In the morning before my cousins woke up I grabbed the laptop and the disk and opened up my email. Jeremie had sent me directions for safely sending him the data. I inserted the disk into the laptop and transferred the file to a locked file and then sent it to Jeremie, then I told him the passcode to the file and sent the email. He told me to destroy the disk when I was done with it to be on the safe side.

I decided I would do that after breakfast. I set the disk down on the desk and got up off the floor and walked out to the kitchen to find something to eat for breakfast. I settled on eating a couple bananas and some black tea. I turned the TV on and found a kid's show. I knew some English so I figured maybe watching this would help me learn more? Besides, it looked like a cute show.

"Emma, can I talk to you?" said my dad, coming out of his room to the living room. "You're going back to school in a few days I want to talk to you now so you can think about something before you leave."

I scowled, why did I have a bad feeling about this? I patted the seat next to me on the couch. "What's up, dad?"

He looked a little uncomfortable and the anxiety I inherited from him was showing in his eyes. "Emma, you know after your mom died I promised myself I would never let you leave me…" he started and I felt a darkness fall and I looked down and watched my tea swish around in my mug. "And you were always so studious, I knew in my head that one day I would need to let you go to that school so you would have the chance to live a better life…" he continued.

"I'm going to Kadic so I can help us all live better lives, I'm doing it for the family just as much as I am doing it for me," I interjected and he put a hand up to silence me. I looked back down at my tea.

"And I let you go. It was the hardest thing I've ever had to do. I knew that it was right, but in my heart I felt like I lost the most important girl in my life, my daughter… Anyway, now that I live here in America and our family is slowly immigrating here, we can all work together equally to create better lives for ourselves. I'm trying to ask you if you've stay here and go to school with your cousins here in America."

I nearly dropped my cup when he said the words, when he suggested that I leave my only real friends and my boyfriend… It didn't sound so bad, actually… being with my family, being in what's called the land of opportunity… But then I remembered that I had a job to do, I had to help the others to save the world. Again. I couldn't leave them, I couldn't just walk away from the school I worked so hard to get to.

I looked up at my dad and set my tea down on the cocktail table and gave him a hug, I loved him with all of my heart and I knew how much courage he had to have mustered to ask this of me. I hated to say no to him but…

"Dad, I worked my whole life to make it to Kadic… and I only have one more year there… I don't know if I'll fall in love with the school Yumi is starting at, or if I'll want to come live here, but I know that right now I need to stay there and finish what I started."

"I knew you would say that… You can't blame me for trying," he said with a resolute grin. "I just wanted to sit down with you and let you know that if things ever get rough at that school or you want to come to school here, you can do that. And this year I'm going to send you an allowance every month for spending so when you go out with your friends, you can pay your way."

"I know that, thank you. I'll write to you every week to let you know how things are going with me."

"No, actually I wanted to say one more thing…" he stated. "You saw that big computer that Marian built?" he asked and I nodded, my interest peaked. "She built that laptop as well and she sold it to me for almost nothing for school. I want you to take that with you so we can video message each other. I am sharing a new laptop with my brother instead. We all agree you should take it so we can keep in touch easier and it will probably help you with school as well."

I was dumbfounded, there was just one surprise after another this week. First discovering X.A.N.A. is awake again, seeing my cousins and more of my family are starting to come live in America, my father's request, and now he's giving me a laptop.

"This has been a crazy week," I said with a disbelieving sigh. "Dad, the laptop would actually help in school… but only if you're sure you want me to take it."

"I am. Now, what did you have planned today?" he asked me.

I took a long swig of tea. "I didn't have anything in particular in mind," I said to him when the cup's rim left my lips.

"I'd like to take you with me to the college. I need to drop some papers off and meet with a counselor. You can see where I'll be going to school like I saw yours."

So that is what we did that day, I went with him to the college campus, which was about the size of Kadic if you included the park. Most of the buildings were connected and encircled a a quad. There was a large library, cafeteria and bookstore, a studio art building, auditorium, and employment building, and a few sports fields with a forest reserved for study by the science classes. My father had to go to the counseling building, which was in the buildings surrounding the quad, and he told me to wait for him in the studio arts building, his last stop was the employment building, which was connected.

I roamed the hallways and admired all of the studio artwork on the walls and found myself admiring an old and large camera that was behind a display case. I could read the gold plate and it reead that it was a the first model of SLR camera that was invented long ago. Next to it was a current model and I was amazed at the differences.

"You know that despite the technology that is out today, I would still rather shoot with one of these bad boys than I digital one." The voice behind me made me jump and I turned to see a boy who looked to be a little older than me was standing behind me. "Sorry I scared you."

I tried to stay calm as I focused on what he said to me. Of course he was speaking English and he didn't look like he would possibly know any Russian or Slovak. I understood what hee said from English class at Kadic and I thought about the proper response before I said it. "No, it is fine. I wasn't expecting to see anyone."

"Nice accent," he complimented and I smiled. "Russian?"

"That's right," I said with a smile. "A mix of Russian and Slovak, though they are very similar."

"What kind of camera do you use?" he asked.

"A small one, nothing like these," I told him and turned back to the cameras. "I use bigger ones in film, but when I take photos I use a small one." I was glad we were talking about cameras… I'd actually researched a conversation about cameras and art for Enlish class that I had to act out with Aelita. I knew this.

My father found me then, "Are you ready? I need to stop in one more place and then we'll go out to dinner," he said to me as he approached and noticed the boy I was talking to. "Hello," he said in English.

"Hello, sir. Well, bye, now," the boy said and waved goodbye to me and walked away. I was glad to have had a chance to meet someone new, even if I didn't even learn his name or anything about him at all…

My dad and I finished the last small errand and then found a fast food restaurant and ordered sandwiched. The rest of the day was casual after that. I walked to the park with Diana and Amy and took pictures with them on the playground and on the trail. I taught them some basic martial arts and self defense because they were interested to, and then went back home and had a very relaxed remainder of break.

I finally had my chance to talk with Louise, Pauline, and Marie for a while on web chat, my dad and my cousins got to see Odd, and Jeremie, Aelita, and Yumi kept me updated on their building a super computer and scanners. Jeremie had the computer up and running but was having trouble connecting the scanners that they built, and of course they were all wary of testing them out on Aelita and Yumi because of all of the unknown factors.

By the end of break, I was kind of surprised that it was already time to leave. Even if it had been two weeks, it felt like only days… and I couldn't fathom how Jeremie could possibly have built a working super computer and loaded it up with programs in such a short time… I knew that I would probably have to lock him in a room for a few days to force him to sleep because I knew that he probably hadn't done any of that while building everything.

I dreaded going back. I dreaded telling Ulrich and Odd because I knew they would be mad at Aelita, Jeremie, Yumi, and I for not telling them right away. I dreaded going back to school and fighting a malignant virus that got some twisted kicks out of the most disturbing of attacks. I really hoped that we would be able to defeat X.A.N.A. quickly and expel the program for good.

I spent my last night in Michigan packing and talking with Odd on the webcam. "What time is it there?" I asked him, trying to count in my head.

"It is two in the morning," he specified with a devious grin. "Don't you dare try to make me go to sleep. I'm on my blog and talking to you so I'm far too busy to waste my time on sleep."

I rolled my eyes and found the disk I was supposed to destroy and picked it up. "Oh," I said, remembering all about it. "Oops." I put it sturdily in both hands and bent it at the middle, snapping it into pieces. I stacked the pieces and pocketed them.

"What was that?" Odd asked and I came to a blank.

"Um, it was a broken disk, it was one of my cousin's music CDs that she always forgets to get rid of so I just did it for her so she won't accidentally try listening to it again."

"Ahh," Odd said and nodded. "Anyway, what time will you be getting in? from New York?"

'I leave here at 9, fly to New York at 10:30, fly to France at 2:35. You can try figuring out the time change and how that all works. It always just confuses me," I told him.

"Alright," he said. "Well I am going to let you finish packing. I guess I probably should sleep so I can be awake for your arrival."

"Goodnight, love," I said and blew a kiss at the webcam. He returned the gesture and waved before signing off. I sighed as I looked around at all of the extra things I had. The painting, laptop, and some of the other new things I'd gotten from family wouldn't fit in my bag…

"Does anyone have an extra backpack or suitcase they don't need? I don't have enough space in my luggage," I said as I walked out into the living room. My aunts were watching the news and my father and uncle weren't even home. Diana and Amy were playing a card game.

"I've got something," my aunt Gladys said and stood from the couch. "It's a suitcase, I'll give you some money as well because the airport is going to charge you for carrying so much."

"Thanks, so much," I said as she led me into my dad's rroom where all of the adults were sleeping. "I sure hope you'll be able to get your own apartment soon," I told her, looking at how cramped the room looked.

"I will soon, I am enrolling in that college that your father is going to and I'm going to go to the nursing school and save up. Plus the girls will be able to get jobs soon as well. And with the government programs they have here… we'll be just fine!" she said with a smile. She handed me the small suitcase. "I hope this suitcase will help."

"It will!" I told her as I left the room to go back to mine. I rearranged my packing and now eeverything was packed away neatly between the two suit cases and my carry on. I remembered to pack the swiss army knife into my suitcase, along with the laptop. I packed all of that into layers of clothes to pad it all just in case the flight was rough. I didn't want to risk anything breaking.

The next morning my cousins woke me up early and we went out to breakfast, just the three of us. They helped me pack my stuff into the car and watched as my father and I drove together to the airport. He gave me some spending money after we dropped my luggage off and watched me go through security. I underwent the long and boring flights back to France and had no trouble getting through the airports this time. I was so glad to hear familiar conversation. French and Italian were the dominating languages in the final airport and it made me feel so much safer, I was home, finally.