So last chapter was heavy. I raised the rating before posting it. From here on things will change abit. We will start to learn the gang's past and we will be dealing with some dark topics. I have plans for everyones past and their families. I can promise you that Yumi is the most normal one. I want to be clear, I will be dealing with topics such as drug abuse, suicide, homicide, and possibly rape. If you don't like it then back out now. It's still the same story but it's gonna get darker. There will still be humor and lightheartedness in it but there will also be some dark moment.
Anyway, with that out of the way I hope you all are enjoying the story so far. I know I am. And since I posted two chapters on this story yesterday and started my one-shots yesterday aswell I think I will try for a chapter or two today. So who is ready for an information based chapter. Don't care. Needs to be done. I will say remember Kenji Hayashi. He is very important. Alright let's get on with it.
Shade: (Cracks knuckles) Alright. Let's do this. Scanner. Virtualization. Oh shit. wait. I skipped a step.
Xanadu
Odd opens his eyes and see's pink. It takes him a moment to remember where he is and why. He pulls Aelita a little closer to him and nuzzles his face into the back of her neck. Her eyes fly open. She relaxes.
"Good morning Odd." She tells him. He smiles.
"Morning Aelita." He tells her. She turns over and places her forehead against his. Her breath catches when she looks into his eye's. Their so full of life, so much better than last night. She pulls him in for a quick kiss.
"You feeling better?" She asks hesitantly. He pulls her closer to him and rests him chin on her head. She rests her head on his chest.
"Yeah. Yeah I do. I feel like myself." He tells her. She smiles as he holds her. She closes her eyes. "Thank you. I needed to not be alone and you let me in. So thank you."
Her eyes snap open and he chest warms up. They lay there for almost an hour. Eventually Odd gets up. Aelita sit up and watch him. He heads over to her computer. He types in a few keys and images of a Japanese man pops up. She gets up and walks over behind him. She places a hand on his shoulder.
"Who is that?" She asks. Her voice wavers as she does. Odd looks up at her.
"Apparently that's Kenji Hayashi. I found a picture of him and you with five others here in Xanadu." He tells her. She takes a couple steps back and sits on the bed. Odd walks over and sits next to her. He takes her hand in his.
"I found it in a cabin in the woods. It looked like no one had lived there in a year. I found that in a man's room. There was another room, a girls room, that had the same picture on the nightstand." He tells her. Her breath catches and she squeezes his hand. Memories flash through her head at high speed. After a few seconds they disappear. She looks over at Odd.
"I….The man looks familiar but I can't exactly remember." She tells him. He squeezes her hand for a second
"We'll find out who he is." He tells her. She nods and leans against him. After a few minutes they get up and Odd heads out of the tower. Aelita joins him once she changes. They go for a walk in the Arctic region.
Kadic
Jeremy and Ulrich walk out of the cafeteria. Yumi is sitting on a bench waiting for them. The walk over to her. She stands up and faces them.
"We ready to do this?" She asks them. The boys nod and the three of them head out. Yumi grabs Ulrichs hand as they walk. When they finally reach the cabin the front door is shut. Jeremy walks up and turns the handle. It pops open easily. He walks in. Yumi and Ulrich follow him. Jeremy gets to the living room and starts to look over the bookshelf. Yumi finds the pink room while Ulrich finds Kenji Hayashi room. They start to look through the rooms. Yumi picks up the picture off the nightstand and looks it over. On the back is a label. Property of Aelita. Yumi puts it back and continues to search.
Ulrich searches through the draw on the night stand. He finds a large number of papers but nothing else. He looks around and spots something sticking out from under the bed. He reaches under and grabs it. He pulls out a large shoe box. He carries it out ot the living room while calling to the other two. They walk over to him. He places the box on the couch and opens it. Inside they find a small stack of papers. On top of the papers is a disk in its case. Jeremy picks it up. He places his laptop on the couch and starts it up. While it turns on he turns to the others.
Once on he puts the disc in and starts the video.
seven years ago
"Alright guys. I am turning the camera on. You all need to introduce yourselves." A man say. He turns the camera till it faces a small european woman. She looks at the camera with a smirk.
"Hi. I'm Daniele Bai. I help generate the creatures in Xanadu along with my Husband Fen Bai." She says. She turns to go back to her work and the camera turns on a Chinese man. He turns to face it. He has a big smile on his face.
"Sorry about my wife Daniele. She is very dedicated to our work. I am Fen Bai and I work with my wife to make the creature of Xanadu. We hope to make a real evolving ecosystem." He tells the camera.
"Alright Fen. It's only the first part. No need to tell them everything." The man holding the camera. Fen nods at him and gets back to work with his wife. He turns to a Finnish couple. The look into the camera at the same time.
"I'm Jarmo Aalto and this is my wife Vuokko Aalto." The man says to the camera with a smile on his face. His wife matches his expression.
"We are virtual environmental experts. We are making the landscape." She says. They wave and the camera turns to a man in an Iron man mask.
"I am Tony Stark." He says. A hand comes from behind the camera and punches him in the arm. He drops the mask to reveal an american man in his late twenties. He smiles at the camera.
"Take this serious man." The person behind the camera scolds him. The american man looks at him with a disbelieving looks on his face before he looks amused.
"Alright mom. Hi. I'm Jonathan Wash. I am the team's brain scientist. I study the effects virtual reality and Virtualization has on the brain." He says. He picks hi mask up and puts it back on. "But secretly I am Iron man."
He man behind the camera shoos him away and he walks off laughing. The man holding the camera sighs. He turns the camera to face him. He is a mid thirties Japanese man. He smiles at the camera.
"And that just leave me. I'm Kenji Hayashi. And I am the leader of the team. My field of study is AI. We hope to make a functioning world for an AI to live in." He tells the camera and smiles. "Well that's all I got for the first video. I plan to do regular updates. Mom and dad. This work could change the world."
The cabin
The video end and a menu pops up with options to play the other videos on the disk. Jeremy looks at the others. Those were the people in the photo.
"They made Xanadu. But why?" He wonders aloud. Ulrich speaks up.
"I don't think they meant to make the Xanadu we know." He tells him. Jeremy gives him an annoyed look.
"Of course not. I was not saying that. I was asking why create it in the first place." He says. He paces the room for a bit. Finally he speaks again. "We need more information about them."
Odd walks back onto campus. After him and Aelita walked around and talked about Xanadu and Kenji Hayashi for a while Odd decided to ask around the school. He walks by the cafeteria and dorms and onto the main building. He enters and goes to the principal's Office. He knocks on the door and a deep voice answers from the other side.
"Please enter." Odd walks in to find the principle working on paperwork. He takes two steps in and closes the door. He looks up at the kindly man.
"Ah. Mr. Della Robbia. What do I owe the pleasure?" He asks him. Odd clears his throat.
"I was wondering if a man named Kenji Hayashi use work here?" He asks the man. He gets a sad smile on his face.
"Yes. Kenji was a fine man. He was one of the best teachers I ever met. He always got the kids so into the topic with his stories of virtual people. He worked here for two years. He lived in a cabin out in the woods. No one has been to it since he left five years ago." He tells Odd. Odd is about to thank him when his face lights up.
"No that's not right. Another man, Jonathan Wash went there about a year ago. He was a teacher like Kenji. They were like brothers to each other, though Jonathan was eight years younger. How did you hear about Kenji anyway?" He asks the young man. Odd looks up with a smile.
"I overheard one of the long term students talk a bit about him so I got curious." He lies. Delmas nods and smiles.
"Alright. I would talk to Mr. Cooper or Miss blake about it. They were good friends of his. Now as much as I love to chat Odd I need to get back to work." He tells him. Odd nods and starts to walk away. "Oh and Odd. If you need anything just ask."
Odd thanks him and walks out. He heads back to his dorm. Delmas grabs the phone on his desk and dials a number. After two rings it picks up.
"Hello Cooper. You may have a young man come in and ask you about Kenji. I think you should tell him the truth about the man, but I urge you to not tell him about the man's associates and what happened. I think it would scare the boy." The other man talks for a bit. When he stops Delmas speaks again. "Thank you. If you would tell Miss Blake the sam I would be grateful."
Delmas hangs up. He rubs his face with his hands and sighs.
"Oh I wish that man had never come here. WHat happened almost got the school shut down and the investigations went on for weeks. Now we have students wondering about him." He says to himself. He opens his desk drawer and pulls out and old news article. He starts to read through it.
Odd opens the door to his room and Leo jumps into his arms. Odd holds him and strokes his head as he purrs.
"Missed me did ya? I'll try to bring you next time I have a social visit there." He tells the cat. Leo purrs louder as if he understands. He sets leo on his desk as he turns on his laptop. He puts on his music and then pulls out a notebook. He flips to a new page and starts to write down what he knows about Kenji Hayashi. When he finishes he gets up and leaves his room with Leo following him.
Jeremy and the others stay at the house for a while longer. He picks up the papers from the shoe box and starts to read through them. He gets to one of the last ones and it is a note. He reads it to the others.
"I am writing this to make a physical documentation of what's going on. Xanadu has been corrupted. We could shut it down but five of us refuse to do that. We believe we can fix this. Aelita is the only one capable of stopping this force. The dark tower has started to produce specters. We do not know where they came from but we know they are dangerous. They can Haunt a tower. When doing so they has access to the real world, but only a few at a time."
"They started to attack Aelita on site. To protect her we have made what we call Guardian forms. These are special forms that give us superhuman powers and abilities. Jonathan is worried this may affect us mentally in our world. I am afraid he is right but we have no other choice. We hoped to fix this by going to the dark tower and shutting off it's core code. When we got to the grasslands we were assaulted by thousands upon thousands of specters. All of us were beaten. Aelita can not go there."
"If you read this please know we know we made a mistake and we are trying to fix it. We never expected this to happen. What I fear most is what's to come. I fear we have not seen the worst."
Jeremy looks at the others.
"This changes things. This is far bigger than we thought." He tells them. Ulrich nods. Yumi takes a step back.
"What are you saying Jeremy?" Yumi asks concerned.
"I'm saying we need to be more careful from now on. I will finish Code: Earth and then I need to work on a way to get data from the towers." He tells her. She lets out the breath she was holding.
"So whats Code: Earth really?" They hear from behind them. They all turn to see Odd standing in the doorway. Leo is next to him with his fur up. He is staring down Jeremy.
"Odd. What are you doing here?" He asks surprised. Odd expression becomes annoyed.
"I came here to give you the information I have on Kenji Hayashi. Look I understand I am new but if what I just hear is true we have to be honest with each other. Tell me what Code: Earth is and I won't hold the lie against you." He tells him. Jeremy opens his mouth then closes it. He lowers his head and sighs.
"Code: Earth is the program I am working on to bring Aelita to the real world." He tells him. Odd perks up at this then his eye's narrow.
"So why was it so hard to do. What's the difference between her and us?" He asks suspicious. Jeremy clears his throat.
"Everything and nothing." Jeremy tells him. Odd opens his mouth but Jeremy cutts him off. "She was created to be like us. In that regard she is the same. But she was created. Not born, that's how she is different."
Odd takes a step back. He leans against the wall. After a couple seconds he stands up straight and looks at all of them definitely.
"I don't care. I don't care if she was created on Xanadu or born on earth. I'm still going to help her. I still care for her." He tells them. Ulrich is the first to react. He smiles and looks at Jeremy.
"Well Jeremy. Looks like he's determined. Good thing we're all still willing to help her as well." He tells him. Odds relaxes and smiles at them. Ulrich walks over and throws his arm around him. "I'm behind you one hundred percent."
Odd looks at his friends and feels his chest grow lighter. For the first time in a long time he does not feel alone. And for the first time ever he has a purpose.
"That's all well and good, but what do we tell Aelita?" Yumi asks. Odd looks over at her.
"Nothing. As far as she knows she is a human. Once Code: Earth is finished she will be. Everyone got that." He says. They all nod and head out.
Done. I love this chapter. This changes the story for real. This is a major point. Now I can start to build off of this. And now you all know the scientist team. What to scientist have we seen and who or what do you think they were when we did. Please try to guess. I bet no one know who the second one was. It's someone the team knows.
I hope this chapter was good. I liked doing the interactions with the characters. I want people to send me Ideas for problems Odd could have had in his past. I have a few ideas but I wanna see what you guys think would be good. So we broke 400 views. I am so happy about that. People seem to really like this. I have been add as a favorite author by more than one person because of this story. Thanks for reading guys and please leave me some reviews. I will see you guys next time we virtualize.