Counter-Offensive

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Chapter 2

Assault - Yumi

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I was sitting at home, doing my homework. The last few days had been taxing on me, as we were attacked by clones three times. They seemed to have been probing us, however, as they broke off just when we were almost unconscious, though they apparently avoided doing any serious damage. Something was going on in Lyoko, that much I was positive of.

"Yumi, dinner's ready!" Mother yelled.

"Page 327…" I muttered to myself, closing my math textbook. It amazed me how I could be a soldier fighting a war against a supercomputer, and still have time to finish my homework. "I'm coming!" I yelled that time.

Slowly, I got up, walking to the door. Suddenly, my cell phone began to ring.

"Yumi?" I heard the phone ask. It was Jeremie.

"Yeah. What is it?" I replied.

"Come to the factory quickly. X.A.N.A.'s launched an attack. He's drawing up the clones!"

"I'll be right down." I shut my cell phone off, muttered a curse, and ran down the stairs. "Hi, mom, bye, mom!"

"Yumi! Where are you going?" Mother asked, her voice piercing and demanding.

"I just remembered that I left my French textbook in Odd's dorm. I'll call him over. It's not night yet, so he can walk about the school." I replied.

"Okay. Hurry back!"

I ran out the door, my arms beating fiercely against the air. Outside, a red light was leaving the factory into the sky. Its glow caused the city to appear in a reddish haze.

The huge clone army was slowly marching out onto the streets, carrying everything from rifles to baseball bats to telephone poles. I quickly took another route.

One clone spotted me and fired off a shot, but I was already gone. I ducked into an alley, and quickly lost him. I decided that I didn't know the city well enough, so I dialed Jeremie's phone number.

"Jeremie, how's Aelita?" I asked.

"Not good. She's taken twenty life points of damage, and is pinned behind a rock. There's some unidentified monster flanking around the rock, and I'm trying to… Aelita, to the left!" Jeremie said. "Sorry, but the monster just tried to take a pot shot. Where are you?"

"I had to duck into an alley on Tenth Street to avoid a rifle-armed clone, and I can't figure out how to get to the factory."

"Okay, take a left, and then a right. That should get you into the first. Then, just keep running parallel to the school. You should be able to find the manhole."

"Right." I hung up, and followed Jeremie's directions. Quickly, I found the school in the distance, and ran parallel. That's when I located the manhole. I quickly got on my skateboard, riding through the sewer, and reached the ladder. I climbed up, and ran on the bridge to the factory.

I swung down near the elevator and got on, heading for the control room. When the door opened, I saw…

Ulrich. I took two tentative steps, as though fearing that he would vanish if I were to approach him, and then exclaimed: "Ulrich!" I ran up to hug up. "I missed you."

"I know, but now's not the time. We have a problem, as I'm sure Jeremie's informed you. Also, Jeremie, I need you to revive my Lyoko avatar. I had to devirtualize myself manually." He said.

"Will do, Ulrich." Jeremie replied, as he sat down on his chair. "Wait, this is strange… Ulrich, your avatar still has sixty life points left!"

"That's impossible! I stabbed myself with my katana!" Ulrich exclaimed.

"Let's try it out. Ulrich, Yumi, head for the scanners." Jeremie ordered.

"Right!" Ulrich and I replied in unison, and head down the elevator into the scanner room. There were two scanners open for us… It seemed strange to be going into Lyoko under such dangerous circumstances. Then again, this was the most dangerous X.A.N.A. attack to date, and we do not know what his ends are.

I stepped into the scanner, and Ulrich did the same.

"Scanner, Yumi. Scanner, Ulrich." Jeremie's voice said over the intercom. The sides of the scanner activated. "Transfer, Yumi. Transfer, Ulrich." At this, I felt my feet lift off the ground, and I started spinning slowly. "Virtualization!"

I landed on the soft Lyoko sand in the desert region. Looking around, I spotted a blur of pink in my peripheral vision. It was Aelita running toward us. Suddenly, from a rock overlooking her, a laser blast flew at her. It struck the ground behind her, the blast sending her flying.

Ulrich immediately glanced around, and froze. I turned to follow his gave, and spotted a huge red beetle on a cliff overlooking there. It was definitely the culprit. Ulrich ran over to Aelita, his katana drawn. "Yumi, I'll handle this."

"But…" I stammered out. I could not let him get killed, not after him being missing for so long.

"Just get Aelita and run. I can handle him." He ordered, and closed his eyes, as though thinking on something deeply. The fabric of Lyoko seemed to shift slightly.

"Ulrich… What's… What's happening?" Jeremie asked. He must have notice the shift in the code surrounding Ulrich.

"Don't worry. This is what I meant by a 'plan'." Ulrich replied. Suddenly, he rushed forward, charging at the beetle, but it quickly dodged out of the way. Guess X.A.N.A. picked up some new tricks while we were holding the home front against the clones. Ulrich quickly spun out of his charge, leaping on top of the beetle-monster. He stabbed the monster's eye, and leaped off, the monster actually exploding before he landed on the ground. "Guess it's score one for the good guys."

"Wow…" I said, surprised. He had always been the power-hitter of the group, the one who would attack when we needed to eliminate crowds, but this was… Different. I ran up to him and embraced. "I'm glad you're back, Ulrich." At this, his cheeks turned a reddish tinge, and I chuckled.

"Let's just get this over with, Yumi." He said.

"And then, how about a movie?"

"Um, hate to interrupt this, lovebirds, but we've got three minutes until the signal is sent!" Jeremie yelled, urgently. Right. The mission. We had to stop X.A.N.A. from activating a signal that would cause all the clones to attack Earth.

"Right, right, now need to yell." Ulrich said, a smile on his face… But then it vanished, a hard expression. "Everyone get down!" At this, we all ducked, just in time to avoid getting blasted by a massive wall of laser fire. They began charging for another shot… And exploded. "Well, let's go."

"One minute, guys!" Jeremie yelled, fear in his voice. The tower was in front of us, and it was glowing a red that was more radiant than ever… Had Lyoko evolved, or was the signal strengthening? Things were getting urgent. Aelita took off, heading for the tower. When she reached the tower, I heard Jeremie say "thirty seconds"!

"So, Ulrich, how about that movie?" I asked, smiling slightly.

"Sure, which one?" he asked.

"How about an action-romance?"

"Sure." And then, the white light engulfed us. When it died down, I was back in my room, doing the homework I had been interrupted from doing (why couldn't the return trip have done the homework for me?).

After finishing the last paragraph of the essay we had to do for English, I decided to take a walk, hoping a certain supercomputer didn't decide to pull a second punch, putting me through the homework again.

I walked down the stairs, where Mother was cooking dinner.

"Mother, I'm going out for a while." I called, before going out the door.

"Okay, be back before dinner, Yumi!" she called.

"Yes, Mother!" I returned.

I walked along the street, thoughts whirling through my head. What had that thing that Ulrich did on the Blocks been? And what about the enhanced speed?

Suddenly, there was the sound of a gunshot. I broke into a run. Please, not Ulrich… Please, don't be Ulrich…

Sure enough, when I arrived at the scene, Ulrich lay on the ground, blood surrounding his body like some discolored waterbed. It seemed like he had been shot be a spreading shot.

Frantically, I dialed to call the police, the ambulance, anyone, fear making it hard to breath. Please… Don't die, Ulrich… Don't die on me! Tears streamed down my face, making it hard to see.

"Yes, what is it?" came a voice on the other end. Good, someone who is awake!

"I want to report a shooting. My friend's on the ground with a gunshot wound!" I yelled.

"Hold on, I'll patch you through to the medical center." The voice, who I figured was a lady, replied. "I'll have an ambulance come."

There was a click, and then the voice changed. "What's wrong with your friend."

"It's my friend, Ulrich. He's been shot!" I exclaimed, tears running down my face.

"Where?"

"The stomach. It seems to have been from something larger than a handgun… His side's ripped open!"

"I'll ready the equipment at the hospital."

"Thanks." I replied, before hanging up. I propped Ulrich's head on my knee.

"Yumi…" he said weakly. "X.A.N.A… The clones…"

"Don't try to talk, Ulrich."

"Yumi… I know that…" he gasped out, as a small burst of blood left his mouth. He was in pain, this much was obvious… He coughed up some blood, which I hastily wiped on my sweater.

"The ambulance is coming, Ulrich. Hold on." His eyes closed, and he went limp. A jolt of fear coursed through me. Was he dead? "Please, Kami-sama… Don't let him die…" I muttered. The sound of sirens came in the distance; help was coming. But would it be enough? Unbidden, tears began to flow from my eyes. "ULRICH!"

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A/N: I think this is good enough for this chapter. Yes, this is a massive cliffhanger.