Code Matriks
Episode 11: A Negative Plus Sign (Part 3)
By B1ockh3d
Author's note: Hey! Sorry I'm a few days late. Long story short, I was sick for the first week and had midterms the second, so most of the time I'd use for writing I used for sleeping or studying. But It's all good now!
Tyron stormed back into the supply closet, waking Cooke violently.
"CHRISTINA!"
Cooke gave him a side-eyed glare, "Piss off."
Tyron slammed his fists down on the table, "What code did you give me?!"
"For...?"
"Your phone!"
"The unlock code. Why?"
"BECAUSE!" Tyron pulled out a tablet, showing Cooke network activity data, "There is a rodent in my computer!"
"Oh... Maybe you shouldn't have done that then." Cooke shrugged, "Did you know, a bunch of computers in my country's government were infected by malware by employees plugging in USB drives they found on the ground outside the building?"
"I don't CARE-"
"Maybe you should, it was a very stupid and avoidable way to get malware-"
"Shut UP!" Tyron shouted, "Since I know you've put a special encryption on that phone, I know you can get past it. You have very little time."
"Or else what? You'll kill me?" Cooke laughed, "That'd make a wonderful international incident. Imagine the headlines, "American College Student Found Dead in Mysterious Lab in Switzerland." Orange would look fantastic on you."
Tyron grinned, "Who said anything about killing? I'd simply virtualize you while removing some key code, putting you in limbo. Then, your friends can't touch my computer without killing you. And trying to convince authorities of the truth would be like convincing a tenth century explorer that the world is round."
Cooke sat back, and shook his head. He was right. "...Alright, give me that thing."
Tyron threw him the tablet, "You have one hour, or it's virtual limbo for you."
He left the room.
"...Ohhhp! Guys!" Markus smiled, "Cooke is online!"
"He's online? How?!" Jeremie puzzled.
"I don't know!" Markus shrugged, "But he's in some sort of distress!"
"Oh, really? Cooke is in distress?" Odd quipped sarcastically, "Can't imagine why."
"He's talking to me in code... Er, no... I-hay ave-hay... One-hay... Oh my god, it's a distress signal written in piglatin." Markus laughed, "That's actually kind of funny."
"What is he saying?!" Aelita hurried.
"Imbo-lay..." A separate window popped up in front of Markus, it was a clock counting down from 58 minutes, "Uhh... Crap."
"What is it now?!" Jeremie demanded.
"He activated a countdown timer for two minutes under an hour and if I read this correctly..." Markus processed, "...Tyron is going to put Cooke in digital limbo when time runs out!"
Jeremie spun around in his chair, "Everyone, head to the scanners NOW!"
"Jeremie, he still hasn't reached his time!" Ulrich reminded, "What are we going to do there early?!"
Jeremie folded his hands, "Buy him time."
"Orry-say arkus-May..." Cooke mouthed as he typed, "I-hay... Ave-hay o-tay... Isconnect-day ou-yay..."
Cooke manually purged the traffic, and reset the network connectors.
He pounded on the door, "Yo! I did the thing!"
No one responded.
"I know at least one of you ugly green mongoloids are watching the door! Get me Tyron!"
He sat down at the table and waited impatiently. After a few minutes, the door swung open.
"COOKE YOU UNTRUSTWORTHY IDIOT!" Tyron ranted, "YOU SEVERED THE CONNECTION FROM THE COMPUTER TO THE DEVICE!"
"Well, duh." Cooke slumped back, "If you want to rid a user of a network, you cut their signal."
Tyron tensed up, "You've erased all of our progress!"
"Yes, on breaking into my computer." Cooke rolled his eyes, "Look, you wanted the rat out, I got the rat out. Now let me go home."
"That is not our agreement." Tyron rejected, "You're going to give us access to your computer and then we'll send you home."
"Hah!" Cooke laughed, "Make me!"
Tyron tapped the tablet, "Limbo in less than an hour, unless you comply."
"Oh, right..." Cooke bit his tongue, "Listen, it booted in safe mode, just restart it like normal and all your progress will still be there. Just continue it."
Tyron opened the door and exited, "Excellent."
Cooke looked down at the tablet, now displaying a terminal message:
static int _ref kernel_init(conn *unused)
He laughed, "Heh. Who's the idiot now."
The whole warrior roster landed in Sector 5, and began running to the elevator.
"Any news from Cooke?" Yumi requested.
"Nope." Markus sighed, "He told me he had to kick me to stay alive."
"This doesn't make sense." Jeremie stroked his chin, "What would Tyron want with your computer?"
"Data, most likely." Aelita theorized, "He probably knows the computer is Carthage based, and he'll further his own computer with any of my father's data he can mine."
"Should we be worried we linked our computers together?" Odd reminded.
"No, we can collapse the tunnel any time for any reason. Safety precaution." Jeremie answered.
Markus rubbed his head, "Man, I can hardly follow all these technical rules..."
A window popped up, indicating that Markus reconnected to the Cortex.
He pushed his glasses back up, "And now I'm reconnected. I wonder- ohhh... Clever!"
"What?" Odd piped.
"Cooke tricked the computer into thinking my presence is an error in their software! my activity doesn't show because he made the computer process my actions as a kernel panic!" Markus celebrated.
"In... Engli- er, simpler words?" Ulrich requested.
"When they reset the network hub and I connected, the computer processed me as an error. Given that the Cortex is a fairly hefty system, it'll be overlooked."
Anthea walked in, with Cooke now lying on the floor.
"What did you break?" She asked.
"What? Oh, nothing." Cooke smirked.
"Alright, what did you edit?"
"Again, nothing."
She cocked her leg back, "Then do you mind enlightening me on why a system that's never failed before is flashing errors?"
"Do you really think I know what happened to your fancy computer?"
"You bet I do."
Cooke propped himself up and smiled, "You'd be correct."
She rubbed her face, "Ugh- just, what did you do?"
"I'll undo it when I leave, which is very soon."
"...Very soon?"
"Yep. My friends are coming to bust me out of this slammer. So I made the computer temporarily incapable of detecting users." Cooke bored, "But I'll clear all that with my information as well."
She crossed her arms, "Very... Bold."
"So! Is there anything you need from me?"
She eased up, and headed out the door, "Please don't forget the flash drive."
The Skid sliced through the digital sea, full power!
"How are we going to do this?" Ulrich queried.
"Well, if you stayed awake and listened to Jeremie, you would know!" William cackled.
"Well- I know HOW, but who's guarding the Skid, and who's going to be transferred?" Ulrich clarified.
"I'm sending Yumi and William to go rescue Cooke, while the rest of you guard the Skid." Jeremie sorted.
"OooOooO! I bet Ulrich is thrilled with that arrangement!" Odd heckled.
"Shut up, Odd!" Ulrich barked.
"Chill, chill, I just meant you get to hang with the best Lyoko warrior!"
"Aelita?" Ulrich teased.
"No, yours truly!" Odd boasted.
"As I recall, you can't beat me!" Ulrich argued.
"Shut up! Both of you!" Yumi snapped, "You can settle this fighting monsters!"
Ulrich and Odd quieted, leaving the comms silent.
"...Jeremie?" Aelita piped.
"You're over half way there, what is it?"
"I... Would like to go rescue Cooke."
"Aw, I'm sorry, I'm not going to be that annoying." Odd apologized.
"No Odd, it's not you." Aelita breathed, "I really want to go there."
"Aelita... Do you think you can handle it?" Jeremie worried, "I don't want Tyron to do whatever he did to Cooke to you-"
"It means very much to me." Aelita emphasized, "You know why."
Jeremie sat back and mentally debated, "...Alright, who wants to switch out?"
"I will." William volunteered.
"No, I will." Yumi argued, "It makes more sense to have someone for close-combat."
"What about me then? Instead of William?" Ulrich butted.
William rolled his eyes, "Oh, shut-"
"No, I agree with Yumi." Jeremie finished, "It's William and Aelita."
The whole gang emerged from the digital sea, without any issues.
"Phew, I can't believe that worked." Markus sighed in relief.
"There one tower here and it's on the west side of the Cortex." Jeremie directed.
"I'm coming up on it." Aelita informed, "Is everybody ready?"
"Ouí!" Everyone chanted.
Aelita steered the ship next to the tower.
"Ooo..." Jeremie bit his lower lip, "It's been so long, I forgot we had to activate a tower for this."
"Is that a problem?" Odd raised.
"Yes... We didn't prepare for this." Jeremie began tapping away at his keyboard, "As soon as I activate this tower, the cat's out of the bag."
"God... Dangit!" Markus slammed his fists down, "So much for buying him time!"
Jeremie checked the clock, "...If we time this right, we can transfer him when the reset clock hits zero."
"And how much time is that?"
"About ten minutes. But because of our tower issue, Odd, Ulrich, Yumi, you guys are going to have to work extra hard to guard the Skid!" Jeremie commanded, "We can't let anything get to it or our mission is a bust!"
"We'll guard it with two hundred percent!" Yumi accepted.
"Okay then..." Aelita breathed, "Docking!"
"Activating the tower for our own purposes!" Jeremie announced, "Are you two ready for transferring?"
"Ready!"
"Ready."
"Then let's transfer!" Jeremie punched the enter key.
Cooke quietly waited. The room was dreary, bleak, and boring.
"I sure hope they can find me."
OOF!
AH-
There was a scuffle outside the door! Cooke took cover behind a shelving unit, and readied to knock it over.
The door opened. Cooke peered through a hole on the structure, and saw an ominous pink glow. He saw a hand pop in, holding a floating pink orb.
"Cooke?" A familiar female voice called.
"...Aelita?"
Aelita swung open the door and scanned the room, "You can come out now."
Cooke stepped out, "...Wow, I didn't expect you guys to do your spectre thing."
"What else would we have done?" She quipped.
"Fair point. That looks so much cooler than however Jeremie explained it in his diary!"
William poked in, "Alright, we have Cooke. Now what?"
"We have to find the interface and transfer him in." Aelita answered.
Cooke gathered himself, "I believe that's on the floor below us, along with my phone."
"Let's move out then!"
"Not so fast, William," Cooke held up his still restrained arms, "I need... Help."
Aelita shook her hands and pointed to William, "I can't cut things."
Cooke looked up to William, with his giant daunting sword, "...Please don't miss."
"I never miss!" William boasted, and swiftly brought his blade down.
"William, you suck." Cooke frowned.
"Hey- I got the restraints off!"
"Yeah, at the cost of my favorite shirt!" complained Cooke, "I got it from Comic Con! I can't get another!"
"Well, maybe I wouldn't have sliced it down the middle if it wasn't so loose!"
"Next time, don't get kidnapped wearing your favorite shirt!" Aelita teased. Cooke rolled his eyes.
William edged into a hallway, seeing two ninjas.
"We're blocked off."
Aelita pressed herself against the wall, "Hmm... Cooke."
"Yes?"
"Lure them down here."
Cooke looked down the hall, and nodded towards Aelita. He began walking down the hall, until the ninjas took notice. He then turned around and dashed back into safety around the corner, where William raised his sword to be brought down like a guillotine.
Aelita grabbed his wrist, "Remember, those are people! Not XANA!"
"I know, I know." William dropped his sword next to him. When the ninjas finally caught up, he swung his sword like a baseball bat and knocked them down and out.
"...Home run." Cooke commented. Aelita motioned to move forward.
They made it downstairs into the control room with no issues. Cooke immediately ripped his phone out of the dock connected to the computer, and sat down.
"Alright Aelita, walk me through this." Cooke requested, "How do I set up a delayed virtualization?"
She reached over and took over the keyboard, "I'd teach you if time wasn't of the esse- Who's Christina?"
Cooke ripped back the keyboard, "TIME IS OF THE ESSENCE! I'M WIPING MYSELF OFF HIS SYSTEM!"
Cooke finished, and handed the keyboard back to Aelita. A clock popped up, showing two minutes. She hit the enter key, and the countdown began.
"Hey! Who are y-"
The trio whipped around, and found an awestruck Anthea standing in the doorway.
"Oh no." Cooke murmured.
Anthea and Aelita made eye contact, for the first time in a very long time.
"Mom... Mommy?"
"Aelita...?"
They were frozen, frozen in both disbelief and exhilaration. So much to say.
"Mommy... Why are you here?"
"Aelita, I wish I could expl-"
An alarm started blaring, with red strobe lights flooding the room. Anthea, with tearful eyes, shakily ran out.
"Larry and Moe woke up." William concluded.
"And called for their fleet of Curlys, we gotta go!"
William stepped out into the hallway, and saw fleets of ninjas flooding in from both sides, "It's not looking good out there!"
Cooke shook Aelita out of her trance, "Aelita! You need to clear me a path to the scanners! I have ninety seconds!"
She shook her head to regain focus, "Er, right. We have to... Go!"
Aelita stepped out and fired two orbs down the hallway leading to the stairs, knocking down three of the six ninjas charging them. William jumped in front of her, and swung his sword, sending out a shockwave knocking the other three down.
"Go! Go!"
Cooke sprang out and hopped over the handrail, and headed upstairs. Which lead to a firm Tyron blocking their path.
"Leaving so soon?" He furled.
"Yep!" Cooke quipped, and motioned to William and Aelita to back off.
"Aw, and I just got off the phone with Briggs about your Mono." He deadpanned, "Is there someone you'd like me to meet?"
"Yeah... My fist!" Cooke swung at Tyron, who dodged it and kicked him back against the wall, "Ow! I guess I was a little too cocky..."
"Spectre translation is very fascinating, I'd sure love to talk to Aelita all about it." He stroked his chin, "Oh! Maybe I'll go flash my marriage license to Kadic and go through it with her."
"Like I would tell you!" Aelita raged, throwing an orb right past Tyron's nose, causing him to stumble back onto his rear.
"GO!" William pushed Cooke out of the stairwell over to the scanner room.
"Which one did you set, Aelita?" Cooke anxiously observed the 10 scanners.
"Three!" Aelita guided.
Right then, the third scanner began to make a whirring sound. Cooke quickly jumped in and the doors shut.
"We got him, Jeremie!" William cheered.
"Bring us in!" Aelita called.
A swarm of ninjas busted into the room, but they were too late. The room was empty, as well as the third scanner.
Cooke touched down on a platform in the core of the Cortex.
"Pheeew!" He stretched, "It's good to be back!"
"It's good to hear your voice again!" Markus exhausted, "Good GOD that was scary!"
"We're still in the haunted house, keep holding your breath." Cooke jumped up to the next platform.
"Alright... The teleport pad is another five platforms up."
"I see it, I see it."
A ninja spawned in, followed by another, and another.
"You might wanna hurry up!"
"I see them! I see them!"
Cooke hopped up another platform, narrowly avoiding a sword slash. He pulled out his sword, whipped it up two more platforms and climbed up.
"Two platforms over!"
Cooke jumped over to it, bouncing his weight off the head of a ninja sticking out of the platform, and landed on the teleport pad. Now landing him in a familiar issue.
The door.
"Aelita, you said you could open this door, right?" He called, "Aelita?"
"Cooke! We can hear you again!" Yumi relieved, "Aelita and William are out cold from the translation."
"Well, shoot." Cooke smirked, "Now what?"
"I'm sending you all your vehicles." Jeremie informed, "Odd, Ulrich, keep guard of the Skid until they wake up. And Yumi, go to the core entrance and wait for Aelita to wake up."
The three nodded, and split up. Odd taking high grounds, Ulrich riding around the area, and Yumi rushing towards Cooke.
Thankfully, the door started opening!
"Oh, fantastic timing!" Cooke celebrated, "That was qui- is Aelita still out?"
"Yes, and the door's opening?!" Jeremie panicked.
Cooke looked through the crack forming, and saw William.
"Uhh... William's out cold too, right?"
"Yes... ODD!" Jeremie commanded, "GO HELP YUMI SAVE COOKE FROM WILLIAM!"
Cooke finally saw the XANA symbol on his forehead, and stumbled back.
"Enroute!" Odd back flipped onto his Overboard and boosted over.
Cooke dodged William's giant sword flying through the widening gap, which Cooke could now see the Scyphozoa waiting just beyond William guarded by two Tarantulas. William's sword dissipated into smoke and returned to his hand.
"Uhh, new problem!" Cooke cried out, "We have unfried calimari waiting to suck my brains!"
"It is imperative that it doesn't!" Markus advised.
Cooke backed away from the almost open door, and turned around. There were also two ninjas, and the special blue archer ninja spawning in on he teleport pad.
"And another new problem!" Cooke feared, "The person who captured me is here!"
"Don't be caught by him either!" Markus added.
"Well, obviously!"
Jeremie stroked his chin, "...Actually, this could work in our favor. How far out are you two?
"Thirty seconds at the most!" Yumi answered.
Odd pulled up alongside her, "Likewise!"
"Stop!" Jeremie demanded.
Yumi and Odd halted their vehicles.
"Huh?"
"Why?"
"Yeah, I'd love to hear your plan, Einstein!" Cooke hunkered.
"Cooke! Lure William in and get him to fight the ninjas!"
William super-smoked past the door, towering over Cooke.
"Sure. That won't pose any problems whatsoever." Cooke sarcastically cried out.
He glanced over at the ninjas. The two green ones charged forward, and the blue one drew his bow.
He looked back up at William, who was raising his sword.
"Da-aiii can work with this!" Cooke jumped up next to William, who turned and continued his swift cut. Cooke leaned way over left to avoid it, and saw the archer getting ready to fire. He swung a roundhouse kick, which William caught.
"Heheh. Pathetic." The Willy clone grunted.
"Maybe. But no." Cooke hopped over to the right, now putting William in the line of fire.
The archer released his arrow, hitting William, which wrapped a cable around him and began shocking him.
This didn't faze the ultra-powerful clone. He turned around, grabbed the cable, and yanked the archer toward him. The other two ninjas then stopped running after Cooke, and aided their friend.
"Excellent work!" Markus complimented.
"That was surprisingly easy." Cooke shrugged.
He slipped out past this and exited into the full Cortex. Which he forgot had the brain-sucker and two creepy crawlers at the ready.
"Uhh... Jeremie, I need some help."
"BONZAI!" Odd shouted from above, pelting one of the Tarantulas.
The two monsters turned and began firing at Odd, letting Yumi slip in on the Overwing.
"Get on!"
Cooke wasted no time, and hopped on the Overwing, clinging to Yumi.
"The package has been secured!" Odd joked.
"Markus, where did you put the MantiSkid?"
"I moved it over to the tower they're docked to, no worries."
Cooke dismounted from the Overwing, and fell onto his back on the ground.
"Jeez... What a rush..."
"Hnnuuh... What's going on?" Aelita awoke.
"You were asleep for the action." shrugged Yumi, "Didn't miss much."
Odd finally showed up, "I can't believe you'd leave perfectly defeatable monsters behind! What a waste!"
Cooke scrambled back to his feet, "Alright, I'm done here. I wanna go home."
"Well heeeere's your ride!" Markus remotely glided the MantiSkid up from under the Cortex's tower platform.
"Beam me up!"
The Skid shot out into the digital sea, not followed by the MantiSkid.
"Hey, Cooke!" Ulrich called, "Where'd ya go?"
"I'm just checking something real quick." Cooke assured, and guided his ship towards the door to the core. Which, surprisingly, was still open. Along with the Scyphozoa and the clone of William. "Yep, they're still here."
"Well, yes!" William rolled his eyes, "Where else would they go?"
"Fair point. Alright, I'm coming." Cooke readied the MantiSkid to dive, but caught a glimpse of black smoke in front of the evil William, "...Hold on."
Cooke squinted, and saw black smoke carrying the blue archer ninja towards the Scyphozoa!
"What's going on?" Yumi worried.
"Ohhh crap!" Cooke panicked, "Scypho-ja- gaaaah Ninjozoa- NINJA SCYPHOZOA!"
"What?!" Aelita panicked, and immediately turned he Skid around, "Stop it!"
Cooke took aim and fired, but William deflected it. Then, a squadron of Hornets flew in, followed by three Krabs, and they all began firing.
"Aiiiieee gotta abort!" Cooke strafed right, and saw the ninja being drawn in by the Scyphozoa, and turn from blue to red, "He's gone!"
"Get out of there!" Markus yelled.
Cooke forcefully slammed the dive button, and crawled into the digital sea.
He immediately saw the Skid, and joined alongside.
"That was not something I saw coming!" Cooke freaked, "Now we have to save him! Or her!"
"He's Tyron's problem." William coldly shrugged.
"No, he's OUR problem!" Cooke ranted, "It was Einstien's brilliant idea to get them to fight each other, and now that I did that, XANA has a powerful archer on his side!"
"Which... You want to save a nameless mercenary that wouldn't do the same for you?" Markus questioned.
"Yes!"
"I'm with Cooke." Aelita agreed, "We've been through this before, Tyron hasn't. And he won't care about losing a warrior."
"Guys, we have our own problems-"
"That list grows everyday, Markus!" Cooke fumed, "This is just another task at hand!"
Markus slammed his back into the chair, "Fine. Just another task at hand."
Now back at their respective worlds, everyone transferred out of their ships.
"Well, I'm glad THAT'S over!" Cooke stretched, "I think I'll get myself a breakfast burrito... With bacon and sausage!"
"Now that is something I can get behind!" Odd commented from Lyoko.
"Maybe it's a good thing we don't have Cooke." Ulrich laughed, "Imagine feeding two Odds!"
"We've fed three before!" Yumi reminded.
"Alright, time to bring everyone in." Jeremie exhaled, "Materialization Yumi, Aelita, and Ulrich."
"Let's go get breakfast, Cooke." Markus smiled, "Materialization."
A ringing tone played out of the speakers in Markus' lab, and a red warning sign appeared in the Materializing screen.
"Materialization William, and Odd." Jeremie finished.
"Jeremie! Something's going wrong with the materialization!" Markus panicked.
"What's wrong?!"
"I can't find Cooke! Again!"
The left and right scanners opened, with Odd and William stumbling out.
"What... A... Day." Odd joined the trio standing in the elevator, followed by William.
"XANA really didn't hold back today." William commented.
Before Aelita pressed the up button, the center scanner closed, and activated.
Odd puzzled, "Uhh... That's not normal, right?"
"It could be XANA!" Aelita slammed the button without hesitation, and took everyone upstairs.
"Welcome to Earth." Jeremie waved, without peeling his eyes away.
"Jeremie, lock the elevator!"
"Huh? What's going on?"
"The scanner activated downstairs!"
Jeremie quickly locked the elevator, "That's strange, I can't see any activity on any scanners."
"There's definitely activity. Go to the security cameras!" Yumi assisted.
Jeremie switched over, and saw the center scanner open. Smoke filled up the cabin, but out reached a hand.
"He... Hello?!" A familiar voice called out, "Markus?!"
Jeremie pressed the mic to his face, "Markus, I found Cooke!"
"Where is he?!"
"In an abandoned Renault factory in France!" Odd snickered.
"Where's that?"
"He's in our factory with us." Jeremie clarified, "I don't know how, but now we have to wait another twelve hours!"
"Fantastic." Markus deadpanned.
Cooke staggered out of the scanner, and discovered two more cylindrical scanners in front of him, and a large door heavily bolted shut.
"Uhh... Where am I? How did I get here?"
Suddenly, the large door opened up. And inside was the Lyoko gang!
Odd waved, "Bonjour!"
"Welcome to France." jokingly greeted Aelita.