Re-routed
Chapter One
Ulrich scanned the area in front of him. There was absolutely nothing wrong with the scene: the tower was inactive, there were no monsters, and there were no pulsations anywhere.
"Yeah Jeremie, I'm sure," he said.
Back in the lab, Jeremie placed his hand to his chin and thought. XANA wasn't in the habit of activating towers just for kicks.
"Alright then," Jeremie replied. He learned forward in his chair and started accessing the network traffic histories in the supercomputer's logs. "I'll see if XANA was accessing anything. Wait for just a minute and I'll de-virtualize you." The logs came up on the screen, and Jeremie spoke to Aelita over the communicator. "It's alright Aelita, you can come back upstairs; XANA deactivated the tower."
"Okay."
Glancing at the logs quickly, Jeremie didn't see anything interesting. No data had been sent out or received by the supercomputer in the past day, at least. The elevator came up, and Aelita stepped out of it and yawned.
"Wow, it's six in the morning already. I don't know if I'll be able to get back to sleep before it's time for class."
Jeremie smiled. "Maybe this is XANA's way of telling Odd he should be studying for his math test instead of sleeping."
"Hey Einstein, I heard that. I'll have you know I actually did study."
"Oh really?" Yumi asked. "For how long."
"Five minutes. But that still counts, right?"
"Sorry to butt in guys," Jeremie interrupted. "But I'm bringing you guys back. One moment please."
With a few keystrokes, Jeremie entered the command to return everybody to the real world. It began the process normally, but their cards disappeared from the screen halfway through the operation. The flashing red exclamation error symbol popped up on the screen, along with an error message. "Cannot read data," it said. "Abort, Retry, Fail?" it prompted.
Jeremie took in a deep breath and clenched his teeth. What was it talking about?
"Guys," he said over the communicator. There was no response. "Guys, are you there? Guys? Ulrich? Yumi? Odd?" There was still no answer. He turned his head to Aelita, who was staring at the error message with a calm but fearful gaze. Still staring at the monitor, she furrowed her brow. Jeremie turned his head back to the console and saw another message had been popped up. This time, however, it wasn't an error message.
"Missing something?" it read.
Jeremie snorted. "Real cute, XANA." He shook his head, trying to clear it. He had to keep calm; he couldn't let XANA get to him. XANA wanted him upset and confused. He knew he had to get his friends back, and fast. The only sensible way to go about it would be to try the easiest solution first, and work from there. He picked his head back up, and stared at the error message again. After closing XANA's popup message, he reached his hand out for the keyboard and hit the 'R' key to retry the materialization process.
As soon as he hit the key, he wished he hadn't. Aelita, who had been standing behind him trying to puzzle out the various processes XANA could have used to trap her friends, suddenly dropped to the ground and let out a terrible shriek of pain.
Even worse than the pain it put Aelita into was the nightmarish, inhuman scream that erupted forth from every speaker in the factory. Jeremie clamped his hands to his hears, trying to block out the deafening roar.
It only lasted for a second, but it was horrifying all the same. As quickly as it started, it ended. Aelita stood back up, panting to catch her breath. Jeremie took his hands off of his ears, and opened his eyes. There was another message up on the screen now. "Don't do that," was all it said. Still recovering from the shock, Jeremie had trouble closing the window with his shaky hand on the keyboard. He managed it though, and Aelita spoke.
"That… That felt like." She stopped. "That felt like I was being ripped apart, pulled in every direction at once."
Jeremie cocked an eyebrow. "No, not pulled in every direction." He paused, considering what this meant. He knew exactly what it meant, but the enormity if it was another matter entirely. Aelita's eyes lit up with recognition.
"XANA crossed the data circuits. He redirected their data through himself when you executed the materialization program. Trying to read the data accessed every part of the supercomputer at once, straining the hardware."
Jeremie nodded. He got out of his chair and began walking towards the elevator. "I'm going to go fix the circuits, then we can figure out how to get everyone back."
"Don't, Jeremie." Jeremie stopped, and looked at Aelita, puzzled.
"Why not?" Jeremie looked back at the console. Right now, every second counted. Without the others, there was no way Aelita could go onto Lyoko; not without her memories being taken by the Scyphozoa anyway.
"We'll need the circuits the way they are to save the others," Aelita explained.
After pausing a moment to reflect on their problem, Jeremie realized Aelita was right. As long as the circuits were crossed, there was a direct path to wherever XANA sent the data. If the circuits were to be un-crossed early, then finding the data would be like finding a needle in a hay stack.
"A direct path…" Jeremie thought. "Aelita," he said out loud.
"Yes, Jeremie?"
"I need you to operate the console. I'm going to the scanner room."
"But Jeremie," Aelita began, her concern showing plainly on her face. Even voicing her dissent, however, she realized Jeremie was right. XANA wanted Aelita on Lyoko, where the others wouldn't be around to protect her from the Scyphozoa. Jeremie was the only one of them who could go. She nodded. "Okay."
Jeremie entered the elevator, and Aelita sat down in front of the console.
"Are you ready Jeremie?" Aelita set the program to follow the circuits to wherever XANA had redirected the others.
"As ready as I'll ever be." Jeremie closed his eyes as he stepped into the scanner. He was nervous, but also resolute.
"Okay, prepare for virtualization." Aelita thought for a moment, and tapped a few more keys. "There. I'm sending you in with a copy of Ulrich's sword."
Jeremie groaned mentally. A weapon would be a good idea, but the thought of wielding one like an amateur didn't sound too enticing. However, it was still a lot better than nothing.
"Okay Aelita, it's now or never. Virtualize me and get safe. XANA's bound to come after you."
"Roger," Aelita said. She pressed Enter. "Transfer: Jeremie. Scanner: Jeremie. Virtualization."