The sun was a clear peach hitting the tops and sides of various buildings in the suburb of Boulogne-Billancourt in Paris, France.
In the distance, Kadic Academy lays with it's green and brown hues which reflected themselves from the sun, which gave the school it's warm aura.
Then, a fairly subtle school bell rings, with many students coming in and out of the many classrooms of the school, especially five students in particular.
These students are the former Lyoko Warriors, who have risked their lives every day to save both their world and Lyoko from the tyranny of XANA. But now, Jeremy Belpois, Aelita Stones, Odd Della-Robia, Ulrich Stern, and Yumi Ishiyama are now just your average Kadic students, with no longer nothing to hide.
"But guys," Odd persisted. "it's not my fault I keep sleeping in class! You can't blame me if class starts too early!"
"Well maybe if you hadn't been trying to beat the 32nd level in Galactic Warriors 5, then you wouldn't be sleeping so much." Ulrich retorted to his quite unusual roommate and friend.
"Hey, I was this close to getting it!" Odd made a pinching gesture to emphasize how close he was to the end.
Ever since the destruction of XANA just a few weeks ago, the group has experience some changes. For one thing, Jeremy isn't as obsessed with computers and technology like before, but the interest in them is still great. Along with this, Ulrich has been concentrating more in his classes, and his grades are starting to improve little by little.
As the group headed for the cafeteria, they noticed William in the distance nearby. As William saw the group, he gave out a friendly wave, with the others giving him a wave back, with kind smiles on their faces. The group and William haven't actually talked to each other ever since the XANA possesion incident in Sector 5, but when they did come across each other, it was a relatively peaceful atmosphere between him and the group, but not when both Yumi and Ulrich were alone with him, then things started getting more heated and tense, due to the fact that William and Ulrich are both seeking the same person: Yumi.
After XANA was destroyed, Aelita now suddenly started to have on and off nightmares. Not just nightmares about her mother Antea, but XANA as well.
"Relax, Aelita." Jeremy tried to comfort his pink haired friend. "XANA is long gone, so there's nothing to be worried about."
"I wish I could say that was true, Jeremy," Aelita said in a concerned tone. "But for some reason, I always think he's going to reappear again."
"Hey, as long as we're around, we won't let anything get to you Aelita." Yumi said to Aelita.
Aelita smiled warmly at the thought of her friends always being there for her. Yeah, maybe they're right. Maybe XANA really is gone for good after all. XANA couldn't possibly be alive with the plan Jeremy hatched. I'm glad to have amazing friends, especially Jeremy. Aelita then felt herself turn pink and looked down a bit.
Just as the group was entering the cafeteria, Jim Morales stopped the group with an envelope in his hand.
Jim Morales has proven himself useful to the now former Lyoko Warriors from time to time, if not, most of the time. The Lyoko Warriors even considered making Jim a warrior himself, but they were still somewhat unsure with the choice.
"Stern," Jim began, putting a hand on his shoulder. "I wish to speak to you, alone."
His friends looked at him from behind in confusion. "You guys go on ahead." Ulrich looked from behind them and gave them the okay to do so.
"Okay," said Odd. "but I call dibs on your portion."
Jim and Ulrich waited a while for the group to be gone, then the two spoke.
"So, umm, Jim," Ulrich began to question awkwardly. "what did you want to talk to me about?"
Jim had begun to look over his left shoulder, then to his right. He then pulled out the envelope and handed it to Ulrich.
"Here," he said as Ulrich took the envelope. "Principal Delmas told me to give this to you. He said something about it being from a relative. Don't worry kid, if it's family problems, don't sweat it. I've gone through the same thing as well, but I'd rather not talk about it."
Ulrich had a slight look of confusion on his face to Jim's opening up to this matter.
"But, ahem, you didn't hear it from me, kid. You should probably be getting back to your friends now." With him done talking, Jim left Ulrich alone to go to his friends in the cafeteria.
Wait, a relative? I thought both my parents were only children? My grandparents, maybe, but still….. Ulrich thought.
With his thoughts placed to the side for the moment, Ulrich took a seat beside Odd in the small cafeteria room.
"Hey, what did Jim want from you, Ulrich?" Yumi asked her returned friend.
"Oh, it's nothing. I'll deal with it later." After the brief comment, Ulrich and the others went on with their day as usual.
LATER:
Later in the day, Ulrich had managed to make time to read the letter that was given to him earlier that day:
Dear Ulrich Stern,
You've probably never heard of my existence ever since you were very small. I'm Gregory Stern, you're father Roderick's younger brother. It's been a long time since we've had any sort of contact with each other. The reason why I'm writing to you is because I've decided to finally try to settle the many disputes with your father. We haven't spoken to each other in almost twelve years, so I figured that it's time to break the silence. Along with this, my daughter Solana will be attending Kadic for the time that we'll be in France. This is her first time in an actual school, so please try to make her feel welcome during her stay. I can already tell that you two will make good friends. Solana should be here sometime this upcoming Saturday. There should also be a picture of her along with this letter. I'm sorry that I'm not able to give you more valid information, but probably it will all be explained later in the future.
Sincerely, Gregory Hoffman Stern.
"Hmm," Ulrich mumbled to himself. Even though in his letter Gregory sounded sincere, something in Ulrich's gut sensed that he's not the guy he says he is. In the letter he may seem nice, but he may just be a carbon copy of his father. "That's the last thing I need." Ulrich said to himself at the thought or this. So this guy drops the bomb that he's my uncle and his daughter will be here at Kadic? Why wasn't I told of these guys sooner?
Ulrich then decided to take out the photograph that was inside the envelope along with the letter. The picture showed a girl around his own age, possibly younger. She had long chocolate brown hair put to the side with deep sky blue strieks, which were the same color as her eyes, for some odd reason, were pupiless.
"Well, we'll see once she gets here, now won't we?" Ulrich said to himself to resolve the question of what she might be like while placing the picture back inside the envelope.
"Who are you talking to?"
Ulrich, shocked, turned around to find Aelita next to him, completely forgetting that he had lagged behind his friends on the way to the wreck room.
"Oh, Aelita." Ulrich said.
"What's that you're holding?" Aelita asked curiously, pointing to the opened envelope with some of the letter and photo sticking out of it. No, I can't possibly tell them about her, can I? "Umm, it's nothing, Aelita. Really."
When the two managed to catch up with their friends in the wreck room, they both took their regular seats at the same spot with the red couch and the two red footstools. Yumi, Odd, and Jeremy were on the couch while Ulrich and Aelita decided to sit on the footstools.
"So Ulrich, what did Jim want to talk to you about?" Odd asked.
"It's nothing, really." Ulrich defended calmly while clutching the envelope in his hand while putting it back in his bag.
"Oh, come on Ulrich!" Odd begged. "We're you're friends. You can tell us!"
"Odd, could you just lay off just this one time?" Jeremy tried to coax Odd into having some sort of common sense in the situation.
"Jeremy's right, Odd." Yumi agreed. "If he doesn't want to talk, then he doesn't want to talk."
"Geez, I'm sorry," Odd apologized. "I just wanted to know what Jim wanted from him, that's all. No need to get all defensive over it."
After a brief stare at Odd, Yumi then turned to Ulrich, making sure and sincere eye contact in the process. "Look Ulrich, it's okay if you want to keep it to yourself. If it's family problems, then you don't have to tell us. And you do realize that you can talk to us about whatever Jim wanted to say to you, right? We're your friends, Ulrich. So you shouldn't have to hide anything from us."
Ulrich sat and thought about what Yumi had just said. Maybe she's right. I shouldn't be able to hold everything in all at once. It's not healthy, and besides, these guys are my friends. I trust them, but sometimes I have to keep things from them. Maybe this time I can try to change that for the better.
Ulrich then proceded to take out both the letter and the photo from the envelope and placed them both on the small table in the middle of the five person group. Ulrich took in a sigh and started to explain his current explanation. "Apparently, I have an uncle whom I've never heard of in my life and now the cousin I never realized I had is coming here to Kadic."
Jeremy had the letter in his hands while adjusting his glasses to read it. After he was done reading it, he handed the letter off to Yumi and Aelita. "This Gregory guy seems like he knows what he's talking about. And how he stated that this Solana had never been to school before implies that she has been home schooled." Jeremy observed from the information in the letter.
Odd then decided to take the photo and view the brown and blue haired girl for himself. Hey, she's actually pretty cute. Odd thought to himself, thinking about a completely separate image of what Solana might look like. But wait, this is Ulrich's long lost cousin I'm thinking about here. Wouldn't it be wrong to be interested in your best bud's cousin? He'd probably kick my butt if he found out I was into her like this. Even though he had gone out with almost every girl in Kadic, this was an entirely different situation. So instead of blabbing out his opinion on the first glance, he decided to keep quiet for the moment and tell of his thoughts when he actually got to see her in person. He then decided to exchange the photo with the letter so that Yumi and Aelita could both look at it.
"Well, that is a possibility." Aelita responded to Jeremy's hypothesis.
"She kind of looks like you, Ulrich." Yumi stated, meaning the 'kind of' part, because Solana's hair was parted the opposite direction of Ulrich's, and, even though she had the same identical brown hair as him, had blue strieks, blue eyes, and lighter skin. She then handed the photo back to Ulrich so that he could see the resemblance for himself. Speaking of which, the resemblance was faint, but it was still there.
"Yeah, let's just hope that she's not a superficial clone of my dad." Ulrich mumbled.
"Hey, if Solana is anything like this Greg guy says, then maybe you two will get along better than expected." Jeremy said while placing a hand on Ulrich's shoulder.
Ulrich smiled, giving him some peace of mind at what was in store. He then decided to take one more look at the photo of Solana. Yeah, I guess she does, doesn't she?
LATER THAT NIGHT:
Aelita, a deep and dark voice spoke to the young girl. Aelita, you can't escape me now. Try all of your futile attempts, Aelita, because none of them can stop me!
"AHHHHHH!" Aelita screamed in the middle of the night, haunted by the voice in her dream. Aelita's breathing started to come back to normal, but was still quick and panicked. She then wiped the sweat off of her forehead as she decided to lay back down in bead.
"Calm down, Aelita. It's just a dream, It's only a dream." Aelita mumbled while trying to calm herself down, rubbing her temples with her pointer and middle fingers.
Aelita then looked over to her alarm clock. The time read 12:45 AM. Aelita then decided to coax herself into going back to sleep. However, she had the aching thought at the back of her head that an old foe has returned.
"No, there's no way." Aelita said to herself before falling asleep. "XANA's long gone, like Jeremy said."
Once again, Aelita's dream had a voice in it. Except this time, an image was shown. It was a girl Aelita's age, and she also looked exactly like her, from the height to the pink hair and green eyes. She was wearing a blue and red-purple loose fitting shirt with the shoulders exposed, two red bands on her wrists, a skirt with the same color scheme as her shirt, brown leggings, and purple and red boots with one inch heels. She also had the same color markings on her face as Aelita's recent Lyoko form, and with an identical piercing on the ear, except it was on the right ear.
Aelita? Aelita, are you there? It's XANA. He's back.