"Aelita! Wait!" Mr. Puck shouted, as Aelita dashed away from her. "Oh, shoot. Perhaps she's not quite as loyal to me as I thought she was." He took off running after her.
Aelita ran as fast as she could, heading for what she thought was the source of the scream. It had been very far away, and she hoped that she wasn't too late. Down the streets she ran, heading toward the sounds of fighting in the distance. She was stopped in her tracks by a familiar hissing sound behind her.
She turned around, only to see three Krabes and the Scipizoa, floating behind them.
"Oh no... they found me!" Aelita thought frantically, before a laser shot from one of the Krabes flew at her. She ducked out of the way and then started running again. The Krabes chased her, firing lasers, trying to slow her down so that the Scipizoa could catch her.
Aelita's legs pumped furiously, as she looked behind her in panic.
"Oh... I wish Jeremie could get a vehicle for me right now!" She thought to herself. "Well," a little voice inside of her said, "Why don't you just use one of the ones that are already here?"
Aelita looked left and right, and saw an overcar ahead of her, parked by the side of the road.
The last time they had tried to work one of the overcars, it hadn't gone so well. But the interface in the library had proved that not everything in this city was too run down to be used. Perhaps this one would work. In any case, if she didn't do something soon, then Xana's monsters would catch her for sure. Even now, they were making their way down the street, coming closer every second.
She pulled the car door open, sat down, and then realized that there were no controls. Just the button that turned it on and a bunch of readouts. There was nothing resembling a steering wheel, or a gas pedal, or even a radio. Aelita pressed the on button anyway, hoping something would happen. And something did. the readouts lit up, just like last time, but instead of exploding, the car released three metal tubes with some sort of suction cup on the end from a hole over the dashboard, which attached themselves to Aelita's head. She felt her mind connect with the overcar's systems instantly.
A neural interface. Of course. If they could speed up time for themselves, then they could do this.
She motioned the overcar up into the air, then forward. It shot off, almost as fast as the Sector 5 transporter, down the streets, with Aelita whooping with joy inside the pilot's seat. The Krabes stopped and stared at the retreating object in dismay, somewhat like the way Wile E. Coyote stares when he first sees the roadrunner speed off. Their thoughts were interrupted by rapid footsteps behind them. They turned around to see Mr. Puck running toward them.
He flipped right over the Scipizoa, landed on the first Krabe, and then threw his giant key at the Krabe next to the one he landed on. It exploded, and the key flipped back to him, and he promptly did the same thing to the Krabe on the other side, before stabbing his key into the back of the Krabe he was standing on. The Scipizoa backed away in fear, but Mr. Puck ignored it and ran onward, chasing Aelita, cursing his luck as he went.
---------------------
Jeremie listened closely to what Xana was saying, but he could only understand half of the conversation between the evil AI and his memory-sucking minion.
"Uh huh... I see. Ok. What? Ok. Don't worry. I can see a shortcut. You'll arrive at the kids at about the same time as Aelita. I'll send you some more Krabes. What? Oh... Yes, I saw who your attacker was, and I don't believe it either. We'll worry about it later. Xana, out."
Jeremie just looked at the clone of him sitting in the supercalculator chair. Was he actually hanging his head in frustration?
---------------------
Mr. Puck had also found the shortcut, and was angrily heading toward the battle between Yumi, Ulrich, Odd, and his Nightmares, determined to take Aelita back, by force if necessary. But Aelita was not worrying about Mr. Puck anymore. She had all the speed she needed now. The sounds of battle were coming closer, and then, suddenly, she was there. Her friends were fighting with a host of monstrous creatures, which all turned at the sound of the overcar making the scene.
"Slow down!" Aelita commanded the car, but nothing happened. It dawned on Aelita that though the propulsion system might be working, the brakes might not be. She ripped the tubes from her head, threw the car door open, and jumped out, just as the car flew right into the monstrous green blob, destroying both car and Nightmare instantly.
Aelita lay on the ground, panting heavily at her narrow escape. She looked up to see what was happening. Ulrich was dueling furiously with the minotaur, sword clashing against axe, as they ran and battled around the square. Odd was firing arrows at the giant bat, which was flying about overhead, occasionally swooping in in an attempt to bite Odd's head off. And Yumi was throwing her fans over and over again at the pink tentacled thing, the fans cutting off tentacles with every attack and Yumi herself dodging the tentacles that were left, trying to keep them from grabbing her.
"Guys!" Aelita cried. "Over here!"
They all turned at the sound of her voice.
"Aelita!" Ulrich shouted, obviously glad to see her, which was, thankfully, a great change from his mood when she left him.
"Hold on, princess, we'll be right with you!" Odd said, as he fired two arrows straight into the eyes of the giant bat. It screamed a giant bat scream as its head disappeared. The body fell to the ground, where Odd kicked it into the mouth of the giant snake with a human head, which started choking to death.
Aelita was watching the battle, fascinated, when two hands clamped around her mouth and pulled her backward into an alley. Mr. Puck, with Aelita in tow, jumped up onto a large balcony extending from the side of a building overlooking the square.
"Aelita! He said, in a pained voice, while putting his hands on her shoulders. "Why did you do that? You put yourself in incredible danger by doing that!"
"You can drop the act, Puck! I found something very interesting in one of the books of the library. Now I look at the creatures my friends are battling down there, and I look at you, and there is no doubt in my mind what is going on. You can't fool me, Nightmare!" She spat.
"What? Aelita, please! It's not like that!As soon, as they are destroyed, we can escape from this virtual prison, and then there will be no stopping us! Those people down there don't like you!" Mr. Puck pleaded.
"You're wrong, Puck," Aelita shot back. "One arguement means nothing. They will always be my friends, and we have been protecting the world from a virus just like you for years now. I will never join you."
"But Aelita-"
She smacked him. Hard.
Mr. Puck looked stunned, then hurt, then furious.
"Insolent child!" He shouted at her. "All you had to do was entrust me with your secret! Then we could have ruled the entire world, together! But your stupid friends are too important to you!"
He stood in front of her, heaving. "But your feelings will not get in the way of me getting what I want! I have an entire army of dream orbs at my command!"
Aelita felt like she'd been hit. "They all obey you? But that means that you're... you're..."
"Rem?" He finished for her. An evil smile spread across his face. "Yes, Aelita. I am the leader of the Nightmares. And like I said, I will get what I want regardless of your feelings. Minions! To me!"
With that, ten orbs flew over the building and settled on the balcony behind Mr. Puck/Rem. They instantly transformed into ten figures that were all too familiar to Aelita. Nine Nightmare-wolves, growling angrily, and a Nightmare-Scipizoa, the eye of Xana replaced with a blinking, human eye.
Rem came forward and took the tiara from his pocket, placing it gently on Aelita's head.
"It looks gook on you." He said with a sneer. "Come forward, my new Scipizoa! If she does not want to give us her memory, we can always take it from her!" He paused to give Aelita a filthy, triumphant look. "And then we'll give her some new memories, ones where she likes me a little better!"
Ulrich had finally gotten the best of the minotaur. Yumi had cut off most of the tentacle monster's tentacles, and had sliced apart the spongy core. Odd had shot an arrow into the heart of the flaming hawk. Only a few of the original twelve Nightmares were left.
But when they heard the scream, they knew that the battle was far from over.