighed, her eyes narrowing in anger when she saw that the cage she and Father spent time in had locked bars. "That cage isn't supposed to even have a door." So, why did it? And who was that in there with her? That wasn't her father.
Cardinal played around a little more before finding the way to listen in. Her glee turned to fear when she heard what the man was saying to her mother.
"-Titania."
Cardinal grimaced, what an oily voice. It was nothing like her father's warm baritone. She shivered as she tried playing with the angle of the video. "Please, let Mother be able to handle him while I figure out what I can do from here." She pleaded almost silently, splitting her attention so that she could look for her Father's private name.
"My name is not Titania! It's Asuna!" her snarl made Cardinal wince. Her mother was deadly when she used that tone. Even without her rapier at her side.
The Sylph just chuckled, he didn't seem to think that he was in any danger at all and Cardinal didn't feel any sympathy at all for the idiot. When her father arrived, he was dead, and that was only if her mother didn't do anything first.
No Name yet, and from her mother's reaction, Oberon wasn't her father anyway. Cardinal knew what her father looked like. Maybe he wasn't logged in or hadn't made an account yet. Cardinal was carefully setting up a program that would alert her to when her father logged on when a motion on the screen showing her mother and the Sylph with the weird wings stopped her cold.
Her hands flew from the virtual keyboard to cover her mouth. Had that creeper really just-? Cardinal felt sick to her stomach as she watched her mother, the proud and powerful Titania get molested.
Cardinal took a deep breath, "Well, if that idiot wasn't dead before he for sure is now." She didn't want to watch anymore. She turned the stream off, feeling like she was going to taste her breakfast again. Why weren't her mother's guards doing anything? She went looking for the views of the rest of the city.
As she checked each camera Cardinal's eyes got wider and wider. Where were the beautiful buildings? Where was their marble palace? Where were all the people? And last but not least: WHY WERE THERE MONSTERS?
Earth: Tokyo: Kirigaya Residence
Kirgaya Kazuto ran in the front door, barely remembering to take his shoes off before dashing to his bedroom. He sighed as he closed the door behind him, "Asuna," he closed his eyes, trying to fight back the tears.
Suguo Nobuyuki was going to
pay for this slight!
Kazuto calmed himself down as he sat in his computer chair and turned his computer on. Seeing her, his wife lying there with a NerveGear on her head was heartbreaking and he felt helpless. "I beat the game, just for her to not wake up. This has to be a sick joke."
He blinked when he saw the indicator saying he had mail. "An email?" he clicked on it, his eyes widening when he saw her blurry picture in a cage, the caption made his blood boil:
Argo found this on a game forum, Kirito, what do we do? This is Asuna. Isn't it?
Kazuto got up and left his room again, Asuna was in another game. "I have to get her out."
His sister poked her head out of the kitchen, "Onii-chan, where are you going?"
"Out. I need to follow up on the lead I just got Sugu," Kazuto turned to look at her as he pulled his winter boots back on at the front door. "I'll be back soon."
Sugu sighed, "Alright, just don't stay out too late ok?"
"I won't." he shut the door behind him and reached for his bike. He mounted it and rode off with all the speed his recovering body could give him. It was still confusing how he was able to do so much already. "It's only been two months since we Cleared SAO." He mused, sure he wasn't the only one who had recovered so rapidly but he was the only one who had recovered the most. "Why did I recover the fastest?"
It took him twenty minutes to get there. Kazuto didn't bother tying up his bike; he let it drop where he stopped as he dashed into the Dicey Café. "Agil! What is the meaning of this?" he snarled as he stalked up to the bar where the tall black man stood cleaning a glass.
Agil, Andrew Gilbert Mills, looked up sighing, "You're here early."
Kazuto glared, "I still think you're full of it when you say it gets busy here." He snapped, taking a seat on one of the stools at the bar. "Now, about that picture you sent me."
Agil sighed again, now he understood what Heathcliff had meant. He reached down behind the bar, "That's kind of complicated." He slid the game along the bar, "I found the pic on a forum for this."
Kazuto looked down at the cover, "Alf Heim?"
"Alfheim," Agil corrected, "The Land of Faeries."
"Do you know where it was taken?" Kazuto's expression had gone flat and serious. He knew that out here they weren't married, but he and Asuna considered themselves to be. "If she and the other three hundred that haven't woken are in another game."
Agil nodded, "The SAO Incident isn't over yet, and it won't be until they wake up." The man put a glass of Oolong tea in front of the seething teen. "You can't do anything until you get into the game, Kirito-san. As much as I hate to say it, Asuna-san isn't going anywhere. Now calm down and drink your tea while it's hot."
Kazuto glared up at the man again before picking up the mug and taking a long sip, "You said Argo found it?"
Agil nodded, "She told me where to look. She wanted to send you the screen shot right away but I told her not to. I'd do so after verifying it myself."
"So it's real then." Kazuto frowned, "Does anyone else know?"
"Everyone else has already seen it," Agil confirmed, "We all have the game." He gestured to the copy in Kazuto's hands, "That one's for you."
Kazuto chuckled, smirking, "You all know me way too well." He sipped at his tea. "We will get her back."
Agil covered a snort; the Kirito-sama he knew was back, "Of course, Commander." Kirito may not have been as charismatic as Heathcliff but he hadn't needed to be. Agil was still amazed that the young man in front of him had been a Solo Player for as long as he had.
Kazuto put the game in his backpack, "Will I see everyone else when I log in?"
Agil smirked, "Knowing some of them, they are already in there waiting."
"Then I'd best not let them wait too much longer." Kazuto drained the last of his tea and walked out.
Agil picked up the mug, "Kathy, now do you see what Heathcliff-sama was saying about Kirito maybe being?"
Kathy poked her head out of the kitchen, "Yes, and I sincerely hope that he is right." She took the mug and saucer from her husband, "I just hope we can save Titania-sama before something happens to her."
Kirigaya Residence
Kazuto didn't flinch like he normally did when the door slammed behind him, "I'm back."
"Onii-chan, do you want lunch?"
"No, I'm going to be busy for the next few hours Sugu."
Sugu pouted as she watched him hurry up the stairs to his room, "Onii-chan only ever got this way about
her."
Suguha sighed, "It was always Asuna this and Asuna that…" And then they had both gone missing. That damned game!
Kazuto paid his sister no mind as he traveled to his room on autopilot. He dropped his backpack on his bed and pulled his NervGear out of the closet. "One more time," he muttered, opening the case and pulling out the Alfheim cartridge.
He discarded the Sword Art Online cartridge and threw it away, since it was now useless and inserted the Alfheim Online cartridge. Kazuto steeled himself as he slid the helmet on his head and lay down on the bed. 14:30 he took a deep breath, "Link Start!"
Yggdrasil: Control Room
Cardinal jolted as she received the alert, someone new had just logged on! She opened a window and grinned when she saw the user name: Kirito. She shut off the randomizer and built his avatar herself. She knew that voice well.
She spiked his dark Spriggan hair and made his bangs just slightly windswept. Next she checked his stats. "I can't let these stats be reset," His Duel-Wielding would be corrupted in the game, but that would not matter in the end.
His items were already lost; there wasn't anything she could do about that.
Another window caught Cardinal's attention, her amber eyes widened, "Aunt Leafa?" the Sylph was in trouble. Cardinal grit her teeth, "Not on my watch."
She went back to the screen showing her the new player. Cardinal quickly overwrote the code where he would be landing. "Now, let's see what happens."
Forbidden Forest: Near Sylph Territory
Kirito smiled as he watched Muscika the Spriggan Capitol get closer under him. He'd forgotten just how much fun freefalling was. That was before everything around him froze. "What?"
Kirito curled into a ball as he fell into the forest that was now underneath him and spun, somehow coming to a soft landing on his feet. "What the hell was that?" he wondered. Then he shook his head and took a deep breath, "Ok, open menu and check if I can get out or not first…"
Kirito brought his left hand up and swiped down. No menu came up, for a second, Kirito panicked, before trying his other hand. Kirito slumped in relief when it was revealed that the hands had merely been switched. He navigated the menu and let out a breath that he didn't even know he'd been holding when he saw the option to log out.
Kirito pressed it, grinning when it asked if he really wanted to log out. He pressed 'no' then went to look at his new character's parameters. The numbers were familiar and it took him a moment to figure out why. "These are the stats I had in SAO." His data had transferred? Well, that meant that the next logical thing to do was to check his items and inventory. Ok, so Duel-Wielding had disappeared, he could probably still use it, but he'd have to get his hands on a second sword first.
His items and inventory however, weren't salvageable. Kirito sighed, before remembering something, "Yui, please be here." Yes! She was!
In fact, Yui was the only 'thing' in his inventory that wasn't a corrupt mess. He pulled Yui's Heart out and activated her program. When she appeared, he noticed that his daughter looked slightly different, but he ignored it, for the moment. "Yui?"
Yui blinked, her eyes widening slightly when she saw his face, "Papa?"
Kirito nodded, "Yes, it's me."
Yui threw herself into her father's arm, "I missed you Papa."
Kirito wrapped his arms around the small girl in response, "And I missed you, but Yui," he bit the inside of his lip, "Mama hasn't woken up yet."
Yui's eyes widened as tears began to bead in their corners. "Mama, never woke from SAO?"
Kirito shook his head, pulling his daughter closer. There wasn't anything they could do about that, but it shouldn't be too hard to find her here, in this game.
Somewhere on the other side of the mountains between Arrun and the Ancient Forest
A Cait Syth looked up from her hunt, her ears twitching. "Fang," she called her familiar back and a purple Feathered Dragon appeared out of the canopy. "Well, this hunt was a bust," she sighed, "I'd been hoping to bring a Ragout Rabbit home for dinner."
Her bushy cat tail lashed almost angrily. "I wish I could have found that rabbit." She remembered the last time she and her sister Robin had had it.
"Kylie."
Kylie turned, her ears swiveling toward the sound, "Robin, I'm over here."
The silver haired Puca smiled as she stopped next to the Cait Syth, "Are you and Fang ready to go home?"
Kylie nodded, "How did your hunt go?" she asked, following her sister to where Robin's larger pet, a white dragon called Lily waited, tied to a tree.
"I managed to get two Silver Deer, I should be able to sell the bones for some cloth. Our cloaks are starting to look a bit ragged." Robin grimaced, her golden eyes narrowing as she untied Lily's reins. "It's been almost three years since Oberon-sama and Titania-sama disappeared. Heathcliff-sama sent word that he'd found them but…"
Kylie jumped up onto Lily's back. "Yeah, I've heard that she might be trapped at the top of Yggdrasil, in the Floating City."
Robin boosted herself up in front of Kylie, "We won't know anything until we hear from Cardinal-hime to give out that quest." She gave Lily a nudge and Lily launched herself and her riders into the air, heading back to Arrun. I'm just glad that Oberon-sama had the foresight to hide his swords."
"But they need to be retrieved before the Grand Quest can be conquered, right?" Kylie inquired.
"Yes, and we can only give that quest to one person." Robin turned her eyes to the land. "We can only hope he will show up soon."
"I know he will Big Sister," Kylie tried to reassure Robin; "We'll find him in Arrun."
Yggdrasil: Bird Cage
Asuna glared at her reflection as she watched Suguo input the combination to open the door of her cage. How dare he even hint at the idea of cheating on Kirito!
'Indulge in a little fun' Asuna snorted. As if she would even think about doing that with anyone but Kirigaya Kazuto. It may have only been a game, but Asuna already considered herself married to the boy of her dreams. There was a term for that wasn't there?
"Yes," Asuna rose from the bed gracefully, "Kirito-kun and I are in a Common Law marriage. We think of ourselves as married, we don't need any proof."
She gazed out of her prison, over the beautiful land of Alfheim. "Please, hurry, Kirito."
(End)
There, and yes, there's worldbuilding going on. Please don't mind the OCs they are there for the quest I'm planning.
