Code Matriks
Episode 18: Teary Eyes and Throwing Knives
By B1ockh3d
Author's note: Hello! I bet you all thought that I completely forgot about this story and no updates were coming, right? Well, I didn't forget. I've been slowly chipping away at the chapter all throughout Summer while I also worked full time, and I started college back up. This is my final year of it! Sorry this took almost 5 MONTHS to get out, but it's been kinda crazy over here on my end, I've finally been able to find time to sit down and finish the chapter. I didn't want to rush it out, because this is a pretty important chapter, and I wanted to make sure I wrote it right. Which included rewriting the first half of it because I didn't like it. And this is a very long chapter! But I hope it was worth the wait, because I have been DYING to post a new chapter for you guys.
Please read on and review!
"This is strange, I can no longer find JAER anywhere on the network." Markus puzzled.
"Like, *poof!* and gone forever, or gone forever and *poof!* the plot demands his return?" Cooke proposed.
"Only time will tell for certain."
"Does this mean we can shut this thing down?" Juliet queried.
"Oh, I'm sure we could, if we didn't just learn all this new stuff about it!" Cooke blocked.
"Alright, fine, we'll keep the nuclear bomb in the basement of a lab in Washington DC of all places ACTIVE!" She snapped at Cooke, "Your curiosity just stretches out the inevitable!"
"Well, you're both wrong. We don't have complete control of the computer, meaning we still can't shut it down." Markus sighed.
"Are you sure? Did you even try?"
"Trust me, the fact that someone or something uploading a massive file on here proves we don't have as much control as we thought."
"So, where do we go from here?"
"Well, you need to go to work while we keep our lab spotless for our inspection." Cooke summed, "Speaking of which, they didn't come the other day. Why's that?"
Juliet shrugged, "One of Cassinov's men left and I caught wind it was an inspection. But then he came back with a box of bagels for the night crew."
"...Bagels for the night crew? That's a lot of carbs to start off a shift." Cooke remarked.
"Not everyone starts their day with hot cocoa and cinnamon." Markus retorted.
"Oh? I'm weird? How many cans of tooth decay do you need to drink every morning to get you moving?"
"Only-"
"GUYS!" Juliet interjected, "As interesting as your morning routines are, we need to stay focused!"
"Erm, right." Cooke shook his head, "Do they normally get bagels?"
"How should I know? It's not my department."
Markus rolled his eyes, "Then we're done for now. You need to get to work, and we got stuff to do."
Juliet nodded, then left. Cooke also left for classes, and Markus stayed behind.
Aelita spread across her bed, and pulled out her clunky pink DJing headphones. She plugged them into her phone, stretched the headband over her head, and relaxed as the Subdigitals played her day away.
Only a few minutes in, and she head a knocking at her door through her thick headphones. She slipped them around her neck, and approached her door, right as her phone began ringing.
"Well, that was nice while it lasted." She ignored her phone and opened the door, to an awaiting Jeremie, "Jeremie! What's going on?"
"Oh, nothing much, nothing much..." He grinned slyly, "Just, Y'know, figured out a way to get rid of XANA forever. No biggie."
Her eyes grew as big as dinner plates. Finally! After being forced to come out of retirement twice, Jeremie found a way to solve their biggest problem once and for all!
"That's great! Did you tell the others?!"
"Not yet. I figured maybe you wanted to?"
"Oh, I will!" She pulled out her phone, and noticed something alarming.
A missed call from Jeremie. And a message that read: "SPECTRE ALERT!"
She looked back up at the Jeremie in front of her. There was no way he just found the cure to their XANA disease. This was absolutely the spectre.
"Is something wrong?"
"Tell me, Jeremie, do you remember what happened at the lake?"
"And we won't have a repeat of that-"
"A repeat of what?"
Jeremie flinched; he realized his true identity was made. His eyes flickered from normal pupils to XANA symbols.
"AH!"
She was tackled to the ground, and the faux Jeremie clung onto her wrists as XANA drained the remaining code from her body. She was paralyzed from both fear and XANA's powers, unable to scream.
After only a minute — which felt like an eternity — XANA stood up, and began laughing loudly. He dissolved into smoke, and flew into the electrical socket.
Ulrich busted into the room, and found Aelita lying on the floor.
"Aelita!"
She groaned. Ulrich wrapped an arm around her and sat her up, "I... Can't see..."
"Oh no, XANA got you!" Ulrich furiously pulled out his phone and called Jeremie, "Jeremie, bad news!"
"Please don't tell me wh-"
"XANA got to Aelita!"
"No! No! NO!" Jeremie panicked, "Is Aelita okay?!"
"She's temporarily blind. I'll call Odd and get her to the factory."
"...I gotta call Markus and Cooke! Take good care of her!" Jeremie hung up the phone.
"Ul...rich..."
"I'm here, Aelita."
"We have to stop... XANA... From... Leaving the... Cor... Tex..."
"We will."
Markus sipped away at an energy drink, whilst tapping away at the keyboard. When suddenly, his phone violently rang, breaking his concentration. He answered the phone.
"Hello, Jeremie?"
"Las urgence! Las urgence!"
"What- English?!"
"XANA IS AT FULL POWER!"
Right then, the scanner doors shut with a loud Clang!
There was nobody on Matriks or Lyoko coming in. Well, nobody expected.
The scanner started whirring, and the computer's superscan started beeping.
"Jeremie... I'm gonna need you to call Cooke for me."
"What's going on?!"
"Scanner just activated!" Markus hung up the phone, and picked up a metal rod they stashed next to the desk.
The scanner doors opened, and there stood a ninja, clad in red and black.
Markus' eyes widened in fear, "OH-"
The ninja's arm sprang up and shot a lightning bolt directly at Markus, launching him across the room.
He quickly scurried to his feet and scrambled to grab his metal rod, "YOU WON'T-"
Another shot! Right in the gut! Markus keeled over, and dropped his weapon.
The ninja raised his other hand and began to continuously shock Markus into a corner.
"AHHHHHHH!"
He finally stopped when Markus was limp against the wall. He picked up the metal rod, bent it into a U shape with his freakish XANA-blessed strength, and thrusted it into the wall on either side of Markus' neck, effectively trapping him.
Markus summoned what little energy he had to try pulling the bar out, but it made it even harder that this thing was pressed up against his windpipe and was nearly choking him. The ninja used this to his advantage, and summoned wires from the walls to pull his hands away and lock them down, as well as his legs and torso.
"SSSS-TO-" Markus coughed, gasping for air.
The ninja electrified him one last time, knocking him out for good. He typed something into the computer, then headed straight for the surface to look for Cooke.
Cooke eyed the whiteboard, and quickly jotted down some notes. His phone lightly buzzed, but he ignored it as this was an exam review class he was taking, and he couldn't lose focus. It buzzed again, a lot more violently. Cooke propped up a binder and answered the call without looking at the screen.
"What?!"
"Cooke! It's Jeremie!"
"Is there something going on?"
"XANA is at full power and I think something bad happened to Markus!"
Cooke slipped out into the hallway, "What do you mean by XANA is at full power?!"
"He can expand outside the Cortex, take over computers, and create Replikas to increase his power!"
Cooke held his face in his palm, "...Okay, how's Markus? What's wrong with him?"
"I don't know! I think something came out of your scanner! We called to tell him what happened, then he told me to- look, he's in trouble! I'll spare you the details!"
"Alright, I'll run there as fast as-" the lights flickered, "...Uhh... The lights are... Not good!"
"Hang tight!" Jeremie advised, and pulled up a view of their school's power grid, "...There is a large amount of energy being drawn in the southeast campus!"
"Great, that's the path I need to go to get to the lab!" Cooke slammed his fist against the wall, "...How did we defeat the XANAfied agents last time?"
"I took over your school's PA system and overloaded it, but it only worked for a moment!"
"Okay..." Cooke scratched his head and calmed down, "He's coming for me, and I gotta fight him."
"We'll get on Matriks as fast as possible to deactivate the tower!"
"You used my school's PA to create tiny EMP bombs that worked on a larger scale, right?" Cooke plotted.
"Yeah, do you think you could make a bigger one in a few minutes?"
"I'm in the northwest campus, the engineering lab is in the northeast."
"...Meaning?"
"I can't build a big EMP." Cooke paced, "...Will any source of electricity work?"
"If you can figure out how to short-circuit a human possessed by a virus by something other than a EMP, now would be the time to do it!"
Cooke eyed an electrical extension cord, "...I gotta go, I'm about to make a fire hazard. Get Juliet to the lab."
"Don't burn down the building while you're in it!" Jeremie hung up, highly concerned.
Juliet drove down the freeway to her headquarters in her large black government SUV, right as she received a call from a blocked number. She answered it.
"This is Agent Juliet Michaelson-"
"JULIET! It's Jeremie! From France!"
"As opposed to the Jeremie I know in Uruguay?"
"THIS IS NO LAUGHING MATTER XANA JUST GAINED HIS FULL POWER AND MARKUS AND COOKE ARE IN DANGER!"
Juliet flipped a switch on her dashboard that activated the lights and sirens, "Where am I going?!"
"What?!"
"LAB OR SCHOOL?!"
"The lab! Markus is in danger!"
Juliet hung up and muscled her way through traffic to an exit, and headed straight to the lab. Without skipping a beat, she rang up Cooke.
"Hey! How's it going?" Cooke forcibly cheered, while knocking over something large in the background.
"Cooke, are you okay?!"
"Peachy!"
"What are you doing?!"
"Looking for two letter openers and- h-hey!" The sound of a drawer opening transmitted through the phone, "Thick rubber gloves!"
"Will you make it to the lab?"
"I hope so! This is gonna-"
K-KRAACK!
"COOKE!"
"Woah! He's already here! I gotta go!" Cooke hung up.
Juliet floored the gas pedal and kept on moving.
Cooke tucked himself under the teacher's desk, carefully looking around. He saw he was in the chemistry room, outfitted with various types of fire extinguishers; most notably, one completely reflective.
He saw the door open in its reflection, and a black and red figure walked in. What was he to do?
He put on the rubber gloves and threw the extension cord over his shoulder, then quietly grabbed one of the fire extinguishers. He looked back at the reflective fire extinguisher, and couldn't see him, but he knew the ninja was still in the room.
He took a deep breath, pulled the pin to the extinguisher, and burst up ready to fire!
But so was the ninja. With an arrow already aimed at Cooke from across the room.
"Uh... Oh no." Cooke squeezed, but he wasn't fast enough. The ninja fired first, nailing the extinguisher in Cooke's hands.
The extinguisher burst, throwing Cooke against the wall, and filling the room with a thick fog.
The ninja has no problem finding Cooke curled up on the ground. He grasped him by the collar and threw him into the storage closet, then knocked down a shelf's worth of contents on top of him. Immobile, the ninja shocked Cooke.
"AHHHHHHHHhhhh-" Cooke fainted.
The ninja attempted to slam the door shut, but noticed a bottle of bleach had blocked him from closing it. He removed it, shut the door, then emptied the contents over the ground in front of the closet door. He then scanned the room, and located a large bottle of ammonia. He threw the contents of that bottle on top of the bleach and left the room, zapping the door lock so no one could get in.
Juliet ran down the stairs, and saw Markus restrained against the wall.
"Oh my god!" She ran over, "Markus, wake up!"
She gave him a couple lights slaps to the face, and he slowly came to.
"Guhhh..."
"Markus, don't move, you're pretty well banged up!"
He sighed, "I... Know..."
"We need to get you out of this."
"There's... Liquid nitrogen... Upstairs... Just, pour some on this bar... And... Hammer it off."
"God, you guys overthink way too much." Juliet grabbed the metal bar around Markus' neck, put a foot on the wall, and pulled the bar out with all her strength.
Markus gasped for air, and coughed, "That... That works... Too..."
"You're welcome." Juliet pulled all the wires holding Markus down away from him.
"Cooke...?"
"I don't know what's going on with him, but am I correct in assuming the sooner we deactivate that tower, the sooner we help Cooke?"
Markus nodded lightly, and slowly lifted his arms from the wire trap, "Can you... Help me to the chair?"
"Sure." Juliet wheeled the chair over to Markus, and helped him in.
"Is the tower solid red?"
"I don't know what that means, but I'm going to assume that it is." Juliet answered as she wheeled him to the keyboard.
He began slowly pecking at the keyboard, and gradually picked up speed, "...Oh crap."
"Oh, please don't say that. What's wrong?"
"XANA collapsed the data tunnel and locked Lyoko's access to our system!" Markus buried his face in his hands.
"Meaning?"
Markus turned slowly towards Juliet in his chair, "Meaning, this is one-hundred percent all you. There is no back up coming to help."
Juliet took a deep breath, "Time to put my cloaking ability to the test."
Markus fired up the scanner, and Juliet stepped in.
"Don't die, I don't know what XANA wants to do with our computer, and I'd rather not find out."
"Got it." Juliet waved as the scanner doors closed.
"Transfer..."
Juliet fell to the ground, landing perfectly on her feet.
"Y'know, this is slowly growing on me." Juliet commented as she drew a knife.
"I'm glad it is." Markus adjusted his glasses, "What do you see?"
"Sea."
"Yes, see? What do you see?"
"Sea!"
"See what?!"
"I see sea!"
"You... Sea?"
"S-E-A SEA!" Juliet barked.
"I... See." Markus gathered himself, "You see sea."
"For the love of everything that is holy- yes!"
"I got it. What kind of sea?"
"What... Like sea sea."
Markus grasped his face, "The digital sea... Or... Like our actual real life sea we have on Earth?"
"The second one." Juliet affirmed.
"Okay... Hold on, I'm gonna call Jeremie."
"I see." Juliet grinned.
Jeremie ran with Odd, Yumi, and William towards the factory, when he received a call from Markus.
"Markus! We're almost there!"
"Bad news, XANA cut your access!"
Jeremie halted everyone, "What?! How?"
"What's going on?" Yumi pressed. Jeremie turned his speakerphone on.
"XANA collapsed the data tunnel, completely obliterated our firewall, and replaced it with his own."
"Has he done anything else?" Jeremie began running and waving the gang to continue forward.
"Ah- well, there's not much more I can do. I've..." Markus trailed, with the sound of keyboard clicks filling in the space, "...Lost control of the return to the past procedures, vehicles, direct scanner transfers... Basically, I can only virtualize people and look at the map."
"How's Cooke?" Odd concerned.
"That's my next task!"
"Alright, just hold XANA off until we figure how to help!" Jeremie hung up, "You heard him guys, we're not looking good."
"Actually," William raised a brow, "I might have an idea."
"Oh, this'll be grand." Odd rolled his eyes.
"I'm all-ears." Jeremie shrugged, "Because I'm all out of ideas."
"We're really going to XANA's former lackey?!"
"Do you have an idea you'd like to share, Odd?" Yumi snapped.
Odd bit his lip, and shook his head.
"...Anyways, I don't quite understand how the Skid works, but could you reprogram it?"
"Reprogram it... In what way?"
Cooke awoke violently, with the noxious smell of chlorine and ammonia assaulting his nostrils and causing his eyes to water.
He coughed, "Ammonia... Gas!"
He pulled himself up with a shelf, realizing his right leg didn't feel right. He looked down at it, and realized it was completely dislocated.
"Oh... Fun!" He coughed again. He checked the door, but it was obviously locked. So, first things first, he had to seal the door from the gas.
He found a roll of orange tape with BIOHAZARD printed in black ink all over it. Propping himself up, he sealed the sides of the doorframe, and stuffed a few rags at the bottom and taped them in. But, he couldn't reach the top.
He pulled out his phone, but it was no use. XANA fried it.
He looked up, and saw an air conditioning vent. Not nearly big enough to climb into, but maybe big enough to stick his head into, and get air. Only problem was, he couldn't climb up that shelving unit in his current condition. Also, it wasn't a particularly hot day, so the school wasn't running the air conditioner.
Meaning the ammonia gas could also spread through the vents to other parts of the building.
Cooke wiped the tears from his eyes, covered his face with his shirt, and slowly started climbing.
"Markus... Please be on top of this."
"...Cooke's phone isn't ringing." Markus slammed a fist the desk.
"Uhm... I called Cooke, he said he was looking for two letter openers." Juliet added.
"Letter openers?! Really?!" Markus scratched his head, "What was he thinking?!"
"I don't know! But I could really use some sort of direction down here!"
Markus regained his grip of the situation, "Okay... What exactly do you see- I mean, observe?"
"I'm on some sort of island, complete with sand, palm trees, so on, and I can see- er, observe, a few other islands around, one of which has an inactive tower. But I have a sea separating me from these other islands."
Markus sat back and pondered, "...Unfortunately, I can't send you a vehicle."
"I'll figure it out." Juliet nodded, "Focus on Cooke."
"Hello?" Jeremie patched in, "Can you guys hear us?"
"Well, I'm glad we can still communicate." Markus sighed in relief, "What's going on over there?"
"Aelita and Ulrich just got here, she's still recovering her sight-"
"Wait, she's blind?!"
"Only temporarily! I'll explain later!" Jeremie assured, "I'm going to reprogram the digital key system on the Skid to read user genetic identification."
"Even I have no idea what those words mean, but I assume it'll be helpful towards our problem." Markus hoped.
"What's the Skid?" Juliet asked.
"That's their ship that can dive into the digital sea and travel through the network." Markus froze in realization, "...Aaaaaand we have a smaller version called the MantiSkid that can do the same thing."
"Can I use that to get around the islands?"
"Islands? What are you guys dealing with over there?" Jeremie piped up.
"New sector, weird biome. I'll explain later." Markus furiously tapped away at his keyboard, "...Yes! I still have access to the MantiSkid!"
"Send it my way!"
"Aaaaand it'll be there shortly!" Markus contentedly sat back, then leaned back forward, "Time to go help Cooke."
Cooke, now precariously leaning his back on one side of the closet while his left foot held him up on a shelf as he was dangling from a few feet high, carefully taped up the top of the door.
"There... All... Sealed..." He hacked up a cough, "Still... Too much... Exposure..."
He slumped his head back to focus on his next challenge, the air vent. Conveniently screwed into the ceiling for ease of access.
"Great..." He looked around, spotting only a Bunsen burner next to his head, "There's a smart idea... Just ignite the fumes..."
He had to think of something fast, because there's only so much time until his leg gave way.
He looked back at vent, and noted the screws in place were flatheads.
"Okay... Something hard and flat." Cooke reached into his back pocket and pulled out his wallet.
He drew a credit card, and jammed it into the screw head.
"...This isn't gonna work." He realized, and slipped his fingers under the side of the vent and pulled. Fortunately, he pulled out the screw and its drywall anchor, effectively removing the vent.
He hopped up one shelf, and jammed his head into the narrow vent.
"HELLO!" He shouted, "TURN ON... AC!"
No response.
"AMMONIA GAS IS... IN THE... SYSTEM! PURGE IT!" He panted.
But still, with no avail.
He took a couple deep breaths of fresher air, and could start to taste the fumes seeping its way into the vents.
"EVACUA-" his foot slipped, "-AAAAAAAAATE!"
He crashed down on the floor. He looked back up at the exposed vent, and sighed. He exerted most of his energy getting himself up there with only one foot and leg, there was no way he could do it again.
"C'mon guys..." He succumbed to the gas, and fainted again.
"Alright, so, Cooke was in his morning physics class, and he was in the north-west area of campus." Markus pondered.
"Are you serious right now? Can't you just look up what building his class is in?" Juliet paced.
"It's building forty-seven. I already know that." Markus pulled up a map of the school campus on screen, "But that doesn't necessarily mean he stayed there."
"Have you even tried calling him? He might not be in danger anymore."
"His phone is dead, and he always keeps it fully charged and you talked to him using it." Markus deduced, "Phones don't just die randomly."
"So, what's the theory, Sherlock?"
"His phone has been shorted, likely due to a sudden high-voltage surge directed at him."
"Well, he did hang up on me because XANA entered the room."
"You got a play-by-play of his situation and you believed he made it out okay?!" Markus scoffed.
"Jeez, sorry for being optimistic."
"Now... What did he want with two letter openers?"
"No idea... Oh! He also found thick rubber gloves wherever he was!"
"Thick rubber... Huh. I can't think what department would-" Markus snapped his fingers, "The chemistry rooms! Those are above the physics rooms!"
"See? I can be helpful."
"Okay, okay... Progress." Markus pushed, "There are approximately eighteen chemistry labs in the building spread apart two floors. Question is, how do we figure out which one Cooke is in?"
"Can't you guys find electrical flows and follow it or something?" Juliet shrugged.
"Uhh... Not exactly sure what you mean by that. But that does give me another idea." Markus smirked.
"It's something at least." Juliet sat down. She looked out over the water, and noticed a large ripple about 50 feet away, "…Huh."
"Huh? What's huh?"
"There seems to be something… Coming up from the water?"
Markus stopped what he was doing and looked over at the virtual map, "I don't see anything."
"There's definitely something under the water."
"Well, this is a new sector, it's likely something we haven't seen yet." Markus shrugged, and continued working on his plan.
The water parted, and what looked like a transparent dome with a brain popped through.
"Yeah, it just poked through. Funny looking thing."
"Hmm, still isn't showing up on the map."
It rose a little bit farther, revealing a bottle-like body and tentacles. It sort of resembled a squid.
"It's a flying squid, wow!" Juliet chuckled, "This place just gets better and better."
"Wait wait wait, what?!" Jeremie tuned back in.
"Can you describe it?!" Markus shook.
The creature fully emerged from the water, revealing the full length of its tentacles.
"It actually looks a lot more like a jellyfish, with the long tentacles-"
"SCYPHOZOA! RUN!" Jeremie and Markus screamed in perfect unison.
Suddenly, two Krabs emerged from the water on either side of Scyphozoa, unleashing a hail of lasers. Juliet scrambled to her feet and ran into the trees of the small island.
"What is this thing?!"
"It wants to suck your brains!" Markus summed dramatically.
"Clarification?!"
"The Scyphozoa is a monster used by XANA to either steal your genetic coding, implant genetic coding, or just plain brainwash you!"
"THAT SOUNDS BA-" Juliet was literally cut off by a gigantic sword impaling the ground in front of her.
"Going somewhere?" a static voice taunted. Juliet looked to her right, and grinning at her was a boy in a black and green outfit with a XANA symbol occupying his forehead.
"You must be William!" She blurted in fear. He gently bowed.
"I CAN'T SEE ANYTHING ON MY MAP! I'M BLIND! I CAN ONLY SEE YOU!" Markus freaked out.
Juliet drew a knife, and slashed at William. He grabbed her arm, and flipped her over on the ground. She drew another knife, swept his legs, and rolled over on top of him. He held her arm back holding the knife slowly inching towards his face.
"Very cute. Want to see what my knife can do?" He taunted, and summoned his sword, knocking her back.
She threw a knife, which he blocked fairly easily. She drew another and threw it, blocked as well. Drew out three, and threw them at different intervals. One managed to break past his sword, hit him in the chest, and knocked him back. She drew out a couple more, and landed a couple extra hits, until the Krab butted its way in and started firing at her.
He got back up, "…Very crafty."
Juliet noticed there was one knife in the sand. She tucked her foot under it, and kicked it up at the Krab, who blasted such a feeble attack.
"Not so crafty."
"It was nice meeting you bye!" Juliet quickly touched the eye on her gauntlet and activated cloaking. William drew his sword from the ground and swung, but didn't hit anything.
He looked down at the ground, and saw footprints forming past him, leading to the beach. A Krab caught up with him, he hopped on top and pointed the way.
"Markus, is there any way we can help?" Aelita chimed in.
"Are… You up for it?"
"I'm still a little blurry, but I think I can see a screen."
"Okay, uhh… Do you have a spare computer on you?" Markus queried, gathering his thoughts.
Aelita pulled out her laptop and a cable, and plugged into a port on the back of the mainframe monitor for the supercomputer, "Yes, what do you need?"
"Alright… Alright… The school has many RFID controlled locks."
"You need me to break into your school's security network?"
"Exactly! And Cooke is presumed to be in building forty-seven, on floors three or four."
Jeremie tapped at his keyboard, "Aelita, you have access now."
"They really oughta up their security. There are bad people out there!" Odd joked.
"Right? I've told them that so many times-"
"Guys," Aelita refocused Markus, "What do you need?"
"Unlock all rooms on those levels!"
"What are you hoping to accomplish?" Yumi puzzled.
"I'm hoping to rule out a possibility." Markus bit on his nails.
Aelita viewed a digital layout of their school, and deactivated all locks on the two floors.
"…One lock doesn't look like it's working!"
Markus buried his face in his hands, and screamed, "THAT'S WHAT I THOUGHT!"
"Room three-eighteen-"
"OF COURSE IT'S THREE-EIGHTEEN!" Markus exhaled, and unclenched his face, "I… Just don't know what to do!"
Aelita squinted at the blueprints for the building, "I'm having a hard time seeing, but…It doesn't look like your school has a chemical suppression system. What's the temperature outside?"
"Wha… What does one have to do with the other?"
"Markus!"
"It's in the lower to mid sixties outside."
Aelita looked up vaguely in Jeremie's direction with a quizzical expression.
"Seventeen degrés." Jeremie corrected. Aelita nodded.
"Oh, right. Metric system. It's chilly out." Markus clarified.
"I… Don't think the building's air conditioner isn't on."
"Why would it be?"
"I'm turning it on, full."
"Why's that?" Ulrich asked.
"TI can't see any trace of a spectre there by the energy levels, and Cooke has to be in that room. Given that his phone shorted out-"
"And he's in a chemistry room!" William bewildered.
"You're purging the system of any chemicals that might be in the vents!" Markus deduced, "That's genius!"
"That's Miss Einstein for ya!" Odd patted Aelita on the back.
"I hope we aren't too late!" Juliet chimed back in.
"Juliet!" Markus sprang back forward, "What's the situation?"
"Still living, but my cloaking ran out and it needs to recharge."
"It's okay! The MantiSkid is only… Oh…" Markus sighed, "It's twenty minutes out."
"Oh, swell! So much for shortly!"
"Tout le monde! Scanners!" Jeremie barked, "We're reprogramming the Skid, we'll just have to finish it on the way there!"
Everyone dashed to the elevator, except Aelita.
"Aelita! Allons!" Odd called out.
She shook her head, "You don't need me, I have to help Jeremie."
"You'll get your full sight back if you go to Lyoko! Plus, who's gonna pilot the Skid?" Ulrich concerned.
"Well, the key is going to be genetically generated by whoever the pilot is…" Jeremie bit his lip, "And Because William is the only person genetically connected to XANA…"
Odd scowled, "Non!"
"Really?!" Ulrich agreed.
"I don't know what's going on over there, but there's a guy with a really big sword headed at me and I don't like it!" Juliet broke.
"We don't have time for this!" Yumi lectured while hitting the down button.
Odd and Ulrich huffed, and William smiled ever so gleefully.
A professor fiddled with the air conditioning controls, but they appeared to be locked. She couldn't even shut it off.
"Sorry class," she apologized, "It's going to get a little chilly."
The entire classroom collectively sighed.
"Now, I have here a vial of Gallium, which has a melting point of eighty-five degrees-"
"Uhh, professor?" a student interrupted, "I smell ammonia?"
"Woah, me too! I thought I was going crazy!" another added.
The professor quickly inhaled through her nose, it was an incredibly strong scent. It even caused her eyes to water up.
"Out. Everyone out now!" She wiped her eyes, and pulled the fire alarm to evacuate the building. The students quickly exited the room, then the building.
"Good news, someone pulled the fire alarm and the building is evacuating!" Aelita updated.
"It wasn't before? I thought you activated the alarm!" Markus stressed.
"I couldn't see the alarm controls." Aelita defended.
"It got done!" Jeremie finished.
"Alright… Fair enough." Markus calmed down, "Soon enough, HAZMAT will be on scene and they'll find Cooke, in whatever condition he's in. Hopefully a good one."
"What's the response time?" Aelita concerned.
"Small, because we're located in Washington D.C.-"
"Guys? Backup?" Juliet reminded.
Jeremie looked at his virtual map, "They're in Sector Five, almost at the Skid."
"That's great and all, but there's two orange monstrosities charging up their lasers!"
Markus stroked his chin, "…Okay, just swim away."
"What?"
"It's not the digital sea, right?" Markus deducted, "And they came out of this ocean, right?"
"Right… And right."
"Swim!"
"Plus, you don't breath oxygen on Matriks or Lyoko, which would making swimming the logical choice." Jeremie expanded.
"Okay, swim. Got it."
Juliet dove into the water, and began swimming downwards, as several laser blasts flew past her head.
"GUYTHS- OP!" Juliet blubbered.
"So, she's still held by the some of the laws of Earth on Matriks. Like being unable to talk underwater." Markus scratched his head.
"DO SOMTHNGHF!"
"…So you need scuba gear!"
"BUGAIDONEETBREEHTH!"
"But you'll be able to speak!"
Markus quickly coded up a program, and activated it. A clear digital display appeared in front of Juliet's face, and it automatically clung to Juliet's face.
"AH! Oh! It works!" Juliet sighed.
"Oh thank goodness… I didn't know if I could do that. It's very basic, so be careful!"
"I have another update," Jeremie jumped back in, "I'm listening to your city's police scanner, and HAZMAT has been called to clean up ammonia gas!"
Markus shuddered, "That's lethal."
"Tell me where that tower is!" Juliet fiercely demanded.
"It's… Huh." Markus cocked his head, "Directly beneath you."
Juliet looked down as she passed a sea wall, and saw nothing but darkness, "Uh, how far down?"
"It looks like a few hundred meters."
Juliet looked behind her, and saw and evil William attempting to turn into smoke, but with no avail. The Scyphozoa wasn't slowed down a bit by the water.
"I don't know what William is trying to do, but he can't seem to do it."
"Makes sense, smoke doesn't work in water." Jeremie nodded.
"But that jellyfish thing is gaining on me!"
"Can you throw any knives?" Markus bit his nails.
"No!" Juliet kept furiously swimming downwards, "If I was just a little bit heavier I could-"
She had an epiphany. She looked back at Wiliam, who gave up whatever he was trying and kept swimming.
"You could what?"
"Sink faster." She stopped and turned herself around, "I need his sword."
"There isn't a rock around you can pick up and use to sink yourself?" Markus scratched his head in befuddlement.
"Not where I am." Juliet drew a knife, and baited William over. On cue, the Scyphozoa stopped and let William ahead to fight.
"There's nowhere to run." William synthesized a chuckle.
"Then let's fight." Juliet invited.
He grinned slyly, and relaxed his arms. As if he was waiting.
Something wasn't right.
"I sure hope you know what you're doing, Juliet. Because I can't reALL-"
Markus was yanked abruptly from his chair by his shirt collar and slammed into the wall behind him.
The XANAfied archer has returned!
"HELP-"
Rather than spending time with Markus, he just zapped him until he was unconscious.
Content with his work, he super-speeded their way down into the computer room, where the looming tower that contains Matriks was held. He walked up to the main tower, gripped it from both sides and started draining energy from it.
After a minute or so of absorption, he bolted back upstairs into the main room. He picked up the chair behind the desk and threw it at Markus still curled up in the corner, and began typing at an insane speed on the keyboard.
"Markus?" Juliet called out, "What's wrong?"
Suddenly, her mask disappeared. Along with the knife she was holding.
"MARKUTH!" She blubbered, "JEREMER!"
"Ahhh!" Jeremie panicked, "Why aren't you guys in the Skid yet?!"
"ARE YOUTH SEREUTH?!"
"We're running!" Odd answered, "Boy Genius and Boy Jealous super-smoked and super-sprinted their way there already!"
"William! Ulrich! I'm transferring you both in now, be ready to launch the second Odd and Yumi transfer in!
"Walk me through it." William nodded.
"Do we really have to let him drive?!" Ulrich argued.
William sighed, "Look, I understand why you don't like me and don't want me to do this. But the reality is this is our only chance to save Juliet and possibly Cooke."
"When did you get all soft?!"
"You call this soft?! I'm taking this seriously!"
"Transferring!" Jeremie interrupted, and teleported them into their respective seats.
"The first panel to your right has all the controls to undock." Aelita summed, "Once you get out, use the control sticks to dive into the sea."
"Makes perfect sense." William shook his head, dauntingly looking around at all the various buttons and switches that cover the interior.
"Don't worry William, I'll get you guys into the digital sea from here!" Jeremie reassured.
"So I don't need to worry about undocking?"
"Yeah, I'll take you guys out." Jeremie gave the thumbs-up to Aelita.
"GUYTH! HETHP COMNG!" Juliet pleaded.
"They'll be there in less than ten minutes!" Jeremie promised.
"I DONB THINKH I HAVB TENN MINUTHS!"
Odd and Yumi caught up, and Jeremie wasted no time transferring them in and quickly launching the Skid.
"Now, as soon as you're in the digital sea, go to the second network hub off starboard to the ship and it'll take you straight on through to the Matriks network!" Jeremie advised.
"So…"
"He means to the right." Aelita clarified, and shot Jeremie a thumbs-up back.
The Skid dove into the digital sea, and William took over the controls as they shot out of Lyoko.
Markus cracked open his eyes, and saw the archer fast at work behind the keyboard. He was too sore to move a limb; there was no way he could fight back. He was underpowered, and completely defenseless to XANA. He instead waited, and watched the archer wreak havoc. He couldn't make out what was happening, because his glasses had flown off his face. All he saw was red windows popping up, clearly errors or warnings about something internal within the computer.
The archer stopped, and Markus closed his eyes. All he heard was footsteps, and the scanner doors closing, followed by the whirring sound the scanner makes when it's virtualizing a person. He reopened his eyes and looked around, he was alone again. He pulled himself up, and shuffled his feet around until he found his glasses. Much to his dismay, he found them with the right lens completely cracked like a spider web.
"What…Ever…" He groaned. Pushing past his unfortunate obstacle, he quickly grabbed the chair and sat behind the keyboard.
Looking up at the screen, all he saw was red windows. There were errors for the scanner, for Juliet's weapons, for the Mantiskid, for the computer itself, for the cooling chamber; literally anything that had a function had an error.
"Ehhhh crap…"
One error in particular was the power levels. It was too low to even think about launching a return to the past.
"Je… Jeremie? Juliet?"
Communications were also broken. He pulled out his phone, but that was already fried.
With a heavy sigh, he pulled himself back together and began fixing the errors.
Evil William let out another laugh, and summoned his sword, which oddly didn't sink him. Instead of Juliet being confident, all that fell over her was fear. She had no way of taking him on.
Panicked, Juliet hit her now fully recharged cloaking. Unfortunately, while she isn't visible, her body outline is clearly visible due to the water surrounding her. William grinned.
"Accept your fate!"
"JEREMER! HEL-"
William took one swing, and an energy beam trailed off the sword hitting Juliet square in the chest. Her useless cloaking subsided, as she flailed about in the water trying to gain traction.
"Please, this is hard to watch!" William mocked, prepping his sword for another slash.
"MARKUTH! DO SOMPFING!" she cried out, but still no response.
"Hold on Juliet! We're coming!" Yumi responded.
"HURR-"
William struck again, nailing a beam on Juliet's head, effectively knocking her out.
He laughed, and shook his head, "I expected so much more from you. Allow me to help."
William floated aside, and let the Scyphozoa past him towards Juliet.
The Skid shot out of the network hub, and they began rapidly approaching the entrance to Matriks.
"Hit the Retrobrakes!" Aelita yelled.
"Uhhh!"
"Big button on your left!"
William slammed the button on his left, and the Skid came to a sudden halt.
"Phew… Thanks Aelita." William breathed.
"The genetic key program should be uploading into the Skid's mainframe now!" Jeremie proudly hit the enter key, "It should only take a minute."
"I see it." William confirmed.
"Guys, I haven't heard from Juliet since we entered the hub!" Yumi concerned.
Jeremie punched away at the keyboard, "Weird… We lost contact with Markus, but we didn't with Juliet. There shouldn't be a reason we can't talk to her."
"Unless she's been devirtualized!" Ulrich reminded.
"No, no." Jeremie settled, "Her card is still up on Matriks. But I can't see any of her statistics."
"Maybe she's cloaking. She can't talk while cloaking, or it'd defeat the purpose of it." Aelita suggested.
"Maybe she's chatting up William!" Odd teased.
"Very funny." William rolled his eyes, "How do I start this thing?"
"You have to fold the Skid up, approach the doorway, and launch the digital key with the rectangular pad over to your right." Aelita instructed.
"Okay, so…" William cautiously pressed a button next to the left control stick, and the Skid folded back up into the tower form, "Okay, we aren't de-"
"AHHHH! YOU IDIOT!" Odd screamed.
"Oh crap what did I do?!"
"HAH! Sike!" Odd laughed, "We're still here."
"…How do I drain the shields for individual NavSkids?" William deadpanned.
"Guys, stay focused!" Yumi realigned.
"Sorry." William apologized, "Alright, key thing."
He navigated the Skid directly behind the door, and launched the key. It shot out as an orange beam, instead of the normal white beam.
"It's…" Jeremie trailed, "…Online! It's working!"
"I got to hand it to you, William. That was very clever thinking." Aelita complimented.
Blip!
William looked down at the display, "…Uh, huh. There's something on my radar."
Odd looked around, "The sea isn't red though. It can't be XANA."
BLIP!
"Whatever it is, it's coming towards us!" William alarmed.
"How fast is it?!" Jeremie pulled up a digital map of the area.
BLIP!
Yumi looked out, and saw the MantiSkid heading straight at them at full speed, "It's the MantiSkid!"
The MantiSkid crashed into the main control head of the Skid, knocking the key out of alignment.
Markus furiously cleared up errors as they popped up, sifting through which ones were red herrings and which ones were real errors; until suddenly, it all froze.
"Oh come on not now of all times!" Markus cried.
A new window appeared, showing Juliet's avatar model. It zoomed in on her head, and highlighted her brain. Numbers started counting down beside it.
"I… Don't recognize this screen!" he shrieked. Whatever it was, it wasn't a nice screen. He pushed it aside, and refocused his attention on the errors. His biggest concern was communications, and the map. Hopefully he could see what Juliet around her. William, the Krabs-
"…THE SCYPHOZOA!" he began violently shaking, and pulled back the brain screen, "Oh no no NO!"
He had less than two minutes until that countdown was over, and there's no telling what XANA was going to do.
"How do I launch the NavSkids?!" William straightened himself.
"Pull three of the levers to your right!" Aelita tensed up.
William managed to launch the three occupied NavSkids, which then went out after the MantiSkid.
"Why is it doing this?!" Jeremie rubbed his head, "It doesn't appear to have a pilot, nor does it look like it was hacked! It's like Markus sent it out on us!"
The Mantiskid flipped around, and headed straight towards Ulrich's NavSkid.
"I'll stop it!" Ulrich fired two shots, which were absorbed by the shields of the ship. He pulled up out of the way, "Dangit! It's pretty agile!"
William pulled the ship back up to the door to Matriks, but couldn't launch a new key, "Uh, new problem."
"Just what we need!" Odd commented.
"I can't launch a new key!"
"It's okay, I can walk you through doing a manual override-"
"Shut up!" William formed a ball of smoke in his hand and slammed it against the pad. A purple, smoky beam shot out into the keyhole, "Does that work?!"
"I… Yeah! I'm connected, but it isn't very strong!" Jeremie flustered, "If I borrow some of the power from the super computer, I can breach the firewall!"
Aelita whipped her head up at Jeremie, "But we won't be able to launch a return to the past if we do that!"
"But they still can!" Jeremie reassured, "It's a safer bet than using the Skid's power!"
The MantiSkid flew behind William, with NavSkids in tow.
"Can we destroy this thing?" Odd asked, locking on.
"I'd hack into, but I'm just too busy!" Jeremie shook his head.
"It's no use, I can't override it either. XANA reprogrammed it." Aelita seconded.
"So, is that a yes?" Ulrich queried, also locking on.
Jeremie exhaled a sigh, "Yeah. Blow it. I gotta make a new one for them anyways."
Yumi locked on, "I'm locked in. Let's fire on three."
"One."
"Two."
"Three!"
All three fired, hitting the MantiSkid with torpedoes. It blew up in a spectacular fashion, leaving only debris sinking down into the abyss.
The trio latched back onto the Skid, right as the door opened.
William released his hand from the pad, "Ho! We did it!"
"Get in!" Jeremie pulled at his hair.
William guided the ship in, and they all found themselves in a watery ocean that looked nothing like the digital sea, but a lot more like the real ocean.
"We're in an ocean-like sector." Ulrich updated.
"Sounds like the right one." Jeremie relaxed, finally.
"H-H-H-Hellll-ll-llloo-oo?" A familiar voice cracked through the speakers.
"Markus?!"
"Yes! I fixed it!" Markus celebrated, "Guys! We are NOT doing great! I think Juliet got taken by-"
"THE SCHYPHOZOA!" Yumi frantically pointed at the scene in front of them.
The Schyphozoa dropped Juliet, and quickly swam away.
"…The countdown thing hit zero!" Markus freaked.
The evil William clone looked up at the Skid, making eye contact with the real William.
"Welcome to the party!" he laughed, throwing his sword point-first at Juliet.
"Michaelson! Get up!" a hazy voice called out, "We've got three more hostiles and I'm black on ammo!"
Juliet looked down; she was wearing camouflage and holding a rifle. She wasn't in control; her body was just running on autopilot. She reached for her belt and pulled out another clip.
"Emmerson! Clip!" She handed the now not-so hazy man also wearing camouflage.
She could smell the dirt and gunpowder in the air. Felt the weight of the equipment draped on her body. Tasted the dry hot air. It was like she was back in Afghanistan.
She scrambled to her feet and lifted her gun, "I got your six. How many Joes in the building?"
"Counting us, two." Emmerson nodded, "Everyone evac'd. Air strike inbounds. Thirty klicks."
This wasn't a dream though. This was all too familiar.
"Let's move out then."
She placed her left hand on Emerson's back, and they proceeded through the building towards the stairs.
"You okay?"
"Yes sir. Blast only blew me off my feet." She replied.
This wasn't just a dream, it was a memory.
Emmerson stopped, slowly raised his weapon, and whispered, "One hostile."
Juliet drew her attention forward, but caught a glimpse of a man raising a weapon of his own, "Contact at eight!"
Emmerson ducked with Juliet, and a barrage of bullets flew overhead. Suddenly, the world began to fade again, to the slightly more stagnant blue world of water she was floating in. The gunfire slowly muffled, and what she saw as bullets turned into a big sword headed straight at her face.
She snapped back into her virtual reality and dodged the sword, managing to catch the grip as it passed under her arm, and she rode it all the way down into the dark.
"Ebbershon?" she softly blubbered.
"Juliet? Are you okay?" a clearly identifiable Markus answered.
"Mashhhhk…"
"Oh! Mask! One second!" Markus chillingly revirtualized her mask.
"Contact at eight…" She reminisced, "We both made it."
"There's… No, you're in the clear. No contacts." Ulrich assured.
"Juliet, are you okay?" Markus repeated.
"Affirmative." She let go of the sword as the red tower came into her view, and the sword disappeared into smoke.
She just floated there, too weak to make a single stroke. That is, until the Skid came up under her.
"Grab on." William looked out at her from the window.
"Who… Are you the good one?"
"Juliet, it's us!" Yumi called out, "That's the good one!"
She clung onto the front window of the Skid, and William brought it down to the entrance of the tower.
"Can you make it into the tower?" Markus concerned.
"I think so. We got a Joe counting on me!" She shook herself, and pained herself to the entrance, "What's the code?"
"M-A-T-R-I-K-S, naturally."
She rose to the top of the tower, and deactivated it.
"Phew, that was rough." Markus relaxed, "Now, a bit of bad news, our power was drained. We can't launch a return to the past."
"Uhh, yeah, that is bad news." Jeremie irked, "We used our power to break through XANA's firewall to Matriks. We can't launch a return to the past either."
"And we didn't even use the backup, this really isn't good!" Markus tensed right back up, "Cooke! I gotta go to the school!"
"Negative! I mean, no!" Juliet flustered, "I'll go! You're all banged up, that'll only raise more questions!"
"…Yeah, good thinking."
"Plus, I need a reason as to why I'm so late for work."
"Alright, I'm launching a materialization. Which, luckily, I can do!" Markus relieved.
Moments later, the Scanner doors closed and opened, releasing a very exhausted female government agent.
"You aren't XANA, are you?" Markus looked down at Juliet, who had collapsed.
"I certainly hope not. I don't feel like I am." She shook her head, "I don't even feel like me."
"I don't know what the Scyphozoa did to you, but please take it easy!"
"Where can I find Cooke?"
"Follow the media trucks. They're probably crawling all over the building." Markus answered, "I can't wait to see what conspiracy theorists are going to make up."
She lifted herself up, and carefully stepped out of the Scanner, "Oof… Legs, they kinda work."
"Well, you're gonna have to put on a convincing show out there."
She made her way to the seat behind the computer, and pulled back her hair into a ponytail, "If there's one thing I know how to do, it's put on a show."
"…How would you know how to put on a show? You've never even hinted at that before. Nor did I ask?"
"It… Felt right to say."
Markus chuckled, "You just wanted to sound awesome with a one-liner, didn't you."
She shrugged, "…Kinda."
"Cooke would be proud. Get outta here." Markus pushed. She left willingly, with a soft wave.
"By the way," Jeremie added, "We also destroyed the MantiSkid…"
"But of course. One problem after another…" Markus sighed, and went straight back to work.
Juliet arrived at WSU, at the same time an ambulance backed in. An officer stopped her from going inside.
"This area has been quarantined, we can't let anyone inside." He stopped.
She pulled out her badge, "FBI. You better suit me up then. This is a matter of national security."
"Right this way." The officer pointed at a tent.
"I would also like a copy of the report sent to our D.C. office."
"Can do." He tipped his hat.
She began walking over, when a gurney busted out of the building with two suited medics on both sides. She quickly ran over and peeked in, and saw Cooke with a breathing mask over his face.
"Who is this man?" she played.
"Who are you?" one of the medics asked, removing their helmet.
She whipped her badge back out, "Juliet Michaelson, FBI. This man may have answers regarding the incident that happened here today."
"Well, agent. If you're willing to take a ride, we'll tell you what we know. Because I doubt Christina here will be talking."
"…Excuse me?"
"We aren't making fun of him, that's the name on his ID." The other medic reached into their bag and handed her his wallet.
She opened it, "...Well, Christina Cooke. Either unfortunate name or a fake ID."
The medics loaded up Cooke, and Juliet joined him inside.
"Now, what exactly happened?" She asked the medic sitting in the back.
"Mr. Cooke here is heavily bruised, dislocated leg, broken left foot, and in the early stages of alveolar edema."
"In English?"
"The ammonia gas almost destroyed his esophagus causing the contents of the stomach to evacuate into the lungs."
"That's pretty gruesome."
"Luckily for him, he was smart enough to seal the doorframe with tape, minimizing the damage. How he managed to do that is beyond me."
"Will he recover?"
"Oh, absolutely. His foot will take the most time to heal, if anything. He's currently in comatose though, so who knows how long he'll be out."
"This is good to hear."
"The thing is, what we've told you isn't even the strangest stuff. He has a massive bruise under his right arm, and a Lichtenburg figure going over his left shoulder down his back."
"What's that?"
The medic pulled back Cooke's shirt and showed a yellow-y tree figure going over his skin.
"Tattoo?"
"We wish that were the case. That's a Lichtenburg, you can only get those by being struck by lightning or extremely high-voltage equipment. But there wasn't anything in that building powerful enough that could do this. This kid was struck by lightning."
"…How did he get struck by lightning and how did he end up in the closet?"
The medic shrugged, "That's your job to figure it out, I'm afraid."
"Thanks for your information."
"Yep, sounds like XANA messed him up pretty badly." Markus sulked into the headset.
"He's resting in a hospital bed now, he'll supposedly make a full recovery." Juliet whispered into her phone, "We have a lot of damage control to do."
"I know, I'm just hoping nobody saw XANA's archer. I'm pretty sure he travelled through the power lines, but if so much as one picture was taken, we have a big problem."
"And ammonia gas."
"I've been watching the news, only one man was affected, but they won't release details until his family is notified."
"So, Cooke's family?"
"Correct."
Juliet looked back at Cooke, still dead asleep, "…I have a question."
"Oh, you and be both."
"Why is his name Christina? Is he… Um…"
"No, no. He just doesn't like talking about it. To make a long story short, he has a twin sister, and the nurses wrote the wrong names on the birth certificates. When the parents found out, it was too late to legally change their names, and they weren't old enough to change it themselves."
"Why doesn't he now?"
"He wants to, but right now, his student loan paperwork, school paperwork, grants, and all sort of other legal stuff are registered as Christina Cooke. It's too much of a hassle to change everything right now, so he's waiting until he graduates. Hence why he prefers being called Cooke."
"Alright…" she paused rather quickly, "I see some black vans pulling up, I'm going to assume they're here to question Cooke."
"I bid you two good luck."
"Yeah, they'll need it." Juliet hung up.
Markus sighed, and slowly punched another number into the keyboard. The phone rang, and someone picked up.
"Hello?! Who is this?!" An almost irate woman demanded.
"Ma, it's me."
"Oh, Mark! Sugar! Are you okay?!"
"I'm fine, it's just been a rough day so far."
"I heard! I had workers install your local news stations in our house!"
"In… California?"
"We'd do anything to make sure you're safe! If you want to come back home, we'll send a jet for you-"
"No, no jets. I'm fine. I'm safe. I like it here." Markus breathed, "Unfortunately, you know my buddy?"
"Cookie?"
"Ye… Yeah, Cookie. Him." Markus bit his lip, "He was the one that was injured in the… Gas… Leak?"
"Oh my heavens! We'll send him some flowers and prayers! Do you want us to come out there?"
"Ah, no? He'll like flowers. I'll text you where to send them-"
"We'll fly out in a couple days, Papa's got some business in New York to take care of anyway."
"…Speaking of texting, I need a new phone."
"That explains why I don't recognize this number. But anytime! Just walk into the store and charge it on the account!"
"…And new glasses…"
His mother huffed, almost to a chuckle, "Now how did you break your glasses and your phone?"
"It… Well, you see, I tripped and… Hit the pavement. Breaking my glasses. Then while I was… Searching… For the path back to my dorm for my spares, I was calling Cooke, er, Cookie, and I fell in a fountain!"
"It sounds like you two are having some terrible, terrible luck!"
"That's… Yeah. Pretty bad luck. Hopefully things are turning up soon!" Markus faked.
"We'll see you soon. Take good care of Cookie!" she hung up.
"Ugh…" He didn't want them to come. Not in a place hot with XANA attacks.
"Agent Juliet." Cassinov panned, as he entered the room Cooke was admitted, "Why am I not surprised to see you here?"
"Because I'm proactive, sir." Juliet smugly smiled.
"You are over three hours late for work-"
"With all due respect sir, I heard the call over the radio and immediately went to the scene. I didn't have time to check in."
"And this whole time you've been standing over Cooke, who coincidentally was the only one injured and is sponsored by the government, you never thought to call it in?"
"I was under the impression you did get the call. After all, you're here."
"But I'm still baffled how the only person injured was one of the two people we monitor."
Juliet raised her hands, "Don't look at me, I'm just as baffled as you are, sir."
"Yet for some reason, I don't believe you." Cassinov picked up Cooke's medical report, "Kid got beaten, gassed, and struck by lightning? There are way too many problems here that make it hard for me to believe you aren't involved."
"I don't know what to tell you, sir."
Cassinov threw the report on Cooke's bed, and walked out, "I'll have DC Police sent me their report."
"Already requested it, sir."
He turned back and glared at her, "But of course."
He continued out, and stepped into the elevator.
Juliet turned to Cooke, "…We very nearly lost today. Good job hanging in there."