Aelita ran frantically down the halls of the dorm room. She struggled to not run into all of the people moving back into the dorms. However she failed at this, and as she turned the corner ran into somebody with their arms full of boxes. The two of them fell to the ground and the boxes fell to the ground. A whimper like cry came from one of the boxes...
"Hey, watch out! Do you know what's in that box"! The short, skinny blond yelled and pointed at the box that was...well whining. "Wait...Aelita"? Odd Della Robia quickly pulled his friend off of her feet.
She took a minute to register that it was Odd, but couldn't find the words for the situation. "Odd, Odd we need to go, now"! Aelita was yelling, and seemed to be shaking.
"No hello, how you doing, how's Kiwi"? Odd joked as he pulled his whining dog out from one of the boxes that dropped. "Sorry for keeping you in there so long, but they still don't except you my little diggity...well you get it by now". Odd was ignoring Aelita and focused entirely on the small dog that was now licking Odd's face.
"Odd, XANA Might be back"
That was all it took to get Odd's attention. "Wait, what? What do you mean XANA's back"? Odd was dead serious now and was not bothering to keep his voice down.
"Shhh. I don't know for sure yet but we need to find Jeremie, put your boxes in and meet me by the rec-room, that's where William and Ulrich are". Aelita ran off as Odd gathered his things(and dog).
Aelita burst into the rec-room to find William and Ulrich on the coach watching TV, resting their feet on an unconscious Anthony.
"Ulrich, William, We need to hurry. XANA..." Aelita didn't finish her sentence when she saw an unconscious Anthony under the two boys feet. "Why is he out cold"?
"Wait, XANA's back"? William jumped up alarmed. A chill ran down his back when he remembered the few scattered memories of his possession.
"He's unconscious because we knocked him out. Now what about XANA"? Ulrich stood up too now, and had a tightened fist ready, as if he could punch the multi-agent program back to non-existence.
"Jeremie's program found police reports near all of the Replica Supercomputers we destroyed. The reports are all recent, at least one person is missing, and something must have happened recently to make Jeremie re-activate the program and put in those coordinates". Aelita finished her sentence quickly and gasped for air.
"Well where is Einstein now"? Ulrich asked. "I saw him bringing stuff to his dorm before, but he said he couldn't talk and had something to do after getting his stuff away. Is he back at the dorms"? William added.
"I was just there, only his computer was set up and it had the program up. Do you think he's at the factory"? Aelita finished as Odd burst in the room, Kiwi following. "Where's Einstein"? Odd yelled.
"Alright, let's head to the factory. I'll call Yumi and tell her the details". Ulrich reached for his phone and held down one of he numbers, Reaching Yumi via speed-dial.
"Hello" Yumi answered the phone, sitting in her room at her house. She was still thinking of what she was having Hiroki do was the right thing.
"It's Ulrich, you have to get to the factory ASAP"! Ulrich struggled to speak as he was running as fast as he could with the others to reach the manhole in the woods.
"The factory! Why what's going on Ulrich"
"...XANA may be back, just hurry down here, please". They reached the manhole and William moved it aside. All of them apart from Ulrich had already gotten down the ladder and headed off without him.
"Alright I'm on my way. And Ulrich..."
"Yea"?
"Be careful". She hung up the phone, got her sneakers on, and had gotten in her car. She quickly drove off to reach the bridge that led to the factory as fast as she could. Ulrich ran to catch up with his friends and soon enough they had reached the Factory.
"Look, the ropes"! Aelita pointed out the ropes that dangled from the ceiling of the factory. They had always used them to reached the floor quickly with the stairs being partially destroyed. However when they deactivated the Supercomputer they had tied the ropes over a support beam on the ceiling so others would be less likely to go explore the Factory.
"Someones here, let's go"! Odd shouted as he ran, and jumped off, and grabbed onto one of the ropes. As it pulled out he loosened his grip and let himself slide down the rope, slightly burning his hand. He looked up at his friends who were still standing at the top. "Come on"!
William, Aelita, and then Ulrich had grabbed the ropes and swung down. They sprinted toward the elevator and looked at the keypad. "Damn, what was the code again"? Ulrich struggled to remember it, but before he could finish his sentence, Aelita had already put in the code.
The elevator ascended and had opened up for them. They quickly ran into it and Odd pressed the button that brought them to the first level below the surface. The doors opened and they were all shocked to see Jeremie sitting at the computer, typing. He had not even realized anybody was there.
"Jeremie"! Aelita yelled and he quickly turned. He was shocked to see her, but turned right back at the computer and continued working. "One second". His voice was that of someone who hadn't slept in days.
"Jeremie, is XANA back? What's going on"? She grabbed him by the shoulders and he quickly turned and snapped "One second"!
William, Odd, and Ulrich were shocked, he had never spoken like that to Aelita. Kiwi began to bark at Jeremie, thinking he was going to hurt Aelita. Jeremie had realized how he acted and quickly regained composure.
"I'm so sorry I haven't been keeping you updated guys, but I didn't want to scare you. To put it bluntly, XANA may be back". Jeremie had turned to face them and closed his eyes, trying to get as much rest in a few seconds as he could. He knew he was about to be flooded with questions.
"What do you mean, 'may be back'? Is he back, or isn't he"? Ulrich snapped this time.
"Einstein, whats going on, you should have told all of us"? Odd questioned him before he could respond to Ulrich.
William stood there silent. He tried to act calm, cool, and collected. He had to keep himself from shaking at the thought that XANA could be back.
The elevator had moved again; Yumi had arrived. Jeremie waited for Yumi to get down before answering any questions. Once Yumi had gotten her emotional-question-asking out of the way he finally responded.
"Alright, so here is what happened in a nutshell. My parents are planning to move to America within the month. My fathers the manager for a branch of a small company here, but the company's gaining a large amount of money from the United States. They wanted my father to oversee a huge branch that would be stationed in New Mexico. My parents were obviously thrilled to move, and make a large amount of money, and they wanted me to go down with them as they went to take a look at the town my parents are going to move to. When I went down there, I noticed that the company was pretty close to the army base that one of XANA's supercomputers were at. I tried to keep myself away, as they do say curiosity killed the cat". He took a break to take a drink from the cup of coffee he had next to him. Then he continued.
"My father met with the founder of the company, Brian Weltcheck. The company sells security equipment that has been becoming popular recently. It was founded here in France but couldn't compete with other company's. The equipment they sell is fine, and it's the same company that creates the security camera's I set up across the factory when we began fighting XANA. However when we met Brian Weltcheck he informed us on why he wanted my father to manage this branch of the company. Apparently the army base had been having problems with their equipment, and they decided to go with buying from another company. They wanted my father to oversee this branch as it would be catering to citizens, and the army branch in that area". Jeremie paused once again to let everybody process this.
"So wait, what does this have to do with XANA? This isn't really 'in a nutshell' you know, Einstein"? Odd smirked.
"Sorry, I'm rambling. Anyway, I was speaking with Brian Weltcheck and I asked him about the problems. He said that army base had been using a cheaper company's security equipment and that all of a sudden it started to malfunction. He said the army base had been inspecting something that happened there two years ago. Apparently when they were 'inspecting' this thing, the security camera's started to malfunction so they replaced them. Then the replacements stopped working. They assumed it was bad equipment, but you can guess what I assumed..."
"Xana" William spoke, shaking now. Aelita rested a hand on his shoulder to try and calm him, knowing what it felt like to be a prisoner of sorts.
"Bingo. I had gotten my father to convince Brian Weltcheck to see if he could get any of the old equipment for me, as they were responsible for getting rid of the old company's equipment. I was able to get it, and examined it. That's when I noticed it; the equipment simply wasn't working when near the base. Something was causing to to bug out when they happened to be checking out the Supercomputer. I reactivated the police report scanner on my laptop and searched the files of the nearest police station. There where encrypted files I had to hack,but apparently in early August a man infiltrated the base and tried to steal some parts from the Supercomputer. I searched the coordinates for the other Supercomputers we destroyed, and the NASSAU shuttle and needless to say, we got reports. I've been working for days on a new scanning program on my computer at home, and on my laptop on the drive back to school, but I needed to finish it here". Jeremie finished.
"Aelita tried to let the information process when she realized she was stilll holding the box from earlier, with a Phoenix engraved in it. "Jeremie! I forgot I had gotten this in the mail"! Aelita gave him the box and he examined it. He noted the lock on the front and rubbed his finger along the engraved mythical creature. "A Phoenix"?
"Mr. Delmas said it was from my mother". Aelita said sternly.
"Your mother, but isn't she..." Yumi led off.
"You sure Mr. Delmass didn't just give it to the wrong person Princess"? Odd said.
Aelita pulled out the paper the box was covered in, with a small white notice from the sender, to the recipient on it. Aelita read it "From Antea Stones, to Aelita Stones".
"Whoever it is, they know your mothers name, and your alias". William finally spoke, feeling he needed to contribute in some way.
"This lock is simply brass, we can easily break it open". Jeremie set the small box down and reached for a screwdriver. He pushed it into the wood under the lock and it flung off of the box. Jeremie handed it to Aelita to open. She took the box and opened the top. Everybody gathered around Aelita to look inside the box.
Inside was a diamond ring, four envelopes, and a picture of Franz Hopper and Antea, holding a baby Aelita. "A ring"? Odd questioned as he held the ring up. "Nice diamond, that probably cost a lot".
"Odd, put it down"! Yumi yelled at him. He put it back in the box as Jeremie reached and got the envelopes. They were marked with numbers, one through four. Jeremie carefully opened the first one. He took a piece of paper out of the envelope and began to read it.