This is the new story I was talking about, The Other Sea. Now: just read people! More chapters to come very soon!
Disclaimer: This story, that story, I still don't own Code Lyoko.
Yumi was trying to walk home for lunch. Trying. William practically stalked her now and followed her home every day, trying to get her attention. "William," she growled, "if you don't leave me alone right now I swear I'll-" She was interrupted by the shrill ringing of her cell phone. It was a text from Jeremy. "CODE: XANA get 2 the factory now!"
"Sorry," she smiled at William, "Got to go!" She ran off leaving him stuttering.
"B-b-but…" He trailed off, realizing Yumi was long gone.
Odd bounced back and forth from his left to his right feet in front of Herb. "You can't catch me!" Odd said in a taunting, singsong voice.
"Oh yeah?" Herb whined, lunging towards Odd. Odd's foot swung towards the ball, sending it whizzing through the air towards the goal. It was going too far to the right and looked like it would miss completely when a head of brown hair bumped it straight past an unsuspecting Nicholas, scoring the 15th goal in a row. "Yeah," Odd shouted, overenthusiastically, "Odd the magnificent, the great scores the winning goal! The crowd goes wild! Ahhh," Ulrich just crossed his arms and sighed.
"Ya know Odd, I headed it in." Odd stopped cheering for himself and turned towards his teammate.
"You did?" he had a very puzzled look of his face.
"Yep I did good buddy." Odd scratched his head thoughtfully.
"Well, I-" He was interrupted by the shrill ringing of Ulrich's cell phone. The boys looked at it between them. It was a text from Jeremy. "CODE: XANA get 2 the factory now!" They began to run towards the forest when something much more shrill then a cell phone stopped them.
"Hey!" Sissy whined, crossing her arms and making a sad face. "Don't go! I want a rematch! And disappointing pretty girls like me is bad luck." She continued to frown at them.
"Hate to break it to you Sissy," Odd said, grinning from ear to ear, "But you trying to look upset resembles more of a…Hmm." He had to think about it while Ulrich knew right away.
"A dying cow?" Ulrich offered, smiling with Odd. If possible, Odd's grin got even bigger.
"Yep! That's it! More like a dying cow then an upset snot bag."
"Well I just-"
"Sissy," she was cut off by a cool voice, "I'll play Herb and Nicholas. 2 on 1. How does that sound? Okay, right?" Sissy looked as if someone had taised her at the same time as she stuck a fork in an electrical socket.
"Uh, well, okay then Theo. Go right ahead! I'm watching, so play fair." Ah, that Sissy that we all know and love is back. Ulrich mouthed a silent 'thank you' to Theo who just nodded and motioned for them to go. They started running into the woods towards the factory.
Aelita was tuned out. Literally. She was currently practicing with her mixing board that Odd had gotten her for her Re-Materialization Day. Luckily he had told Jeremy he was getting and Jeremy, being who he is, knew that Odd would forget to buy the power cord and he bought that for Aelita. Along with the cord, he had gotten her a pink laptop with the super scan installed. It was amazing to be able to know that there was a XANA attack at the same time as Jeremy. Even when they weren't together, which was rare, she would be on the alert and ready to head to the factory so that she could be virtualized. But right now, she was mixing with the volume all the way up, headphones on and head bopping to the music. So she didn't hear her computer beeping frantically. Theo had been watching her and all of a sudden had run out onto the soccer field when he saw something through the window. She didn't know what he had seen and, frankly, she didn't care. All that mattered was the music. Since she had the laptop with her at all times, she wasn't carrying her phone with her. Why get reminded from a phone when you had the program at your fingertips? So she didn't hear the beeping of her computer, which was increasing in urgency, and she did not hear or feel her cell phone vibrating blazing a message from Jeremy, "CODE: XANA get 2 the factory now!" And as Yumi ran away from William, as Ulrich and Odd sprinted through the forest, and as Jeremy worried about if they were all coming, Aelita just kept mixing.
"Where is Aelita?" Jeremy was pacing. "I sent her the text message and she has the super scan on her computer! What is she doing? We can't deactivate the tower without her here. If she doesn't come, XANA wins!" Jeremy continued to rant while the others looked at him, slightly amused expressions on their faces.
"Um, Jeremy?" Odd interrupted him, causing the smart boy to glare at him menacingly. "Couldn't one of us just go get Aelita?" Jeremy stopped pacing, looked at Odd and blinked three times.
"Oh! Well yeah…we should probably do that. Odd, you get her and don't put her into the scanners right away; I need to talk to her. Do you know where she is anyways?" Odd scrunched his eyebrows and ran his hands up his hair, smoothing the spike.
"Eh, probably mixing in the gym," Odd shrugged, "If she isn't on Lyoko or with you that's where she is."
"Of course! She would never hear her cell over the music. Alright, get her as fast as you can and try to find out what XANA's attack is this time."
"Yes Sergeant Einstein!" Odd said, grinning cheesily and saluting Jeremy who rolled his eyes before the purple haired boy got into the elevator with Yumi and Ulrich, who headed down to the scanner room.
"So immature…" Jeremy mumbled to himself before returning to typing away on his keyboard. A strange window with a neon yellow jellyfish on it popped onto the supercomputer screen. "Huh? What's this? Is it some sort of universe parallel to Lyoko? No its-" He gasped. The jellyfish disappeared and a box like the one for sector five appeared.
Welcome to Ocea. Land of the kandil deti neoni verdhë.
CODE: _
Jeremy blinked in surprise. This seemed to be some strange alternate Lyoko! Where did it come from? Had it been created by XANA to trap them? Or was it another one of Franz Hopper's strange-
"Hey Jer?" Ulrich interrupted him, "Are you going to send us in-I don't know- today?" Jeremy turned his attention away from the strange window and started up the virtualization process.
"Sorry Ulrich, I found something really interesting. You guys will have to check it out after we deactivate the tower. That is, if we can. If Odd doesn't get her back here then XANA will have really defeated us! Without Aelita, we can't fight back against XANA."
"You're right Jeremy," Yumi's voice came through his headset, "Where is this tower anyways?" On Lyoko she looked around the forest sector. No monsters to be seen, and no tower either.
"The tower is north-east of where you are now and there's no welcoming committee. I'll program your vehicles." A few buttons were pressed and the over bike appeared.
"Uh, Jeremy," Ulrich waited and Yumi tapped her foot impatiently, "Where's Yumi's over wing? It didn't show up on Lyoko." Just then, the light source for Lyoko, whatever it was, flickered. The virtual world went dark and just as quickly as it had vanished, the light reappeared.
"What's going on around here? The other vehicles are all bugged up and a little light on the edge of the supercomputer screen is blinking red! What does it look like on Lyoko?" Jeremy said frantically, typing and clicking, opening and closing windows, and all the while watching the strange red light that had appeared.
"Well I hate to say it but its just as bad here! Whatever distributes light to Lyoko is flickering and the forest sector is going in and out of darkness! Right now its on-no wait-dark again-light-dark-light-dark-light…" Ulrich said as the brightness switched back and forth, on to off.
"This must be XANA's attack! He isn't attacking the Earth, XANA is now attacking the inner workings of Lyoko itself!" More lights flashed, warning windows blinked, and the screen showing Yumi's bugged vehicle still blared on the computer. Ulrich and Yumi gasped and the girl let out a small squeak as the lights of Lyoko turned off and stayed that way.
"Jeremy," Yumi said, her voice shaking, "We have a serious problem." Suddenly, a bright red dot of light shot towards Ulrich and Yumi. "What is that-uh…" The light, which happened to be a laser, had hit Yumi in the chest and she crumpled to the grass.
"Yumi!" Ulrich shouted in a worried voice. The laser's light had lit up the area just long enough for him to see a block standing on the other side of the plateau. As the laser's electricity zoomed through the geisha's body, Ulrich had seen her fall limply to the ground in a heap before the blackness washed over Lyoko once more. "Jeremy," he ran over to where he thought that Yumi had hit the ground, feeling around carefully once he got close, "What happened to Yumi? Are the hits real again? Is this part of XANA's attack?" He found Yumi's hand and grasped it tightly in the dark.
"I'm really not sure Ulrich," Oh-no. If Einstein didn't know something, it was going to be a serious problem. "Your best hope would be to get rid of that block. I can't pull up Yumi's card, but I know you don't want to get hit right now! Be careful! I'll go check the super calculator." The smart boy jumped up from his seat at the computer and headed down to the room that stored the brilliant machine. "I really hope I can fix this," he said to himself as the elevator doors opened, "Really, really hope."
Back on Lyoko, Ulrich stood up, dropping Yumi's hand from his and walking slowly towards where he remembered the block being, carefully testing the ground in front of him with his saber before each one of his tentative steps. Another one of the bright red lasers shot through the darkness, illuminating the plateau and allowing Ulrich to see the block which had fired at him. He easily deflected the single laser from the block with his saber and continued to walk towards the block. Now that he knew the way, he simply stuck his saber out in front of him and waited for it to collide with the block or for the block to fire another laser. Once again, he deflected the lasers from the block. This time, there were five lasers instead of just one. With him walking towards the block directly in front of Yumi there was no chance she could get hit unless he moved out of the way. With the extended amount of light from the block's blasts he could see for much longer.
"Super sprint!" he said, charging towards the block at an incredible speed, dodging the next round of lasers that it sent at him. "Impact! Yeah!" He cried out victoriously, burying his sword into the XANA eye on the block's surface. With the block gone Ulrich once again made his way towards Yumi in the dark. Without the lasers there was no light at all, but his saber gave off a soft glow that prevented him from running into Yumi who was still lying on the grass and seemed to be unconscious. He sat back on his knees and rolled over the motionless geisha so that he could see her face.
"Oh Yumi…" he took in a sharp breath at her passive face. She looked just like she had in the light but with only the small amount given off by Ulrich's saber her face was so different. One side was light and pale with the small bit of blush per usual but the other was crisscrossed with shadows that darkened her features and made her look so much more…dead. Ulrich began to panic as he thought about all of the possibilities.
When she had been hit, it could have been a special blast that possessed her or maybe she had fallen out of one of the scanners back at the factory, unconscious and comatose.
She could even have just fallen out of the scanners with no life in her at all.
The digital envelope could have been damaged!
She could be a prisoner of XANA without knowing how or where or who or anything!
"Yumi!" Ulrich tried to calm himself down, "Yumi! Wake up…please," he shook her lightly and a black hair fell across her face, covering her mouth and causing more of her face to look dark and gone. He reached up and brushed it away, hand running across her cheek as he brought the stray hair over in an attempt to put it behind her ear when,
"Ulrich…" her eyes fluttered, finally opening, her voice scratchy and soft. Ulrich was so surprised that his hand froze in the process of brushing away her hair, his fingers just touching her cheek. As she looked up at him, he sighed in relief.
"Yumi I," tears came to his eyes and he let one of them fall to her face. It was warm and she smiled. It was a small tired smile but it was still a smile and it meant the world to him. He realized that his hand was still on her cheek and she did too. Her eyes drifted over to his fingers, gentle and kind, and she continued to smile.
"What happened to me? I remember a red light and then…" she shook her head sadly. He pulled his hand away slowly, resting it on his saber.
"The light, it was a block's laser and you just crumpled to the ground. Jeremy didn't know what was happening because he couldn't pull up your card and so I fought the block in the dark and once I killed it I came back over to you. Yumi, you don't understand, you looked so, so…" He searched for words and nearly choked when he found the one that he was looking for, "Dead. I was so scared Yumi. I though that you were gone for good or that XANA had you or-" He just sighed and Yumi continued to smile at him softly.
"But I'm just fine Ulrich. You don't need to worry anymore. When Odd and Aelita get here we'll make our way to the tower and Aelita will deactivate it. Maybe we'll even have a return to the past! But it will all be fine, I promise." She looked so sincere when she said it that he almost believed her. That she was fine, that it would all be okay, that Aelita and Odd would get here in time, even that Jeremy would fix everything and launch a return to the past. But he didn't.
"But Yumi," Ulrich said sadly, "You aren't okay at all. That hit did a lot of damage and I don't know if you can stand up on your own, let alone fight. We have to wait for Jeremy to tell us what to do and then we'll move. Until then, you're going to stay right here." She frowned at him and looked away.
"What will you do?" Her eyes were glistening, almost like she was going to cry, which he had never seen before. Yumi's lip trembled and she swallowed. Overall, she looked like a small frightened child.
"I'm staying here too." he held one of her hands in both of his, "Right here with you."
Okay that is chapter 1 and it is officially the longest one thing I'm publishing ever! It turned out to be way more romantic then I planned but hey, I can't help myself! (; See y'all later!
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