After over two months of sporadically working on this story while trying to get through college, I'm proud to finally publish the fourth chapter in its entirety! While I can't guarantee the wait for Chapter 5 will be any shorter, I hope this chapter makes up for it. :) Enjoy!

Kobe, Japan

Located on the north shore of Osaka Bay, Kobe was smaller than nearby Osaka to the east; however, being Japan's sixth largest city, it was still a bustling, lively city in its own right. It was an unusually warm, sunny Saturday afternoon in Kobe, so many people decided it would be a good idea to relax and play at some of the region's beaches. One of the most popular of these beaches was Suma Beach, which granted visitors a marvelous view of northern Osaka Bay.

It was a perfect day—a day ill-suited for the carnage that was about to come.

Less than a kilometer off the coast of Suma Beach, the spiky carapace of a massive creature suddenly emerged at the surface. It didn't take long for beachgoers to notice it—the thing was moving very fast towards the beach. People stood up and approached the water's edge to get a better look at this strange sight.

And then the creature's head—also covered with sharp, bony horns—exploded from beneath the waves and let out a menacing, high-pitched howl.

That was enough to send the beachgoers into a panic. Many didn't even bother to stop and grab their belongings as they quickly fled the beach, deserting it in a matter of seconds.

The giant, spiky creature continued to trudge its way through the water before finally clambering onto the beach on all fours. It was very robust in appearance, and closely resembled an ankylosaur, albeit with much sharper teeth and claws. It paused for a moment to survey the cityscape ahead of it, and then began to march into it, effortlessly carving a path of destruction in its wake. The mission its new master had given it was simple: destroy as many buildings and kill as many people as possible.

Under XANA's control, Anguirus was more than happy to do so.

Kadic Academy, Paris Metropolitan Area, France

Several time zones behind Japan, it was lunchtime at Kadic Academy. Because classes at Kadic ran for only half as long on Saturdays as they did on weekdays, it was also the end of the school day for the Lyoko Warriors.

Aelita, Jeremy, Odd, Ulrich, and Yumi all ate lunch together at their usual table in the cafeteria. Odd, in particular, was making short work of what his friends presumed would be the first of many helpings of meatballs.

"Have you ever thought about pacing yourself, Odd?" asked Ulrich, taking note of his roommate's seemingly superhuman eating habits.

"I can't help it," Odd answered, his voice muffled by the meatballs he was trying to chew up. "My stomach has a mind of its own."

"Sure it does," Ulrich responded sarcastically.

"No, really!" Odd exclaimed, having swallowed his food. "Have you ever thought about how much food Godzilla needs? My stomach is the same way. We both get really angry if we don't get enough to eat."

"Actually, Odd," interjected Jeremy, who was reading a large book at the lunch table, "Godzilla doesn't need to eat at all. He just needs to absorb radiation to stay active." Glancing up at Odd from his book, he jested, "Even if he did eat, I'm sure he'd still be hard-pressed to outdo your appetite."

Aelita, Ulrich, and Yumi all burst out laughing at Jeremy's joke, while Odd merely slouched back in his seat, rolling his eyes.

In her mirth, Aelita caught a glimpse of the cover of the book that Jeremy was reading. She saw its title, In the Shadows of Monsters: Kaiju in the 20th Century; as well as its author, one Kyohei Yamane.

"What are you reading, Jeremy?" Aelita asked him.

"A book I found in the library," Jeremy replied. "Since XANA is taking control of the world's kaiju, I figured it would be a good idea to find out more about them. At the moment, I'm learning a lot of new things about Mothra." Jeremy showed his friends the pages he had been reading in the book. In between the rows of text were three black-and-white photographs. The Lyoko Warriors recognized the flying form of Mothra in one picture, and the Shobijin in another. The third featured a familiar cross design.

Yumi held up her medallion—she had worn it around her neck every day since the Shobijin gave it to her—and quickly noticed that the design carved onto it matched that of the cross in the book. "Hey, that's the same symbol that's on my medallion!" she said.

Jeremy nodded. "That's Mothra's symbol," he confirmed. "It was discovered in 1961, by a joint Japanese-American expedition to Infant Island. They were also the ones who discovered the Shobijin. Unfortunately, the expedition was led by a greedy businessman, who kidnapped the Shobijin and brought them back to Japan, where he made a huge profit by forcing them to perform in shows. But then Mothra came and attacked Japan; somehow, she knew that they were there.

"The businessman tried to escape to the U.S., but Mothra only followed him there. She started attacking San Francisco, but quickly stopped when the Shobijin were rescued and returned to her. According to the book, she hasn't been aggressive to humans ever since."

"Mothra seems pretty different from Godzilla," commented Ulrich.

"Yeah," Jeremy acknowledged. "They've actually fought each other before."

"When did that happen?" asked Yumi.

Just as Jeremy opened his mouth to respond, a series of alarming beeps sounded from his backpack. Picking it up from the floor next to his chair, he opened it and extracted his laptop, the source of the beeps. He promptly unfolded it and typed in a series of commands. Suddenly, his eyes widened in horror.

"What's the matter, Jeremy?" asked Aelita.

"XANA has just launched an attack," he answered, his fingers still rapidly tapping away at the keyboard as he tried to learn more about the A.I.'s latest scheme.

"I thought you said XANA couldn't activate towers on Lyoko anymore?" questioned Odd.

"Not here," Jeremy replied. "In Japan. He's possessed another kaiju using a Replika. It just made landfall in Kobe, and is now heading straight for Osaka."

Yumi abruptly sat up, now looking even more horrified than Jeremy. "That's where my uncle is!" she exclaimed.

"Are you sure?" Jeremy asked her.

"Positive," Yumi confirmed. "Before we left Japan, he told us he had to travel to Osaka until they could repair the damage that Rodan caused to his workplace in Tokyo. But now he's in danger again—we have to go and destroy that Replika!"

"I realize that," Jeremy responded. "But—"

"But what?"

"Aelita and I were only able to finish the submarine last night. We haven't had a chance to test it yet; we don't know what kind of threats might be hidden in the Digital Sea, or whether or not the sub will even survive the plunge in the first place!"

"I get that," Yumi acknowledged—although not deterred. "But there are thousands of more lives at stake—not just our own. And when has taking risks ever stopped us?"

"Yumi's right, Jeremy," Aelita chimed in. "XANA has killed so many innocent people already. If we don't do something, more will pay the price."

Jeremy mentally weighed the statements from Yumi and Aelita. Although he was reluctant to put his friends' lives at risk, he realized that they were absolutely right—the city of Osaka couldn't afford to wait until the new submarine had been given a proper test run. No, they needed to find this Replika and destroy it now before XANA had a chance to take more lives.

"All right," he finally announced. "We'll head to the factory right away. When we get there, I'll run a program that will locate Replika that's controlling the new kaiju, while I transfer you to Sector 5 so you can enter the submarine."

With that, the Lyoko Warriors stood up from their lunch table and began their trek to the factory.

North Pacific Ocean

Godzilla swam even faster, now exceeding an unbelievable 100 knots. While he had been following Anguirus for the past few days, it was only now that he sensed that his old ally had made landfall on Japan.

Ally. It was a funny word considering the complex relationship between Godzilla and Anguirus. Eons ago, the two kaiju and their kind had coexisted with each other. They often competed and fought for the same food and resources, but, ultimately, both were united in their efforts to protect the planet. However, when the humans' nuclear weapons awakened them both, they once again came into conflict with one another—while Godzilla attacked Japan out of fury, the less aggressive Anguirus had tried to subdue his more belligerent counterpart. This did not end well for the giant ankylosaur; after a lengthy fight, Godzilla viciously beat and mauled him, forcing him to retreat to sea.

Years later, following Godzilla's humiliating defeat by Mothra—or, more specifically, her offspring—the nuclear leviathan eventually found himself at an island in the Pacific. There, he encountered Anguirus again. This meeting was much more peaceful than the last; with Godzilla having decided that attacking humanity was more trouble than it was worth, Anguirus no longer had reason to be hostile towards him, and the two kaiju quickly became companions.

Today, it seemed their roles had reversed. Now Anguirus was the aggressive one, albeit not of his own accord. Godzilla could easily sense that the strange force that had possessed Rodan had now done the same to Anguirus.

Rodan and Anguirus. In Godzilla's case, simply calling the two kaiju allies wasn't enough—they were his friends. Or, at least, they had been.

This only fueled Godzilla's rage. The strange force had turned his friends against him. Worse still, there was no guarantee that they could be freed from its control—for all Godzilla knew, Rodan and Anguirus would never be the same again.

Godzilla forced the thought to the back of his mind. As reluctant as he was to hurt his friends, he realized he might have no choice if he was to have any chance of stopping the strange force and its schemes.

The King of the Monsters pressed on towards Japan, his determination not wavering in the slightest.

"I've started the program," said Jeremy, now seated in his usual spot in front of the supercomputer's interface in the Lab. "I'm calibrating it to only lock on to the strongest source of XANA's activity within the Greater Osaka area; it should then trace those signals to find the Replika that's controlling our kaiju."

"How long will that take?" asked Ulrich.

"Theoretically, a few minutes," Jeremy answered.

"You mean you don't know for sure?" Yumi inquired, her frustration growing. Not that anyone could blame her—her uncle was in danger, after all.

"It's like I said, Aelita and I haven't had the chance to test these new programs yet," he responded. "It's just our luck that XANA chose to attack before we could."

"So, what now?" she asked again.

Jeremy began typing more commands into the interface before replying, "The least we can do is find out more about our attacking kaiju. I'm going to use the supercomputer to tap into both the Japanese news networks and military communications so we can monitor the situation."

Shortly after, a video feed of a Japanese news broadcast appeared on the interface's screen. The scene was a grisly one—a massive, spiky, quadrupedal kaiju was rampaging through the dense cityscape, effortlessly crashing its way through any building that stood in its way and leaving a trail of smoldering rubble behind it. Among its spikes, some small but noticeable scars covered its body, with an especially prominent one on display under its eye.

"That's one big armadillo," commented Odd, a look of horror on his face.

"It's Anguirus," Jeremy said.

"Anguirus?" asked Aelita.

"One of the kaiju I was reading about," he explained. "He fought Godzilla in Osaka back in 1955—and if those scars are any indication, it wasn't a pretty fight."

"Did he win?" Ulrich asked.

"No, but Anguirus is still strong and resilient in his own right. He might not be as powerful as Godzilla, but it seems that XANA snagged a very destructive kaiju nonetheless. The sooner this program locates the Replika, the better."

On cue, the interface beeped, and a new display took up the screen. "Bingo," Jeremy announced. "It's a copy of Lyoko's Desert Sector. Head to the scanners—I'll virtualize you to Sector 5. The submarine is docked in a hangar there."

Aelita, Odd, Ulrich, and Yumi entered the elevator that served as their access to the Lab from the rest of the factory. Yumi pressed the "down" button, and the elevator promptly descended to the Scanner Room below. When the doors opened, they stepped out into the Scanner Room, where they were now surrounded by the three towering, cylindrical scanners.

"Ladies first," said Ulrich, glancing at Aelita and Yumi.

The two girls each stepped into a separate scanner. The doors closed, sealing them inside.

In the Lab, Jeremy used the interface to begin the virtualization process. "Transfer, Aelita," he said on the interface's headset. "Transfer, Yumi. Scanner, Aelita. Scanner, Yumi." Upon typing in the last set of commands, he called out, "Virtualization!"

The virtual forms of Aelita and Yumi materialized almost simultaneously several feet over the floor of Lyoko's fifth sector. The two girls dropped and landed on their feet, and then they took a moment to notice their surroundings.

They had been virtualized in the Arena, a circular room encased in the center of the giant blue sphere that was Sector 5. In front of them was a narrow corridor that led to an unseen location. Behind Aelita and Yumi, Odd and Ulrich promptly materialized and dropped to the Arena's floor in a similar manner to the girls. Quickly, however, they noticed something different.

"Hey, our clothes are different!" Ulrich exclaimed.

True to his word, the four teens saw that their virtual apparel was now significantly different from what it had been ever since they had started fighting XANA. All of their outfits were now more futuristic in appearance—in particular, Odd now sported a pair of cat ears to match his purple catsuit, while Ulrich had gained an extra katana while ditching his old samurai garb. Meanwhile, Aelita now wore a translucent skirt, and Yumi a pair of shoulder pads to match her new burgundy suit.

"When we rebuilt Lyoko, Aelita and I decided to upgrade your Lyoko forms as well," Jeremy explained, radioing his friends from his station back in the real world. "I wanted to make it a surprise."

"Wow, Einstein," said Odd, impressed. "Who knew you had a good taste in fashion?"

"Well, the fashion was, for the most part, Aelita's doing. I mainly just handled upgrading your weapons and abilities."

Back in the Lab, Jeremy glanced at one of the smaller screens that flanked the interface. Displayed on it was a map of Greater Osaka, with a red dot indicating Anguirus's position. Jeremy noted that Anguirus had just left Kobe, but was now advancing eastward towards the more heavily-populated Osaka city proper. At the rate the spiked behemoth was moving, Jeremy knew it would be less than an hour before he arrived.

"We can talk more about your new clothes later," he said. "Head straight down the corridor in front of you. There will be an elevator for you at the end of the path that will take you to the hangar. Since Sector 5 no longer has a countdown, there won't be any traps to slow you down."

The Lyoko Warriors did as they were instructed, and ran down said corridor, leaving the Arena. After a few yards, they arrived at a vast, open space, surrounded on all sides by Sector 5's blue walls. At the end of the path was a ledge, where the four teens stopped. Seconds later, a large metal platform—the elevator—descended down a rail stretching from the ceiling to the ledge. The elevator came to a halt in front of the Lyoko Warriors, and they boarded it. Then the elevator began to head back up towards the ceiling.

In just under a minute, the elevator emerged in another, much larger room near Sector 5's north pole. Suspended in the middle of it was a disc-shaped platform, five docking arms, and in the middle of it, the vertical frame of the submarine.

The four Lyoko Warriors marveled at the sight as the elevator ascended into the hangar. Ulrich whistled, while Yumi remarked, "It's beautiful."

"Einstein, you and Aelita have outdone yourselves," complimented Odd. Then, rather abruptly, he asked, "What should we name it?"

Yumi cast an annoyed look at Odd. "How is that a priority right now?"

"Oh, come on, Yumi!" Odd protested. "We have to come up with a name for this thing before we set sail for the first time. Ulrich agrees with me!"

"Actually, Odd, I'm with Yumi on this," said Ulrich. "That's the least of our worries right now."

"Unbelievable," Odd muttered. "Fine, I'll come up with one myself. How about the SS Meatball?"

The other Lyoko Warriors facepalmed in unison.

"Is it possible for you to stop thinking with your stomach for one second?" Ulrich finally asked.

"Can you blame me?" Odd responded defensively. "I never got my second helping of meatballs."

As the elevator neared its destination, Aelita decided to interrupt her friends' banter. "When I was little," she began, "my father told me stories about a ship from Norse mythology. It never lost its way, and could even sail through land. It was called the Skidbladnir."

The Lyoko Warriors considered Aelita's suggestion. "That actually sounds like a cool name," said Yumi.

"It sure does," Ulrich agreed.

"Yeah," added Odd. "But let's keep it simple—we can call it the Skid for short."

"I guess we're all in agreement, then," said Jeremy as the elevator stopped. "The Skid it is."

The four Lyoko Warriors stepped off the elevator and onto the platform that encircled their newly-christened submarine. "What do we do now, Jeremy?" asked Ulrich.

"Each of you step onto one of the transporter spots to your right," the young genius instructed. "Since Aelita is piloting the sub, she'll be in the center."

They did as Jeremy told them to, and stepped onto one of the small, circular platforms. Aelita stood in the center, while Odd, Ulrich, and Yumi each stood in one of the four smaller platforms surrounding it.

"Now, I'm going to transport you to the inside of the Skid," Jeremy announced. "Energize!"

Promptly, the other four Lyoko Warriors vanished from the transporter platforms before reappearing inside the Skid. Aelita was now seated in the cockpit on top of the submarine, while Odd, Ulrich, and Yumi were each now in one of the smaller, detachable pods.

"Everything looks good from my end, Jeremy," said Aelita. "Initial checks of the Skid's systems have been completed."

"Then we're ready to go," Jeremy responded. "Releasing docking mechanisms."

Inside the Skid's hangar, the five docking arms disengaged and pulled away from the submarine. On the Skid itself, a pair of jets mounted on its wings ignited.

"We have ignition, and liftoff!" exclaimed Aelita.

The Skid began to rise out of the hangar, heading for the exit in Sector 5's north pole. Within seconds, the Skid had emerged from the massive blue sphere, and now levitated in the space between the sphere and the Celestial Dome, a much larger, dark blue sphere that encased the entire sector.

"I'm opening the tunnel to the Desert Sector," said Jeremy. "After that, it's straight into the Digital Sea. Are you guys still sure you want to do this?"

"Positive," answered Yumi.

"Definitely," added Ulrich.

"I might still be hungry, but you can count on me, Einstein!" Odd chimed in.

"Try not to worry, Jeremy," Aelita assured him. "We'll make it to the Replika. I trust that you've done everything you can."

Still feeling nervous, but with newfound confidence, Jeremy acknowledged, "Okay. The tunnel is now open."

The Skid flew into this tunnel in the Celestial Dome and emerged seconds later, now hovering several meters above the Digital Sea in the Desert Sector.

"All systems are go for the dive," said Aelita.

"Copy that," responded Jeremy. "Please stay safe, you guys."

"We will. Commencing dive!"

The Skid promptly fell from the sky, impacting the surface of the Digital Sea just a few seconds later. Before the Lyoko Warriors could tell what was going on, the submarine soon emerged through a gate of some kind. The four teens could see a second, translucent barrier laying ahead of them, and beyond that, the dark turquoise expanse of the Digital Sea.

"We made it, Jeremy!" Aelita announced excitedly. "We're in the Digital Sea!"

Back in the Lab, Jeremy let out a sigh of relief. "Excellent," he responded. "I'm deactivating Lyoko's protective firewall. Once you pass through it, I'll guide you to the Replika."

"Roger," acknowledged Aelita. "Rotating into cruising configuration and engaging turbo-propeller."

The submarine's vertical configuration began to change into a more horizontal one, with the cockpit now near the back and the smaller pods facing towards the front instead of downward. At the same time, the translucent barrier—the firewall that kept XANA out of Lyoko—parted, giving the Skid access to the Digital Sea in its entirety. Shortly after, the Skid's engines started, thrusting the submarine through the firewall, which sealed back up once the vessel had passed through.

The Lyoko Warriors were now cruising through the network.

As night fell over Japan, Anguirus continued his relentless rampage through Greater Osaka, following his new master's every command as he made short work of every building and other obstacle that stood in his way. People were already trying desperately to evacuate from Osaka and the smaller outlying cities threatened by the spiky kaiju. Many hadn't bothered trying to use their vehicles, and simply tried to flee on foot.

Meanwhile, the JSDF had been deployed almost immediately after Anguirus made landfall in Kobe. They had been given two main tasks, their first being to help civilians get away as quickly as possible. As the swift evacuation neared completion, the military prepared to commence its second task: an armed defensive downtown Osaka.

The whirring sounds of helicopters overhead signaled the start of this plan. A squadron of four Japanese AH-1 Cobra helicopters rapidly flew towards Anguirus before slowing down to a hover just a few dozen meters away from the kaiju.

"Command, this is Attacker One," radioed the pilot of the lead Cobra. "We are in position and awaiting further orders."

"Attacker One, this is Command," the commander on the ground responded. "The order to attack Anguirus has been confirmed. Commence fire."

"Ryokai," the pilot acknowledged. "Commence fire on the target."

Simultaneously, the four Cobras unleashed their payload of BGM-71 TOW missiles at Anguirus, all of which exploded upon impacting his protective spiked carapace. As the flames and the smoke cleared, the kaiju cast an angry glare at the helicopters and roared in defiance, and started to advance towards them. The Cobras began to pull away, drawing Anguirus towards a less densely-populated area near the western bank of the Yodo River, one of the main rivers that flowed through Osaka.

The next phase of the attack was about to begin.

As the Cobras retreated to a safe distance, a sizable battalion of Japanese Type 10 Main Battle Tanks and wheeled Type 16 Maneuver Combat Vehicles stationed on the opposite side of the river trained their guns on Anguirus, and promptly opened fire all at once at the spiky behemoth. Dozens of 105mm and 120mm HEAT rounds peppered Anguirus, exploding upon contact with his tough hide in an impressive display of firepower.

All of which did next to nothing against a creature that had managed to hold his own against Godzilla himself.

With another furious roar, Anguirus pawed his claws at the ground, and then began to charge across the Yodo River in a manner similar to that of an angry bull. Just before reaching the other side of the river, the kaiju suddenly did something nobody expected—he jumped into the air and curled his body up into a massive, spiked ball. Hastily, the tanks and MCVs tried to steer out of the way, but a few were not so lucky. Anguirus rolled right over them, easily crushing them like they were children's toys as he broke through their defensive line before plowing into the dense cityscape behind them.

The JSDF's defensive had failed. Anguirus had entered downtown Osaka.

Back in France, Jeremy continued to monitor the situation in Osaka closely while he guided his friends to the Replika. He had listened to the JSDF's radio communications—which the supercomputer had conveniently translated from Japanese for him to understand—as they carried out their defensive operation against Anguirus. He watched live news footage from the Japanese TV networks as the attack helicopters lured Anguirus to the Yodo River's edge where the tanks and other military vehicles could get a clear shot at him. However, the spiked behemoth did not suffer so much as a scratch, and managed to charge his way right through them. Just as Jeremy had thought, XANA had indeed taken control of a powerful beast in Anguirus. He could only hope that XANA wouldn't have the chance to find and possess even more powerful kaiju.

"Jeremy, we're arriving at the Replika now," Aelita radioed in, interrupting Jeremy's thoughts.

"Copy that, Aelita," Jeremy acknowledged.

In the network, the Skid approached a giant, blocky sphere, similar to how Lyoko appeared when seen from the Digital Sea—minus the firewall that Jeremy had added.

"Look for an entry portal at the south pole, just like on Lyoko," Jeremy instructed.

"I see it," Aelita responded as she maneuvered the Skid towards said portal, which was physically identical to that on Lyoko. But looks could be deceiving; chances were, XANA had secured the Replika's entryway with an access code of some kind. Fortunately, however, Aelita and Jeremy had prepared for such a scenario.

Aelita rotated the Skid back to its vertical orientation. Inside the cockpit, she placed her hand on a touchscreen panel. "Digital Key activated," she said. Immediately, a white beam shot out at the Replika's closed gate from underneath the Skid's cockpit.

"Can you get us in, Jeremy?" she asked.

"I'll have to crack this access code first," he replied as he began to run a decryption program on the interface. "It shouldn't take more than a few minutes."

As promised, the Lyoko Warriors didn't have to wait long. The Replika's gate unlocked and swung open, allowing Aelita to maneuver the Skid into the Replika. Seconds later, the submarine broke the surface of the Digital Sea, and accelerated into the orange sky of the Desert Replika. As the Skid flew up to one of the many large plateaus of the Replika, Odd, Ulrich, and Yumi peered out through the bubble canopies of their detachable pods—which they had agreed to call Navskids—and surveyed the landscape.

"It looks exactly like the Desert Sector," commented Odd. "Come on, XANA, show a little bit of creativity!"

"That's rich, coming from the biggest copycat in Biology," Ulrich retorted.

"Oh, yeah?" Odd countered. "I didn't see you get a great grade on that Lab project."

"All right, knock it off," Yumi interrupted. "It'd be nice if you two could focus on the task at hand."

"Don't worry, Yumi," reassured Jeremy. "It shouldn't take too long to destroy the Replika. Aelita just needs to go into a tower, enter the virus code, and it's goodbye Replika."

"That's it?" asked Odd. "Why'd you bring us along, then?"

"It'll take some time to execute the virus code," the young genius explained. "Your job is to defend the Skid while Aelita enters the code—if it's destroyed, there will be no way for you to get back to Earth."

"Sounds dangerous," Odd quipped. "Well, good thing I work well under pressure."

Aelita spotted the glowing red halo of a nearby activated tower and maneuvered the Skid towards it. "Initiating docking sequence with the tower," she announced.

"Roger, Aelita." Jeremy acknowledged. "Once you dock the Skid, I'll energize you out so you can deactivate the tower, then I'll reactivate it for our own use so you can input the virus code. The rest of you, sit tight for now."

Within moments, the Skid had hovered to within just a few meters of the tower. Aelita pressed a button in the cockpit, and a purple energy beam shot out from the Skid before wrapping around the tower. The pinkette felt a surge of both relief and triumph—the Skidbladnir's first expedition to a Replika had gone off without a hitch. But celebrating would have to wait, at least for a short while longer—first, she had to deactivate the tower.

"Energize!" Jeremy called out.

Promptly, Aelita disappeared from the Skid's cockpit and rematerialized a few feet away from the base of the tower. She approached it and then passed through its exterior layer, entering it. Then she walked to the center of the tower's circular lower platform, which allowed her to levitate up to the smaller upper platform. Stepping onto this second platform, the tower's holographic interface materialized before her. After placing her hand against it, it flashed her name, "AELITA," and then she entered the words "CODE: LYOKO" into it.

"Tower deactivated," she announced.

"All right, Aelita," said Jeremy, "I'll reactivate it for our purposes and then you can get to work."

Outside the tower, the other three Lyoko Warriors watched as the tower's halo faded from red to white, and then to green as Jeremy reactivated it. From inside his Navskid, Ulrich's eyes peered across the horizon of the Desert Replika before coming to rest on three peculiar, square-shaped rocks in the distance.

Then he noticed that the rocks were moving.

Ulrich looked closer. The "rocks" were cube-shaped, and were scurrying towards the tower and the Skid on six short legs. Each of their four sides sported a white, spherical dome, with the eye of XANA emblazoned on each one.

"Jeremy, we have company," Ulrich warned. "There are three bloks heading this way."

"I see them," Jeremy acknowledged. "Their target will be the Skid—I'm energizing all three of you out so you can defend it."

Odd, Ulrich, and Yumi soon vanished from their seats in the Navskids and reappeared some ten meters from the Skid just in time to meet the three monsters face-to-face.

"Odd, you try to lure one of them away from me and Yumi," Ulrich instructed. "We'll handle the other two."

"You got it, buddy," Odd responded. He began to sprint towards a pile of boulders not far from the tower, firing a volley of laser arrows from his arms at one of the bloks as he ran. This was enough to get the monster's attention, and it began to pursue him, firing its laser cannon at him from one of its four eyes.

While the blok chased after Odd, Ulrich and Yumi prepared to square off with its two comrades. Ulrich withdrew his two katanas, and Yumi unfurled her two tessen fans. In response, the bloks' eyes glowed red as they charged their lasers, and then they fired simultaneously at the two teens. Ulrich deflected all of the shots aimed for him with his katanas, while Yumi blocked her shots with her fans. The Japanese girl then somersaulted away, drawing both of the bloks' attention towards her and away from Ulrich.

This gave Ulrich the opportunity he was waiting for. "Triplicate!" he shouted, and two digital clones of himself suddenly appeared on either side of him.

While one of the bloks continued to shoot at Yumi, the other diverted its attention back towards Ulrich and his two doppelgängers as they charged towards it. The monster opened fire at one of the clones, and annihilated one of them with one shot. After missing its next two shots, it managed to eliminate the other clone, but by this point, it was too late—Ulrich lunged at the blok and plunged his two katanas right into the center of its soft, vulnerable eye before leaping away. Its weak spot having been hit, the blok reeled over, and then exploded.

Meanwhile, Odd had lured his stray blok to just outside the pile of boulders. Using the claws on his catsuit's gloves, he grappled onto one of the boulders and then fired another three laser arrows at the blok, all of which ricocheted harmlessly off of the blok's hardened shell. Growling in frustration, Odd dove behind the boulder. Now behind cover, Odd could easily shoot at the blok without worrying as much about being hit by its laser.

With this fact in mind, Odd decided to taunt his opponent. "Hey, dummy!" he shouted at the monster. "Bet you can't hit me now!"

What the blok did in response was something neither Odd nor the other Lyoko Warriors could have prepared for.

The monster swiveled its cube-shaped head, pointing one of its eyes at Odd. Then the eye began to glow as it charged—only the glow was purple instead of red. Then, with a loud whoosh, the blok fired an orb of purple energy straight at the boulder Odd had ducked behind.

At the sight of this, Odd panicked. Like the other Lyoko Warriors, he knew from experience that bloks only ever had three attacks—and this was not one of them. Before he had time to react, the purple orb hit the boulder, destroying it in a massive explosion that sent Odd flying. The boy screamed as he careened through the air, before landing face-first on the ground.

Several yards away, Ulrich, having heard the explosion, turned his head just in time to see his best friend crash to the ground. "Odd!" he yelled. Fortunately, he hadn't been devirtualized, but was now lying still on the ground, completely at the mercy of the approaching blok.

Noticing this, Yumi—herself focused on fighting the other remaining blok—instructed Ulrich, "Go help him. I'll take care of this one."

Ulrich gave Yumi a nod, and then turned towards Odd. "Super Sprint!" he exclaimed, and ran at lightning speed towards Odd, leaving Yumi alone with the blok. Yumi unfurled her fans again and hurled them at the blok. Much to her surprise, however, the monster managed to dodge them both, and pointed one of its eyes towards Yumi, which began to glow blue. Knowing what was coming, Yumi attempted to get out of the way, but the blok was quicker—it fired its Freezing Spray at her and hit her legs, encasing them in ice.

Now Yumi was defenseless—or so the blok thought.

Yumi's two fans promptly returned like a pair of boomerangs, slicing their way through the blok's eyes as they flew back towards her. Yumi caught her fans, and the monster exploded shortly after. She then used her fans to cut herself free from the ice that trapped her legs, and quickly ran off to help Odd and Ulrich.

The remaining blok slowly approached Odd, still lying facedown on the ground. Seeing that the boy hadn't been devirtualized by the blast from its new weapon, the monster charged up another shot from its laser cannon and fired at him. Before the laser bolt could hit him, however, Ulrich suddenly Super-Sprinted in between Odd and the blok, deflecting the bolt right back at the monster as he passed. The laser hit the blok's eye, destroying it.

With all three of their enemies now being eliminated, Ulrich approached his downed friend and helped him up. "You okay?" he asked.

"Never better," Odd replied. "I had the situation under control the whole time."

Ulrich chuckled. "I didn't know lying facedown on the ground meant having things under—" Suddenly, he noticed something on the rocks behind Odd, and abruptly shoved his friend out of the way. "Odd, watch out!"

Ulrich withdrew his katanas just in time to deflect a laser blast from a kankrelat, which had discreetly clambered its way on top of one of the boulders and was now shooting at Odd and Ulrich. The young brunette effortlessly blocked its next few shots with a few swings of his katanas.

What the small, insectoid monster did next caught Ulrich off-guard. The kankrelat leapt into the air and hurtled itself right into Ulrich, knocking him over. It then latched itself onto the boy's chest with its four short, mechanical legs.

"What the—?!" Ulrich exclaimed in shock as he now wrestled on the ground with the seemingly crazy kankrelat on his chest. In his struggle, he noticed something strange about the monster—it was now starting to glow red. Frantically, Ulrich tried harder to shake the kankrelat off of him; whatever reason there was for the strange red glow, he knew it couldn't be good.

At last, Ulrich managed to pry the monster off of his chest, before throwing it away from him with all of his might. It was just in time, too—no sooner did the kankrelat land some ten feet away from him than it violently vaporized in a large explosion, which, Ulrich realized grimly, would have easily devirtualized him had the monster still been attached to him.

Now, it was Odd's turn to help Ulrich up. "Guess that's two I owe you now," he said.

As Ulrich opened his mouth to respond, he and Odd heard something off to the side, and they both turned in time to see two more kankrelats leaping their way. Before they could grapple on to the two boys, however, a pair of tessen fans suddenly flew past and sliced cleanly through the monsters' frail shells, destroying them in middair. Odd and Ulrich turned around to see Yumi approaching them.

With no more monsters in sight, the three Lyoko Warriors turned their attention to Jeremy.

"Hey, Jeremy," said Ulrich, "what was with those monsters? We haven't seen them do anything like this before."

"Yeah," agreed Odd. "First, bloks that blow stuff up, and now kamikaze kankrelats? Did XANA put these guys on steroids or something?"

"I'm afraid it's much worse than that, Odd," Jeremy answered grimly. "XANA's access of the network has granted him nearly unlimited resources to work with. Just as we've upgraded our abilities on Lyoko, he's done the same to his monsters to level the playing field. We'll have to be very careful from this point forward—there's no telling what other surprises he may have in store for us."

"Well, that's comforting," Ulrich muttered sarcastically. "What should we do now?"

"Head back to the Skid. Aelita is almost done implementing the virus code."

"Got it," acknowledged Yumi, and she, Odd, and Ulrich promptly began to run back towards the Skid and the tower.

While her friends fought the monsters outside, Aelita continued to work away at the tower's interface. She just needed to enter a few more commands in order to execute virus code, and then the Replika would be vulnerable; XANA would no longer be able to effectively control Anguirus, and the kaiju would break free of his own accord, destroying the Replika in the process. At least, that was Jeremy's theory behind the virus code.

"How is the virus code coming along, Aelita?" Jeremy asked her.

"I'm finishing up right now," Aelita replied. She entered the last commands, and then pressed a button on the tower's interface that would execute the code.

But nothing happened.

Aelita blinked in surprise, and pressed the button again. The result was the same—no response from the tower's interface.

"What the hell?" she asked in confusion.

"What's wrong?" Jeremy asked again.

"I can't execute the virus code!"

"What?!" Jeremy exclaimed in shock. In the Lab, the young genius frantically typed away at the supercomputer's interface, trying to find the solution to this problem. He scanned every line of the virus code he had developed, looking for an error, but he found nothing—the code was flawless. No, the problem had to lie elsewhere, maybe somewhere in the Replika, or the towers…

"Jeremy, something else is happening to the tower!" Aelita cried.

The inside of the tower was now shaking violently. Aelita struggled to keep her balance on the platform as the tower swayed from side to side. The tower's interface was also acting strangely, blaring alarms as it erased all of the work Aelita had done on the virus code. Then it disappeared, and the tower's shaking stopped soon after.

"What was that?" Aelita asked.

"XANA has just regained control of the tower from us," Jeremy replied. "All that work you just did was for nothing."

"But why didn't the virus code work?"

"I—I don't know, Aelita," Jeremy stammered. "That's what I'm trying to figure out right now."

Back in the Lab, Jeremy scanned through every piece of data on the Replika that he had at his disposal—anything that might help him determine why the virus code had failed. With Anguirus still ravaging Osaka under XANA's command, they couldn't afford to give up now and try again later. No, the Replika had to be destroyed now, or else even more lives would be lost.

As Jeremy tried to solve the problem, an alarm suddenly blared on the interface, breaking his concentration. He glanced towards the source of the alarm and grimaced at what he saw.

There was now a second red dot on the interface's map of Osaka. While the dot that denoted Anguirus was fixed roughly in the middle of the city, this new dot was located in Osaka Bay, and it was approaching land very fast.

"That's just what we needed," Jeremy muttered.

"What is it?" asked Ulrich, who had been listening to Jeremy and Aelita's conversation along with Yumi and Odd.

"The supercomputer has just detected a second kaiju rapidly approaching Osaka from the ocean."

"Another one?" asked Yumi, concerned. "Which one?"

Jeremy typed in some more commands, and an image of Osaka Bay from a live Japanese news feed filled the interface's screen. What Jeremy saw on it caused his heart to skip a beat.

The dark, towering figure of the kaiju emerging from the waters of the bay.

The rows of jagged spikes that protruded from its back.

The fiery orange eyes that conveyed an expression of pure, unadulterated rage.

His hands trembling, Jeremy gripped his headset and answered, "It's Godzilla."

So, how was that for this story's first chapter featuring the Lyoko Warriors in action? Since this is an alternate Season 4, the events of the Code Lyoko episodes "Maiden Voyage" and "Replika" have been effectively combined and condensed, only now there is the added challenge of trying to stop the XANAfied Anguirus's rampage. And this is only the beginning—the Lyoko Warriors must now destroy the Replika while dealing with XANA's newly-upgraded monsters, all while Godzilla confronts his former ally in Osaka. Will they be able to free Anguirus in time?

I hope to reveal this all to you soon! Once again, thank you for reading, and be sure to leave a review!

Replies to reviews for this chapter will be posted here. Watch this space.

MadameMirage77: Sorry to hear that you're sick! D: I hope you manage to get over it soon. And yeah, even though Godzilla is supposed to be on the same side as the Lyoko Warriors, his arrival still poses a problem for them; as with Rodan (who, by the way, you'll see more of in the near future), he'll be trying to stop the XANAfied Anguirus by any means necessary—even if it means causing collateral damage, which the Lyoko Warriors want to avoid. As always, thank you so much for the review!

Greer123: Thanks for another review! I'm glad you liked the chapter, and I hope you have a great holiday season as well!

ReginaDC21: It's totally fine, I'm happy that you eventually did write a review! Thank you so much!