C o d e - C r I s I s

Episode 7

R E N A I S S A N C E - M A N

Part One

Everything was in order. All the members of the team had their excuses laid out for the whole day, with plenty of trusted allies to vouch for them – just in case. Of course none of that would do them any good if they got their data scattered across the internet and never returned, but that was just a chance they'd have to take. Aelita had gone home to Hermitage late the night before, while Jeremy stayed at the factory to finish up the final tests on the Skid. He promised it would be much improved over the original, and the gang had high hopes. Other than the Shrieks, none of them had any idea what to expect of X.A.N.A in terms of enemies or tactics, but if the Goliath Krabe Jeremy designed for them in Dry Run was any indication…they were in for the fight of their lives. Together as a team; Ulrich, Yumi, Odd, Aelita and William walked dutifully towards the factory – like astronauts preparing for launch. Aelita was nervous, but careful not to show it. Like Jeremy, the rest of the team would often look to her as a leader, another 'Einstein'. If she was panicking then they'd think something was very wrong, so she did her best to keep a straight, sure-looking face. Odd was ecstatic. He was a pretty good athlete in the real world, but his stint in Dry Run had gotten him hooked on Lyoko again. He couldn't wait to go shredding through X.A.N.A robots, hordes at a time. Ulrich was almost as nervous as Aelita, but just a determined not to show it. Yumi could pick up on it though, and took his hand in hers. She smiled at him. He tried not to smile back, but it ended up looking like he flubbed a sneeze. Whatever X.A.N.A had for them, they would face it together.

William was petrified.

He was scared out of his wits, and he wasn't doing a good job of hiding it either. Fortunately the others had their minds busy on other things and didn't notice. It was the nightmare he had last night after they finished in Dry Run. X.A.N.A had spoken to him, asking him to return something of his back to him. William had no idea what it meant, but it was so vivid, so terrifying. He didn't tell the others, he was afraid they'd think X.A.N.A was really contacting him again. They'd kick him out of the group again for sure, if they were lenient. Chances were they might think he'd been under X.A.N.A's influence the entire time, trying to gain their trust to trap them when they got to the Replika. He didn't even tell Sissi (not that she would care much anyway). He called her as he left his house that morning to tell about the mission. He tried not to play up the whole 'fate of the world' angle, but couldn't help dropping a few hints when she seemed a bit too apathetic. Usually he could tell when she really didn't care about something and when she was just pretending not too, but anything regarding Lyoko or the team really didn't seem to pique her interest. As they approached the entrance their friend, Jean Aíme, was just stepping out. He was reading a thick book of poetry from an large assortment of authors, he gazed up and frowned at the grim expressions on their faces.

"Ah, mon Dieu," he sighed, "you kids look like you're going to a funeral."

"With any luck we will be," quipped Odd, "the bad guy's, that is." They continued past him. Jean just shrugged, he knew enough not to ask questions. They got to the elevator and went down to the operations room where Jeremy was waiting. He didn't face them at all. He just kept typing into the computer, monitoring the screens. They waited for him to say something, anything, but he remained silent. Aelita took a step forward.

"What are you waiting for?" he asked concisely, "Get to the scanners."

Odd whispered to Ulrich, "No time for long good-byes, I guess." No one else made a move and waited for Aelita to step back into the lift, but she wasn't going to be intimated so easily. Before Jeremy even knew what was going on she rushed up to him turned the chair around and kissed him passionately, the others found themselves staring off in other directions awkwardly – it took quite a while for her to finish. Finally she pulled away, still holding Jeremy by the shirt she gazed deeply into his dazed eyes.

"I love you," she said, in no uncertain terms. Jeremy could only mumble. He raised a quivering hand to straighten his glasses, then cleared this throat.

"I…" he said slowly, trying his best to keep looking 'smart' "love you too." Aelita smiled,

"Now wish us luck, damn it."

"Good luck."

"Great, we'll see you later."

She straightened her hair a bit, and walked professionally back into the lift. "Odd, the scanners please."

Odd grinned, "Right away, Princess." The lift doors closed and they started down to the scanner level. Yumi sighed, crossed her arms and turned to Ulrich."How come you never do anything like that?" she huffed.

Ulrich rolled his eyes. "Don't start."

-

Odd, Ulrich and Yumi were virtualized first. William and Aelita were right after them. They all appeared right in the hanger. No more tripping through Carthage.

"What?" whined Odd, "We skipped the sliding elevator thingy?"

Jeremy rolled his eyes, "We're kind of in a hurry, Odd."

"But I liked the sliding elevator thingy…"

"ODD!"

"Right! Sorry, let's go! 'Yoo-hoo, it's us' time!"

"What did you say?" asked Ulrich,

"Oh come on, don' t tell me you forgot 'Yoo-hoo, it's us' time?"

"I can vaguely remember a really, really bad catchphrase. But the memory is so faint…"

"Har har, everyone's a critic…"

"Can we focus, please?" said Aelita. "Jeremy, bring up the Skid."

The hangar was like a cavern, in the center was a deep glowing pit which housed the Skidbladnir; their vessel for traveling through the digital sea. Jeremy built it to allow them to hunt down X.A.N.A's Replikas during their first 'engagements'; it would serve much the same purpose now. Jeremy pressed a button and a moment later the team were teleported into the Skid's stations: Aelita in the cockpit, with Ulrich, Yumi, Odd and William in the Nav Skids. He took a moment to let it sink in…X.A.N.A had made him his own personal Nav before to hunt the others down, but this was the one made for him that he never got to use. The Skid had two modes. One vertical where the Navs hung under the main cockpit, in this mode the Skid would submerge into the Digital Sea and interface with towers – and a second, horizontal stage where it would cruise at high speeds and dispatch the Navs for combat. Currently they were in the vertical mode, standing upright in their Navs. Slowly the Skid began to descend, while the crew tried to get the feel of their craft again. The Navs looked much more thickly armored than before, with more powerful looking thrusters to boot. Each one was a bit more streamlined as well as more personal to each pilot as well. Yumi's had dark red flares of color on the sides and roof, Ulrich's cockpit and thrusters had orange highlighting each seam of armor, Odd enjoyed the jagged purple triangles lining the roof of his Skid, and William had thin blue lines crisscrossing like DNA strands along the sides of his.

"So Jeremy," asked Yumi "what can you tell about this Replika? What sector is it based on?"

"Bad news," he answered. "As far as I've been able to tell it's brand new. I haven't been able to get a clear picture of it, but the data is nothing remotely similar to the other sectors. Even Dry Run pales in comparison, as far as complexity of code goes."

"So you have no idea what we're in for?"

"Well the data is very tightly packed, surprisingly tight for a Replika since, after all, they're only supposed to house small portions of X.A.N.A's program so that destroying one would do minimal damage to his total self. Perhaps his program is so powerful now even the Replikas are more intricate, but it's the level of intricacy that's so…terrifying."

"How bad could it be?" shrugged Odd as the Skid started to pick up speed, "Hey Einstein, shouldn't we be in our own Replika? To get into the Digital Sea?"

"No time, and no need. The Internet is a big place, Odd, this process bypasses the traditional route in order to bring us closer to our goal. There is some sort of buffer keeping us from getting as close as I would've liked, but it did make it a bit easier to find in the first place. I'd explain but, we both know you don't really care about that, do you?"

"And here I was thinking you didn't know me at all."

Jeremy chuckled, "It's all set, everyone ready to get wet?"

Ulrich nodded, "Make it so."

As they were falling, the tunnel had been getting brighter and brighter, until suddenly they hit the Sea. It felt as if they'd been airdropped into a real ocean, only without the splash, just a feeling of strong impact. Odd had shut his eyes (he'd never admit it, though). He opened them when he heard Aelita gasp.

"Oh my God."

The whole of the Sea was a deep, bloody red. Before it would always be a pleasant, airy blue until X.A.N.A became active to attack them. Even when he did it would look more like the Internet had entered a red alert status than anything else. But this was different, the 'water' looked as if it had actually been stained red; they could barely see 10 feet outside their windows. In what they could only assume was the distance they could make out the faint shapes of the 'buildings' that made up the Internet, hanging like upside-down skyscrapers, each giving off a dim red glow. Before they would always look smooth and clean, even in the X.A.N.A state, but now they all seemed to be broken and withered. Crooked shapes were highlighted through the murky sea, with large and small pieces constantly falling off left and right.

"This is unbelievable!" gasped Aelita, "How could X.A.N.A have gained this much power and influence in such a short time?"

"He did it slowly," Jeremy explained, "his files hid themselves to well for my programs to detect, and like a virus they used the files they hid on to multiply themselves at an astounding rate. Their numbers increased dramatically after we shut down the computer, but each piece never had enough power by itself to make a scene. When he finally started piecing them together he was 10 times stronger than before, and doing this was a piece of cake."

"But I thought you said X.A.N.A couldn't be sentient in that form?" asked Ulrich, "How did he get his consciousness back?"

"And what triggered them all in the first place?" added Yumi.

"I don't have any definite answers yet, just theories. One possibly is that someone activated it from the outside, remotely."

Odd was dumbfounded, "Whoa, you mean someone actually turned him on? Who would work with X.A.N.A?"

There was a brief silence in the Skid. William sighed, Odd's face turned bright red.

"I mean, who would knowingly work with X.A.N.A? Mind control doesn't count, of course!"

"Everyone," said Aelita, "I'm detecting something on radar. Activating lights." She turned on the lights of the Skid, it didn't help much, and their eyes had just finished adjusting to the glow from the towers. It did give them a better view of their immediate surroundings; the buildings were indeed decrepit, but now they could see what looked like black ink eating away at them like acid. Aelita made sure to stay far enough away to keep any from getting on the ship.

"Aelita, what did you find? Monsters?" asked William.

"I believe so, and there seems to be a great deal of them between us and the Replika."

"Well where are they?" shouted Odd, excited, "We'll detach and take 'em out! I figure a couple of us can keep them busy while the other two cover you to the Replika."

"Wow," gasped Ulrich, "Odd? Actually planning something? There must be a draft in Hell today."

Odd grinned. "Don't be hatin', man."

"The sensors place them below us. They don't seem to be heading for us, just moving ahead. We could pass over them all the way to the Replika."

"No good, Aelita," said Jeremy, "the Replika is just below whatever those things are. We may not have to fight them, but we will have to pass through them. I recommend moving slow and silent, lights off, use the sensors to guide you and I'll help from here."

"Roger."

Aelita turned down the engines until they were only humming quietly, and then turned off the lights. With a deep breath, she started their descent. They couldn't see anything! Jeremy and the Skid's sensor systems were their only eyes, and they were getting closer and closer to whatever was keeping them from the Replika. Soon they were right in the middle of whatever flock of creatures they had detected before, but the still couldn't see or hear anything.

"Jeremy?" whispered Aelita.

"You're on the same level as the Replika, so just keep heading forward and you should reach it about eight minutes, at this speed. I'll guide you around whatever these things are."

"Do you have any idea what they are?"

"Now that we're close, the sensors are giving me more information."

"And?"

"They're big."

"How big?"

"Colossal."

As if on cue a massive eye of X.A.N.A, big as the ship from end to end, opened on their left side, followed by a loud, low moan – like whale song. Aelita was speechless, the entire gang was speechless.

"What do think the chances are," whispered Odd, "that they're just giant eyes and nothing else?" Boldly, Aelita turned on all the ship's lights and focused them at the eye. Letting out another moan, the creature blinked and leaned away from the Skid, letting them finally get a look at it. Odd sank in his seat. "I really gotta learn when to shut up." The beast was an immense Krakken; a giant squid. It was nowhere near as mechanical or rigid as the last squid creature of X.A.N.A's they'd fought years ago. This one looked almost organic, but with circuit-board-like markings all over it's body. It's 'head' was the most artificial looking part; a giant metal shell and another, small eye glowing on the top. She couldn't count all the tentacles, but there were at least a dozen, not including the two extra long graspers that extended far out of her range of vision. The Krakken rocked from side to side, as if to shake it's head straight. It opened it's eyes again and the X.A.N.A pupil shrunk menacingly to a thin slit on the slimy black surface of the cornea.

"Princess?" whimpered Odd, "I think you pissed it off!"

Aelita jammed her foot on the accelerator, "Engaging thrusters! Full power!" As the jetted away the Krakken let out another loud roar that shook the entire Sea around them, it seemed to send out a pulse of energy that radiated through the Skid as passed on into the darkness, no doubt communicating to the others. After it passed through the ship, they could all hear a slight ringing in their ears. Aelita wondered that if that sound had been made out of water it might sound very similar to a Shriek attack, but there was no time to theorize now. They were speeding through the abyss, blind as bats, weaving through the reaching tentacles of the school of Krakken. The Replika was close and the monsters' movements were slow, but she tried not to be reckless. Ahead of them one Krakken released an enormous could of black ink from its mouth, and it rose up into their flight path.

"That's the acid!" Ulrich realized, "Don't go through it!" Aelita rolled the ship at the last second and avoided catching any of the deadly cloud. From what they saw before it wouldn't simply wash off with momentum, it would stick to and devour any part of their vessel it touched, spreading like an infection. More and more of the Krakken were releasing ink clouds, and black ink is really hard to dodge at high speeds in dark red water. They were getting dangerously close to passing the Replika all together, it was time to make their move.

"If this goes on," said Yumi, "they'll put a wall of ink between us and the Replika and we'll be stuck. Detach the Navs, Aelita!"

"What?" yelped Odd, "You don't think we can fight these things, do you? They could crush us in their eyelids!"

"Just trust me! Aelita, do it now!"

With a press of a button they were all released from the Skid and soared off in the direction of the Replika. As expected, a huge cloud of corrosive ink had formed between them and their destination, instead of rising up to the buildings like the others, it hovered right in their path growing larger and larger.

"We're running out of room, Yumi!" said William urgently, "What's the plan?"

"We'll use the torpedoes," she explained, "we'll each shoot one right into the center and detonate a path big enough for the Skid to pass through, then we'll have to reconnect fast before linking to the Replika."

"Sounds risky," noted Ulrich, "shouldn't we use all the torpedoes? Just to be safe."

"No, Ulrich. Remember, we have to get out too."

"But what if it doesn't work…"

"There's no time to talk about it!" shouted Jeremy, "I've added a system to the Navs and the Skid that will devirtualize you back home if anything goes wrong, if it doesn't work we'll just have to try again another day. But right now you're running out of time! Do it now!"

"But if we made it we'd lose the Skid!" said Odd, "It'd take months for you too rebuild…"

"DO IT NOW!" shouted Jeremy, slamming his fist on his armrest. All at once the team shot one of their torpedoes at the cloud, the acid worked on them fast, causing them to detonate right at the center rather than passing through. A huge explosion blasted the ink out in all directions, leaving the team having to dodge the deadly corrosive missiles, but their plan worked! A clear path was made to the Replika. There was no time to slow down, the Krakken were already releasing more clouds of ink. Without stopping, the Navs carefully tried to attach themselves to the speeding Skid. Aelita activated the Key, the tool on the Skid that allowed them to enter X.A.N.A's Replikas. Jeremy had modified the Skid so that the Key could be used while moving, as well as fired like a laser from the front of the Skid and not just from the top. Odd, William and Ulrich attached without too much trouble, but Yumi was having a hard time reconnecting her Nav, and if she couldn't attach before they passed through the gate she would be destroyed entering the Replika. The Key was charged, and the Skid shot a beam of light right from it's nose at the port of the Replika, slowly the door began to open…this was going to be close. Around the outside of the portal they could see the ink closing in already to block their way.

"Yumi you have to link up now! I'm about to turn on the afterburners!" Aelita charged the turbo and held her finger tentatively over the ignition switch.

"What?" shouted Ulrich, "No! You can't! She'll be destroyed if we don't bring her in!"

"Don't worry," said Jeremy solemnly, "I can activate the devirtualizer before she enters the portal and she'll be brought back to earth, but you four must make it through!" Ulrich didn't like the idea at all, but they had little choice. The gate had full opened and the ink was almost completely surrounding the outside perimeter, Yumi pushed her Nav to the limits and latched on just as they passed through. Some of the ink tried to follow them in, but any little bit that tried was instantly incinerated, then the portal closed. They were finally inside.

Thank you for reading Code: Crisis - episode seven - "Renaissance - Man"

Next episode: "Renaissance Man – Part Two"