A/N: At long last, I have returned! And the winner for my contest is Kgmck-117! Sorry supremecmdr.ofthenet, but I had already typed his up before I got your e-mail. I was just about to upload when I read my inbox. Sorry again! For Kgmck-117, I'll be sending the prize shortly, after I type this up!

Returning to Face the World Returning to Face the World, Returning to face the

A drop of sweat streamed down Jeremie's face, dropping off at his chin to hit a fold in his turquoise shirt. His olive green (just making that up) eyes were blank, merely reflecting the computer screen. Pale hands shook, knuckles white from gripping onto the armrests of the chair.

It seemed hopeless; there was nothing left to do. All thought of the materialization program was erased from Jeremie's mind, an attack like this would kill his friends, and then he'd be all alone.

No one to protect him from the snarling bullies that would leave him covered in blood at the end of the day, no one to smile at, no one to share moments with. All alone, just like before.

His friends had never once needed him. He always depended on them to help, to support him. Ever since that first day when Yumi had told the older boy to knock it off, Jeremie had always needed them more than they needed him. He was worthless, like an old forgotten toy that had ran out of batteries.

But now they needed him. Jeremie had always dreamed of something like this, where he, the small, skinny, freaky little boy would save his strong friends. But it was nothing like this. Nothing so astonishing, so unreal had ever crossed his mind.

And now Jeremie sat there, watching his friend's life points tick down, wasting time. Only one thought came to his mind: the scanners.

There was only one time that he had gone into the scanners before. But Aelita had been there to encourage him, and now she was gone. Jeremie thought of any other possibilities, but none were possible. At least, without the scanners.

So Jeremie's fingers began to type, come back to life as they skittered across the keyboard. He accessed data, brought up deleted memory files, learned and prepared for what was coming.

Finally he pushed back his chair and bolted for the elevator. Jamming the button in, Jeremie waited for the machine to go down a level. The doors burst open and he ran into the room. A single scanner was open for him, waiting to engulf him.

He hesitated for a moment. But the thought of his friends persuaded him to go on. Leaping into the scanner, Jeremie felt a slight tingling sensation come over him. Adrenaline pumped in his veins, but it was no time to back down.

The simulation started, and the wind began to blow Jeremie's blond hair skyward. His glasses began to slip off his nose, and he had to grab them before they were lost in the transfer. And then it all went dark.

Jeremie collided with the ground, his shoulder smashing into the dusty beige path. He winced at the shock of his landing, and then rose to his feet, dusting off whatever may have stuck to him.

He took a moment to examine what he looked like. Everyone's appearance's changed when they went to Lyoko, and his was no exception.

Indigo, almost black baggy jeans nearly concealed dark boots, although light in weight (but he wouldn't know would he? They can't feel in Lyoko). An emerald green jumper (sweater) covered his top half, and an onyx waistcoat clung to his shoulders. Taking off his glasses, Jeremie admired the sleek, silver frames of the tinted glass.

But each moment he wasted, another life point would be lost. Gathering up his energy, Jeremie sped off towards the tower.

'According to my settings, I shouldn't be far from the tower,' Jeremie thought as his feet pounded into the road.

It was amazing the transformation he had gone through. Before, Jeremie had been the slowest kid in the school, but now he was reaching speeds that not ever the best sprinters had reached.

Rounding a corner, Jeremie saw in the distance the great tower. But it was like nothing he had ever seen. All the descriptions of activated or deactivated towers were not ever close to this. A black aura surrounded it, and it seemed to vibrate with power. There wasn't much time left.

His legs moved faster, his stride longer. When he was a few meters away, the boy genius remembered Aelita's memory files, her knowledge. Holding out his hands, he strained for a moment, feeling an incredible power sliding from his shoulders to his hands.

A bright blue blast rocketed out of his palms, growing larger as it went. It swallowed the tower, purifying it.

Jeremie's eyes were shut in concentration, and he didn't know how much longer he could keep it up. In fact, he was surprised he was even able to access this kind of power. It had nothing to do with the situation, or the way he felt. It was just a one-time thing, and after this he would never be able to do it again.

At last he collapsed on the ground, drenched in sweat. When he opened his eyes, to his great amazement he saw that the tower now had a pearly blue aura. Then the thought of his friends came to him, and he crawled towards the towering structure.

He closed his eyes when he dived through. One had to be in a state of true calm in order to enter a tower. When they reopened, a smile came to Jeremie's exhausted face.

Odd, Ulrich, and Yumi were laying on the floor of the tower. They were all knocked out from the tower's attack, but none of them had lost all of their life points. Then black came to Jeremie's vision, and he saw no more.

"Jeremie? Jeremie?"

Jeremie awoke, groggy from the sleep. Ulrich was staring anxiously at him, filled with concern. When he noticed that Jeremie had shifted his position, he grinned.

"You're alright!" exclaimed Ulrich.

"Nice going Einstein!" Odd yelled, nearly hitting Jeremie. "You had us all worried!"

Yumi simply smiled.

"I wish we knew how many life points we had left," Jeremie whispered. His throat was dry, and he was still weak from the enormous effort he had recently made.

"We'll just have to guess as always. Which reminds me," Odd said, turning Jeremie, "how'd you save us?"

Jeremie shrugged, actually being more confused than his friends at this matter. He tried to stand up, but stumbled. Immediately Yumi and Ulrich rushed to his side to support him.

Odd's tail flicked the air, aimlessly dancing around. At last the owner of the purple tail stood up and said, "Let's get out of here. Jeremie has to reset the go-back-in-time-thing so none of this ever happened. So, who shall have the honor of slicing him in half?"

But as they stumbled outside, an army met them. Hornets, blocks, crabs, roachers, and even mega blocks were lined up, ready to attack.

"Get back in the tower!" cried Yumi. Shot after shot headed towards them, glowing red with Xana's fury.

Odd carried Jeremie back to the safety of the tower while Yumi and Ulrich protected them from the blasts. They slowly backed up until they dived backwards into the tower.

Almost directly after they had gone inside, the tower began to shake and tremble. The Lyoko gang stared nervously at the walls of the tower, expecting them to collapse any moment now.

"The tower's not going to make it!" cried Yumi in distress.

As if it had been cued, a crimson glowing beam shot through the tower as if it didn't exist. They all ducked down to hide from the monster's attacks.

There was no choice but to fight. All together, Jeremie, Odd, Ulrich, and Yumi charged out of the tower, screaming their odd war cry. Odd instantly shot off two arrows, since his stock had risen with his life points. Each one hit a roacher, and they blew up.

The other creatures ignored this, and kept on shooting. Yumi and Ulrich went into the defense, reflecting the beams, while Jeremie simply dodged them.

One beam came flying towards him, and Jeremie cringed, expecting to be blown off Lyoko. But no such thing happened, as the beam was mirrored back to the crab.

Jeremie was knocked back a meter, but the crab was destroyed instantly. Amazed at his sudden talent, Jeremie stared wide-eyed at where the stumbling thing used to be. Taking off his sun glasses, he examined them.

A sharp edge was near the ear rest, like a sickle. If the others could smash through monsters with their weapons, why couldn't he?

He raced past Ulrich and Yumi, a blur to their eyes. His eyes were narrowed in concentration, and finally he leaped over the hornets and blocks to land on another crab. Raising his left hand high in the air, he slammed it down and cut through it with the sunglasses.

A shining white light streamed from the cut, and Jeremie leaped backwards off the creature to land on his feet just as the explosion came.

"Nice job Jeremie, you're getting the hang of things," Odd congratulated him as both ducked to avoid losing life points.

But then a second shot came, and Odd was knocked backwards off his feet by the impact. White electricity sparked around where the attack had hit him, and the teenager groaned in pain.

Yumi held up her arm as she received the metal fan. It was the downfall of a hornet, and soon she prepared it to take another monster's life. Jerking out her wrist, she let the fan fly into another hornet, where it burrowed deep enough to be fatal.

Ulrich stood beside her, waiting for the perfect opportunity to strike. His eyes darted back and forth, his weight shifting from foot to foot, the samurai sword drenched in sweat.

Without warning, he leaped into the air, sliding sideways. Bringing his arms back behind his head, he slashed at a crab. The beast attempted to lumber out of the way in order to escape, but even as it moved Ulrich came crashing down.

The sharp noise of metal hitting metal rang through the air as he hit one of the many legs. It twitched horribly and collapsed, forcing the crab to bend down. The brown-haired teenager took this to his advantage, and attacked again.

"Impact!" he shouted as he forced his weapon into the Xana eye on the crab's back.

Immediately the creature exploded, and debris flew everywhere before disappearing into nothingness. Ulrich avoided the full blast by kicking off it. As he spun through the air, he sheathed his sword in order to land properly.

His firm hands slammed into the dirt, where they propelled him to land on his back. Ulrich flipped up, and pulled out his shield of a sword in front of his face just in time to avoid a hornet attack.

Odd meanwhile pranced back and forth, mocking the monsters of Xana by dodging every blow. But he had to then leap behind a large rock to avoid a beam from the army. Holding his right wrist in the air in front of him, the half cat locked and loaded his arrows. Daring to take a look from his hiding spot, he noticed a block in his aim. Not knowing how many arrows he had left, Odd whipped around and only shot one at it.

The block never saw it coming. That single laser arrow struck its weak spot, and it only took a moment for the weapon's ability to take effect.

"Yeah!" cheered Odd.

Inspired by his success, he leaped on top of his hiding spot. The purple tail attacked to his back side flicked the air, moving back and forth like a snake on the move. A hornet aimed for him, and Odd leaped onto another stone to barely miss the ray. Green and black lines appeared where the attack had hit.

Using his claws to climb sideways, he continued to sneak around and shoot to his heart's delight. Odd was leaping from one stone to the next when time seemed to stop. Halfway there, he grinned, thinking that he'd make it easily. But an unexpected attack from the side sent him flying towards the edge of the path. A horrified expression came to the boy's face, knowing that he wouldn't be able to recover in time.

Just as he was falling over the edge, a strong hand grabbed his. Looking up, Odd saw Jeremie beaming at him. Suddenly, the smile slipped, and a look of strain came over the genius' face. He didn't know if he could hold on much longer.

Odd looked around for alternate solutions. Looking below, he noticed that there was another path a little behind him. He knew it would be difficult, but it was his only option.

"I'm gonna try and swing over to that path," Odd shouted over the noise. His head gestured to his destination.

Jeremie grew pale. "How?" he gasped.

The struggling teenager smiled. "I'll find a way."

And with that, Odd forced his feet up, and kicked off the trail, letting go of Jeremie's hand as he did. His head titled backwards, watching the space below him, praying that his efforts had been enough.

"Ugh!" he cried as his shoulder made contact with the mountain road. Wincing as he got up, Odd scanned his surroundings for a way to get back up. His eyes narrowed on his only choice: a treacherous climb up the steep supports of the track where the battle was taking place. It was just a matter of getting there.

A familiar sound got louder, and Odd turned to stare at a group of roachers that had come to meet him. Smirking at the creatures, he prepared to jump.

Jeremie stumbled as he was nearly jerked off too. To his horror, the reflecting sunglasses slipped off his nose and plunged into the abyss below.

"Oh no, oh no, oh no," he moaned.

Even with a blurry vision, Jeremie could still tell that a mega block had just focused its attention on him. He began to step backwards, trying to retreat, but he knew it was no good. Especially when the mega block revealed its weapon.

The immense blow came so fast Jeremie barely had time to leap out of harm's way. Another one came shortly after it had adjusted itself, and once again the boy genius had to rely on luck.

He sped around the mega block, trying to make sure it could focus on him. Finally, it seemed so dazed that it couldn't think straight, and spun around like a top.

"I hope this works," whispers Jeremie to himself.

Pulling up the sleeve of his jumper, he sprang forward. At last, the mega black noticed him. It opened up, and was charging up to fire when he brought down his fist. Smashing through the wires and circuits of the amazing creature, it was an immediate end to it.

Jeremie fell to his knees, clutching his right arm. Pain was shooting through it, and even if he had his glasses he was sure the pain would have blinded him anyway. He was completely defenseless, and even with the incredible super strength he had, it was no good if his arm was busted.

A silhouette loomed over him, and Jeremie knew that the end was coming…

"Take that!"

Odd fired two arrows, piercing two thirds of the group in an instant. The last roacher looked at the places where its group mates had been before deciding it really didn't care where they had gone off to.

"And you're going to be my ticket out of here!" Odd cried.

Firing another laser arrow, he didn't move out of the way of the explosion. Instead, he let it throw him backwards. Twisting in the air, he managed to lodge his claws into one of the thick supports. Pulling himself upwards with whatever upper body strength he had, Odd suddenly noticed something dark flying towards him. His tail snapped out and wrapped itself around the item.

It was a set of sunglasses. Sunglasses with a deathly sharp tip at the end. Odd clenched his teeth and took a chance. Leaping upwards, he slipped his claws into the support again, just in time.

When he was nearly there, he heard a cry of pain. His heart nearly stopped, and shock came over him.

"Jeremie!" he shouted instinctively, and hurried on. He didn't know how much longer Jeremie would be able to last.

"Here you go Einstein," a voice said cheerily from above.

Jeremie's eyes suddenly slid into focus as his sunglasses were put back on. Odd was standing above him, looking weary but happy.

"Odd… you're okay!" Jeremie cried.

The half boy, half cat looked at him strangely. "Of course I'm okay, what made you think otherwise?"

"You went over the edge…"

"Oh come on, you should know us better than that! We always have back-up plans."

A new voice interrupted them. "Jeremie, how'd you do that?"

Ulrich was gazing with awe at the fallen boy. He had observed Jeremie smash the mega block into oblivion, and he had no clue he had that much power.

"If you haven't noticed, we're not done yet," Yumi said as she slid next to them, blocking a beam as she did. "Jeremie, what happened to your arm?"

"No time to explain. I'll just have to use my left one," Jeremie replied, struggling to his feet. Snatching the sunglasses off his face, he hobbled towards a group of blocks, spinning around the eye wear to deflect the beams.

Holding his arm up into the air, he brought it down with tremendous speed, releasing his sunglasses just in time. Like a boomerang, they slid through the air, and cut into one of his targets. Yumi joined him, and a massive explosion took place, the sound ringing in their ears.

Both of them were synchronized as they caught their weapons, their left arms reaching across their bodies. Suddenly Odd leaped over them, at least 7 feet in the air.

"Chain reaction!" he cried, and fired half a dozen laser arrows towards a swarm of hornets.

None of the arrows were wasted. The sleek golden darts sunk into the hornets, and it was like one domino falling upon another. Odd let out a cry of surprise as he went hurtling through the smoke the blasts had made. The others held up an arm to their face to protect their eyes.

"Wahoo!"

When the dust had cleared, Jeremie, Ulrich, and Yumi saw that Odd was riding a crab. It was bucking all over the place, attempting to get the crazy kid off. Yumi chuckled at the odd sight, like a cowboy at a rodeo in the Wild West.

But Odd was suddenly blown off his ride. Out of the hornets that hadn't been in the sudden onslaught, one of them had decided to put a fellow monster in danger. But the crab had not been harmed. However, Odd now lay on the ground, his chest flickering with the same electricity as before. He groaned, and when he opened his eyes, they were widened in shock. The crab from before was charging up, ready to aim one final blast at him.

"Hiya!"

Ulrich came to Odd's rescue, and threw his sword into the air like a javelin. It speed through, and came to rest in the scarlet Xana eye on the monster's head. That crab started to swerve like a drunk before blowing up.

Ulrich caught his sword, which had come hurtling through the air back at him when released from the crab, and spun it around, deflecting the shots from the massive horde of roachers. It glowed blue with the energy it observed, and it shook in his hands with the energy.

Sensing Ulrich's help now, Odd sat up and aimed for a place little over Ulrich's left shoulder. Shouting out his famous battle cry,

"Laser arrow!"

he shot out an arrow. It accidentally hit their shield, and was deflected right back at him. Odd let out a shout and ducked, just in time to hit a roacher that had snuck up from behind.

"All right!" he cried. "Ulrich, you can stop now."

They both dove out of the way as another dozen shots came flying towards them. Ulrich was taking deep breaths, and sweat covered his brow. He was leaning on his knees, trying to get back the energy that he lost.

There was only a dozen or so monsters left. The Lyoko gang knew that they would win this fight. Yumi got her fan back out, opening it up in front of her face mysteriously, Jeremie gripped his sunglasses, Ulrich held his sword in front of his face, and Odd readied himself by holding up his right arm, aiming for a monster.

"Augh!"

They all fell forward onto the ground, wounded by a surprise attack. While they had been sitting around, Xana had created another army of monsters, and they had attacked from the rear. All four of them looked wearily up to see the original cast glaring down at them, ready to shoot.

The next thing that happened seemed to occur in slow motion. The lasers were filed, and all of them gaped at the assault. They glided through the thin mountain air, ready to hit the wounded warriors.

"NO!"

A harsh voice, somewhat familiar, rang through the mountain valley, and all of a sudden, a periwinkle light formed a shield around them. The lasers were absorbed by the swirling light, and none of them could believe what happened. Even the monsters were looking around for an unseen force that had allied their enemies.

A pale tan dust had risen off a side path. A silhouette stood in it, alone. As the dust cleared, everyone observed a set of green eyes glaring out from under a mane of brilliant pink hair. Fists were clenched at their sides, and two mauve marks were under the eyes.

It was Aelita.

Returning to Face the World Returning to Face the World, Returning to face the

A/N: This chapter is shorter than the last, but still has a lot of action. Here is Kgmck-117's original entry for the contest:

Jeremie: Silver sunglasses, blue jeans, green jumper with a black waistcoat,
boots.

Powers: Karate and incredible strength. Instead of being smart he's strong! Also maybe a bit of telekinesis

I didn't demonstrate the super strength and karate much. Sorry! Anyway, the new season of Code: Lyoko in English version has excited me so much! It won't influence any of my Code: Lyoko stories (like the ones I'm planning). Review please!

EDIT: Just on CL, I heard that Ulrich and Sissy kissed once, and I thought "EWWW!" But not before thinking that happened during my story! In that extra chapter I gave back a while ago, they kissed. It's so much like my story!