[modern AU]

Last time on Only Online - Reboot...

"You're our little rat." Yuuki scoffed, "Sasuke will never love you. You're just a bunch of 1's and 0's."

"Why you..."

"But he can love me. At least I'm human."

"W-wait, what are you..."

Yuuki opened the computer terminal and typed in a series of codes. She closed Sakura's application, zipped it, and attached it to an email.

Alright, Sir. I got her right here. You can have her back, my playtime is done here.

The cursor hovered over the 'send' button before she turned around, looked at Sasuke's sleeping figure, then grinned evilly, "he won't even remember her by the time he wakes up. He won't notice she's gone."

She clicked the button on the mouse and chuckled softly to herself.

"Goodbye, Sakura. Sasuke's mine."  

~~~

"Mmmf...." Sasuke rubbed his eyes as he squinted through the sunlight that streamed through his window, "morning...?"

All he heard was the chirping of the birds outside his window. He swung his legs over the side of the bed and made his way to his desktop computer. He clicked the mouse a few times before picking up his phone and checking his messages.

"There's..." He looked around, "something fishy. It's way too quiet..."

He shrugged slightly as he took his phone and stood up to leave.

"I wonder if Yuuki left."

"Sasuke?"

Sasuke peeked his head around the corner of the hallway and saw Itachi, "hey."

"Good morning....? Wow, I can't believe you're out of your room."

"Shut up." Sasuke scratched the back of his neck, "did you see anyone leave?"

"Who, Yuuki?" Itachi rose a brow, "no, I didn't."

"Huh?" He looked at him, "did she leave in the middle of the night?"

"I dunno. You tell me." Itachi rolled his eyes, "you just got ditched, one-night standee. Heh."

"I don't need that right now." Sasuke groaned as he grabbed his keys and left the house.

Wait, where am I even going?!

"Oh, good morning, Sasuke! I thought you'd never wake up."

Sasuke felt a pain in his chest as he turned and saw the very girl he was looking for coming down the sidewalk, "h-hey."

Why am I feeling this? I should be thrilled to see her. Why... Why is there still something wrong?!

"I just went out for a morning jog." Yuuki smiled, "you okay? You look sick."

"N-no, I'm fine."

"Are you sure?"

"Yeah."

"Alright, then, uh." She smiled, "want to grab a bite to eat?"

"I'm...." He studied her eyes, "I'm not hungry..."

Her smile slowly faded as his expression remained unchanged, "Sasuke?"

He peered into her eyes and grabbed her shoulders, leaning in and bringing their faces closer, so close she could feel his breath on her lips.

"S-Sasuke..." Her hands made their way to his chest as his hand cupped her face.

"Yuuki."

She stared in horror at the coldness in his tone. He wasn't there for a kiss.

"What are you wearing?"

"Wh-what?" She stared at him, "what are you talking about?"

"Your eyes." Sasuke looked at her coldly, "are you wearing contacts?"

She stepped away from him, chuckling softly, "you saw, huh?"

She removed one of the contact lenses and held it on her finger, "this computerized contact lens?"

He peered at her, "who are you?"

"S-Sasuke, let's not--"

"I'm not going to repeat myself." He didn't budge, "you can't just kid with me like that, you know."

"Heh." Yuuki smirked, "so you got me, huh? Well... It's too late."

"What do you mean?"

"I sent her away."

"Who?"

She cackled, "I never thought it'd work, but you really did! You really forgot about her!"

Sasuke's face went pale.

Crap...

"Yeah, that's right." Yuuki pulled out the thumb drive, "you looking for her? She's right here."

"S-Sakura..." Sasuke stared the hardware she held in her hand, "so, you're the one behind this? You put her into that video game?"

"Actually, I'm just a part of making it happen." Yuuki shrugged smugly, "you see, that email was meant for someone else, and you just so happened to be that lucky winner. So, we're just taking back what belongs to us."

"She doesn't belong to anyone!"

"Ooh, getting all defensive, are we?" Yuuki said with a smirk, "so what are you gonna do? Huh? Fight me for her? She's literally a computer program. Not like you could make out with her or anything."

Sasuke pursed his lips, "even then, she was once a human, and putting her into this game is completely immoral."

"So, there's no way to get her out. What'll you do? Put her back into your machine? It's either that, hand her over to us, or delete her."

"I would never."

"Well, guess your only choice is to leave her to the experts." Yuuki slipped the flash drive back into her pocket and chuckled, "sucks to suck, huh? Oh, and guess what?" She approached him and leaned her chin on his shoulder, her breath tickling his ear, "she never really liked you. I programmed her to do all that stuff. Heh. Truth hurts, doesn't it?"

Sasuke sighed with a chuckle, "sure does."

"Hm." Yuuki walked off. So, he's not going to try and stop me, huh? Pity. I thought I'd get to run today.

Sasuke watched her leave before running back into the house and up to his room. His hands shook frantically as he slid into his swivel chair and turned on his computer. His fingers fumbled in his pocket as he fished out the very thumb drive Yuuki had, "heh. She'd better be more careful if she's going to get up that close to me."

He stuck the device into his computer and opened the files, sifting through everything until he found that oh-so-familiar game file. He opened it and the moment he did, she appeared from a pile of pixels.

Sakura gasped as she came to life, "S-Sasuke?! Sasuke!!"

"Sakura, you have to hide." Sasuke looked at her, "I just got you back from Yuuki."

"I know, I know! But..." Sakura looked at him through the screen as she brought her hand up to touch the glass separating them, "listen to me. And listen close."

"What?"

"You have to delete me."

"What?! Why?!"

"Just trust me!" Sakura looked at him seriously, "I know what I'm doing!"

"Like, delete your file?"

"Yes. Then empty the trash can and make sure I'm gone."

"Why?!"

"I...." Sakura shut her eyes, "I can't let this operation go on. I'm their greatest masterpiece, and if I'm destroyed, they'll have nothing. I can't risk anything else on this. I need to end it completely."

"Yeah, but... What'll happen to you?"

"Well...." Sakura smiled sadly, "I don't really remember, but..."

"No, wait, Sakura." Sasuke gripped his desk tightly, "I can't just do that."

"You have to! Please! Do it..." Sakura pursed her lips, "listen, you have to do it for me. I don't want to cause anyone any more trouble. Just... Do it before Yuuki gets here!"

"Yuuki..." Sasuke looked down, "she told me... You were programmed to act the way you did."

"What?! That's ridiculous. Don't listen to her! She's a lying brat. This is really me, Sasuke." Sakura crossed her arms and pouted, "for Pete's sake, of course this is me!"

"Well, you're in a computer screen right now! It's kind of hard to take you seriously, you know!"

Sakura chuckled slightly, "we can't waste any more time, Sasuke. Please."

"... No."

"Then you leave me no choice." Sakura sighed, "Sasuke, it's been fun. I really hope I could see you again sometime."

"Wh-what?"

"And listen. Watching you and Yuuki last night, I was hurt. I really was." Sakura smiled as tears brimmed her eyes, "I guess it's just cuz... I love you. Maybe not the same way Yuuki does, she kinda hates you now. But... I wasn't sure if I'd ever get out of this computer. I'm just a program now. I curse those guys for what they did to me, but I also feel like if it weren't for them, I never would've met this dumb guy named Sasuke."

Sasuke stared in horror as Sakura slowly left the window and stood over the trash can, "S-Sakura..."

"So there!" Sakura chuckled, "I said it. I love you, Sasuke. There. Now if you want to do one last thing for me, make sure you clear the trash can when I'm gone. Haha, that sounds like a chore IRL, huh? Take out the trash, Sasuke. Got it? Haha, that still makes me laugh. Well, until next time."

Sasuke didn't say a word as he watched her wave goodbye to him before disappearing into millions of pixels, moving into the machine's trash can. Tears brimmed his eyes as he felt his hand move the mouse over to the icon to open it. Among the millions of other files he'd deleted a long time ago, there was a small icon of Sakura's game file, sitting and waiting to be erased for good.

"S-Sakura..." Sasuke shut his eyes as his cursor hovered over the "empty" icon, "I... I don't care if you're a computer program or a real girl, I just... I wish you could've stayed forever... I might love..."

His voice trailed off when he heard the click of his mouse, his body moving unconsciously, as the files vanished along with Sakura. For good.

____________________

"I called the police after that. Of course, Yuuki came back in the middle of the night to try to steal the drive from me, thinking I kept Sakura. Well, when she came back, the cops were waiting at my place for her. They got her and the guys working with her. Apparently, they've been trafficking off teens for this video game AI project. Pretty morbid, huh?"

"Yeah... Creepy." Naruto blinked a few times as Sasuke explained the entire story to him from Sasuke's bedroom, "so, uh, you fell in love with a computer program?"

"Sh-shut up! She wasn't a program! She was a real girl trapped in a computer!"

"Ah." Naruto rolled his eyes, "and this was a couple weeks ago, right? Why are you telling me this story now?"

It kind of slipped my mind." Sasuke chuckled weakly, "besides, I didn't think you'd believe me. "

"Well, you were right to think that. I still don't believe you." Naruto laughed just as the doorbell rang, "you might wanna get that."

"Eh. Itachi's got it."

"Sasuke?" Itachi called from the steps, "it's a guest for you."

"Hm?" Sasuke stood up from his chair and left his room, "who could that be?"

"I dunno." Naruto shrugged, "pizza guy?"

Sasuke sighed and headed down the stairs, "come on, Itachi. If it's those ninja scouts from last week, I already told them I'm not... Doing... That..."

"Hi, Sasuke! Been a while."

"N-no way..."

"So, uh." Itachi chuckled sheepishly, "I didn't know who she was, but she insisted on letting her see you."

Sasuke's legs gave out as he ran the rest of the way down the stairs and threw his arms around the girl standing right there in his front doorway, "i-it can't be... But... How?!"

"They really wiped my memory in there. But turns out, our real bodies were hooked up to neurotransmitters that put us into the program. I woke up the moment you deleted me, actually. Sorry, I kinda stole your address from your computer to find you, though. I actually live in the next city--"

She was suddenly cut off when Sasuke grabbed her shoulders and kissed her. She was taken aback at first, but then she wrapped her arms around him and kissed him back.

"Ah..." Itachi blinked uncomfortably, "alright, split it up you two. Not in my Christian household."

"Shut up, Itachi." Sasuke pulled away and smiled at Sakura, "listen, I, uh..."

"I know." Sakura grinned, "I'm a pretty loveable person, aren't I?"

Sasuke chuckled as he wrapped his arms around her again in a tight hug, "you are." 

~~~ 

Written by xX_Fang_Xx