A Renegade of Reality

Chapter 3: Familiar Terrors

About a half an hour has passed, both Asuna and Sinon were still resting under the tree along with Kazuto asleep on Asuna's lap. The two girls were watching their friends playing and occasionally laughed at their clumsy movements. Both Klein and Agil were sitting on the grass having a casual chat while the three other girls were still having fun. Occasionally, they would see Klein spacing out in the middle of the conversation to ogle at the attractive ladies passing by, earning him a smack in the back of the head by Agil.

Things remained peaceful until a small moan caught Asuna's attention. She looked down and saw Kazuto stirring slightly in his sleep. Gently patting his chest to soothe him, Asuna felt Kazuto relaxed a little but it didn't take long until she felt his body tensed up again. His eyes were shut tight in a pained expression as the soft moans turned into louder groans.

"Kirito-kun?" Asuna called out to her lover in a soft voice. Sinon had also turned her attention to them in worry.

"What's wrong?" The girl with the pigtails asked.

"I don't know. Maybe another bad dream?" Asuna wondered as she held Kazuto close to her body and softly patted his cheek to try and wake him up. However, Asuna felt Kazuto's face was cold to the touch. The cold wasn't from the cold weather of early spring, but the cold sweat he was giving off. "Kirito-kun, wake up." Asuna called his name again, this time louder, while shaking him but the boy did not hear her. His breaths soon became ragged and his body started to tremble. Sinon became increasingly anxious and tried calling out to the boy as well. This eventually caused the others to turn towards the two girls and ran over to them.

"What's going on?" Klein asked them, noticing the struggling teen in Asuna's arm.

"We don't know. He just started acting that way." Sinon said looking up to her friends.

Just then, Kazuto started squirming in Asuna's arms trying to free himself. Asuna naturally tightened her hold on him to prevent him from hurting himself. "Kirito-kun! Wake up! Everything is alright! It's just a dream!" Asuna began shouting at her lover, desperately trying to snap him out of it. After a few calls, Kazuto's eyes suddenly shot open and froze for a moment. He panted breathlessly and more sweat rolled down his head. Slowly moving his eyes around, he realized he was lying in Asuna's arms with all his friends staring at him in worry.

"W-what happened?" He asked, holding his head. His head felt heavy and muddled, his eyes felt extremely tired. "Did something happen to me?"

"You...don't know?" Asuna lowered her head to meet his gaze. "You seemed like you were having a really bad dream. Everyone got worried and came over."

"I-I did?" Kazuto weakly lifted himself from Asuna and tried standing up despite everyone's protests. Just as he was about to take the first step, he felt his head throbbed violently. He began falling forward and Agil managed to catch him before he hit the ground. The boy opened his eyes and his body immediately tensed up.

"Hey, you okay?" The man asked Kazuto only to see him clutching his head with his pupils dilated, seemingly in a panicked state.

"A-ah...ahh..."Kazuto emitted a hoarse voice and slowly looked up to Agil who was still holding him by the shoulders. "Ah...AH!" Instead of thanking him, Kazuto let out a cracked scream and roughly shoved Agil away from him, causing himself to lose balance and fall on the grass. With fear in his eyes, Kazuto backed away from his friends and moved his arm over his shoulder as if trying to reach for something on his back. Feeling that there was nothing behind him, he backed away even more. "Don't...don't come any closer!" He screamed.

"O-onii-chan..." Suguha softly called, her eyes tearing up seeing her brother like this.

"Daddy, what's wrong? You're scaring me..." Yui flew to Kazuto's side, also having tears in her eyes. She softly touched his cold and sweaty face but Kazuto could not feel her presence at the moment as he wasn't wearing his Augma.