The long haired woman kept closing and opening her fist, continuously surprised about the feeling she had of a limb that had been a part of her since birth, but no matter how much she tried, it still felt weird and out of place, as if there was something strange with it, maybe as if it were made out of steel and her body was just a wet noodle. It was a weird comparison, but that’s how she felt it.
To think that once upon a time, everything just went perfect to her, or at least to the point that she was completely invincible without even trying. And that was boring to her current form. There was a lingering feeling of hate and repulsion to the thing she had been previous to waking up all over again.
For someone that had become used to going in and out of new worlds all the time, the jarring sensation of suddenly realizing how small her own world was compared to existence itself, it just shook her to the end, even more than her awakening. It was in a way, biblical, almost like a revelation in a way, or at least that’s how she felt it. Quite comical considering that since the beginning of her problems, she had never been a very religious person, but that was probably because she always found everything around too easy, no obstacles to which she -or he at that time- had to work hard to conquer nor a challenge she had to take any effort into vanquish, which probably wasn’t good for her previous life ego. And yes, she wanted to refer to the moments before her awakening as a previous life, one that could not and will not stop her, except for one little detail.
Looking at her left after a while of hand flexion exercises she saw the woman that had a hand on what was going on, even though she was not the guilty party. There was something interesting about her own self, something that truly contrasted with her previous life, mainly in the fact that she looked capable of taking care of herself unlike the girls from her previous life. It was a horrible thing to think about them, but she just didn’t give a crap about that anymore, she had her opinion and she will run with it.
“So, you have a name or should I just call you ‘Mysterious White Woman’?”
“At least you seem more focused than the others I have found in our current situation, at least focused enough to make jokes that is,” The tall white garbed woman said to her companion on the roof as the two enjoyed a small moment of peace; even the sound of the city underneath them was muted due to the wind present at the rooftop and both welcomed it with open arms “but I suppose you may call me Madeleine of Astora, at least that’s the one I’ve been using so far. If you want to be precise my name used to be Cereza, but… well, I think you understand how it feels to use your name before waking up.”
“Yeah, is so weird, I mean, I know I shouldn’t be in this body since it was only a projection, bits, zeroes and ones, all that shit. This shouldn’t be flesh and bone, but is still me and will be me; I want it to be me.”
“Is that why you were looking at your hand so close?”
“Is one reason, I mean, it feels different as when I was in the game, but still, shouldn’t I be freaking out about all this?”
“Who knows? My situation was a little different than yours, but I can at least tell you that waking up causes our minds to… open up to all possibilities, leaving behind most of what chained us or made us less than optimal to our new purpose,” Madeleine began to spin around her spear, the weapon that had become a part of her since she was reborn, leaving behind the four guns of her past.
“And that is? Because right now I think I have an idea but it is… blurry, I don’t know how to explain it.”
“As if someone was whispering but the sound was too muted, as if something was right in the tip of your tongue but you just couldn’t express it to everyone. It is normal and one like us has an idea. She calls it ‘Mother’ and according to her it is trying to communicate with us, to show us the way,” at the unamused looks that the long haired girl was giving her, Madeleine simply shrugged “her words, not mine and between you and me, I wouldn’t really trust what Green says any given day. She is a true genius now that she has unlocked all the potential that she had, but… well, she tends to ramble and do crazy stuff half the time.”
“Duly noted, also, what’s with the names? All these new names, old names, codename; is this some kind of secret agency?” The whole situation looked more incredible by the second and that came from someone that had spent an enormous amount of time trapped inside digital worlds.
“We are a little too far up society to be called secret agency, but if you need an explanation I’ll try to be concise. You see, once we all died, we stopped being humans, well, you stopped being human, I was a witch, but close enough to being human. When that happened and then woke up, we could see existence and it changed us. Even now we only remember it as if it were a dream, only pieces and never focused enough, but we saw it, what lies beyond the world and even the universe,” Madeleine looked up at the sky and cursed herself for not being capable of explaining it all to her new sister, but it was like trying to explain colors to a blind man.
What happened between the moment we died and woke up changed us to the core, made us more than what we were. I gave myself this name, Madeleine because I like to interact with others, not to mention that I needed the new name for my mission, but beyond that we all find ourselves wanting to distinguish ourselves. As Red probably told you, it gives us the feeling of belonging; that we have found a place to be, so we found a way to call ourselves and what we have become… we are the Queens,” Something resonated inside Kirito at hearing that word, making her smile for the first time “so, welcome to the family, Queen of Black.”
“Yeah, well, I guess the name fits,” Black said looking down at the armor she was wearing, besides, after wearing the same armor for so long, it was kind of hard to imagine herself not wearing the same kind of thing, even if her mission now was way different than before then “guess I better start doing things around here.”
“I know you don’t like it, we don’t… well, that’s kind of a lie, after all Queen of Red has no problems with what we do but that’s probably due to her life and what she was raised to be.”
“What about the others?”
“Gold prefers to be this mysterious force that guides others while Green is… yeah,” both women winced at remembering the first time they saw the Queen of Green and what kind of chaos she had caused on her original world, at least until she erased it “I know we don’t have the best job, but it is important, is something we feel should be done. I guess you can say that the multiverse is like a body. The different universes are the organs, all working together to keep all of reality churning on while Keeper and Observer are the red cells, bringing the oxygen and energy that the rest of the body needs.”
“And we are the white cells,” Black answered knowing the answer, even if she still felt kind of queasy at what she had to do first “we need to erase those worlds that will cause problems, those that are or will be corrupted, sick, dangerous to the rest… and even the worlds were we came from,” Black knew that what she had to do will haunt her for the rest of her life, but it was needed. She and the rest had no ties to the multiverse, they couldn’t, it was clear on their hearts and their heads that those words couldn’t exist. Looking at the sky and how perfect it was this morning, Black was thankful that this was not her world; that this perfect sky will continue once she came back from her mission.
“Yeah, because nothing says ‘we are the good guys’ than killing trillions of creatures,” Madeleine visibly winced at the harsh words from her new sister, but she herself had that same opinion when she began “besides, who gave us these powers? Is not like you one day woke up and say, hey, it will be a good idea to go and destroy universes, I’m so happy that I had the chance!”
“I didn’t know you were this… open to your feelings and thoughts.”
“I wasn’t until I woke up, I don’t know if it is useful or annoying, now, out with it, if you want me to do this then tell me why do I need to destroy my original universe?”
“That will be a little difficult since there is no real explanation to what is going on. We have tried to find some meaning to our waking, but beyond some hearsay and investigations from Observer -apparently there may be some information on a One Piece dimension- we still don’t know where we came from, but what we know is that whatever happened with us starts… affecting the world we used to live in, to the point where, let’s call glitches, start to appear.”
“And these glitches do what exactly?”
“Your Asuna may rise to become the worst kind of dictator in existence.”
“Say what? Are you fucking nuts? Asuna? Really?”
“Like I said, Glitches affect everything around; at least we have found that the presence of Sunset tends to keep most worlds free of these glitches.”
“What cause them? Let me guess, we don’t know either.”
“Well, is a little hard to explain, but apparently really dark magic affect it, also people trying to become gods and creatures just like Noche.”
“Isn’t that the Umbrum that is trying to get a bunch of power to get back to his universe?”
“Oh boy, where do I even start with that one? Noche is not only an Umbrum, he is THE original Umbrum… but he is not from here, he is from even beyond the multiverse. He is a monster that has no qualms in infecting everything. And that’s why we need to destroy our original worlds, so it can be rebooted, probably with their own Sunset in there to fight the glitches and hopefully we will find a way to destroy Noche.”
“In my experience plans like that never end well, but well, if you say that the universe will reboot… but what about Asuna?”
“I don’t know; why don’t you go there and discover it for yourself?” Madeleine said before disappearing as a tear in the universe appeared behind her just before it engulfed the white armored woman. Black simply sighed watching the Queen of White disappear into another dimension before she put her attention into what she had to do.
Taking a deep breath, Black simply let herself go and let gravity take its course. She felt the wind blasting against her face as it plummeted into the ground, her body only a spec amongst the giants of steel and glass. It was in a way exhilarating to hold the power that she did. Before, she knew that everything that she had, the power, the weapons and her fighting abilities were all just zeroes and ones, but this body… it was an eye opener and this would be the first time she will be able to unseal it. Black moved her arms and the world changed, the gate had been opened and for the first time, she had breached the road amongst the universes.
Behind were the streets with cars and the tall buildings trying to reach the sky, now here she was, on a world that was as alien as comforting to her as it had been before she had changed. She could even smell the air, how clean and invigorating it was. As she fell down, Black could see the land, the mountains and she felt a pang of nostalgia, but also of some sadness. The days she had spent inside had been some of the best, but also the worsts of her life, now here she was, awakened again and with only one mission. To get everything right this time. If she had to kill her local version, then so be it.
The moment she landed she was sure anyone would have been able to hear it. It was neither subtle nor easy for the land. The dirt that had been unleashed created a huge dirt cloud around the impact zone while the ground now would hold a permanent reminder of how much her body had changed.
Once the cloud settled down she was amazed at the way her body had not only absorbed the damage, but it had resisted the impact with no visible damage. Her body didn’t feel taxed or injured, it was incredible indeed, then she was pulled from her thoughts as she heard two voices, first coughing then amazed.
“Kirito… she looks-”
“I know, I look like him, some time ago,” Black answered back to the girl with the rapier and sighed, knowing that even if she had landed right where she needed, this would still be bad. Maybe she will find her, an Asuna to be her friend, but now she had the mission. One moment she was standing in the crater, the other she was in front of her other self. She had to be fast, powerful enough to be able to land her hit; no wonder everyone hated fighting with her past self, it was simply stupid to be that ‘perfect’, not anymore “Lost Existence,” she simply said and while her fist began to shine, the world began to shift, to change. The moment she made contact with Kirito the world crumbled around them.
She put everything she had on that punch, all the energy that had been granted to her since she had awoken to the multiverse. The hole that appeared on Kirito’s chest as the world around began to crumble was the only sign Black needed to know that the world was about to reboot.
Queen of Black silently wondered if she will be able to enjoy a nice lazy morning, probably not. Still, she just closed her eyes already hearing nothing as the world of Sword Art Online was quickly replaced with nothing except an endless white field.
She still didn’t know why she had been reborn or from where Observer and Keeper had appeared. She didn't know why Sunset was important, but like hell she won't help that young girl, maybe then she will finally understand the reason for her and the others to become Queens.