Jeremie got up, rubbing his body, which was sore from being tied up for so long in such an uncomfortable position. He went over to the computer, sat down, and began to examine the readouts on the screen.
He immediately became confused. The holomap showed Odd, Yumi, Ulrich, and Aelita running through what was clearly a city, pursued by a large number of solid silver circles. There was also a fifth triangle on the screen, but it was colored a menacing red, as opposed to green or yellow. A large number of Xana's Bloks stood outside the city gates, and the superscan showed an activated tower, but maintained that Xana was not controlling it. Jeremie had no idea what to make of it.
But there was another window on the screen, with text typed on it. He began to read it quickly, and realized that Xana had been taking notes on the situation before he lost control of the tower. He scanned the notes rapidly, taking into special account what the monsters had observed of the orbs' shapeshifting abilities, and guessed that that was what the silver circles on the screen represented. His thoughts wandered to his friends, and realized that they were probably very worried about him. He started speaking into the mike.
"Guys!" The voice came from above. "Are you alright down there?"
"Jeremie?" Yumi shouted as they kept running, following the pulsations and hordes of Nightmares following them, in a mixture of disbelief and relief.
"I'm back. How are things going?"
"Well, Einstein," Odd said, "Its a reeeeeaaaaaaalllllllly long story. But right now, we're being chased by the army of some evil virtual bad guy, and WE COULD REALLY USE SOME HELP!"
"I've got the situation under control, sort of. I'll get you some vehicles to help you outrun those Nightmares. And I'll see what kind of data is in the tower that that guy activated."
"The nightmare leader's name is Rem!" Aelita blurted out, to clarify that information to the others.
Jeremie turned to another screen on the computer and activated an analysis program on the activated tower. It mainly contained a corruption virus for the materialization program. Xana had put that there. But Rem had put something else in too.
"A materialization program?" Jeremie said, scratching his head. He shrugged and went ahead with programming the vehicles.
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Rem stood on the balcony he had been knocked off not too long ago. Things were under control. The tower was under his control, changing the desert's day to night, increasing the strength of his minions. The kids were fleeing, but the Nightmares were catching up to them, and soon they would be just like all the others he had killed; reduced to mindless and bodiless babbling voices, doomed to stay in his city for the rest of Lyoko's existence. Soon he would have Aelita back. There was just one more thing that needed to be taken care of.
Next to him was a single dream orb. At his signal, the orb devirtualized, turning transparent blue before disappearing completely. That human in the real world had quite a surprise coming to him.
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The overwing, overbike, and overboard materialized in front of Yumi, Ulrich, Odd, and Aelita, who vaulted onto them effortlessly. The three vehicles and their passengers sped off. Aelita dared to look behind them.
The entire monstrous host was charging along the road behind them. Ogres, imps, giants, trolls, blobs, animals, people, robots, and many things humanity had no name for, ran as one mass behind them, eager in their thirst for human blood. Aelita cringed at the sight.
"Faster!" She urged. "They're still gaining on us!"
"I've got it floored!" Ulrich said from his seat in front of her. "But the pulsations are getting stronger, which means that we're getting closer to the tower. We're not out of the city yet, but we will be soon."
Ulrich was right. The red, rusty wall that encircled the city was getting much closer. They were riding along a very wide street, the pulsations going right down the middle. Then they could see the gates, the sand of the desert contrasting greatly with the paved streets of Arcotopolis. They sped through the gates, and stopped.
There, in front of them, were a t least 150 Bloks. The kids' exit from the city had alerted all of them, and they were all staring at the kids now.
"You've got to be kidding me!" Odd exclaimed. "We get through all that, only to be faced with this?"
They retreated behind the walls of the city as hundreds of laser beams cut through the air, nearly searing them with their heat.
"OK. We can fly over the Bloks." Ulrich said. "They can't fire upward very easily. And maybe they can delay the nightmares for a while. Who knows, they might even win."
"Got it." Yumi replied.
"This had better work, Ulrich. I want to live to see you and Yumi kiss again." Odd said, earning furious blushes from both of his friends.
"What?" Aelita asked.
"I'll explain later. C'mon, lets go team!" Odd said in a mock impression of Sissi's cheerleading.
They flew out from behind the wall. Laser fire erupted from the ranks of Bloks below, but those were dodged and soon they were flying high overhead, where the Bloks couldn't reach them, heading for the black tower in the distance.
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Rem watched them go with distaste. Xana's bloks had done little to slow the kids' progress, and if they managed to deactivate the tower, then they could flee back to the real world, where he couldn't reach them. It was time that he put his plan into action.
The dream orb that had been devirtualized had arrived safe and sound in one of the scanners. Rem opened it now, and the silver sphere floated out, its one eye opening to examine its surroundings. It could sense the consciousness of the mind above, and it read Jeremie's mind with little effort. It selected something had dreamed about when he was just a little kid, after reading a book on medieval history. The sphere morphed.
In its new form, the nightmare pressed the button to call the elevator. It came down and opened, and the materialized monster stepped in, pressing the button for the lab. Jeremie heard the elevator doors open a short while later, and gasped at what he saw.
Standing there was a figure at least 7 feet high, in a rusty suit of armor. It had no face, but two glowing red eyes stared at him from beneath the dark knight's helmet. From behind its back, it drew an iron sword, stained red with blood. It strode over to Jeremie and brought the weapon down.
Jeremie dove out of the way as the weapon cleaved the chair he had just been in in half. Dashing around the Nightmare, Jeremie ran into the elevator, frantically pressing the button to make it rise. The doors closed on the Nightmare, and the elevator rose up to the ground floor, with Jeremie in it. He stood against the back wall, breathing heavily, knowing that the monster wouldn't be delayed for long by the trick.
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The Bloks soon saw the advancing horde, and they prepared for battle. The Nightmares far outnumbered them, but the majority of the Nightmares did not have ranged weapons. The strategy Xana had given them was simple. They were to start firing as soon as Rem's army was in range. The gate would act as a bottleneck in which the nightmares would be scrunched together and unable to maneuver. Add to that the fact that the other 150 Bloks that had been sent to guard the other city gate were coming through the city to join the fight and trap the Nightmares, it seemed like there was no way Xana's forces could lose. As for the kids, well, the tower was no longer controlled by Xana. Let them deactivate it if they wanted to.
But the Bloks had yet to see the ferocity with which Rem's minions fought. As soon as the creatures were in range, the Bloks started firing, and the Nightmares started going down. but more took their place, completely undaunted by the falling of their comrades. The Nightmares exploded through the city gates, and started literally tearing the first Bloks they encountered to shreds. The Bloks were taken aback by their ferocity, but then started counterattacking with a ferocity to match.
Lasers and other projectiles flew across the battlefield, as monsters and nightmares alike fought and destroyed each other. It was quite unlike any battle earthly armies had ever fought, but there were no spectators for this awesome event, save the commanders of the opposing forces, and Rem was not pleased at what he was seeing. Despite the prowess of his minions, Xana's strategy was working. He wasn't a superinteligent AI for nothing. His ranks were steadily being depleted as they hurled themselves against the Bloks, and from where he was standing, he could see Xana's second wave marching through the city unopposed.
And what about the kids? Those vehicles that had appeared out of nowhere were bringing them to the tower fast. There were no nightmares available to stop them. How would he get the power to do the impossible? Of course. The tower. He reached out with his mind and drew power from the tower.
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The vehicles landed behind a rocky outcropping a short distance from the tower. Yumi, Odd, Ulrich, and Aelita peered out from behind the rock, but none of Xana's or Rem's minions were in sight. It was completely unguarded. In the distance, they could see the Bloks, finishing off the rest of the Nightmares and, they imagined, congratulating each other over the victory.
"It's all yours, Aelita." Odd said as they approached the tower. "Deactivate that thing and get us home."
They were completely unprepared for what happened next.
A dark column of evil energy erupted from the city in the distance, still visible through the gap in the rock walls that ringed the city's plateau. It rose high into the atmosphere. The Bloks looked up at it and started firing, only to completely disintegrate as the dark column's power swept over them.
The kids looked up at it in horror as the dark energy swirled about in the air, then crossed the distance from the city's plateau to the tower's plateau intwo seconds flat. It settled in front of them, and then took a familiar shape, the sole but very powerful guard of the tower.
"You shall not pass!" Rem screamed at them.