Aftermath Part 2

Dorm

Sanne sees Krieger coming back from the gym. "Not with Skitz?"

He shakes his head. "She's been with her brother all day."

"Oh, that's where she is." Sanne hasn't seen her all day. "How has Ark been?"

"Bad, Skitz?"

"Worse. Ark doesn't remember. He was brushing his hair and then on Lyoko. Skitz, she saw Mira's face. She felt the knife in her chest. The blood filling her lungs. I, I don't know how she lived. She shouldn't have lived."

"Neither should I." He rubs his throat. "She slit my throat. I couldn't breathe. Shock, I couldn't move. It had to be shock."

Both feel the fear, darkness, overcome them.

Without thinking, both hug each other for comfort.

When they hear footsteps, they see the twins. "Oh, um," Sanne pulls away from Krieger. "Skitz, Ark, how are you?

"Hey," Ark doesn't even try to smile. "Tired. Need a nap."

"Same."

Sanne looks down at her feet. She knows why Skitz, and Ark, are so tired.

Nightmares. She has them far worse than I ever will. Ark is a great friend but he isn't my brother. "Uh, Krieger and I will go to the mall or something. Leave the rooms open for you."

A weak smiles appears on Skitz's face for a second. "Thanks. You two have fun."

She looks at Krieger and tries to smile more but can't. I lost my brother. I don't want to lose Krieger to Sanne but really, does it matter? We didn't even date because we liked each other like that. It was a ruse that failed. I'm glad if failed but... I don't care right now. About him, dating, anything really. Just my brother.

"Yeah, you two have fun." Ark yawns. "While you can."

Sanne hears the anger in his voice and wants to respond but doesn't. Ark has every right to be mad. If I found a way to stop Xana this never would have happened.

"Maybe I'll go to the Factory instead. I, I can find a way to stop this."

"Whatever." Ark and Skitz walk past the two.

At the Factory, Sanne sits down and looks at what she has been working on. "All of these programs, and for what? To save Dante?" She sighs. "He isn't my mom. If I turn this off he's trapped."

Krieger puts a hand on her shoulder. "What if someone else find it?"

"That's the issue. If we hadn't been so stupid, if I hadn't been so stupid. I did this." She feels the tears form in her eyes. "I got Ark killed. Skitz's nightmares are my fault. I don't know how it is with Ark but Skitz, she used to hold me when I had mine. Now I hold her when she has hers."

"We could have stopped you. I could have. I'm just as at fault as you are. We all are." He sighs. "Ark had so much fun. He wouldn't shut up about it. He couldn't wait for the next attack so he could go to Lyoko." He pulls his hand away. "It was a game. It didn't seem real."

"Ark getting killed made it real, didn't it?" He nods. "Maybe we should just shut it off. Shut it off and make it so no one can get in again."

"How?" Krieger looks up at the control panel monitor. "Blow up the Factory? Your grandparents might notice."

"I was thinking that. Or cement. Steal a cement truck and pour it here."

Krieger shakes his head. "It won't work. Even if we blew it up the, authorities, would come in and clean it all up. They would find everything."

"Frak." Sanne stares at the monitor. "Maybe we should give up and call our parents."

"Maybe." They'll kill us then ground us until we're eighteen. After that they might disavow us forever. We'll never see each other until then. "They'll separate us."

"I know." We deserve it. "It will save our lives. The twins."

She's right. "We might have to do it. Grow up and realize we're not good enough."

Frak, he's right. "We'll ask the twins first."

"Mira?"

"Frak her." No, don't say that. "I mean, this isn't her fault. She got dragged into this shit by us. She did nothing wrong."

"This isn't her choice. We aren't calling her parents." Sanne leans back in the chair. "I vote yes. I hate to say it, but yes." Please forgive me mom, dad.

"So do I." Dad... No, my mom. She'll be the one to worry about. My dad is always calm. How he does it I have no idea.

When they go back to the dorm room they wake Skitz up first. "What did you two do?"

Gave up. "Krieger and I decided we want a vote on if we call our parents."

Skitz shoots up from her bed. "What? Our parents?" She goes silent.

"Yes, Skitz, we know we'll be punished. Probably grounded and kept away from each other."

We deserve it. "Frak, we deserve it. I deserve it. I talked you in to it." Sanne sighs. "We can lie. Say I turned it on and didn't tell you until a week or two later."

Krieger grasps her hand. "No Sanne. We all did this."

"We all frakked up." Skitz takes the other hand in hers. "You two are right. We need to tell our parents." All three nod.

Suddenly, a black mist... The three go alone without Ark or Mira, fight, win, launch a return.

The four meet in Sanne and Skitz's room and tell Ark about their vote. "Well, it was good knowing you two." He holds his sister's hand in his. "I'll at least have my sister. You two won't have anyone else."

"What about Mira?"

He shrugs his shoulders. "I shouldn't have dragged her in to this. I frakked up there. She's great, still is, but I frakked up with her."

Sanne gets her phone out. "I'll call my mom. They'll probably,"

"No," Krieger takes his phone out. "We all call our parents."

Ark holds his phone up. "I'll call my dad."

"I guess I'll call my mom." Skitz gets her phone out and finds her mother's number. "It was good hanging out while we could." She looks up at Krieger. "I know it wasn't love but we had fun."

"More fun than I thought we would."

That's my sister! "Let's get this over with." Ark hits dial on his phone.

Less than an hours later...

Jim and Samantha has the four teens in the back of a van on the way to the airport. "Kids, I know we may have, sugar coated, some of the stories but this has got to be one of the worst things you could ever have done."

"We know grandpa. I, I was so excited, I didn't think about it. I convinced the others."

"You did," Sanne glares at Krieger and he stops.

"No, you didn't think." Jim looks over at his wife who sits silently fuming in her seat. "Hopefully your parents can come in and fix things quickly. If so, maybe they won't ground you kids forever."

I doubt that. "Thanks big guy. My dad, I never heard him like that before." We couldn't have disappointed him more.

"Odd still loves you. Yes he may be angry but know he will never stop loving you or your sister. Same for you Krieger and Sanne."

"I hope so." Krieger can only imagine what his parents will say or do when he goes home.

"So do I." I frakked up. This is all my fault. Krieger wanted to turn it off. If I hadn't been so damn nosy this wouldn't have happened. "Thank you grandpa for driving us. I, I love you."

If she found the Super Computer she has to know who Franz really was. Yet she still calls me grandpa. Because I am. Maybe not by blood but by love. "I love you too, Sanne."

"No. Shut up. All of you. No more talking for the rest of the drive."

Samantha's stern tone of voice gets the van as silent as she had been.

The parents come, fight Xana, and save the day after only two months after getting Dante, Xana, locked back up in a Tower. They turn the Super Computer off and head to their various homes.

Several Months Later...

Sanne smiles at her laptop as Skitz appears on the screen. "Hey! Long time no see." She waves at the webcam.

"Sanne!" Skitz waves back. "How have you been? Have you heard from Krieger?"

"Good as anyone else could be. The tutors my dad hired have been relentless. At this point I won't even need to go to college." She can't help but smile as she sees her friend for the first time in nearly a year. "You?"

"Mom and dad have been busy but made sure to keep us busy too. Ark got to do some Junior Extreme sports stuff for dad." Skitz loves seeing Sanne's smile. "So, did you hear from Krieger yet?"

"What did Ark do? My video privileges are still kinda strict. I'm only allowed to be on this for like another fifteen minutes."

"Wing gliding into the grand canyon with a few others." Skitz starts to worry. "Again, have you heard from Krieger?"

"Into the grand canyon? Is he crazy?" Sanne's smile starts to waiver. "Um, about Krieger, he..." Sanne looks at the time. "We can talk about anything for another fourteen minutes. Like how I got new art software and finally learned how to draw and shade and all these other cool things on a PC. I have a bunch of work I can share to you."

"I want to see it, I do, but what do you know? I tried asking my parents and they won't tell me anything. I'm kinda worried. Aren't you?"

Sanne's smiles disappears. "Um, he, I mean, he's okay as far as I know. Mom and dad would have said something if he wasn't." I hope. "You haven't heard anything?"

"No. Nothing." Oh gods. What if Ulrich and Yumi disowned him? Or worse. "I hope he's okay."

"So do I." The happy mood quickly sours. "I'm allowed twenty minutes a day, for now. They say in a month or two they will make it an hour. I have to earn the right to have more freedom."

"Same. Except it has been easier for me I'm sure. So many chores and tutors. My dad hasn't had to mow the lawn all summer. My brother is willing to sky dive and deep sea dive and shark cages. I'm not. So he makes money for dad and the people he works for and I make sure the house is clean and stuff." How we have so much laundry I have no idea. "When we turn seventeen they'll even let us have friends over. If you and Krieger are allowed to."

"I hope so! I haven't had someone my age in a kilometer radius of me since I came home. A couple of my tutors are fun to talk to during lessons but they're paid to be here."

The two continue to talk until Sanne's time runs out.

Twin's Seventeenth Birthday comes and... Sanne, with her parents, go to America for the birthday.

Sanne hugs her friends tightly and doesn't want to let them go. "I missed both of you so much."

"Same Sanne." Skitz fights back tears as she hugs Sanne.

Sadly for the trio, Krieger is not there. The three have heard nothing from their friend. The last time they saw him was at the airport waiting for their planes.

Skitz hopes when Krieger turns eighteen he would try and contact them. And yet... Silence.

Having gotten accepted to college, Skitz goes and enjoys herself. While her brother tries some of the first space tourist flights she studies and parties at school. Ark joins an expedition with their father to go to the North Pole as she graduates.

Sanne, with her many years of tutoring, skip college and goes to work for her father. Always wondering what happened to her friend Krieger.

None of the parents mention him or his parents. As far as Sanne can tell, Yumi and Ulrich never talked with her parents after defeating Xana again.

Nearing thirty, she uses some of her salary to hire a private investigator to hunt down her old friend. "This has to work. His parents are still living where they did before. Even if he doesn't live there he has to visit them."

Only to find out... "What?"

Sanne looks at the picture on her phone. Of a gravestone. She sees the end date on it. "Our parents were fighting Xana then." She almost drops her phone as the thought comes to her. "Xana killed him. It has to be what happened." Our parents never told us. They couldn't.

In the two months it took for her parents to defeat Xana, he had killed Krieger.

He came after me, twice. As far away as I was he still came after me. Gods, I never thought to ask the twins if he came after them. He probably did.

She isn't sure if she should tell Skitz or not. It takes a few days of mourning and some alcohol before she finally contacts Skitz.

"Hey Sanne! What's up?" Skitz sees her face. "What's wrong?"

"Haven't, I mean, we never heard from Krieger. Didn't you wonder what happened to him?"

Skitz is silent. Her face shows... "You knew."

"It was one of the first things I did when I got a job. I paid a PI to look him up."

"Why didn't you tell me?"

"I didn't tell anyone. Not even Ark. I almost, well, let's just say the therapist my parents had me see when we were first sent home got some more business from me for a year or two."

"Oh." Sanne knew what that was like. Her mom had her talk to a therapist too. "It's my fault."

"Sanne, Krieger could have stopped us. I could have stopped you. Ark, any of us. We did it together. It is on all of us."

"You're right." Sanne checks the time. "Still early there, right?"

"Yes, but I'll drink a glass to our friend. Let me get to the kitchen real quick."

Sanne goes to her own kitchen and makes a screwdriver as Skitz make an appletini. "To Krieger."

"To Krieger." Both ladies drink. "Shit, maybe you could find time to come here for my thirtieth."

Skitz sets her glass down. "Yeah Sanne, I'd like that. Maybe take a trip to Japan? See an old friend and have a drink or two with him."

"That sounds like a good plan." Sanne leans back in her chair. "I'm so sorry."

Skitz is about to respond when she realizes Sanne is saying it to Krieger, not her. "I am too."

The two keep the news to themselves. Not even at Ark's wedding after he tried to get the Stern's to come do they tell him. "Let him enjoy his honeymoon."

"Did you see the cans on Leslie? Your brother is about to have a lot to enjoy."

"Checking her out, Sanne?"

She shakes her head. "I have eyes. She has freaking watermelons."

"They're as real as my nose." Skitz touches her nose she had fixed after taking a nasty fall down some stairs two years earlier. "Ark loves her and that's all that matters to me. She's actually pretty cool, for a you know what."

Sanne laughs. "Good thing your parents are pretty liberal. Not everyone could come home with a porn star they met at Carnival."

"Only my brother would do that." Skitz holds up a mostly empty glass of champagne. "To the man who should have been the best man at my brother's wedding."

"Come on, Ark would still choose you as his best man even if Krieger were alive." Sanne holds up her glass and taps it to Skitz's before finishing the champagne inside.

After turning forty, Sanne finally works up the courage to go to Japan to confront Yumi and Ulrich Stern.

Ulrich sees her and wants to slam the door shut in her face but stops. "What are you doing here?"

Sanne has to stay calm as she talks. "I know about Krieger. I, I wanted to know. Why? Just get some hair or a tooth brush. Scan it and he's back. Why didn't you do that?"

"You know, Yumi would probably do a palm thrust to your throat. Crushing your wind pipe. She's done it before when someone tried to mug her."

Sanne takes a step back.

"I won't, because you should know." He glares at her. "Twenty two days. It took twenty two days after his death to defeat Xana. Krieger was at home under quarantine. No phone, computer, or other electronics. He couldn't have sent a message if he wanted to. We would order our usual groceries on the phone app. They get delivered and he makes whatever it is he wants."

"And?"

"When we finally came home we say several orders sitting on the front porch. They should have been brought inside and yet they weren't." Ulrich closes his eyes and takes a few deep breaths. "We found him dead on the floor. Electrocuted. Twenty two days his body was on the floor, rotting."

"And? A hair brush or,"

"No!" His shout scares her. "Twenty two days. No DNA on a toothbrush or from his hair would work. We would have gotten another William. An undead monster that can never come to Earth."

Sanne wants to sit down but there are no chairs on the porch. "I'm sorry. I can't tell you how sorry I am."

"It doesn't matter, does it?" Ulrich looks at a watch on his wrist. "You better leave before Yumi comes home. I won't stop her."

The darkness dripping from his words scare Sanne enough she hurries to the rental car she took there.

Skitz and Sanne go on a singles cruise together. For Skitz, it is to celebrate her divorce. For Sanne it is to support her newly divorced friend. "Come on Sanne, plenty of eligible men here. We're all single." Skitz sees two woman walk by wearing bikini bottoms and nothing else. "Or eligible women."

Sanne shakes her head. "I already told you, not interested. I've dated a few guys here and there and none of them gave me that, spark. You have your fun and I'm going to enjoy the pool and free drinks."

"Get enough drinks in you and you might have some fun."

She smiles. "Wouldn't be the first time."

That night, after a few too many drinks and some fun with some stranger, Sanne lays out on a chair under the moon and stars. "Who knew this would be my life? Single, child free, and more money than I can spend." She smiles as she sips on her drink. "A life I can share with Skitz." Who knows where she is right now. She lifts her drink up. "Que sera sera. Whatever will be, will be."

The light from the full moon shines off of the ocean water. "Only thing that would make this better is if Krieger were here." She smiles to herself. "Maybe he would have made me feel the spark." She sets her glass down.

She falls asleep on the chair and doesn't wake up until the Sun crests over the horizon. "This is the life." She feels her stomach rumble. "Breakfast and a massage sound good right now."

She enjoys the trip, as does Skitz, as she tries to keep her mind from thinking about her missing friend. A friend who protected her. He loved her and wanted to keep her safe. In the end she got him killed.

Nearing sixty, in charge of SINC and more, she sits in her office. "This is it." She sees the deed for the old warehouse district in Paris. "I can tear everything down and build a new world. Fill up the Factory with concrete. Never have to worry about Xana ever." Never have the chance to bring back Krieger. Except... Well, his parent's are both dead. Maybe I could bring him back? I never told them about my back up program. Saving the DNA of my friends every time we were scanned. That way we'd have a mostly recent version of them.

She shakes her head. "It's been too long. His family is dead. I'm old and so are the twins. He'd be closer to Ark's grandkids age than us."

She finishes work for the day and goes to the elevator. "Soon I will make sure I live in a world without danger."

A/N Okay then... I HAVE to end this series. I LOVE my characters and their interaction with each other but it distracts me from original work, my Youtube channel (James the Lesser Express Lane) and more. That and I need a way to end the series. I am not doing the multiple world Sanne good Xana bad thing again. So here we go. Parents called in, beat Xana in 2 months, but during that time... Krieger is killed. No one tells the other kids about it. It isn't until they're older and Skitz/Sanne both hire Pis to look for him do they discover the truth. And then threw in the "DNA was too old" to explain why they didn't just bring him back. Hope you enjoyed it as much as I did!