Author's Note: Eh...finals creeping up on me. I am updating when I can. It's kinda late at night while I'm doing this and my parents are getting annoyed but too bad because I can't keep my lovely audience waiting too long again. So here it is! It is a longer chapter than usual. You Ulrich and Yumi fans might find it enjoyable. And all of you that wanted the emails will find it enjoyable as well (that's you, J-lyoko). Ginny-Hates-Them, I find that it is awesome possum that I just happened to use your name. Maybe I'll have them call Angela "Ange" from now on, tee-hee. T3h OnE aNd OnLy, I can't believe you reviewed! Score! I am glad you liked it. So anyway, its back to the books and studying for me. I agree with you wholeheartedly, J-lyoko, about the horrible finals. But, you know, we have no rights in school and it is basically a dictatorship in that hellhole, so might as well. Enjoy and I hope you are having a better time with life than I am at the moment!

Ulrich woke up to the sun in his eyes. He cursed and turned over. His curtains have proved once again to be defective. When he moved out of his parent's house and into his own apartment, his mother had lovingly shoved some curtains she had made herself into his hands. Although much appreciated and wonderfully made, the fabric wasn't thick enough to block strong incoming sunrays. And the fabric's olive green shaded pattern was starting to fade from all the sunlight. Ulrich turned over again and buried his face under his pillow, as the sunlight's intensity seemed to get brighter just for him.

With his head stuffed underneath his pillow, he got cold, black relief. His body started to relax.

Then his alarm went off.

With a slightly irritated growl, his hand shot out from under his blanket and groped around for his clock. After a few minutes of this, his hand had still been unsuccessful. Just as he thought he had to actually open his eyes to find his alarm, his hand knocked into it quite painfully. He cursed softly and fumbled around for the off switch. Then to top off his wonderful morning, he accidentally knocked the alarm clock off his nightstand, making a crash loud enough to wake him up for good.

He groaned and forced himself up in bed, squinting his eyes in the harsh sunlight. I am so not a morning person.

Trudging, he went into the kitchen to see what was for breakfast. Wow…Fruit Loops. Yummy. Unexcitedly, he retrieved a carton of milk from the fridge and prepared his cereal.

As he sat down at his small table to eat, his eyes passed over his computer briefly. It was a nice computer, a blue iMac that he had saved for about forever to get. But it was worth it. Today, however, none of that passed through his mind. Instead, everything from yesterday crashed upon his head as if his head was the floor and the situation yesterday was the alarm clock. He scrambled up, abandoning his cereal, and jumped into the chair he had placed in front of the computer.

He went to get his cereal as his computer booted up. The Fruit Loops crunched around nosily in his mouth. He put the cereal down when the computer was ready.

Without hesitation, he got online and went straight to check his email. As he was waiting for the page to load, he went over everything that had happened yesterday in his mind. When he got to the conversation he had with Odd before he left, he chuckled. Odd was as stubborn as ever on the matter, apparently. Ulrich shook his head in a sad way as he thought of the look on Odd's face. Determined. Ulrich then sighed. Didn't Odd know that it was over between him and Yumi?

Although this was the case, he found himself still wondering if she had emailed him. As he looked on at the fully loaded page, his heart did a little involuntary jump at the number of messages he had waiting for him. Five. The little extra jump was for both Yumi and for Lyoko.

As he went into his inbox, his heart skipped again when he saw Yumi's name. It kind of withered away, however, when he saw it was just a forward. He clicked on it anyway. I mean, it's from Yumi. Maybe it's a forward with a personal message inserted into it.

What he read was even more than expected.

"Hello! I am Lori, from your old school. I was at the assembly today and I'm new so I really appreciated you stopping by. I really hope that school will turn out to be everything good you mentioned. It sure would relieve the new school pressure for me.

"However, this email isn't exactly about the pressure of a new student. It is actually about something different entirely. At first, I was wondering why in the world would you want to give a bunch of junior high and high school students your email address. I mean, there are such things as fatal viruses your computer can get. (Ulrich grinned at this and his mind flashed back to frantic Yumi complaining about the same exact thing.) But now as I actually email you, I think I might have found the answer.

"Does secret tunnels, sewers, old rundown warehouses, and rusty elevators that work mean anything to you?

"I might just sound entirely insane right now. So if I do, no need to respond. Just dismiss this mail and move on with your life.

"I hope life treats you well!"

Ulrich sat back and took deep breaths as he deleted the message. Does secret tunnels, sewers, old rundown warehouses, and rusty elevators that work mean anything to you? That sentence kept ringing and echoing around Ulrich's head. Surely this cannot be what he thinks this is. No. No, it can't. Ulrich blanched, however, when he saw a forward from Jeremie. He clicked on it, a bit apprehensively and waited for the page to load. Actually, Lori, it means a lot to me. My question is, how did you find out???

Jeremie's forwarded message was almost the same thing paraphrased. A girl named Cynthia sent it. Ulrich skimmed over the first part lightly. It was just as cheerful, innocent, and happy as the last girl's email. However, when it got to about the middle of the email, Ulrich zoomed in and paid more attention.

"When you said in your little speech to us that there are more things than meet the eye here at our school, did you actually mean it? If you did, do you have proof? Because I think I might have proof and that proof might be the same proof you have."

Ulrich was amazed again. These kids must be a group of friends, just like us. They were definitely onto something. Ulrich almost stamped his feet with impatience. They were being vague for safety reasons, he knew that. If only they know that we know! Then they can just tell us if what they are thinking is what we are thinking! Ulrich knew he had never been the biggest fan of patience. I guess now I have to try to be.

Aelita's forwarded message came next. Ulrich found it was Angela who wrote it before skipping to the important parts.

"Since you have so kindly provided us with your email addresses (which was not a good idea, believe me, because there are many kids that aren't like me and will actually send you utterly useless stuff), I would just like to comment a little bit here. I was wondering whether in your years at this school you noticed anything strange. By strange I mean, well, like, computer's acting a bit peculiar and people disappearing all the time to play, perhaps, a 'hot new computer game'? If so, please email me back. I would love to hear from you!"

Ulrich thought hard as he deleted this one. Hot new computer game. Apparently, he was relieved to know, the group of kids must have found Lyoko but not know what it is yet. Now they were asking the only people who would have a chance of knowing what it was. Smart.

Ulrich mentally slapped himself when he saw Odd's forward next. Odd was usually the slowest of the group to actually get things like these. Apparently this time, Odd had beat out Ulrich. Ulrich grinned as he clicked on the forward. A boy named Charlie sent this one.

"The school's great and all, but I really have to take your word on it because I'm knew, especially about the stuff that is there but we can't see it. This was mentioned in your friend's short little speech. I was wondering, however, do you know anything about a warehouse near the school? See, I was just walking around one day when I happened to spot it. I would have loved to go explore but I was afraid of getting into trouble, so I left it be. But, it has been bugging me. Any info on this mysterious structure would be appreciated!"

Ulrich had a worried expression on his face after he read this one, although he still had a slightly amused air about him. Ulrich had lied enough times in his childhood to tell a lie from truth and he could tell that this Charlie was lying about just "walking around one day" and happening to discover the warehouse. The warehouse wasn't that obvious to the regular passerby. Plus, unless you went through the boiler room or the sewers, the warehouse was a rare place to stumble over just on a little walk. Not a lot of people stroll along there. At least, not anymore.

As Ulrich was redirected back to his inbox, he finally focused on the last email in there. It was from an unknown email, so Ulrich immediately assumed it might also be from a kid that was on the verge of discovering Lyoko.

He was right. It was from one named Ian.

"I love to explore and when you guys said that this school had many surprises, well, naturally I wanted to go poking around. What I found from my 'poking around' was quite unique, bizarre, and unexpected, though. I was wondering if you could give me some feedback on it. I found an abandoned warehouse with an elevator just as old as the warehouse but it still works, curiously enough. What is down there is even more bizarre, but that's as far as I'll go. If you know what I am talking about, I'm sure you have already figured what it is. Please reply! Ciao!"

Ulrich immediately hit the "Reply" button and waited for the page to load. Then, just as the page completed it's loading, he placed his hands on the keyboard and typed quickly in response:

"You have no idea what you are onto. My friends and I are definitely paying a visit to your school today. Do you mind if we meet? We have many things to discuss."

Then, he signed it with his name and sent it. Short and sweet, Ulrich thought and nodded mentally. Good plan, good plan.

He then promptly sent out an email to Yumi, Odd, Jeremie, and Aelita telling them that they are definitely going to have to go to the school today. He sent it off and logged off of his account.

But still he sat there, his bowl of soggy Fruit Loops long forgotten. He didn't feel satisfied. He felt like he still needed to do something. Suddenly, it dawned on him what he wanted to do. He didn't feel as uncomfortable about doing it as maybe he once was, but he had to admit to himself that it was what he truly wanted to do. He got up and walked back into his room. After much digging, searching, and shuffling around he found what he wanted: his cell phone. Then he turned it on and found his address book. From there he scrolled down to the I's. Yumi's number.

He breathed out nervously. It was the number she had given him a long time ago to her apartment. He hoped that it was still valid. He found his hand slightly trembling as he pressed the call button. Then he waited.

When the phone picked up, he almost wanted to end the phone call. But he waited as he heard a female say, "Hello?" on the other end. Relief washed over him. The voice was Yumi's. He could recognize it anywhere. He could still recognize it after all these years.

Suddenly, Ulrich remembered that he was supposed to answer. "Oh…uh…hello, Yumi."

The voice instantly brightened. "Hello, Ulrich! What are you doing, calling me?" Ulrich opened his mouth, just about to answer when Yumi stated the answer herself in a graver tone. "It's about the emails, isn't it?"

"Well, yeah," Ulrich said stupidly. He marveled at a time when they both were younger, a time when they weren't afraid to call each other up on their cell phones just because they were bored, just because they had wanted to talk, just to pass the time away with the other's voice in the ear. Ulrich sighed softly as he knew that time was gone.

Yumi, however, had gone on without contemplating the meaning of life. "I was so startled when I read them. I didn't think someone would find out about Lyoko so quickly. I mean, it's the second day of the new school year."

"Someone has been doing some outside research," Ulrich said bluntly. He then astonished himself when he realized he hadn't taken ten million years of thought to comment on something.

"You're telling me. We certainly weren't that sharp when we were their age. At least, not with Odd around."

Ulrich laughed slightly. "Yeah, I know."

"But still," Yumi rattled on. "I wonder how much they know about Xana and Lyoko already. I mean, they were really vague in their emails."

"But they did that with a reason."

"Yes, I know, Ulrich, but I'm impatient."

"God, Yumi. If you are impatient, I'm about dying with the tension."

Yumi laughed softly on the other line, making Ulrich somewhat happier.

There was a little bit of silence after that. Ulrich broke it awkwardly. "So, are we meeting at the school today? I definitely think we should."

"Oh, definitely," Yumi said, her voice hinting at relief that the silence was broken. "We've got to meet up with this Lori and crew."

"Yeah…"

The conversation trailed off again. Ulrich glanced around his room. It felt so long ago that they had just talked effortlessly on the phone.

"Ulrich, do you sometimes miss what it was like?"

"Like when we were still these kids' age? Kind of. At least I feel more mature now, like that's a big improvement."

Yumi laughed again but then grew serious. "Well, I mean, about the two of us. We never did get that sorted out, did we? We kind of just left it."

Ulrich froze, incapable of saying anything.

Yumi paused, and then plunged ahead. "I kind of miss it. Miss Odd teasing us. Miss just knowing you had someone to rely on whenever you needed it."

"You still have someone to rely on whenever you need it, Yumi." Ulrich could have slapped himself in the face for letting that slip out. It was just running through his head. It wasn't meant to be said. Stupid brain, stupid br…

"Really?" Yumi's voice became small and sweet. "That's really sweet, Ulrich. I still think you're the best."

Ulrich paused, wondering what way she meant it. Then he replied causally, "No, you're the best, Yumi."

There was a slight pause on the other line as well. Then Yumi said in a joking voice, "Yeah, you're right. I am the best. And if we can ever get back into the lab and get back into Lyoko, I can still prove it." Ulrich could have sworn he was just making up the fact that Yumi's joking voice didn't sound quite genuine.

"Oh yeah?" he joked back, regardless. "We'll see. I'm afraid you might have slipped in technique over the years." He felt more comfortable now, slipping into the conversation as easily as he did ten years ago.

"Don't tell me that my technique slipped, Ulrich Stern. I'll be the judge of that." Yumi said it in a mock snappy tone. Then she laughed and said, "Well, we can continue this confrontation when we actually get to Lyoko. We better stop chatting and get off the phone if we want to get to the school."

Ulrich smiled, although Yumi couldn't see. "Your right. I'll see you later."

"All right, Ulrich. And remember. I am the best."

With that, Yumi hung up the phone.