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Aelita tried desperately to protect Ulrich while the program that he had activated went into effect. Everything she tried resulted in her losing life points. Her only option left, make a protective barrier around Ulrich. After she had accomplished that, she and 'Yumi' fought. Aelita tried her best, but couldn't stand up to 'Yumi's' awesome power. With a little encouragement from a certain someone, she found the strength to run away, but she was far to weak, she only had 10 life points left, to get very far before 'Yumi' tackled her. After 'Yumi' got off of Aelita, the ground started shaking. 'Yumi' and Aelita looked over toward where Ulrich was. His protective barrier blew up and he stood inside a bright yellow light.

'Yumi' and Aelita looked over at the swirling mass of yellow that was not to far off in the distance. All they could see was the black outline of Ulrich. Zooming in closer, one could see that he hadn't changed much. In fact, he looked exactly the same except for on little notch extending from each of his gloves.

"Aelita," Ulrich yelled, "get to the nearest tower and heal yourself."

"But Ulrich, I want to stay here and help you." Aelita pleaded with him.

"Aelita, I need you away from here."

"But..."

"Now!" he yelled even louder than before. Aelita nodded, turned around, and ran. Luckily for her, the nearest tower wasn't to far off in the distance.

"Hey, wait a minute. I wasn't done with you yet." 'Yumi' yelled at Aelita's retreating figure. As if on command, five roachsters materialized next to 'Yumi'. "Attack her." she commanded. The roachsters turned and began to chase after Aelita. But, before they could get too far, the ground began to shake and a wall sprang up in their path. "What? How did she do that? She didn't have enough life points to do that?" 'Yumi' asked, obviously confused. She wasn't the only one, the roachsters were also confused. They stared at the wall, trying to compute a way to get around it.

"Yumi!" Ulrich's yelled to get her attention. She turned back around and looked at him. "You have done quite a few unforgivable actions lately. You tried to kill Aelita and me, you posed as someone I care deeply about, and you're working with XANA to try and destroy the world. What do you have to say for yourself?"

She smirked. "This!" she yelled as she threw her fan at Ulrich. Her aim appeared to be dead on, but...

"What do you have to say?" Ulrich's asked again. 'Yumi's' eye's went wide with shock when she heard him. She slowly turned her head around.

"What? How, how did you do that?" she asked, a little shaken.

"Anything else?"

"Yeah," she smirked again, "Roachsters attack!" she commanded.

The roachsters turned around and began to fire.

Ulrich looked at 'Yumi' and then stuck out his hand which, surprisingly, contained her fan. "Here, you might want this." She took the fan. Ulrich let out a playful smile and then jumped over her, in a rolling type jump, and landed behind her.

'Yumi' looked forward and noticed three lasers flying right towards her. She brought up her fan and shielded herself from all three attacks. After that, she lowered her fan. She glared at the roachsters which caused them to stop firing, then she turned and looked at Ulrich who was still standing behind her. 'What caused him to be so agile all of a sudden?' she thought. 'This raises some serious questions.' She couldn't dwell on it too long, for she still had to get rid of him and Aelita. 'Yumi' smiled. "Goodbye Ulrich." she said and then disappeared behind the roachsters which, in turn, caused them to continue firing.

'So she's gonna do this the hard way huh, we'll have to do something about that.' Ulrich closed his eyes for a second to concentrate, then he opened them back up and began to dodge the lasers with great agility, much similar to that of Odd. Ulrich was jumping back and forth, and side to side in an attempt to try and get a little closer. When he was about eight feet away, he jumped to the left making his body parallel with the ground. He grabbed the bottom of his right wrist with his left hand and yelled, "Flying stars!" A flying star flew from his hand as he past each monster. Three of the stars, the three middle ones, each hit the XANA symbol on the monsters and caused them to explode into nothing but pixels.

"How did you do that?" 'Yumi' yelled in outrage. Never before had she seen anybody do moves like that, except for the Odd that XANA had created. And what about those stars, she had only seen one thing similar to them and they were 'Odd's' laser arrows. 'How did this happen?'

"What do you mean? Are you talking about the enhanced speed and agility, the new weapon, or the wall?" Ulrich asked, slightly amused.

'Yumi's' eyes went wide as things started to piece themselves together in her head. 'The speed, the agility, even the wall and weapon they were all part of that program.' Then it all came together. 'Connection, the colors, he combined his abilities with theirs. How had Jeremie come up with a program like that?'

Aelita made it safely into the tower. She was happy that she would finally get a little break, but she was also a little worried. She remembered hearing some monsters and she remembered seeing a couple lasers fly by her, but then they stopped. And what about Ulrich, she wasn't sure if the program had actually worked. 'Ulrich! That's why the monsters stopped, Ulrich must have done something to stop them. That means the program was a success! But for how long? I better heal quickly, incase he needs some back up. But until then, I better check to see if this tower has any information on our other projects.' Aelita moved to the center of the tower and slowly rose to the top.
Ulrich let out a little chuckle. "I see that look in your eyes, you're finally getting it aren't you." The last two roachsters began to fire again at Ulrich. "Well it seems I've got a little pest problem to finish up with first."

Ulrich closed his eyes and focused his mind on the roachster on the left. The monster soon began to glow yellow and rise into the air. Confused, it fired wherever it could. This was what Ulrich had hoped it would do. He brought the roachster in front of the other one and it shot it, reducing it to nothing but pixels. With its job done, Ulrich just gently tossed the monster into the digital void.

"Now Yumi, how about we get this started, and no holding back this time." Ulrich smiled and getting into his fighting stance.

"Alright, no holding back. This time I won't go so easy on you." 'Yumi' said as she too got into her fight stance. She glared over at Ulrich.

Ulrich charged at 'Yumi'. He was quick, there was no doubting that. As he sped towards her, he pulled out his sword. He sliced her stomach with one quick slash as he passed by causing her to flinch in pain.

'Yumi's' wound quickly healed, but it left a scar on her memory. 'His speed has increased dramatically, it even surpasses my own. I wasn't even able to block his attack. And I thought XANA had thought of everything.' she thought.

"Computer, life point update." Ulrich yelled up at the computer. He was curious as to how many life points 'Yumi' had left, but more importantly it would be able to tell him if Aelita made it to the tower yet.

"Ulrich: 40 life point, Yumi clone: 50 life points, Aelita: 22 life points," the computer replied to his command.

'His attacks are killing me, literally. I need to think of a new tactic that can get him. If I remember right, Ulrich said that this program was incomplete and he didn't know how long it would last. Maybe if I can buy some time, he'll lose this new found power of his.'

"So Ulrich, tell me something, why did you decide to come on this suicide mission?"

"What suicide mission are you talking about? Who's the one who couldn't even see the last attack?"

"Oh come now Ulrich, I'm just getting warmed up. Now, what was your real reason? I know it couldn't all have been for those pathetic friends of yours, it had to be something else."

"Whoa whoa woha, hold on there. Who are you calling pathetic? Are you talking about the same 'pathetic' friends of mine that safely stopped all of XANA's attacks?"

"All but one that is. Now come on, anyone who couldn't have survived that must have been pathetic. So, what was it really? Did you finally want to finish off this war? Stop the evil from the roots?"

"Well, yeah. That would have ended up being one of the consequences of stopping XANA."

"Oh my naive little Ulrich, XANA isn't the root of evil. I thought you would have learned that by now."

"What are you talking about? XANA's basically the only evil around. Who else could there be?"

"Ulrich... you really don't look at the big picture do you. This world that you've saved time and time again, it doesn't work in spite of evil, it works with it, it works because of it. And those people that you are always trying to protect and save, you see if there wasn't evil in every single one of them, they wouldn't be human. Think about it, even you have some evil in you. You try to keep it hidden and under control, but you can't you're not strong enough."

"Yumi," he calmly spoke, "things are not always as clear as good and evil. There are gray areas too. Sure, everyone has some evil in them, but just because people have evil in them doesn't mean that they're going to be nothing but evil."

"Oh Ulrich, you're so naive. You know nothing of the true natures of these people that you save. They're all worthless little creatures that don't deserve to live."

"You have no idea what you're talking about, you haven't lived with people. Sure some of them are really annoying and can get on your nerves at times, but they are all virtually good people."

'This isn't working. I need something else, and quick. I'm starting to run low on life points and he's just warming up. I think it's time to pull out the big guns' "And what about Yumi?"

Author's Notes:

Well I did it, I got it up when I said I would. How long has it been since I've posted two chapters in a span of one week? Gosh, I think we'd have to go all the way back to the first two chapters of "Dreams of Insanity". I'll try and have the next chapter done before Father's day, the 19. Now as for this chapter, I think it's pretty good. It could be a little better in some places, but I think I got across the points I wanted to make. And how about Ulrich huh, taking the moral high road now. But 'Yumi's' pulling out everything she's got in her. I hope you all are now able to understand what the program did to Ulrich. I must say though, I was a little surprised that only one person was able to figure it out before this chapter. No extra hints were given, she just looked at the details. Oh, and there will be no question for this chapter.

Review Reply:

top20fan13: Thank you for the awesome review. Wow, a 13/13, that's pretty good. I'm sure you were able to find out the answer now.

Help Wanted:

I'm still looking for a proofreader if anyone is interested. Let me know, I could really use someone's help.

Alright, now I think I'm going to do something I haven't done before, a chapter dedication. I wish I had a better chapter to do this with, but this will do. I'd like to dedicate this chapter to top20fan13 and Flying Star. Both of them are just the best reviewers a writer could ask for. And, Flying Star was the only one to figure out what was happening with Ulrich. Let's give both of them a hand! (claps)