"So." Jeremy had asked. "What do you know about Lyoko?"

Those words had haunted Arno for the past week, even long after both groups had discussed the topic at great lengths.

"Next to nothing." Arno had replied, which was the truth that had scared him for a month now. He knew next to nothing about this strange world that they'd discovered.

Jeremy had sighed at his reply. It wasn't the sort of response that Arno had hoped for. Even now, as he sat in class, he remembered the discussion that had occured a week prior. He flashed back to that memory, as he'd been doing for the past few days. Class couldn't be less important to him in these moments.

All nine of them had gathered in the heart of the factory, huddled around the super computer like explorers around a fire. The adults all stood with grim expressions painted on their faces, silent, wearily staring at the children. Arno recognized a few of them. Jeremy was one of the science teachers, the computer science teacher, to be exact. Aelita, his wife, was the general science and math teacher, with whom he was more familiar with. Ulrich, who stood with arms crossed over his chest, was the gym teacher, the same one who'd been seemingly keeping an eye on Arno for the past few weeks. Lastly, there was his wife, Yumi, who none of the students recognized. They looked stern, and all of them, with the exception of Jeremy, were silent.

"What is Lyoko?" Arno asked, breaking the silence. The adults all exchanged glances, as if unsure whether or not they should answer, but at this point, answers were all Arno wanted.

One moment, he'd been standing on the ice, fighting monsters and demanding answers, and the next, his vision was white, and he was back in his dorm room. One phone call later, he, Jonah, Trisha, and Oliver were each trying to find Maxwell, and when they did, he seemingly didn't remember a thing. They tried to recount to him the events of the previous day, but there wasn't a thing that he remembered. Arno remembered, very vividly, the moment he checked his phone after that conversation. The date was the same, as if time hadn't passed for 24 hours. Then it hit him.

"This computer can send us back in time." Said Arno. "This thing can send us to a virtual world where we fight monsters, it can apparently erase memories, what the hell else can thing do?!" His tone rose more and more with each passing word, and it quickly became clear to Jeremy that there would be no getting out of this conversation. He leaned back in his seat, contemplating things as his gaze turned to the ceiling. All of the adults seemed to avoid Arno, as they looked at anything but the children. At last, Arno had had enough. "Answer me!" His voice turned to a scream as his face scowled. Finally, Jeremy sighed.

"Listen." He ordered, leaning forward and pointing a finger at the children. "What I'm about to tell you, you can't tell anyone else, ever. If you can promise me that you won't tell a soul, then I'll tell you everything that we know about this." Arno turned back to the others, and to Jonah specifically. Oliver nodded, and Trisha stepped forward.

"I won't tell anyone." She confirmed. Max gave a thumbs up, and all eyes turned to Jonah, who began to look between them.

"What?" He asked. "Why's everyone looking at me? I know how to keep a secret!" He drew two fingers across his lips, and then made a throwing motion. For once, his mouth remained shut. They all turned back to Jeremy, who sighed again. He leaned forward more, placing his elbows on his knees.

"Alright then. I'll tell you everything that I know about Lyoko."

Arno couldn't believe half of what he'd heard. Over the next few days, after listening to the story, the only thing he could convince himself of, was that they were all in over their heads.

"It was about 40 years ago now." Jeremy had explained. "A man named Franz Hopper was involved in a military weapons program, one that could disrupt enemy communications. He decided that this weapon was too dangerous when he saw it in action, so he decided to make a weapon of his own." Jeremy tapped a knuckle against the computer screen behind him. "A weapon by the name of Xana."

"Xana had been created to destroy project carthage." Aelita said, picking up the explanation where Jeremy had left off. "But that multi-agent system was very advanced, and before long, it was making decisions for itself. Xana became self aware, and when my father tried to deal with him, the program retaliated."

"Franz Hopper was your father?" Asked Trisha. Aelita nodded.

"He virtualized the two of us onto Lyoko whenever the secret service became aware of what we were doing. He tried to reason with Xana, but in the end, he was taken prisoner, and I was trapped on Lyoko until Jeremy found this place and started everything up."

"And what's Xana's goal? What is it trying to do?" Asked Arno.

"World domination." Answered Ulrich, with a shrug. "Pretty standard supervillain stuff, really."

"And what makes this program so dangerous? What is it capable of?"

"Lots of stuff." Said Ulrich, before Jeremy continued.

"Xana can manipulate electric currents in the real world by activating those towers that you saw on Lyoko. Think of it like a key. A tower activates, and Xana can access our world. He can possess people, inanimate objects, he can create specters, and control just about anything electronic. This virus is one of the most dangerous things on planet earth, just shy of planet earth herself."

"How stop illness?" Asked Max. Everyone turned and stared.

"Well," Aelita started, "We killed him before, but it took a multi agent system that took months to develop, and every time we return to the past, he gets stronger. I'm not sure how we'll beat him this time. I'm not even sure how he managed to survive the antivirus 20 years ago."

"But he can be stopped." Said Arno, stepping forward. "You stopped him once. We just have to know how to counter. All we have to do is deactivate towers, right?" Jeremy and Aelita exchanged a quick glance.

"In short, yes." Said Jeremy. "But that leads us to a very important question." All of the adults' eyes turned to Jonah. "What do YOU know about Lyoko?"

The ringing of the bell snapped Arno out of his thoughts, but he was quick to recover. He packed his things, and was the first one out of the doors when they opened. He marched across the courtyard. It was lunch time now, and the children had all agreed to meet while they ate.

Arno was the first to arrive, followed quickly by Trisha and Oliver, then Maxwell, and lastly, Jonah.

They sat in silence for some time, poking nervously at their food, waiting for someone to speak up. As usual, Arno was the one to break the silence.

"What have we gotten ourselves into?" He bemoaned, holding his head in the palm of one of his hands. "We have no idea what we're really up against here, do we?" Oliver was, as usual, silent. He looked to Trisha to speak, which she did.

"Whatever it is, I'm just glad I'm not fighting it alone. We're stronger together. Whatever this thing is, we can take it."

"What makes you so sure?" Asked Arno. "What experience do you have, fighting rogue AIs?"

"About as much experience as you do." She retorted.

"I have about a month's more time than you."

"And yet we both kicked about the same amount of ass on the ice fields."

"That means nothing when we're fighting monsters. They said this thing can access the real world, possess people and animals alike. What do you do when that happens? What if this thing possesses one of us? What can it do, that they're not telling us?"

"Well," Jonah interrupted, "it's obviously not all powerful, right?" All of them turned to the boy. "It hasn't blown up the school, and outright killed any of us. As long as we're all here, we have a chance." Arno and Trisha fell silent. They each knew he was right, but Arno didn't like it, and Trisha didn't know how to continue. Meanwhile, Maxwell nodded with a hand on his chin.

"Boom boom zoom zoom." He said. Arno leaned back in his seat, crossing his arms over his chest and huffing out of his nose.

"I really don't like that you're right about that."

"I'm right about a lot of stuffs." He replied with a smile. "You would know if you listened from time to time."

"I know you're right about some things, but you're also a lunatic who would jump into a fire to cure a cold." Arno's words had no impact, and the boy flashed him a wide grin before taking a few bites of his food.

"We can fight thing is we work together." Said Trisha. "Although, Jonah, are you sure you have no connection to that thing?"

Trisha's question brought Arno back to the conversation from a few days prior, and his thoughts drifted away, until he was back in the factory with every pair of eyes glued to him as he demanded answers.

"What do YOU know about Lyoko?" Jeremy had asked Jonah, but the boy couldn't reply. It had been abundantly clear that he knew nothing about Lyoko, or anything surrounding it, but that didn't change the fact that Jonah had successfully deactivated a tower. The words 'Code Glitch' were still seared into Arno's mind.

"I don't know anything." Jonah finally said. Only in times like these, was Jonah a man of few words.

"Can you figure out how it happened?" Asked Arno. Jeremy shrugged.

"Maybe." His eyes then turned to Aelita, who throughout this entire conversation had been visibly uncomfortable. "But not right now. For now, I need to get Aelita home." With that, he stood from his chair, and took Aelita by the hand. "This has been a bit of a long day." He turned to Ulrich and his wife. "Ulrich, Yumi, can you stay with them, talk to them, tell them what you know?" They both nodded.

"Of course. We'll help them get adjusted." Yumi said, speaking for the first time since the two groups had met. With nothing more than a nod, Jeremy and Aelita left the room. They boarded the elevator, the doors closed, and that was the last that they saw of them for the next few days.

"Arno? Arno!" Trisha's calling shook Arno out of his thoughts, and he came back to reality with a start. "Are you alright?"

"Just thinking." Arno replied. "There's been a lot to think about." Trisha nodded.

"Yeah. That's something we can agree on." She leaned in, lowering her voice as though scared that the other students around them would hear her. "So, I guess we're officially Lyoko warriors now. That's what Mr. and Mrs. Ishiyama called us, right?" Arno scoffed.

"We're not Lyoko warriors. We're just kids who got caught up in something that's way bigger than us."

"But I like that name!" Jonah exclaimed. He then threw a hand up into the air. "We're the-!" Arno clamped a hand over his mouth, and Trisha quickly silenced him with a finger to her lips. The eyes of the entire lunchroom were on them for a moment, but then the children turned back to their food.

"Remember, Jonah," Arno hissed, "we need to keep this a secret. Don't blow this." Jonah nodded his head meekly. Arno turned back to address the full group. "We're not warriors. We're kids. This isn't our fight."

"But we're the only ones who know about this. This IS our fight." Trisha urged, but Arno wasn't convinced.

"And why can't we get the military involved again?"

"You heard what Ulrich and Yumi said. The military, the government, they would try to control this thing, and they can't; it would destroy them."

"And what's keeping it from destroying us?" Trisha shrugged.

"It has to be something. Yumi said that Xana seems really weak."

"That means that it's powering up."

"That means that, for now, it's still weak. We have time to kill it, now more than ever."

Arno leaned back with a huff. Every point he had seemed to be counterable, and it didn't help that Trisha seemed to have a point. He couldn't think of anything else to say, so he simply stared ahead. Finally, he came to a conclusion.

"Well then." He said. "I guess we are Lyoko warriors." His voice came out as a resigned sigh, and he looked around the table towards the others. Then he leaned forward again, pressing his arms down onto the table as he brought his voice down to a whisper. "Then listen up. All of you." His gaze circled around towards the others, and he cast his eyes onto everyone one person at a time. "If we're going to do this, then we're not going in blind. We still don't know fully well what this thing is capable of. We don't know what it can do, but more than that, we don't know what WE can do. After school today, we're going back to Lyoko, and with their help, we're going to figure out exactly what we can do, understand?" He looked to the others. Oliver nodded, as did Jonah, Trisha, and Maxwell.

"That sounds like a plan." Said Trisha. Maxwell punched the air.

"Fire yes!" He cried out, soft enough only for it to be heard across the table. Jonah then did performed the same motion.

"Fire yes!" He said in the same volume. He then pushed a fist into the middle of the table, and Maxwell did the same. Then Trisha tapped her fist against those of the others.

"Fire yes!" She said. Oliver followed suit.

All of their hands were now connected at the center of the table, with the exception of a very reserved looking Arno. He watched their hands with no eagerness in his eyes.

"Listen." He said. "I appreciate you guys' spirit, but you all need to do what I say, when I say, how I say, understand?"

"Within reason." Said Trisha.

"I always do what you say!" Jonah quipped.

"Fire yes!" Maxwell chanted again. Arno sighed, and after a moment's hesitation, he too placed his fist on the center of the table, and connected it with theirs.

The unity was formed, and with their five hands connected, Arno felt a sense of relief, and a sense of dread. He had no idea what this force was capable of. He had no idea what he and his team was capable of. All he knew, was that if they were the world's hope, then the world was screwed, or at least it was currently screwed. However, through a great deal of training, and some help from the veterans, he hoped to turn the tides. Tonight, when they went back to the factory, he would start them down the path of being ready to fight this thing, whatever this thing was.

"First thing's first," Jeremy said, bringing the computer monitors to life, "We have to get Max virtualized. Not only will that give him an immunity to Xana and some of his attacks, but it'll also render him protected when we have to return to the past."

"So that's why he didn't remember." Said Arno. He stepped forward, keeping careful watch over what Jeremy was doing. "How is this computer able to travel back into the past?" Jeremy shrugged.

"I don't know. Franz Hopper is the one who built this thing, we just figured out how to use it." Arno was silent as Jeremy finished bringing up all of the windows he needed.

A few hours after school had ended, they all met up at the lab to talk and train. It was mainly Arno's idea, but aside from Aelita, everyone seemed on board.

"Alright, got it." Jeremy exclaimed, spinning the chair around to face everyone else. "So, who wants to go to Lyoko?" All at once, Arno, Jonah, and Trisha each raised their hands.

"What?" Asked Max. "Why up hand?" Instead of answering him, Arno grabbed Max by the wrist, and raised his arm. "Well ok, up hand is up hand." Meanwhile, Trisha laid a hand on Oliver's back, and gently spoke a few words that got him to raise his hand as well.

"Well, you guys seem eager." Said Ulrich, from the back of the room. "You guys remind me of us, back in the good old days."

"They don't sound all that good." Said Arno. Ulrich shrugged.

"I guess you would've had to be there." Then he turned to Jeremy "Are they ready to go?" He nodded.

"I have the virtualization process ready to go. As soon as you all are ready, head down to the scanner room. It's time to get you all to Lyoko."

Over the past few weeks, Max had virtualized Arno and Jonah enough times to know that the process was about as safe as could be, but that didn't stop him from eyeing the giant metal tube with weary eyes.

"Scared?" Arno asked from behind, with a clap on the back. Then he continued. "Don't worry. Just remember to take a deep breath before going in, alright?" Max nodded. Then, the tubes opened. Sensing his nervousness, Arno stepped in front of him. "I'll go first." He, Jonah, and Trisha each stepped into one of the tubes, and just as quickly, the doors slid shut. Within the span of half a minute, the machines began to roar and glow, and when they opened again, the people that the tubes had been holding were gone.

Max swallowed his fear to the best of his ability, and he took two shakey steps into the tube. It closed, and Max took in one deep breath before his world started to fade away.

From the very first moment, the only thing Maxwell thought was that he never wanted to be virtualized again. The sensation of not existing, of not being able to breath, of floating in an empty void was far from worth it in his mind.

At last, the sensation began to fade, and he felt himself reappearing piece by piece in a highly unfamiliar environment. He'd expected to be virtualized in the same sort of place that he'd brought Arno and Jonah into before, where ice spanned the environment as far as the eye could see, and the only two colors were dark blue and white. In this place, the horizon was constantly interrupted by brown pillars that stretched from their roots in the ground, up into the sky where they faded from view. Some of them were only a few feet apart, while others had some actual distance between them, and throughout the entire area were green grassy walkways that spanned the distance above a pale sand colored abyss that seemed to encompass the world around them.

As Maxwell spawned in, he saw the others gathering in a circle and talking in hushed tones. His first thought was that he wanted to join them, but that thought was almost immediately displaced when the force of gravity very suddenly began to act on his body. He fell from the sky with a loud thud, and an almost louder groan.

"Ah son of a Paul Bunion!" Max exclaimed, rubbing his sore tailbone. "That really smarts." He continued to rub his backside, but Jonah turned and pointed a finger.

"Max! You can speak french?!"

"Huh?" Max slowly rose from the ground, his eyes scanning the others as he started to run his mouth. "Peter Piper picked a patch of something I don't know the rest of this tongue twister can you guys actually understand me?"

"Great." Said Arno. "So now we have two people who can't shut up."

"At least we can understand him." Said Trisha.

Oliver laid a hand on Max's shoulder from behind him, and gestured to his body while offering him a reassuring smile. Max looked down, his gaze following the gesture, and he saw that his entire appearance had been given a major upgrade.

Much like Arno, his attire was mostly black with bits of white that were showing. The outer section of his arm was jet black, and composed of little plates and wires, while what laid beneath was a soft white fabric, that just barely showed between the plates. It covered his body from his neck, to his toes. He looked like something out of a dimly colored cyberpunk world.

"Oh hell yes!" He cried out, upon getting a full look of his new attire. He spun around, trying to observe every inch of the outfit while the other stood back and watched. "This computer has given me a badass costume, AND it seems to have some sort of auto-translation function! This is awesome!"

"What's your weapon?" Asked Jonah, prompting Max to stop spinning.

"Well," He said, stretching out the word as he tried to find where his weapon was holstered, "I don't mean to brag, but Iiiiii haaaaave aaaaaa." He struggled to find the weapon, which sat securely on his hip, but the moment he spotted it, he yanked it out. "This!" He cried out, gesturing his hands towards a rather small pistol. "Oh." He groaned, raising an eyebrow as he examined the tiny weapon. Arno stepped forward.

"Can't always be a winner." He gave him two pats on the shoulder, and while Max was still investigating his weapon, Arno spoke to Jeremy. "Is anyone else coming in?"

"Just you guys for now. We've never had more than five people online at a time, so I'm just making sure that the machine can take it. I've gone ahead and virtualized you in the forest sector so that you can explore more of the world. If Xana really is back, then we're going to want to make sure that we're all familiar with Lyoko." He paused for a moment. "Now, I'm sure you all have a lot of questions, and I have a few of my own, but first, I think you all might enjoy these old toys." As soon as he'd finished talking, noises erupted from all around them, like an old machine starting up. The children all stepped closer to each other as in three spaces around them, shapes began to appear; vehicles, to be accurate. One was a mono-wheel motorcycle, another was a long purple and yellow board, while the third was a large platform with a handlebars at its front. They each hovered just a few inches off of the ground, waiting for them to step on.

"These look awesome!" Cried Max, taking a step onto the long board. He struggled for a few moments to retain his balance, but then moved the board forward, very slowly.

"I call shotgun!" Said Jonah, taking a step towards the moto bike, but Arno was quick to pull him back.

"Let's let the person who knows how to drive, handle the controls." He saddled the bike, gripping and twisting the handlebars before motioning to Jonah. "Come on." He did as he was told, and wrapped his arms around Jonah's middle as he took a seat. Lastly, Trisha took the controls of the final vehicle, and Oliver stepped on board with her.

"Is everyone settled?" Arno asked, struggling to turn his head to see everyone. They all nodded in response. "Alright then. Follow me, stick close, let's take these out for a spin." Arno revved the engine, feeling the bike shudder beneath him, but then he accelerated, and soon enough the ground was fading into the dusty atmosphere behind him. It felt good to get behind the wheel of a vehicle again.

"Alright, this is pretty cool." Said Arno. "How is everyone else doing back there?"

"I'm having a blast!" Max replied. "I love being able to fully understand everyone, and to be understood, at long last, is amazing!"

"We're doing alright back here." Said Trisha. "Any chance you could spawn some more vehicles next time?"

"I'd rather not push the system too much right now." Jeremy responded. "This thing hasn't been used in about 20 years. I want to see if we can go easy on it for the time being."

The group pushed on, and both ends of the conversation were silent for some time while the children became accustomed to the vehicles. Then, at last, Arno spoke.

"What can you tell us about this thing? About this place?"

"Besides what I've already told you, basically nothing." Jeremy replied. Only Franz Hopper has all the answers, and he's," Jeremy paused, "Well, we won't be able to get any answers from him. What I can tell you now, is that Lyoko is a vast digital expanse made up of what -was- five sectors. You've seen the ice sector, and this is the forest sector. You haven't seen the mountain or desert sectors yet, but it looks like Xana's been busy. I'm looking at four new sectors that we haven't ever seen before."

"So not only is the enemy not dead, but it's been working behind the scenes."

"That's what it looks like."

"Then how do we stop it?" Arno heard Jeremy sigh on the other end of the comms.

"The last time we killed, or supposedly killed, Xana, it was through a multi agent program that I developed, and that Franz Hopper assisted in."

"Can we run the program again?"

"We can try. I'll need a few days to run over the program again, but in the meantime, it looks like we're going to have to remain vigilant." He paused again. "You're a little ways away from a way-tower. It's a little ways east, so to your right. Make it there, and I'll see if that tower, and let's see where that leads you."

"You don't know where it'll drop us?"

"We didn't retain everything over the past 20 years. The only reason I can still remember any of the controls is because we did this thing for years. Plus, it looks like Xana's been busy, so he's bound to have some new tricks up his sleeve."

"Wonderful." Arno muttered. Jonah peeked his head out from behind him.

"If anyone can do it, it's us." He said.

"I second that." Trisha chimed in. Their confidence did nothing to put Arno at ease.

"Well alright then." He resigned. "Get us to that way tower Jeremy."

"Will do." He replied. "Like I said before, it's east of your location. Get there quickly if you can."

"Will do." Arno replied. He led the others in turning towards the east, and he twisted the handlebars to accelerate the bike. Within moments, they had the tower in their sights. "So we just go into this thing, right?"

"You and the vehicles will pass straight through." Jeremy confirmed. "Just go in, and the worlds gravity should take you straight down."

"Platform nine and three quarters!" Jonah cried out from behind.

"Yeah, let's just hope that it doesn't close up." Arno muttered. He sped up his bike even while his companions began to slow down. They were just as hesitant as he was, and he didn't blame them. Nonetheless, he continued forward, keeping his eyes on the base of the tower until he got close enough to seal them shut. He pulled back ever so slightly, just enough so that any impact wouldn't deal significant damage to either him or Jonah, but the moment the wheel touched the black roots of the tower, it, along with them, was dragged into the structure.
Arno barely had time to comprehend the black void covered with pale blue windows before he and Jonah were thrown downwards into the abyss at the bottom of the tower. Jonah screamed, but Arno simply clenched his jaw. With one hand still on the controls, and the other reaching back to secure Jonah, he tried to pull up, but only when the two of them entered a sort of tube with data flowing to and from did the vehicle stabilize.

"I'm never doing that shit again." Arno spat, still recovering from the fall. Jonah said nothing, but simply groaned as his stomach recovered from the drop. The older boy turned around just in time to see the others take the plunge as well, and they handled it about as well as Arno had. "Are you all ok back there?"

"I'm alright!"Trisha replied. "As long as we don't have to do that again."

"I'll get back to you whenever my stomach returns to its rightful place in my insides!" Said Max.

"I miss the times when I couldn't understand what you were saying." Muttered Arno, just quiet enough for his words to fall into the void without being heard.

"Heads up everyone!" Jeremy's voice cut through the conversation. "You're coming up on what looks like a pathway. Get ready to pull up!"

Just as they were instructed, the children prepared to pull up on their controls. They saw an opening a little ways ahead, an empty circle that did indeed look as much like a pathway as it could. Arno tilted his machine upwards, and upon approaching the empty space, he was once again carried away, and up through the tunnel. The entire atmosphere around him became brighter and brighter, until at last he and Jonah ripped through the standard tower room, and out the side.

"Oh my god."

"Whoa! That's so cool!" Said the two boys. Before them stretched something that looked quite like the ice sector, except it was almost a polar opposite. The large pieces of land that floated within a sea of red and orange were black as coal, and rough as a piece of petrified tree bark. Everything from small pebbles to massive chunks of black stone were slowly sifting themselves across a lake of red hot magma that bubbled and popped at the surface, and the atmosphere was almost as red and hot as the sea.

"Jeremy, can you see any of this?" Asked Arno.

"Yeah, I can." Said Jeremy. He took his time, taking it all in. It looked very similar to the ice sector, but with a significantly more sinister look about it. It made Jeremy shudder, thinking that Xana could've made an entirely new sector. If that were possible, what else could Jeremy's old enemy have done?

"What do you make of it?" Arno interrupted his thinking, and Jeremy, again, took his time to respond.

"We have our work cut out for us." He finally responded. "Listen, don't touch that lava. I think that might just be a retexturing of the digital sea, so it's potentially very dangerous. The overboard, overbike, and overwing can fly over any surface, but if you see any monsters, steer over to land just in case the vehicle is shot."

"Sure thing. Anything else you can tell us?" Asked Arno.

"Only to be on the lookout for red towers and monsters. If Xana created new sectors, it's possible that he's created new monsters too."

"Duly noted." Said Arno, before falling silent. His eyes surveyed over the magma, and everything that was floating on its surface, but he had trouble believing that all of it was real. Everything felt surreal, and as his companions emerged from the tower with expressions and gasps of awe, he knew he wasn't the only one who felt like that. Once again, he affirmed his own conclusion. "We are in way over our heads." He said. He turned, slightly, and caught sight of the others, each one speechless as they took in the strange new environment, and Jeremy's lack of interruption seemed to indicate that he felt the same way. Every new detail that Arno saw only informed him further that whatever quest they were on wasn't going to be easy. Whatever they were up again would not go easy on them. "Come on." He said, kicking the overbike into motion. He guided the others towards a particularly large obsidian plateau, and upon setting the bike down, he motioned the others to follow.

"I'm sure you all know this by now, but whatever all of this is about, we've stepped into a world that we don't even know the basic functions of." He explained, walking swiftly over to the center of the landmass. "We are clueless. We are weak. We are going to get our asses handed to us." He continued, making sure that the others followed, but then stopped when he got to where he wanted to be. Then he turned around, and addressed the others to their faces. "We all agreed to this. We all said that we would do this, right?" He looked to the others for a response, and they all affirmed in one way or another. Then he drew his weapons, and held them at his sides. "Then if we're going to do this," he explained, "we're going to do this right." He lifted one of his maces towards Trisha. "Trisha, you're going to spar with me. Jonah, Oliver, Max, sit back and watch until it's your turn." He then stepped away, and readied his weapon as Trisha took a few uncertain steps forward. "You all elected to be here, and you all elected to listen to me. So now I'm going to do my part in making sure that you all are safe."

The children all settled in their places. Max, Oliver, and Jonah all stood off to the side, while Trisha looked at him with a smirk.

"Well look at you, mr. team leader." She said. He brushed off her comment, and instead simply prepared himself.

"Whenever you're ready Trisha." He said. "If we're going to do this, we might as well be as prepared as we can be."

Authors notes:

Leave feedback, l (if you feel like you can) is BlueWing10. I feel like I'm starting to pick things up a bit, so the story should take off running here pretty soon. If it feels like each chapter is a new writing style, that's because it is.

Just a reminder that I'm currently working on my own book as well, so if production of these chapters is a bit slow, that's why.