Yumi opened her eyes in the yellow, circular walls of the scanner she had used. The door swung open automatically, revealing the other two scanners. The scanners were three yellow cylinders slightly taller than the average person, because the average person was exactly who they had been built for. She stepped out, swore, and dashed to the elevator that the team used to move between the floors of the factory.

She pressed the button to bring her to the computer room and felt the rectangular room lurch upwards.

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Odd arrived at the tower panting and sweating. He had run faster than he thought he could, without even knowing why. It wasn't as if there was a prize for the first one there.

(Why,) he thought, (Didn't I stay at the battle?) He saw the girl sitting with her back against the tower, and felt as if his question had been answered. It hadn't, but it was as close as he would get.

She wasn't particularly beautiful, but she was quite a pleasant sight. Her outfit was a brown jumpsuit covered with a green vest and several green sashes over her arms and legs. Her skin was smooth and her hair was golden and soft. In her hand was a green, wooden yo-yo attached to a soft, black handle instead of a finger-wrapping piece of string.

She looked straight at him, as silent as he was. He stood there, just looking at her for a few moments. He felt privileged to be near this girl. He was amazed at her beauty, even though she was little more than average-looking. Something about her was more beautiful than she looked, some kind of innocence, chastity, love.

"You are the one named Odd, are you not?" he heard, but she didn't say. He thought for a moment to ask how she did this, but decided against it.

"Yes," he said. "You were going to show us some sort of people living on Lyoko?"

She nodded and walked into the tower, beckoning with her hand for him to follow her. He walked in to see her typing away at a holographic keyboard in the middle of the air.

The inside of the tower was blue. There was a white platform in the shape of The Eye of Xana. Once one stood on the center of the eye, one would rise up and land on a smaller platform in the shape of a circle. It was this higher platform on which they stood.

"What are you doing?" he asked. She remained silent and continued to type. He decided to stand back and wait, but he didn't have to for long.

"Lyoko historical archives accessed," said a female voice that came from every direction at once. In a moment, Odd found that he was no longer in a tower, but in the computer room. He was staring at a screen, feeling very confused. Jeremie was nowhere to be seen.

The holographic map was different, less detailed and more like something a physicist would dream up than a game designer. The land was more like land one could find on Earth, and had less exciting obstacles than true-to-life terrain.

Odd frowned.

(What's going on?) he thought. The voice spoke again.

"Era one," it said. "No population, scanners unfinished, Lyoko hanging in existence by threads." The hologram began to rotate faster, as though some one had pressed fast forward. When it stopped, the landscape was a bit more detailed, with several features that seemed more fun than the last version.

"Era two. No population, scanner finished but Lyoko not real enough to enter." The rotation sped up again, and when it stopped the landscape looked much the same as when Odd saw it last.

"Era three. Population is thirty humans. Scanners finished, Lyoko can be entered." Odd was beginning to think that something didn't quite make sense. That made him feel even dumber than he had a second ago, because nothing that was happening made sense.

"Era four," the voice said before Odd had fully noticed that Lyoko had once again fast-forwarded. This time, the present-day Lyoko was mostly accounted for, except that the land was covered with all kinds of primitive housing, such as lodges and teepees. "Population is three hundred human, two hundred dragons, two hundred and fifty werewolves, two hundred cat folk, one hundred and seventy elves…" the voice went on to list several other kinds of mystical creatures that had lived in Lyoko. "Scanners working, Lyoko entered daily." Lyoko sped to the next era.

"Era five, final era," said the voice. "Xana active, population full, Xana has become destructive, unable to remove Xana from program, population destroyed, Lyoko shut down." Odd stared at the blackness. The hologram was gone.

Questions shot through Odds mind like bullets. What had happened? What was Xana supposed to have done? What did it do? And most importantly of all, how could it have ended so suddenly? Wouldn't somebody have noticed before Xana got all that power?

And then he was back in the tower, looking at the girl in the brown jumpsuit.

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Ulrich arrived at the clearing, to see Odd, firing questions at a girl in a brown jumpsuit covered in a green vest and sashes. He had left Aelita behind after making sure there were no monsters about. A stupid move, he knew, but there was little to worry about. He didn't know why this was true, but he had a very strong feeling it was.

"How did it happen? Who created this place? Why didn't they stop him? Where are these people now? The files said they were destroyed! They can't still exist, can they? What's going on?" The girls' lips moved, but no sound came out. Fortunately, Ulrich could read lips.

"She says she's mute," Ulrich said, making his presence known. "She can't talk. She also says she used telepathy earlier, but doesn't have the energy to now." Odd let out a sigh of annoyance.

"This complicates thing," he said. He looked back at her to see that her eyes were cast to the ground in shame. Neither boy knew this, and Aelita was to far behind to tell them, but the disabled where highly oppressed in Lyokan culture. After all, it was a perfect place. Why should imperfect beings exist there?

"You okay?" Odd asked. She looked back at him, put a fake smile in her eyes and nodded. There was no reason to concern any non-Lyokans, the race that had created the computer, designed the people, checked the physics involved and done all the other stuff that must be done to create an artificial world; the Lyokans should be grateful to them that they even existed.

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"What is it?" Yumi asked Jeremie as he stared at the screen in intense determination.

"Xana attacked us on Lyoko, right?" he said. When Yumi nodded, he continued. "That means he must have a tower activated somewhere, but the super-scan's drawing a blank. There's nothing." Yumi stared at the screen as well, but couldn't make sense of any of it.

"Yeah," she said. "That's pretty weird." She scolded herself. Of all the things she could've said, she had said that. Couldn't she come up with something smart or helpful?

Jeremie didn't notice, however. He was to busy typing away and trying to figure out what had happened.

"It doesn't appear," he said finally, "that we'll see any more monsters any time soon." He sighed. "Still, I wish one of the guys had stayed with Aelita. It doesn't feel safe." Yumi nodded. Lyoko wasn't a very safe place that often.

Jeremie spoke into the microphone.

"All right," he said. "Everybody, get to a tower and I'll de-virtualize you." A few moments later, he began running the program that would bring the team back to the real world through the scanners. After it finished, he had to run it again for Aelita, who had reached the tower soon after.

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In the judgment field, Xana curled its lips into a dark smile. This had to be its best plan ever. The group opposing it had one fatal flaw, one serious error in judgment that would lead to their downfall. This was the definition of a tragic hero, a character who had great power and respect alongside one fatal flaw. These characters had plenty of flaws, and all of them it could manipulate.

The one he was focusing on at the moment, however, was a simple, human one. This merely proves the chroniclers irrelevant theories that people suck, but that is not important here. What is important is that flaw.

Trust. There was one in that group that should not have been trusted, but was welcomed gladly by the others. Xana was going to cash in big on that mistake, not that it used the phrase "cash in" often.

Yes, Xana felt it had truly won. It knew that its latest plan was totally flawless. Failure was not an option. The stress would quite literally be murder on his poor, young foes' minds.

It tilted its head back and laughed a dark, evil laugh. It had finally won!

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Aelita stepped out of the scanner, slightly annoyed that Ulrich had ran off. Still, she wasn't going to let it ruin her day or her good mood. The door swung open and she saw Odd, Ulrich and a girl who was apparently the one they had come looking for.

The girl was dressed in an out fit of clothing that I cannot describe, because I know very little about clothes. I can, however, tell you that the bottom was brown and the top was green, which was apparently designed to give the impression that she was a tree.

"Hi," said Aelita. "What's up?" In a few seconds, her good mood would be ruined. She would become totally enraged, and the greatest tragedy to strike the Lyoko gang would be revealed.

"The new girl can't talk," said Ulrich. "We're trying to work out a way to communicate."

Aelita stepped forward, an angry look in her eyes. Odd and Ulrich stared at her in surprise. She walked over to the girl they had recently met, and kicked her hard in the stomach. The girl fell to her knees, clutching her stomach. Aelita grabbed her by the collar and jerked her back up.

"Not only did you defile a tower," she whispered, her voice quivering with rage, "but you saved yourself, an abomination that shouldn't exist, while the worthy were slain!"

As though coming out of a trance, Odd and Ulrich realized what was going on. They grabbed Aelitas' arms and put them behind her back before she could do any more damage. She dropped the girl, who fell to the ground and began massaging her neck with one hand and clutched her stomach with the other.

Pain on Earth was a lot worse than on Lyoko. She was not getting off to a good start.

"Aelita!" Odd cried, truly concerned. "What are you doing?" Neither boy had ever expected her to act like this. She was usually happy and concerned for others; she was never one to start a fight. Her response was so simple; it sent chills though Odds' body.

"Lyoko is meant to be a paradise. It isn't supposed to have flaws, or even flawed people. They are simply flaws in the program, bugs in the design.' Odds' terrified expression met Ulrichs', one of anger.

"C'mon," said Ulrich, letting go of Aelitas' arm. "Let's go to the computer room."

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Jeremie sat back in the chair.

(Time to "interrogate" the "prisoner,") he though.

The elevator door opened, and the four teenagers stepped out. Jeremie noted that the look of perky happiness that usually covered Aelitas face was gone. Now, it was replaced with pure resentment. Odds' expression was one of sorrow, Ulrichs' of undirected anger, and the girl Jeremie quite naturally assumed to be Kaserht looked ashamed, with a bit of physical pain mixed in.

"What happened?" he asked. Odds' gaze met his. He shuddered. "Guys?"

Yumi looked worried. She walked over to Ulrich and looked into his eyes.

"Answer him," she said in a soft, concerned tone. Ulrich muttered something that sounded sulky. She asked him to repeat it.

"Ask Odd. I don't wanna' talk about it." he said. Yumi let out a sigh of annoyance at his anger, but knew that with Ulrich, the third inevitable thing in life was mood swings.

"Odd," said Jeremie in a way that was more of a question than anything else. Odd nodded.

"When Aelita found out the girl we found on lyoko was mute, she kicked her. Hard." Jeremie looked at Kaserht. She certainly seamed to have been hurt. He didn't want to believe it, but Odd wasn't the type to lie about something like that.

"Aelita," he said, trying to keep his disposition neutral, "Explain yourself."

"Lyoko is designed to be a perfect place," she said. "The people are not supposed to be flawed. No disabilities, no deformations, no autism, no mental illness. This is how my culture evolved. Wrong or right, it's how I think."

"I can assure you, it is very wrong," said Jeremy, still not showing the emotional storm inside him. "It's a way you are born, not a punishment, an element of luck and chance. You do not have the right to hurt anyone, not matter what you think of them."

The intensity in the air grew. Before Aelita could think about what she was doing, she had stormed back into the elevator.

Jeremie watched the screen that showed where the elevator went. It headed up a floor to the exit. Aelita had left. Tears came to his eyes, but he brushed them away. There was business to attend to, information to gather.