Code Matriks
Episode 3: RUN/SYSADMIN. EXE
By B1ockh3d
Author's note: As I expected, I was a week late. I'm NOW going into finals week, and I don't know what's going to happen about the next chapter, it may be a week late like this one. Buuuut, after finals week is summer! More time to work on chapters! Thanks for reading!
Update: I'm not a French speaker, nor do I plan on studying it, so all my French used in this story is through Google Translate. If you do speak/know French and I make a mistake, let me know and I'll fix it!
And to the readers that are confused by what the Lyoko warriors are saying when they speak French, that's kind of the point. Cooke and Markus have no idea what they're saying. They have to figure it out by the context of the situation, or by telling them to knock it off. I could put in the translations, but it would break up the action awkwardly. Don't worry, It won't be something I ride on. If there's a scene that takes place at Kadic/without Cooke and Markus, it'll be in English.
Thanks for understanding.
The scanner doors opened, and Markus stepped out.
"Man, that was was wild!" Markus remarked.
"Oh, please." Cooke laughed, "You only got scanned. Being virtualized is much wilder!"
Cooke turned back to the computer, and Markus pulled up a chair and took over for him.
"Thanks for walking us through that, Jeremie." Markus thanked.
"No problem!" Jeremie smiled at the camera, "Now you shouldn't be affected by the return trips."
"Yeah, speaking of which," Cooke began, "How come I wasn't affected even though I'm not linked to your computer?"
"I've done a little digging into that, actually." Jeremie pushed his glasses up, "Originally, I thought the computer stored your genetic DNA so it knew who to avoid changing."
"But?"
"But, it's actually the other way around. When you're scanned, you're implanted with code, code that acts like a key to the door of the return trips." Jeremie explained, "And since we confirmed Matriks is based off of Carthage, it's not unreasonable to assume they use the same keys."
"Huh." Markus grunted, "I suppose that would be a lot easier to manage."
"How's that document scanning going?" Cooke asked.
"Slowly." Jeremie answered, "It's taking a lot longer because I don't have the actual file. I've got the super computer translating common words right now."
"I'm hoping to get that secure data tunnel finished with you in the next few days." Markus promised, "We're just gonna have to work around our school schedule."
"Speaking of which," Cooke flashed the time on his phone, 12:30 PM, "We got class in an hour and I haven't eaten yet."
"Alright, alright." Markus waved to Jeremie, "I'll be online at four. Which is... Ten for you."
"Okay. I'll go get dinner until then." Jeremie shrugged, then closed the chat.
"What's on the agenda today?" Cooke asked Markus as they walked back to their school.
"Lessee..." Markus rubbed his chin, "Mr. Craig is going over heat induction and thermodynamics, Ms. Kalo is covering electromagnetic radiation, and I think that's it?"
"I meant with our new French friends." Cooke clarified.
Markus shrugged, "Jeremie texted me this morning that he wanted to catch us up with them. Apparently there's something called "The Cortex" they need our help with."
"Sounds needlessly complex yet painful." Cooke nodded, "How can we help them?"
"I... Don't know how you get "painful" out of that, but to be honest, I don't know what it is. Or why they need our help, of all people." Markus shrugged.
"Hm." Cooke accepted, "What's on the lunch menu today?"
"Dude, it's the same thing everyday." Markus deadpanned, "We're in college, we have multiple restaurants to choose from."
"Where do you want to go?"
"I could totally kill for some Mexican food right now..."
Jeremie slid into his seat next to Aelita.
"So, how's our new friends?" Odd opened.
"They're pretty nice. I walked Cooke through how to scan Markus." Jeremie took a bite of mashed potatoes, "Got a little bit more of their document translated."
"Have you told them about the Cortex yet?" Aelita asked.
Jeremie shook his head, "They had to go for lunch. I'm gonna talk about it tonight."
"Remind me, why are we relying on strangers to take out the Cortex for us?" Ulrich questioned.
"Because Professor Tyron doesn't know we've booted up our system, and," Jeremie pointed at Aelita, "If we were to step foot on the Cortex, he's going to come back for Aelita and use his parental status to take her away, effectively stopping us for good."
"Using another person from another computer is the best way to confuse Tyron." Aelita expanded.
"So, we won't ever have to go back to the Cortex?! Yahoo!" Odd celebrated, then paused, "But... Isn't Aelita the only person who can open the Cortex?"
Jeremie sat back further into his chair, "Yeah... That's the only thing. Cooke can't open the Cortex doors."
"We'll find a way." Aelita assured, "Unfortunately, this also means I can't see my mother."
Jeremie reached over and grasped Aelita's hand gently, "Hey, don't worry about it. Like you said, we'll find a way."
"So, lemme get this straight," Cooke paced in the background of Markus' chat with Jeremie over Skype, "This professor, Tyron, is the legal guardian of Aelita, the only person who can open this door you keep talking about?"
"Yeah. Crazy, huh?" Jeremie adjusted his glasses.
"And... How did that happen again?" Cooke begged.
"Professor Tyron married Aelita's mother. It's really not that complicated, Cooke." Markus answered. Cooke rolled his eyes.
"Okay, so, where do we come in?" Cooke sat down in a backwards chair.
"Tyron doesn't know about your computer yet. He knows where ours is, and he doesn't know we've reactivated it." Jeremie continued, "He is expecting us, and when we do attack, he'll come for Aelita. Or worse, shut down his super computer."
"That doesn't sound good." Markus worried.
"No. But, he isn't expecting you. We can control everything remotely through your computer, while Cooke goes and plants the virus to destroy XANA." Jeremie elaborated, "Then, nothing should come back to us."
"Sounds simple enough. Get in, plant the virus, and get out." Markus nodded, "Except for two things."
"Hm?"
"One, you said only Aelita can open the door to the Cortex." Markus pointed out, "And two, it's awfully suspicious that another person who has never stepped foot on the Cortex has the exact same virus to kill the exact same virus it was killing last time he had the virus that he defeated already. There's no way it won't come back to you guys."
Jeremie nodded, "Don't worry, with all the data we siphoned from his computer, we can tailor make this one differently. It won't be a worm virus."
"Well, then how do you plan to open the Cortex door without Aelita? Hmm?" Cooke snarked.
Jeremie sat back into his chair and scratched his head, "I'm... Still working on that."
"You mean you don't know." Cooke slumped.
"He means it's a work in progress!" Markus barked.
"Alright, alright-"
Jeremie's computer started beeping, "...Uh oh."
"What?" Cooke slipped on his shoes.
"Activated tower." Jeremie bit the walls of his cheek, "On Matriks."
"Fantastic!" Markus threw his hands up in frustration, "Cooke and I will be there in twenty minutes."
"I gotta wake everyone up if they aren't already asleep!" Jeremie informed, "Let me know what's going on as soon as-"
The beeping stopped.
"Huh..." Jeremie scratched his chin.
"What's huh? Fill us in!" Markus requested.
"The tower was deactivated." Jeremie baffled.
Cooke sat down on his bed and sat back, "Great! So nothing to worry about!"
Not a moment later, the tower scan started beeping again.
"Oh god..." Jeremie ran his hands through his hair, "If what I think is happening is happening, this mission is gonna be really annoying."
"What do you think is happening?" Markus concerned.
"This happened before, XANA keeps activating and deactivating the same tower to throw us off, because we can only enter activated towers." Jeremie shook his head, "It was frustrating."
"Well, let's go there for good measure." Cooke recommended. Markus nodded, as well as Jeremie, who then ended the call.
Cooke landed on the ice world, and scanned the area with his eyes.
"Well... Lots of ice. Still." Cooke commented.
"Interesting..."
"Not really."
"No, no, not you," Markus shook his head, "I'm getting the same kind of fluxing signal from the tower."
"Alright, where is this tower?" Cooke looked around.
"South by southeast."
"Sooo... Left? Right?"
"The path right behind you." Markus directed.
Cooke turned around, and ran through an ice valley.
"How far away is it?" Cooke scanned ahead.
"Not far. Less than five minutes at your current pace." Markus answered.
"STOP!" Markus yelled into the mic.
Cooke stopped immediately and hid behind a corner, "What's going on?!"
"I can see the tower onscreen, it's still fluxing, but there's a crazy number of monsters outside!" Markus panicked, "I'm counting twenty!"
"Holy!" Cooke peered around the corner, seeing nothing, "Where?!"
"There should be a ledge overlooking the tower about fifteen meters in front of you." Markus advised.
Cooke cautiously walked over to the ledge, and he couldn't believe what he saw.
"Uhh... Now would be a really good time to call Jeremie!"
Jeremie, Aelita, and Ulrich approached the sewer entrance. Odd and William broke off to go meet with Yumi.
Jeremie's phone started buzzing, it was Markus.
He answered, "What's going on?"
"Cooke, what's going on?" Markus linked his phone to the super computer.
"The tower isn't activating and reactivating," Cooke began, "XANA is trying to activate a tower here on Matriks, and our virus keeps taking over control! The tower is switching from red to orange to red to orange!"
Jeremie turned to everyone and whispered, "XANA and the virus in Matriks keep fighting for control of the tower."
"Ohh, but it gets worse." Markus continued.
"Huh?"
"There's about twenty enemies here!" Cooke yelled in frustration, "Half of them are the mechanical monsters, and the other half are some monsters I've never seen before! But judging by the XANA symbol on them, I think you're familiar with them."
"What are they doing?!" Jeremie and the gang began full on sprinting.
"That's the weirdest part! They're fighting each other!" Cooke shook his head, "I don't think they've even noticed me yet!"
The warriors got to the sewer, "Alright, we still have to get there by Skid. We're maybe thirty minutes away."
"I'm gonna figure out what's going on with that tower." Markus assured.
"I'll be on standby." Cooke went back into hiding.
Jeremie hung up his phone, "The situation is getting weirder by the minute. We gotta hurry!"
Ulrich and Aelita nodded.
Cooke found a better vantage point. He watched as the mechanical wolves tore apart Krabs one limb at a time, as Tarantulas blasted through the mechanical skeletons, and the mechanical condors and Hornets kept knocking each other out. It was a bizarre experience. All the while, the tower kept switching from red to orange, and orange to red.
"Any luck?" Cooke cocked his head to the right.
"Not yet." Markus shook his head.
"Hello? Can you hear me?" Jeremie called out.
"Oh, hey." Cooke greeted, "Now, I've seen a lot of weird things in my life, and this tops it."
"Have you guys figured out what XANA and your virus are doing?" Aelita spoke over the comm.
"Well, aside from fighting each other and I think they're fighting over the tower control, not really." Markus answered.
"Where are you guys?" Cooke requested.
"We're running to the Skid right now." Aelita informed.
"Skid… That's what you call your ship?" Cooke queried.
"It's short for Skidbladnir." Jeremie smiled, "And it allows us to dive into the digital sea."
"I'm still new to all this, but I'm gonna say that sounds awesome." Cooke nodded.
"Hey... Isn't that the name of a Norse ship?" Markus roughly recalled.
"Very astute." Jeremie complimented.
"How far away are the others?" Ulrich asked.
"They're... Entering the factory." Jeremie peered over at the security camera feed, "I'll send them in when you get to Matriks."
"The more, the merrier." Cooke commented, "The thing is, I don't know if diving into this situation will mean helping a side or fighting both sides."
"Well, if it's helping a side, assume it's not XANA's side." Ulrich advised.
Aelita and Ulrich dove into the digital sea, they were ten minutes away.
"Any news?" Cooke asked.
"Not yet." Markus answered.
Suddenly, an A.M. radio signal crackled in Markus' headset.
"Mark-US!" Two strung together audio clips played, like they were sampled from two radio shows, "Mark-US!"
"... He... Hello?" Markus replied.
"HELP-us-fight!" Whatever was trying to talk to him was using voice samples from various audio clips, "We-ARE-not-Strong!-enough!"
"Who is this?" Markus queried.
"What's going on, Markus?" Cooke concerned.
"Someone, or something, is trying to talk to me through the radio." Markus zeroed in.
"Huh? Open up the transmission." Jeremie asked.
"We-CALL!-our-sell-zzz-JAER!" It answered, "JAER-JAER-JAER-JAER!"
"Are you the virus in our system?" Cooke requested.
Right then, a mechanical wolf ran up to Cooke. Cooke drew his sword, but noticed the wolf wasn't getting ready to attack.
"COR-RECT!" JAER answered, "DE-activate-Tow-errrr."
Cooke bravely sheathed his sword. "Give me one good reason to!"
"Dude... That is such a stupid request." Markus face-palmed.
"Zah-NAHHH-will-Control!-May-tricks!" JAER warned, "DE-activate-Tow-errrr."
Jeremie's eyes widened, "Deactivate the tower! If XANA worms his way over to your system, he'll gain his full power!"
"Lee-Yoko!" JAER alerted, "DE-fend-Cis-Ad."
"Cissad? What's Cissad?" Ulrich queried.
Aelita stopped the Skid, "Hold on, why would a virus ask for help?"
"It doesn't matter, if XANA takes over, it's over for us and Matriks!" Jeremie pulled at his hair.
Aelita hit max thrusters, and propelled their way to the entrance of Matriks.
"We're entering now." Aelita informed.
"Great! I can spawn in backup!" Jeremie celebrated.
"Wonderful, great, we need all hands on deck." Cooke peered over.
Cooke's eye twitched, and he noticed he world turned into a grayish hue, and time slowed down a bit, then returned to normal. "...Eh?"
"We're about a minute away from you." Aelita reminded.
Cooke shook his head and un-dazed himself, "Oh, excellent."
Cooke turned away, and reoriented himself, "Man... That was weird."
"What was weird?" Markus pried.
"It... Was nothing. It was probably a computer glitch. We don't know how this computer can mess me up, after all." Cooke shrugged.
"That makes me a little more concerned, what happened?" Markus insisted.
"For a split second, the world went into grayscale for me." Cooke answered, "But it's gone now."
The Skid parked behind a large pillar, and Aelita and Ulrich spawned right in front of Cooke.
"It's about time." Cooke sneered.
"You could've started without us." Ulrich inspected the situation.
"How are we going to deactivate a tower that switches between possessors?" Aelita tilted her head.
"Let's start by defeating XANA's monsters." Yumi chimed in, as she joined in with Odd and William.
"Oh goodie, you're all here." Cooke overlooked the pit of monsters, "I think our best course of acti-"
The world slipped into grayscale, and time slowed down a tiny bit. And now, Cooke saw an invisible figure highlighted, and the figure was slowly moving towards the tower.
William summoned his huge sword, "Disons juste-"
"Stop." Cooke held his hand in from of William.
William looked over and noticed Cooke's eyes weren't blue like they normally were, but orange.
"Êtes-vous... Ҫa va?" William asked.
Cooke blinked, and his eyes turned back to blue, "Ye- What?"
"Ah, désolé," William corrected, "Are you okay?"
Cooke nodded, "Yeah, who has a long ranged weapon?"
"Oo! Oo! I do!" Odd volunteered.
Cooke pointed at a blank space of ice between two Krabs, "Shoot there."
Odd aimed and fired, and it hit something.
A figure started imaging, and it was soon recognizable as evil William.
Everyone but Cooke gasped.
Cooke looked over at William, "Hey, he looks just like you!"
"That's because he is just like me." William grouched.
"How did you see him?!" Yumi demanded.
Cooke shrugged, "I don't know."
"Uhh, guys?" Odd pointed down, down to a smoke trail coming towards us.
"Allez!" William commanded, and held a battle stance.
Aelita, Ulrich, Yumi, and Odd took off running for cover. Cooke followed, and the smoke trail ended at William, and the smoke turned into the evil William.
"Jeremie?" Cooke begged.
"Oui?"
"You still have a lot to catch us up on."
Yumi looked around the rock we were behind, and saw nothing, "...Tranquillement, allons-y."
"What?" Cooke shook his head.
"Shh..." Odd shushed.
Aelita pushed past Yumi, "Odd, grimper ce rocher."
Odd nodded, and climbed up the rock we were hiding behind.
"Can you guys please keep it English?" Markus asked, "Sorry, it's just a little hard to keep up with you guys."
"Déso- er, sorry." Aelita apologized.
"Its fine, continue." Cooke encouraged.
"Ulrich, give William support." Aelita directed.
Ulrich huffed, but ran off towards the two Williams.
"Jeremie, can you send us the Overwing?" Yumi requested.
"Coming..." Jeremie trailed, and an oblong hover scooter appeared in front of the two girls, who hopped on and flew to the other side of the pit.
"Uhh... Can I have one too?" Cooke looked around awkwardly.
"Just stay there, we'll have the situation under control." Jeremie advised.
"So... What am I here for?" Cooke threw his hands up.
"Backup!" Ulrich called out.
"Basically nothing... Gotcha."
"BACKUP!" Ulrich shouted.
Cooke looked around the corner, and saw Ulrich pushing back evil William's large blade with both of his katanas, and slowly being pushed back. It was pretty clear the real William was already devirtualized.
Cooke drew his sword, and ran headlong towards the battle. He swung at William's blade, and turned it into a whip as the short sword made contact, and effectively wrapping the whip blade around the large sword. He pulled back, pulling the blade away from Ulrich, who quickly drew back and lunged at the evil clone, who then exploded.
Ulrich picked himself up, "Phew... You're pretty crafty with that thing."
Cooke retracted his sword and sheathed it, "Yeah... Not bad for my third day here."
"Guys, take out the squad of five Hornets incoming." Jeremie commanded.
"I should really get a popcorn machine down here." Markus pondered out loud.
"Dessus, Jeremie." Ulrich sprinted up the same rock Odd was perched on, and jumped out into the squadron of flying insects, taking out two.
Cooke drew his sword, and whipped it up wards, hitting another two. Leaving one left.
Ulrich regrouped with Cooke, and watched as the Hornet turned back around.
"You got him?" Cooke asked.
"Yeah." Ulrich drew one of his swords, and started running towards the pest.
And then it exploded.
Ulrich stopped, and looked up at Odd, "Hey!"
"Quel?" Odd smirked while shrugging sarcastically.
Odd slid down the rock into the bowl of enemies, and Ulrich joined.
"Markus," Cooke started, "What's going on down there?"
"Uhh..." Markus analyzed the map of the area, "...XANA is getting creamed."
"Okay, good." Cooke nodded, "Jeremie, how do you deactivate towers?"
"Aelita or Yumi has to step in the tower and ascend to the top to reach the tower control panel," Jeremie elaborated, "However, I don't think it's going to be that easy."
"How so?" Yumi chimed in.
"Well, you guys can deactivate Lyoko towers and Replika towers controlled by XANA, but we aren't technically on a Replika, nor is the tower only controlled by XANA." Jeremie explained.
"Sooo..." Odd trailed.
"We have to play it by ear." Jeremie shrugged.
Aelita jumped off the Overwing into the pit, and activated her wings. She flew down, and took out two Krabs. Leaving a Tarantula, a Krab, and two Kankrelats remaining.
"Presque claire, Jeremie." She informed.
Yumi swooped low, throwing a fan at the Tarantula and jumping off the Overwing, set to crash into the last Krab. The fan missed, but the Overwing hit. Ulrich jumped from above on top of the Tarantula, stabbing both of his sabers into the center of the XANA symbol.
As he hopped off, the two Kankrelats took advantage of the now unarmed warrior and fired on him, nailing him in the chest and head, instantly devirtualizing him.
Odd winced, "Ooo... Que ça va laissera une marque!"
"You guys got em?" Cooke requested.
Right then, two shots came from overhead and took them out. The four of them looked up, and saw two mecha-skeletons atop their own mecha-wolves, with their laser guns pointing where the two Kankrelats once stood. They despawned their guns, and rode away.
"As cool as mecha-skeletons with laser guns sound, they're a lot scarier up close." Odd commented.
"It just seems strange to me how a virus wants help." Aelita pondered, "The only time XANA needed our help was to replace the batteries."
"Well, there's your answer." Markus figured, "Self-preservation. JAER isn't a strong virus, and XANA would've surely wiped it clean."
Aelita nodded, "I suppose. But, something feels off about JAER."
"Yo, guys," Cooke waved his hands and pointed at the color-changing tower, "Tower? Deactivate?"
"Right." Aelita straightened, and ran into the tower. She ascended to the top, and placed her right hand on the control surface.
ERROR: UNAUTHORIZED USER
"Uhh… There's something wrong!" Aelita shouted, "I can't deactivate the tower!"
"Try it when the tower is red!" Cooke suggested, "Which is… Now!"
Aelita tried again.
ERROR: UNAUTHORIZED USER
"It says I'm not authorized!" Aelita kept tapping the surface with no avail.
"Drat, hm." Jeremie sat back, "Perhaps… Yeah. It's like I was saying. It's not a Replika or entirely XANA controlled. You don't have the "key" to deactivate towers because you weren't scanned to Matriks."
"But, didn't you say the system was built off of Project Carthage, and used the same keys?" Markus reminded.
"No, the return to the pasts use the same keys because they use identical "pulses" and software." Jeremie clarified, "In this case, it comes down to the hardware and software of Matriks."
"…Huh?" Odd grunted.
"Hardware?" Yumi puzzled.
"The scanners, guys." Jeremie answered, "The scanners for Lyoko-"
"Jeremie, this is great, we need to learn more about our super computers, but we're wasting time. Can I deactivate the tower?" Cooke interrupted.
"Uhp- In theory, yeah." Jeremie nodded, "If it works, I'll finish explaining."
"Just tell me how." Cooke hurried.
Aelita walked out of the tower, "Just walk to the center of the platform in there, stand still, and let the tower lift you up."
"Alright." Cooke walked up to the tower, and placed his hands all over it, "Uhh, how do I get in?"
"Concentrate on wanting into the tower, and it'll suck you in." Yumi answered.
"That would sound weird on a normal day, but this isn't normal." Cooke shook his head, placed both hands on the tower and closed his eyes in concentration, "Let me in…"
And he was sucked in.
"Woah!" Cooke picked himself up, "That was a weird feeling…"
"Center of the platform!" Odd ordered.
"I'm on it, I'm on it." Cooke sighed. He stood in the center of the tower, and rose up to a platform above, "He-hey! That was pretty cool!"
A panel appeared in front of him.
"There should be a panel in front of you. Do you see it?" Jeremie guided.
"Yeah."
"Put your hand on it."
Cooke placed his hand on the screen, and the screen remained blank.
Then a moment later, the screen initialized.
…SYSADMIN…
"It worked!"
…CODE
"What's the code?!" Cooke panicked.
"L-Y-O-K-O!" Odd answered.
Cooke punched it in.
…ERROR: INCORRECT
"That didn't work!"
"If your guys' is Lyoko, then maybe ours is Matriks." Markus deduced.
Cooke punched in M-A-T-R-I-K-S.
…Nothing
"I… Don't think it worked." Cooke slumped, "…Oh!"
The panels of binary code began falling down to the bottom of the tower, then came shooting back up.
On the outside, the tower went from switching between orange and red, to the floating pieces retracting and becoming a solid black tower.
"Tower deactivated, woo!" Cooke stuck his fists up in the air as he exited the tower. Odd gave him a pat on the back.
"You're officially one of us!" Odd congratulated.
"Nahh, I gotta learn French first!" Cooke joked.
Yumi punched him in the shoulder, "Alright Akio, let's get out of here."
Aelita, Odd, and Yumi devirtualized.
"Uhh..." Cooke trailed.
"I can bring you in now, don't worry." Markus promised.
"Oh, good." Cooke smiled, as he was devirtualized.
The scanner doors opened, and out came Cooke patting his body down.
"Didja lose something on Matriks?" Markus remarked.
"No, it just… Every time I go there, it's literally an out-of-body experience." Cooke steadied his head with his hands, "The return trip feels like waking up, but… Like… Waking up from a short half nap while… Listening to your teacher in the middle of class. And… Taking an energy shot at the same time that depletes immediately."
"Oh man, you are out of it." Markus helped him over to the computer.
"You get used to it." William chimed over the speakers.
"So, Einstein, if you're okay with me calling you that?" Cooke asked.
"I have no problems with that." Jeremie smirked.
"Continue with your long-winded explanation of something the readers already figured out a while ago." Cooke sat back.
"Uh, what?" Jeremie queried. Odd laughed in the background.
"Just- finish what you were saying earlier!" Cooke hurried.
"Right! The scanners were built differently, therefore, they had to be programmed differently. One the many keys there are in the system is one that recognizes a person that came through the Matriks scanner. This one person specifically the system administrator." Jeremie pushed his glasses up, "That would be you, Cooke."
"...Oh!" Ulrich facepalmed, "Cissad... Sys ad... System admin. JAER told us how to deactivate the tower!"
"Okay, Jeremie, what does this mean?" Markus asked.
"To modify anything in Matriks, you need to be a system admin." Jeremie simplified. Everyone except Aelita exhaled, finally understanding him, "Meaning only Cooke can deactivate the towers on Matriks."
"Ugh," Cooke grunted, "I am the wrong person to be the system admin."
"I think it was first come, first serve. Sorry bro." Markus shrugged, "I think I can find a backdoor in case Cooke can't make it. Or worse."
"That would be an excellent backup plan." Aelita agreed.
"Okay, I have another question," Cooke began, "How did I see invisible things?"
Markus turned around to face Cooke, "I know this one! I looked into your profile for once, you have a power called Extrasensory. It allows you to see and decipher objects that shouldn't be there."
"In English?"
"You can see invisible objects, bad guys, or anything that shouldn't be there. Like false walls, and false people." Markus clarified.
Cooke nodded, impressed, and grabbed his coat from the back of his chair, "Well, that was a fun day. I'm going to take a nap. In my bed."
Cooke went up the spiral staircase, and left. Markus redirected his attention towards the computer, "Okay guys, is there anything he and I should know about XANA?"
Everyone looked at each other, brainstorming.
"Absolutely." William nodded, and it seemed everyone in that room knew what he was talking about, "The other William."
"There's two of you?" Markus puzzled.
"Oui. There's a XANAfied version of me on Lyoko. I was taken by XANA, and brainwashed for several months serving him. As you can see, I'm free now." William relieved.
"XANA… Took you?" Markus worried, "How?"
"There's a XANA controlled monster we call the Scyphozoa, which is capable of altering and controlling your brain." Jeremie sulked, "You'll know it when you see it."
"I take it that it looks like a jellyfish?" Markus assumed. They all nodded. "Got it."
"That's really the only big thing you need to be wary of. Don't let it get near you, or Cooke." William finished.
"I'll keep that in mind." Markus acknowledged, "One last thing, Jeremie, can you refine the search in the censored document for words in sequence with the letters J, A, E, and R?"
"I've had it searching for JAER since it contacted you." Jeremie contently smiled, "Nothing yet."
"Okay then, keep me posted." Markus accepted, "Meeting adjourned. Go home, it's like… Midnight for you guys. You craaaazy kids shouldn't be out so late!"
They all waved, and Jeremie ended the chat.