System Failure (An Adesa Fanfic) [Originally by Littlewolf65]

Chapter 4

Adam's POV
Pretty soon, all the others went home for the night to get some rest before doing the whole thing all over again tomorrow. It seemed that for every virus we defeated, another two came into existence. It was more than a little irritating, to be honest. While everyone else went home, I stayed back to help Jin pack up a few things. Just turning off computers and turning on the system that runs automatically during the night to keep Seto and Brice running and stuff like that.

"Uhhhh Jin? You there?" Seto's voice crackled through Jin's headset on the desk.

"Yeah Seto, what's up?" Jin asked, putting on his headset. I walked over to the other side of the desk and put my arms on top of the computer screen. Seto and Brice didn't normally talk while we were packing things up. They were too busy checking the systems.

"There's a virus entering the system."

Jin and I both looked at each other, confused and more than a little worried. "What do you mean 'a virus entering the system'?" I asked Seto, loud enough so that Jin's mic could pick up my voice. "Isn't that impossible?"

"It should be," came Seto's voice, also confused. "But it's somehow happened. Something's.... off."

I glanced around the room. Some of the hard drives and computers were still up and running, but none of them had the tell-tale signs of a virus attacking.

"Can you guys stop it?" Jin asked, starting to type in some code.

"If it's not already in the system, yeah," Brice said. "But this one's gone past the firewall."

"I can check it out," I suggested to Jin. "If it's only one, I can handle it. It might be safer; we don't know what this virus is capable of, and we don't want to hurt the AI's."

"Alright, but you'll be careful?"

"Of course." I tapped my mic. "Can you can hear that right?"

"Yup. When you're ready."

Making sure that I had my golden sword at my side, I pressed the purple gem on my amulet and felt my body start to dissolve. After the usual hated hurt-dissolve-bodywrappedinlead experience, I was in the mainframe of the glitches. My hand was instantly on my sword, ready to deflect any attack the virus might make. But it was all silent.

"Anything?" I heard Jin's voice say through my earpiece.

"Nothing so far," I said, reaching my hand up to my earpiece and relaxing slightly. "Can you find the virus?"

"Of course. Start looking around though, we want to get rid of this virus before it starts causing any damage."

"Got it." I started at a jog around the mainframe, my hand resting on my sword hilt. Like Sparkles Tech, the mainframe was a layer of green code over our world, with bright green orbs for computers. Many of the orbs were only dim circles; they were the computers that had been turned off so that viruses couldn't access them. I made sure that the main room was clear first before I started checking the other rooms.

"Found it!" Jin said suddenly in my ear, making me jump slightly. Honestly, it was a little unnerving, being in a mainframe without Ty like I was used to. "It's in the room two down from you. The hangout room."

"Thanks."

I snuck around to the hangout room, my hand lightly on the hilt of my sword, ready to draw at a moment's notice. I paused outside the door, carefully glancing into the room. I was probably being too cautious, but no virus had ever broken into our system before.

The virus was just standing in the room, not attacking or destroying anything, just standing there looking at the room. I frowned slightly. This was very unusual behaviour for viruses.

In one movement, I drew my sword and stepped into the room. The virus spun around and saw me, instantly backing up until its back hit the wall. It looked scared or at least wary of me, but it wasn't attacking.

"How did you get in here?" I asked.

The virus just looked at me. I took a step closer, further into the room. It instantly dissolved into red coding and dove around me and out the door. I lashed out at it with my sword but it dodged and ran down the corridor.

I growled in frustration and chased after it. I really wished that Ty was here with me. He was much better at catching worms than I was but I chased the worm regardless. It ran through the corridors, occasionally diving into offices before running straight back out. It acted as though it was confused or disoriented.

I lost sight of it as I reached the main room again. I sighed in annoyance and raised a hand to my headset.

"Jin, you there?"

"Yup, what do you need?"

"Can you find the worm for me?" I asked.

Jin whistled a little. "Yup. East side, heading away from the armoury."

I drew my sword and sprinted to my left, aiming to cut off the worm. Just as I reached the corridor, it flew past me and I chased after it. Finally, it ran into a corridor that ended in an office. I stopped at the entrance, splitting my sword into two. The worm resolidified at the end, glancing back at me, its shoulder-length red hair flicking as it did so.

Now that it finally paused, I could see that it was a female virus, which wasn't uncommon: the ratio of male viruses to female viruses was the same as humans. Her eyes were filled with red coding but I could have sworn that I saw a flash of green code just once. She had a grey shirt and shorts but no apparent weapon.

"Who are you?" I asked.

The worm didn't answer, only pushing her back further against the wall. I walked slowly towards her, making sure that I was blocking the rest of the corridor. I didn't want to have to chase her again, but she could also have a hidden weapon. If I got hurt, there was no backup.

The virus slid down the wall and pushed herself into the corner as I came closer, her eyes fixed on my sword blades. She made a small sound and hugged her knees closer to herself. I paused slightly, frowning. Viruses attacked, they didn't cower.

"Please..." the worm whispered slightly. A bit of red coding from her eye slipped out and ran down her cheek.

I couldn't help but stare at her as I realised what was happening. This virus was crying. She was scared. Of me. More red tears slipped down her face as her eyes flicked from my swords to my face. I was torn for a moment. I shouldn't be hesitating; this is a virus, and I had sworn to destroy all viruses. But she seemed so... non-virus-like.

I sighed and moulded by sword back together then sheathed it. She watched me warily as I slowly knelt down in front of her. "I'm not going to hurt you," I said truthfully. "As long as you don't run off."

Hm. Strange virus, huh?