The Dream Thief Returns
Note: A sequel to Dream On. In this fan-fiction, XANA forms a new Pandora's Box and begins collecting honey energy again. XANA is more powerful than ever, but he manages to forget one small detail…the Warrior of Heart has his number.
Chapter 1—Not What it Seems
As usual, Kadic Academy students were enjoying another day of learning and enlightenment, busying themselves in work before finals would be held. Emily was just as busy as the other students, though she was one of the younger students on campus. She had decided to head to the library to begin researching for her report on ancient Greek philosophers.
Emily walked into the library and searched the computer for her topic and began gathering up her books. As soon as she found all the information she needed, she had begun sighting her references. Jeramie was sitting at a table nearby reading another issue of Scientific American.
"He should really come over to my house and ask for issues from us.
I need to tell him we subscribe to it, he'll be delighted !", she thought to herself as she got up and sat next to him. It was strange. She felt as if he wasn't even in the same room as she was. She began to become confused. Composing herself, she decided it was only mere happenstance that Jeramie was acting peculiar. He was probably engrossed with one of the fascinating articles about space exploration or the possibility of terraforming on other planets and moons in our solar system. She gently poked him in the arm to try and get his attention, but yet again, no response. She recoiled slightly and removed the book from his hands. There was a blank, stoic expression on his face, as if he had been frozen in time. Feeling rather uneasy, Emily decided to leave the library at once and return home.
Matters only became stranger when Emily returned home. Her parents seemed to be stuck in a pose as if they had been dancing. Their expressions, like Jeramie's had been earlier, were frozen, cold, distant, and void.
"Mom, dad, please. Snap out of it. This isn't funny.", she said, in a concerned tone. Neither of the parents moved from their positions and her express of distress was unheard. Becoming more agitated, she checked her parent's room and the two of them were fast asleep. What she had seen was merely a physical projection of what they had been dreaming about. She could see that they were losing energy rather quickly and she stopped fretting immediately. The culprit was XANA and she had wondered how he had become so powerful all of a sudden. There wasn't any time left to think, so she decided to go to Lyoko herself and deal with the megalomaniac virus herself.
Chapter 2—Ensuing Battle
XANA stood cockily above the Pandora's Box he had created, smiling evilly and rubbing his hands together greedily. His latest implementation of lulling everyone to sleep had worked like a charm. Over the radio waves, he had sent out a low tone that none could hear (that is unless their ears were obstructed by something). With all the people he had been watching, they wouldn't even know they were getting sleepy, but once they had, their honey energy would be drained by him.
Pandora's Box, as it was so rightfully named, was linked into the core of Lyoko, and it grew more powerful with the energy it collected. Whenever XANA needed some of the energy, he linked one of the cables into himself and the energy flowed into him. It reminded Emily of many of the "junkies" she had read so much about and could see XANA was nothing more but an addict and required human's energy to function properly. It was rueful, if not melancholy to witness. If it wasn't stopped soon, the entire world would be locked in their dreams and eventually die.
Not noticing Emily had entered Lyoko, XANA marveled at his progress and hoped the diversionary tactic of the physical projections of the dreamer's dreams would be enough for those (or in this case Emily Morales) to be fooled and eventually go through the day until they fell asleep and into the clutches of the false realm XANA had created.
"Enough ! Bring this to an end ! The people you are draining will be no good to you once they are dead !", Emily said. XANA, recognizing the voice of the Warrior of Heart, turned around and grumbled, rolling his eyes.
"Of course they will be good to me dead. When they are gone, the world will be mine to rule.", XANA said, pointing out the flaw in her observation. But XANA was still incorrect.
"There will be no one to rule. You will be a lonely king, save for your consorts, and the monsters that you have created. You will have to search for alternate sources of energy. Eventually you too will die.", Emily added. XANA almost shivered at her accuracy. He didn't care though. Either way, the earth would eventually belong to him.
"You expect me to just hand everything over to you in one fell swoop ? Dear, you're more naïve than I thought.", he said, turning around to face her. Not wanting to be unfair, he decided he would fight her alone without the use of his monsters. After all, she was only one Warrior and more likely, she would be defeated easily.
The two began to square off and spar against one another. Emily tried to hit the Box with one of her weapons but it was impenetrable. She gritted her teeth and growled slightly, becoming irritated. She didn't allow herself to become too terribly angered since that emotion would solve nothing.
"I am always one step ahead of you Warriors. It's just simple logic really.", XANA said, with a sly sneer and a toothy grin. If she didn't know any better, he would've resembled a wolf, tiger, or perhaps even a bear.
"Were you prepared for this ?", Emily said, beginning to use one of her most powerful attacks, which pushed him back quite a bit. He hit the Pandora's Box, but still nothing happened. There wasn't even a crack on it, but XANA had felt the impact. Taking a human form hadn't been all he thought it would be, and it was indubitably more painful than being in free, uninhibited form. He could've returned to his viral form, but it required a lot of thought and focus in order to that. Besides, moving around in this form gave him a new perspective and helped him understand his rivals far better.
So for the time being, he would remain in human form until it wasn't necessary.
Chapter 3—The Power of Music
As soon as XANA got back up to his feet, he caught Emily off guard with a swift attack, hitting her from all sides. Luckily, she had blocked it, so her hit points wouldn't decrease. Suddenly, she began singing and infused her staff with the power of heart. Maybe this would be the trick to cause the box to finally break. As she had thought, this was more than enough to crack the box and under pressure it broke into thousands of pieces. The cables fell by the wayside and disintegrated, and the energy flew out of the stratosphere of Lyoko never to be seen again.
XANA had been hypnotized by Emily's song, but once she had finished, he had seen what had become of Pandora's Box. She had teleported back to Earth and out of harms way. He beat his fist upon the ground and groused, grumbled and complained in a low mutter. The battle had seemed rather short, possibly one of the quickest battles he had been involved in. His entire body ached and he actually had bruises.
"A strange phenomenon, he pondered to himself as he gritted his teeth in pain. What energy he had collected was now gone. He had understood music was powerful, but he still didn't understand how "love" worked. Too exhausted to even process one more thought and feeling utterly defeated, XANA collapsed. His entourage, having seen him faint, came to his aid and moved him to his grotto where he could recuperate. Another plan would come in time, but for now, he needed to garner his strength for the next battle against the Warriors.
Chapter 4—Normal Need Not Apply
After what seemed to be a grueling yet rapid kung-fu fight against XANA, Emily had readjusted herself quite easily to the time change on earth and the surroundings. Going back and forth as much as she had between the two planes had been simple, and she didn't have any trouble adapting as usual.
It was late, and everyone was still asleep, but their thought projections were no longer there. She knew that this meant everyone was sleeping normally and that their energy levels were being restored as they dreamed. She sighed. She loathed reliving one of the episodes of The Twilight Zone, and thought she would never have to live it in her life but unfortunately, she had.
She didn't seem too rattled by it, but was glad it was all over. She was also aware that XANA would never admit defeat until he controlled everything in his realm and in Earth. But so long as there were Warriors to defend the Earth as well as Lyoko, this would never come to pass, even if XANA had grown more powerful.
She sighed in enervation as she fell upon her bed with a FWUMP. Emily had spent a rather intense time in Lyoko and the feedback of it all was coming back upon her. As soon as she had closed her eyes, she was fast asleep within sweet dreams of her own. She couldn't wait until tomorrow since it meant summer vacation was near and the Morales family would head to the beaches as they always had in years past when Emily was a baby.
When morning arrived, everyone awoke and matters had returned to at least a sense of normalcy. She could hear Nicholas somewhere banging away on his drums loudly with Yumi singing vocals and the blare of an electric guitar and funk of a keyboard. She knew the quiet wouldn't last long after all. Deep within her heart, she knew the reason behind the music: summer was coming. And that meant no more school !
Epilogue
After finals were completed and graduation had passed, Kadic would be saying goodbye to their senior students and greeting their freshmen in the year to come. Emily came to a strange realization even though she had begun packing to travel to the beach with her mother and father. Her friends were going to be seniors next year. They would be moving on while she would still be in Kadic. That didn't mean they wouldn't see her. Besides, she had made a vow with them. She would always remain close to them and part of the Lyokian Warriors until XANA was finally defeated. She would remain a Warrior no matter what, even long after XANA was gone. After all, she had been given gifts for a purpose and not using them would be prodigal.
Emily was enjoying a picnic on the beach and relaxing as the seagulls cried overhead. Some of the seagulls were amongst human beings, grabbing up pieces of leftover bread or standing on the beach staring at the ocean. As she finished her gourmet sandwich, she received a text from Jeramie on her PDA. It read,
"Greetings ! I hope all is going exceptionally. Without doubt, I know everything is well. The gang and I miss you and hope that when you return all of us could go out for a pizza and a trip to the arcade like old times. Well, I'd better be on my way. Aelita and I have a movie to see. Take care, Jer."
Emily smiled as she read the message and replied to it. In a couple of days, she would be returning and joining in a fun-filled night with her friends. For now, she relished her time on the beach, hearing the rush of the waves and the giggle of children playing in the waves as they splashed around.
When Emily returned, she asked her parents if she could go out with them to the mall and of course they accepted. They hadn't gotten around to thanking her for what she had done after she had demurely told them of her trip to Lyoko but they ordered dessert for her in order to celebrate since they thought she had deserved it.
"All by yourself, huh ? Gosh, how brave.", Naomi said, patting her young friend on the back.
"I did what I thought was necessary. I'm just pleased that we can enjoy this moment now…", Emily said before Odd whisked her away to try and best her in a game of DDR. Emily had no trouble out-dancing Odd but it was a close competition.
Though the night soon came to a close and the friends, laughing loud and long had to depart, there would be many more nights to be spent together before school started again. Granted they would all be busy in their own ways, but their friendship would never be broken. As Warriors they were like a fortress but as friends they were as invulnerable as steel.
The End