Chapter 23:

After Ulrich was gone, Jonas just calmly threw the blade of the sword into the ground at his feet and continued to walk toward Aelita as the weapon disappeared in response to its welder no longer being present in the virtual world.

However, as he approached the last Lyoko Warrior, he didn't try to harm her, instead he just laid his hand on her shoulder, causing her to become immune to the time-warp as well, which made her nearly fall over in the process, but he held out an arm to keep her from hitting the ground.

Still remembering what had happened earlier, she at first backed away from him in fear, knowing very well that she didn't have a weapon to fight him off with, but as she looked up into his eyes again, she found them to have returned to the soft, comforting gold of their original color, without any sign of possession present.

"Jonas?" She asked hopefully, leading to him smile at her in such a way that she knew he was there.

"Sorry about that, Princess," He offered kindly, "The fail-safe could only be activated with a time stop, which I would have only used when fighting against Ulrich."

"Why didn't you tell us this?" She requested simply, not really angry or upset just genuinely confused

"I couldn't," He said sadly, "Xana was in my mind, if I had told you; he would have found out, and everything would have been for nothing."

"But – why?" She asked again, leaving him to look at the ground with a sigh.

"I needed his power," He admitted, "But to get it I had to trick him into entering my body; it was the only way to capture him."

"I – I don't understand," She complained sourly, not really all that accustomed to not understanding things, "Why would you risk it? If Ulrich had been devirtualized before – Xana could still take you over, what if –"

"I know it's complicated," He interrupted softly, "But this was how it had to be."

"Why couldn't you just tell us?"

"Because it's not your sacrifice to make," He answered calmly causing her to start slightly in response to his word choice.

"What sacrifice?" She demanded quietly, causing him to smile as he looked down again.

"I don't have a lot of time before Xana takes over again, and he'll most likely survive, so you should probably take this time to go on that vacation, he won't resurface for a few weeks."

"What aren't you telling me?" She asked as she realized he was hiding something behind this sudden change of topic.

"Never could get anything past you," He laughed quietly, before letting his smile drop, "I have to put this virus directly into the network," He explained suddenly, "And with it apart of me – there's only one way to do it."

"What?" She stated in shock as she realized what he meant by that, "No – no, you can't." She insisted weakly, causing him to step forward to suddenly hug her.

"Don't worry, Princess; I would never force you to remember," He whispered into her ear and she started again slightly, still unable to believe what he was telling her. However, she knew she didn't want to find out and quickly tried to break away so she could stop him, but while his grip was still soft and gentle, it was strong as iron.

"For what it's worth –" He added after another minute as he continued to hug her as if wanting to remember every detail. "Thank you – for letting me say goodbye."

"Odd –" She tried to say as he stepped away again, however, the time bubble he was controlling quickly swallowed her up again as they lost contact and she was once more unable to move freely and could only watch helplessly as he walked toward the edge of the plateau; where he stopped momentarily to look up at the sky one last time, then threw himself into the digital sea.

Short Chapter

Sorry