Sorry for the wait, but it's done! This one does have a cliff hanger though... But plenty of those awkward moments people love. Anyways, on with the story!

Jason stirred, then opened his eyes halfway.

"...Hello..." He muttered, half asleep, "...Do you...come here often...?"

Jeremie wanted to say something, but knew that Jason wasn't completely awake. Jeremie was thinking about this virus. Who would it effect next? She decided to go onto the computer and try to find a cure.

After about two hundred lines of code, Jeremie started to think about a name for herself if they couldn't find a cure. She had typed up a whole list, deleting ones he didn't like. The final two were Jennifer and Jessica.

"This is only a last resort..." She mumbled., then looked at the clock. She was so tired, and it was only 11pm. Normally, Jeremie would stay up until 2am. She went to bed, just wishing this was a nightmare.

None such luck, but Jeremie hadn't slept that well in forever.

"Wake up, sleeping beauty," Jason said, shaking her, "We're going to miss breakfast."

"Don't call me that," She said, groggily, "Did you know you talk in your sleep?"

"No, why?"

"I think you were hitting on me last night."

Jason stopped what he was doing and let out a chuckle.

"That's a good joke Jeremie."

"I mean it."

"Well, how do you know it wasn't a dream?" He said smiling.

"Your eyes were half open," Jeremie said, "You were looking straight at me."

"Well," He said, feeling embarrassed, "Then let's never speak of this again." He turned and continued what he was doing.

Jeremie just shrugged, and went to get dressed. When she was ready (after 20 minutes), they started going down to the cafeteria. When they got there, it was close to empty.

"Where is everyone?" Jason asked. Nikolai and Greg were sitting at a table with Odd, Morgan and William, who had his head down, probably sleeping. Nik waved Jeremie and Jason over to the table.

"This is bad." Nik said as the two got over to the table. Morgan was talking to Odd, quietly. The look on her face was a mix of confusion and fear.

"What's going on?" Jeremie asked, sitting down.

"Almost the entire school is infected," Nikolai said, "Classes are canceled because of it."

"Where's Aelita?" Jeremie asked, scared of what could have happened.

"She hasn't called you?"

"No, not today."

They heard Odd, "Okay, okay, I'll ask them," She turned to the four people, "Can we tell Morgan our secret?"

"Odd," William sighed, sitting up and rubbing his temples, "That's a horrible idea."

"Why? Because of what happened to you?" Odd asked.

"Hey I had no control of what I did."

"Do we have to argue right now?" Nikolai asked, "Because, I don't know if you noticed, but it's Doomsday."

"The world isn't gonna end." Jason said.

"No," Greg said, "But if it gets chaotic enough, civilization will."

"Listen," Morgan said, "If you tell me your secret, I'll keep it."

"It's more of a seeing is believing kind of thing." Odd stated.

"Should we really take her to the factory?" Nikolai asked. Jeremie's laptop started beeping.

"Well, we've gotta go anyway," Jeremie said, "I've got to find Aelita though." Nikolai and Greg just went off to the woods, Odd told Morgan to meet her by the gym, and Jason went with Jeremie to find Aelita.

Jeremie suggested to check her room, and she was right. They knocked on the door, and Lilly opened it.

"Um," Jason's sister stuttered, "Maybe you shouldn't come in right now."

"Why?" Jason asked.

"Aelita doesn't want to be seen right now..."

"What happened?" Jeremie asked, frustrated and fearing for Aelita.

Lilly looked around, then pulled the two into the room. She was stronger than Jeremie would have thought. Seeing, Aelita, Jeremie sighed that his fears were not confirmed, if anything she looked better than usual.

"What's wrong Aelita?" Jeremie asked, seeing that she had been crying.

"I had the worst dream..." She muttered.

"What was it?"

"I don't remember... But it was terrifying."

"Those monsters yesterday," Jason pointed out, "They must have given her nightmares."

"That would make sense," Jeremie said, "They don't have faces, that would give me nightmares. But not Jason, he was dreaming about me."

Everyone just stared at Jeremie. Had his mind always been like that? Since when did he get that far off of a subject, and why would he point something like that out?

"I already told you," Jason said, as calmly as he could, "That we would never speak of that again." He was thinking of a few ways to kill Jeremie for not keeping a secret like that. Drowning always seemed like the best choice in these situations.

"Oh, sorry." Jeremie said, her face getting red.

"What kind of dream, BROTHER?" Lilly asked, glaring at her twin.

"Not that kind of dream!" He shouted, "That's sick, how could you think of something like that?" He tried to turn it back on her, but it didn't work. He just apologized and turned to face Aelita.

"Do you think you'll be fine to go onto Lyoko?"

"I guess," She replied, "I just don't feel too good."

"OMEGA's attacking again," Jeremie said, "It's just one tower right now, but it could get worse."

"Let's go then." Aelita said, standing up. They all left the room.

Nikolai threw his phone down. He still couldn't get in touch with Tim. He had disappeared before Nik got back to their apartment. Greg said that he gotten a call to go on a mission. Where was Carthum?

His thoughts were interrupted when said phone rang, it was the man he had been trying to get in touch with. HE picked up the phone.

"Tim, where in the HELL are you?"

"Just left Ethiopia," He answered plainly, "Civil unrest. You won't believe what's causing it."

"Epidemic?"

"All over the world, and I did some recon to see what the government was doing..."

"Well, what did you find out?"

"It's more in your ballpark," He answered, "They were possessed, every last member of their military, government, and even their president. They were moving tanks with OMEGA's symbol on it."

"What was in the tanks?"

"That's the really bad part," He said, a scared tone in his voice, "The tanks were full of VX."

"Nerve gas?" Nik asked.

"It's more dangerous than that," He explained, "Twenty seconds in this gas, and you won't even have nerves."

"So, is OMEGA declaring war?"

"Maybe, but it was going on in the old Carthage building there."

"There was a Carthage branch in Ethiopia?"

"Yeah, it's the newest one, and first to be shut down by the UN's wrist-slapping division." (reference to political cartoon)

"Well," Nik said, "This just got interesting. You mentioned an epidemic?"

"You need to watch the news more. The whole world is infected. I can't explain the details, but I can tell you it isn't fatal. It's more like a mass fake-out. People get sick, but then they're fine afterwords."

"Well, I need to get to the factory, I'll call you later."

"I'm about to land at the airport... probably shouldn't be on a phone at all."

Nik hung up, sighing, and stepped out of the elevator. He was thinking on why he had to work with idiots when he found what OMEGA had done. There was a raven-haired girl sitting in the computer chair. She turned to look at him, and he saw the mark in her eyes.

"Eesos Kirstos..." Nik muttered before an electrified punch hit him in the gut. Greg pushed the up button and watched as the doors closed before the girl could get to them. The only thing that came to his mind was that part from the Godzilla movie: Elevator opens, Godzilla babies look at man in elevator, man says, "Wrong floor." Doors shut.

Odd was walking Morgan across the bridge to the factory. She went down the line first, then helped the other girl down. They were walking towards the elevator, Odd wondering how he would explain that he used to be a boy to her, when Greg came running out of the elevator, shouting something about how OMEGA possessed some girl and took Nikolai down. He ran into Odd, who fell over.

"What the hell Greg?" Odd exclaimed, rubbing her head, which had hit the ground when she fell.

"That girl's crazy! I haven't seen anybody get possessed, I just read about it!" He eventually started to speak gibberish, and with his thick British accent, Odd couldn't make out a single word he was saying. She then did something that happened to her hundreds of times, she slapped him across the face, bringing him to his senses.

"What is he talking about?" Morgan asked.

"It isn't safe here, Morgan," Odd said, "We need to go."

"But, what were you gonna show me?"

Just then, a figure crawled out from behind the elevator. Her hands were electrified so she could move on the walls, and she had a truly evil look on her face.

"Hello, humans." The girl said in a very evil voice as she stepped onto the floor. The voice was like when XANA possessed someone, but more of an overpowering tone in it.

"What do you want OMEGA?" Odd asked.

"I just wanted you to meet my friend. She's like a little sister to me."

They saw Dee walk out of the elevator. She had XANA's (her's) mark in her eyes.

"You see," The possessed girl said, "With my help, she has regained all of her powers as a polymorphic clone."

"Dee?" Odd asked.

"It's XANA, and it was always XANA." She said in her normal voice.

"This is a major plot twist," Greg pointed out, now calmed down, "Almost like a bad Stephen King movie."

"This is not the time, Greg." Odd muttered.

"What are you gonna do with us?" Morgan asked, feeling truly scared.

"You can live," OMEGA said through his host, "The world will destroy itself anyway."

XANA looked at the possessed human, "You're just letting them go?"

"There is no need to kill them, they are incapable of stopping me."

"Stopping you?" XANA asked, cocking an eyebrow. It was a new thing she had started doing.

"Yes," OMEGA said, a smirk forming on the host's lips, "Just me." She shocked XANA in the back of the head and she fell to her knees. Then something really strange happened. She put both fingers on XANA's temples, and the two were surrounded with electricity. XANA was obviously in pain. She fell to the ground, unconscious, but breathing.

"What did you do?" Greg asked, shocked at the moment that didn't really make sense.

"Making sure that there would be no power struggle," OMEGA said, "Her abilities are neutralized."

A pitch black fog raised out of the human girl, and she fell to the floor. The fog dispersed. Morgan looked at Odd.

"This isn't every day is it?"

Odd just ignored the question and brought Morgan over to the elevator, and Greg dragged XANA over with them. The four of them rode down to the Lab. When the door opened, Morgan was in awe. She wanted to walk into the room, but there was an unconscious Nikolai laying on the floor in front of the elevator.

"Is he okay?" She asked.

"He's been through worse." Greg said, dragging XANA out of the elevator and sitting her against a wall. He then got Nikolai and put him next to XANA.

"Odd, get down to the scanners," Greg said, "I'll try to wake Nik up."

"Wait," Morgan said, "There's more?"

"Yeah," Odd said, "Two more rooms, but I'm only allowed to show you this room and the scanner room."

The two walked to the elevator and rode further down. Morgan was surprised at how much smaller this room was compared to the Lab.

"Welcome to the scanner room," Odd said, making a gesture for her to come in, "But until Jeremie trusts you, you can't use a scanner."

"What does it do?"

"When Nikolai wakes up, he'll show you."

There was a squeal over the PA system as Nikolai turned it on. This made Odd and Morgan cover their ears.

"Odd, get into the scanner," Nik said with a bit of pain in his voice, "We need to hurry."

"Okay." She walked into one of the scanners and the door shut.

"Morgan, was it?" Nikolai asked, when she nodded to the camera, he said, "Come on back up here."

She was back in the Lab right when he started to virtualize Odd.

"Scanner, Odd... Virtualization."

She saw a 3D image that looked like Odd, but it had a tail and was dressed like a video game character.

"Where's Odd?" She asked.

"She's been demolecularized and reconfigured in the supercomputer's software," Nikolai explained, but saw the confused look on Morgan's face, "In short, she's in virtual reality."

"Don't worry," Greg said, placing a hand on her shoulder, "It took me about two years to understand it."

"What kind of virtual reality?" Morgan asked.

"It's called Lyoko, and that is all I can explain right now," Nikolai said, "Odd's the only one in there and GREG hasn't gone in yet."

Greg caught the sign and ran to the elevator. He ran to a scanner and was virtualized.

Odd looked behind herself, seeing Greg virtualize. He landed on all fours, just like Odd would. But that wasn't the only similarity she noticed.

"You have a tail!"

"Yeah, so?"

"If you're virtualized based off of your DNA, wouldn't that mean that we're related?"

"That is a possibility," Greg said, then in a sarcastic tone, "I'm British, you're Italian. That makes perfect sense, right?"

"Well, what about the Roman Empire, huh?" Odd asked, "Didn't they rule the world once?"

"Yeah, that does make more sense than what I was thinking."

"What were you thinking?"

"Parallel universe."

"I thought that too, but you're too old for that to make sense."

"Kharawshee Bozhe," (Good God) Nikolai said, "Shut the hell up! OMEGA is trying to kill thousands of people and you're just standing there."

"First, we don't have Aelita, so no tower deactivation," Odd pointed out, "And second, what do you mean OMEGA is about to kill thousands of people?"

"I just got a call saying that OMEGA has possessed a whole government in Ethiopia. They have a few tons of VX nerve gas in their possession. It's weaponized."

"What's VX?" Odd asked nervously.

"It's a nerve agent that completely dissolves the target's nervous system." Greg explained.

"So what," Odd said, "They won't be able to feel anything."

"Your nervous system is what keeps you alive." Nikolai said.

"Oh." In the real world, Morgan slapped her forehead. Odd could really be stupid, but this wasn't the time.

"Hey, Nik?" Greg said to the virtual sky, "Where are we?" He had noticed that they were standing in what looked like an abandoned city-square. The coloration was similar to the desert sector.

"You don't remember the Dead Zone?"

Now it was Odd's turn, "The Dead Zone?"

"It's a part of the desert sector where there are no monsters except for shamblers." Greg answered.

"What are shamblers?" Odd asked.

"They're zombies." Nikolai answered from the sky.

Odd didn't know that one could hyperventilate on Lyoko, he didn't even know that they could breath. But she started to panic.

"Pull me OUT NOW!" She kept screaming this until Greg calmed her down. Well, he actually slapped her across the face (to return the favor), but it calmed her down.

"You know," He said, "I think that screaming will only attract them."

As if on cue, a shambler stumbled their way. Odd tried to not look at the face, thinking of when the whole school was turned into bite-happy zombies. But the face came into view anyway, and it was disturbing, mainly because it had no face. The bottom half split open, revealing a long, thin tongue.

"What is that?" She asked.

"It's a tongue." Greg said in a disgusted tone.

The monster's tongue left its mouth and went for Odd. It wrapped around her arm, and started to spark.

"What?" Odd stumbled, trying to break free. Greg ran up, and did something unexpected. He swiped his hand by the tongue and severed it. He didn't even touch it. The shambler reared in pain and Greg got it in the head with a laser arrow. It fell and exploded, leaving a puddle of goo like when a creeper died.

"It was draining your life points," Greg explained to Odd, "So I used my blade to cut off its tongue."

"What blade?" Odd asked, trying to get over the previous event.

Greg flexed his right hand, and a small blade came out of his sleeve. It was attached to his wrist.(AN: I know, I know... Assassin's Creed reference... But it's still an AWESOME weapon)

"Whoa," Odd said, wide-eyed, "That's so cool."

Greg didn't say anything, he brought a blade out on his other arm.

"What is it?" Odd asked, worried.

"Don't move." Greg said slowly.

Odd heard a sound behind her. Greg jumped from Odd's position and slashed a shambler behind her, just before landing.

"Tricky sons of bitches." He said.

"Guys," Nikolai said, "Maybe we can speed it up? There are thousands of lives at stake here."

"Sorry," Odd said, "Just a little side-tracked."

"You two are more alike than I thought." Nikolai said, sighing.

Morgan was bored. This was the secret? Yeah, it was cool. But she wasn't seeing the real action, the actual saving of the world.

"Is there anything else to this place?" She asked Nikolai.

"Well," He said, "You can explore the factory. That's always interesting. Or..."

"Or what?"

Nikolai sighed, should he tell her about the supply room? It was a huge room that wasn't in the computer or floor plans. It was like Area 51 for the Agency. The only difference was that it was never monitored.

"There's the supply room." He said.

Morgan looked at him strangely.

"You mean like a broom closet?"

"More like a warehouse," Nikolai replied, "Just go into the elevator, type in the code: 1189 into the pad. When the elevator stops, type in the code: 2633. The door will open and you can enter." He added in his mind, And be out of my misery.

Morgan went into the elevator and followed the instructions. She expected to find a tiny room with nothing to do, but was, well, amazed at all the stuff in there. It was f****** huge! There was and old computer module in one corner, with two large metal tubes next to it. Those tubes looked similar to the... what did Odd call them? Oh yeah, scanners. These could have been older models. She decided to explore more, finding a rack of guns. Upon closer inspection, though, they were just dart guns. As she continued looking, Odd and Greg were up to there necks in virtual zombies.

This was quite literal, as the horde appeared not too long after the first two went down. They came out of the areas between the buildings and flooded the virtual streets. Odd, only having laser arrows, was trying to conserve ammunition. Greg had his blades out and was slashing anyone that got too close, except for Odd.

"This isn't working!" Greg shouted, angrily, "We need someone else!"

Jeremie, Aelita, Jason, and Lilly arrived at the factory and had just gone down to the Lab.

"Where's Morgan?" Jeremie asked, looking around the room.

"In a confidential area." Was all that Nikolai responded with.

Jason put his hand on Jeremie's shoulder, signaling to not ask any further.

"I can control the computer here," The Russo-American said, "You four go down to the scanners."

This made two of the four cringe.

"Uh, dad?" Jason said, "Only two of us here actually get virtualized."

"Oh, alright," Nikolai then single Jeremie out, "You stay here, the other three go. That's an order."

Lilly looked nervous. But it was an order. She followed Jason and Aelita to the elevator, then entered a scanner in the room.

Nikolai was silent during his the process, using the key commands to control the machines.

"What do I do?" Jeremie asked.

"XANA was knocked byeassaznaatyelnee, sorry, unconscious," Nikolai said, "Keep an eye on her."

Jason and Aelita had been virtualized, but were wondering what was taking Lilly so long. Her wire frame formed, filled, and dropped. She landed very ungracefully.

It was a very simple attire, a brown cloak with a white tunic under it. What was up with Medieval fashions around here?

"Hey sis," Jason greeted her, "How do you like Lyoko?"

"At least I can't feel pain here," She replied, brushing herself off, "But I know that I have a good weapon, and some decent abilities."

"We should move," Aelita suggested to the twins, "Odd needs our help." The twins nodded and they started for the horde, an obvious mark in the distance.

Once there, Lilly was the first to attack, forming two yellow ethereal blades around her hands. She literally jumped into the crowd and slashed like a maniac. Jason drew his machine pistols and started firing into the mass before jumping in himself. Aelita was amazed at their way of fighting, it was barbaric, but effective. She found a way around the horde and ran for the tower, activated with a black haze around it, instead of red.

She entered unopposed, and went up to deactivate the tower. She placed her hand on the screen to confirm her identity, and entered CODE LYOKO. The already dim tower did not deactivate. None of the few lines of code fell, it was as if she never entered the code. She tried it again. AELITA... CODE... LYOKO. Nothing.

She was about to say something when she devirtualized. She exited the scanner, and went for the elevator, noticing that Jason and Lilly were devirtualized too. A few seconds later revealed the same for Odd and Greg. They all went up to the Lab to see what had happened.

The door opened to reveal a stressed Nikolai.

"Prakleenaats!" He shouted over and over as he beat at the keyboard. Jeremie was curled in the corner, a frightened look on her face.

"Nik!" Greg shouted. Maybe it was because it was a friend's voice, but Nikolai stopped immediately. Greg continued, "What's the problem?"

"Proklyatyi komp'yuter vygnali menya iz sistemy!" (The damn computer kicked me out of the system!) Nikolai shouted in rapid Russian, then added, "Ya ne znayu pochemu, no eto pugaet menya!" (I don't know why, but it's scaring me!) This disturbed Greg, as the only other two times that Nikolai had spoken in rapid Russian were when he was really scared or in trouble.

"Nikolai!" Greg shouted again, as the boy had started to babble in Russian about the computer and how there were so many problems with it. The British boy thought to try this in his language.

"Chto sluchilos?" (What happened?) Greg asked him, his accent making it sound strange.

"Ya tol'ko chto skazal vam , chto komp'yuter ne rabotaet!" (I just told you, the computer isn't working!) Nikolai answered in a panicked tone.

"Mozhet byt', vy dolzhny uspokoit'sya i govorit' po-angliĭski?" (Maybe you should calm down and speak English?) Greg suggested. Nikolai looked at him for a while. Then, he took a very deep breath and let it out, mellowing as he did that. He then walked over to the wall by where XANA was unconscious, leaned on it, then slid down to the floor. He buried his face in his hands. He had no hope left in this situation.

TO BE CONTINUED...

Sorry for the WTF moments... After all the time I spent on this chappy, I could have done better. Prakleenats, writer's block sucks... But I'm also working on the new chapter for CODE: Fallout, if anyone's interested.