Past and Present

By thesuperdot

Chapter 5: Reawaken, Dear Xana!

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Grant's hand hovered over the switch on the super-computer. He bit his lip, and a though occurred to him.

"Why is it off in the first place?" He withdrew his hand. "Why is it in an abandoned factory?"

Terry, Ceil, and Ax groaned. "Grrrant! Just turn it on already!" Ax said.

"No, wait, just listen! Think of it, none of this makes any sense. Why on earth is there a very large computer in what is essentially a bunker? Who put it here?"

"We don't know." Was Terry's reply.

"Maybe it was an abandoned project in the government." Ceil suggested.

"True, but why was it abandoned?" Grant persisted.

Ceil shook her head. "Who really cares? Listen, there's a switch for a reason. If something goes wrong, we simply come back down here and shut it off. Simple and effective."

Grant rolled his eyes. "Okay, I guess." And his hand grabbed hold of the switch and pulled it down. "There. It's on."

Nothing happened. There wasn't even a slight hum to indicate anything came on. No lights, nothing. The only thing that happened was the 20 years of past suddenly became present and the cover slid back into place.

"It is? Nothing happened." Ax said.

Terry rolled his eyes. "Thank you, Mr. Obvious."

Ax glared at Terry, Ceil shook her head. "Let's try going to the computer monitor. Maybe something happened there."

They rode the elevator up two levels. Nothing was on, or at least, at first glance. Grant walked over to the chair. The others looked at him expectantly.

"Hey, you're the computer nerd, you figure it out!" Ax said. Terry and Ceil agreed.

"Yeah, take a look, please?"

"Come on, this is your element!"

"Oh, alright." Grant took a seat. Suddenly, there was activity! The chair swung around toward the monitor and keyboard and halted once it arrived. "Ooooookeeeeyyyyy. Something's on…"

Grant's fingers hovered over the keys as he read the screen. He placed them onto the arm rest and sat back. "Huh, it, it's on…"

The others rushed over to see. Sure enough, on the screen were the words:

System ready. Begin activation?

Grant's finger barely touched the 'y' key when the screen became a flurry of text and gibberish. The other screens began to switch on one at a time, also displaying text, numbers, and gibberish.

The half made dome flicked itself on and displayed what could be regarded as the most bizarre map conceived. It appeared to be testing itself, rotating around, lighting up different areas, showing close ups of other areas, and displaying text about certain areas. But just as it started, it stopped. So did all the screens.

Activation complete. Do you wish to connect now?

Grant pressed the 'y' key again. This time, the screens went blue and a loading bar appeared in the center one. Once it hit 100, a few screens changed.

In the top left screen, channel 6 was being displayed. In the top right screen, the system vitals, such as CPU usage, connection, memory left, were displayed. And at the bottom of the main screen, a simple bar was located.

Command:

Grant looked at it and then at his friends. "I, I, think we're in…" He stammered. "But, I, I've no idea what I'm doing…"

They didn't care. "You look like you do."

In the command line, Grant typed in 'GUI' for Graphical User Interface. The screen refreshed and showed a much clearer picture of what they were dealing with.

A number of icons appeared with little labels to them:

Lyoko Monitor

Profile Editor/Creator

Tower Checker

Scanner Access

TV Control

Time Reversal Settings

"Hey, check that out, profiles! This must be a game of some sort." Ceil said.

"I don't know about that. That could be network users." Grant reminded him.

"We'll never know unless we click on it!" Terry said.

"More like type it. There is no mouse." Grant did so.

Current profiles:

Aelita (Protected)

Ulrich (Protected)

Yumi (Protected)

Odd (Protected)

Protected profiles cannot be modified. What do you wish to do?

Grant typed in 'Create new'. A new dialog box appeared.

How many do you wish to create? Max 3

Grant typed in '3'. The whole screen refreshed and a new dialog box appeared.

Profile creation is an automatic process. Please send the subject down to the scanners to continue. Press any key to continue.

Below it, a picture of the scanner room popped up. It looked just like the room below.

"Cool, well guys? Let's go see what it wants!" Without another word, Ceil ran off into the elevator and down into the scanner room. Grant looked at Terry and Ax.

"Uhh, why don't you go make sure she's okay, okay?"

They did so, albeit reluctantly. Grant pressed a key and the profile screen closed out to the scanner access screen. He decided to click on the middle one. He then noticed that a small message had appeared.

Intercom active.

"Ah, hello?" He said.

"Hiya, Grant!" Ceil's cheery voice called back.

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Down one floor, Ceil stood in front of the open tube and looked into the blinding white interior. Terry and Ax ran up to her. "Hey, guys, check it out."

"It's white…"

"What do we do?"

Ceil began to approach it. Terry placed a hand on her shoulder to stop her. "What do you think your doing?"

Ceil brushed his hand off and smiled. "Going in, of course."

"Do you think…"

"I'll be fine!" She took a deep breath, and then let it out. To be truthful, she was a bit nervous. She stepped in and turned around, smiling. "See? Told ya!"

A message appeared on the computer stating the following:

Subject detected in Scanner 1. Closing door.

And the door to the scanner closed tight. Finally causing Ceil to freak.

"Hey! What just happened! Grant! Terry! Ax! What going on?"

Terry stood there in alarm. "Grant! What'd you do?"

Grant voice crackled over the PA. "I, I don't know! It just started by itself."

"Well? Get her out!"

A new message appeared on the screen:

Proceed?

Grant quickly hit 'n'. But something went wrong. The screens began to distort and flicker and for the briefest of moments, a large red picture of what could be described as an eye appeared. That was followed by red text.

Error error error error error error error error error error error error error error error error error error error error error error error error error error error error error error

Proceeding… Creating profile for… Ceil…

"Hey! What's going on? I feel… funny…" Ceil was saying. "Terry! Ax! Get me out of here!"

"Grant, what is going on? Stop it already!"

"I can't! I lost control!"

"Guh… Ohhh… Errraaaa…. GYYYYYYYAAAAAAAAAAAA!" Ceil screamed.

Terry grabbed his hair in panic. "CEIL!"

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAA…………….."

Then silence.

Up above, Grant could only stare in wonder at what just happened. The scanner screen had switched to a view of Ceil, having something done to her. Then a green circle appeared, and the screen switched to what appeared to be a map.

The left screen switched on and showed a picture of Ceil on a sort of status card. The right side switched on and displayed a list of nearby towers and their status. The very top middle screen showed a detailed map of the sector she was in. Next to him, the holo-map appeared, and indicated which area was active. It was labeled 'forest'.

"Gr, grant? Are you there?"

"Yes, I am. Can, can you hear me?"

"Where am I! What just happened? I feel very strange!"

Grant switched on the intercom. "GUYS! Get up here! You've got to see this!"

Terry and Ax did so, but weren't sure what they were looking at. "Guys, she in the computer!"

"What?" "Where?" "I'm where?"

"She, Ceil, is inside the computer!"

Terry shook his head. "No way! You mean to tell me that Ceil has gone from meat and bone to a computer language?"

Grant nodded. "Yeah! Ceil is now a program in the computer! What's it like there, Ceil?"

Grant switched it to intercom and everyone listened to what she said. "It's very odd! I, I'm in a forest! A very big forest at that!"

"Yes, okay! But do you feel any different?"

There was a pause. "No, actually, I don't…"

Ax scratched his head. "Then why'd you scream?"

"I was startled… It really isn't that bad…"

Grant brought up the scanner screen and opened tubes 1 and 3. Terry and Ax saw what he just did.

"Wait, we don't know if she can come back!"

Grant took the point, brought up the screen and was unable to figure out what to type.

He finally decided on 'retrieveceil' and was greeted with the following message:

Profile Ceil cannot return direct from Lyoko unless a Time Reversal is triggered OR she enters a tower. No tower is active; therefore no Time Reversal can occur.

"See? She can come back, all she has to do go to a tower."

Terry shrugged. "Alright. I guess I'll go and keep her company." Ax was less enthusiastic about it was eventually dragged away by Terry.

"Good luck!" Grant called after them.

Terry took tube number one; he set Ax in front of number 3. Terry closed his eyes and stepped in. The same thing happened. Ax stood in one place before finally stepping into the tube.

He had the sensation of being pulled apart, painlessly, and being put back together again. When that was finished, he found himself in a whole new world.

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Next Chapter Soon.