AN: Thank you so much guys for your support so far for the story! It means so much to me!

Now, we enter Chapter two. I'll admit that I'm unsure how to feel about this chapter. I really liked it when I first began writing it, but by the end I felt unsure if I truly captured the essence of both characters (well, for XANA I decided I would interpret it as how I saw it, especially since it didn't get true development until the later seasons). But I think this is going to be the formula I'll stick with for the rest of the story - one chapter will center around the gang's exploits, and another will center on Yumi and how she's handling things (I'm considering a third one, just for Jeremie, but I'm unsure yet). Let me know what you guys think of this, if you feel that splitting the story up between several POVs will make reading it a more enjoyable experience.

Whoa, that was a long one! All right, now that that's out of the way, let's dive into Chapter two!

Chapter Two: Darkness

I fear who I am becoming,
I feel that I am losing the struggle within
I can no longer restrain it,
My strength, it is fading
I have to give in

- Within Temptation, "It's The Fear"

Light.

There was no light.

No familiarity of the world around her.

Wait, she could recognize?

Impossible.

She was deleted. Gone from this world.

Destroyed.

Wake up.

So she did. It hurt to wake up. Yumi was completely encompassed in darkness. Darkness... she had had enough of it. She wanted the light- no, she needed the light.

She felt a presence about her being, but she could not quite place what it was. It was unnatural, but familiar. It felt familiar to her. She closed her eyes again to try and remember. Yes! There was Aelita... and Lyoko. Aelita about to be devitalized by the Megatank. Yes, now she remembered. She ran to the Megatank. Pushed it over the edge. Then she, quite vividly, remembered the sensation of falling.

Yes, it was all coming back to her. She sacrificed her life to save Aelita's, the one who was more worth it in that moment. After all, they couldn't deactivate the tower. They couldn't completely save the world without Aelita's help. Yes, now she remembered...

But she had to be dead, right? She fell into the digital sea... There was no possibility of surviving it.

Open your eyes.

It was that command again. Yumi slowly opened her eyes, but was again met by darkness. Seriously, she used to love darkness, how isolated yet quiet it was. Now things were becoming too eerie. But... she couldn't wish to go home, could she? She was dead.

No, not dead. Your codes are intact.

The cold, not intact voice sent shivers down her spine. But the name was on the tip of her tongue. "Xana?"

You are quite an unusual warrior. Why sacrifice yourself for the A.I virus? She's taken away all that you love.

Who was he talking about? Aelita? And why did it hurt to suddenly think so much?

"Are... are they okay?" That's all she cared about. She's always had the mantra of putting others before herself (and it never quite helped that her closest friends were a year younger than her, furthering that need to protect them above protecting herself). If they were doing well for themselves, then she could consider her short life well-spent.

Yes. They are okay. They are happy.

"Good. That's what matters."

But they are happy without you.

Come again?

"Hm?" she asked, unable to help herself.

You should've let me destroy the A.I. virus. I could've saved the world.

"You mean destroy it. You never wanted to save the world."

Shall I show you what I mean?

Under normal circumstances she would've been adamant to tell him off. However, this whole situation was anything but normal. "What the heck?" she said aloud.

My circuits will allow you to peek into what I've observed.

"Fine."

It was a funny sensation at first - silly enough she had thought Xana had meant his actual circuits, but no, it was just the metamorphosed form of Xana that wrapped himself around her. All the other times that she had confronted Xana, she had felt the aggression from the other side. But not this time. He was surprisingly gentle with her, like cradling a newborn.

She closed her eyes and then there was light! She found herself looking upon Kadic, as though it was like any other normal day. Though she was content with her sacrifice, she still wondered if the others mourned for her.

The next shot brought her into the lunchroom where the group, including Aelita, sat, laughing over some dumb joke Odd had made. The corners of her mouth tugged. They brought Aelita to the real world? Good. I'm glad for her. She seems to be doing okay for herself.

They transitioned to a scene with Aelita, Ulrich, and Odd standing underneath one of the trees in the courtyard, discussing matters among themselves. Now this made her feel bittersweet, as it reminded her of all the times she and the boys did that while waiting for Jeremie. Bittersweet turned to slight irritation as Ulrich was pulled aside by Emily, and the younger boy wholeheartedly going along with her, saying goodbye to the others.

I'm sorry.

Her teeth were slightly clenched. "No, he deserves to be happy. I'm... happy for him."

They faded into another shot, this time of Aelita standing outside of the Ishiyama residence. Her heart fell. Her parents! She completely forgot about them! How would her parents react to knowing that their wonderful daughter was gone from this world?

She found her answer. And she did not like it one bit.

There was a shot of Aelita mingling with her parents, as though they had been longtime friends. There was her mother making Aelita some noodles, and Aelita and her father playing a board game. Even a shot of her parents watching Aelita as she slept on Yumi's futon.

Still, she looked for a sign of hope that they remembered who their real daughter was. "Do they... do they even remember me?"

My scanners say that this was all taken recently since from your departure of that world.

"Was there like a mourning or something?" She never cared for big to-do's, but this one seemed like a fairly big to-do.

No. None that my scanners had observed.

So, was that it? Did they all move on without her? Did Aelita essentially take over her place in the group, even living with her parents like she had been their daughter from the first day? She tried to gather all the positive thoughts she could get, and her only convincing argument was that she was happy as long as they were happy.

Even then that felt like a lie. She wasn't happy at all. She longed for home, for her friends and family...

There is more, Lyoko warrior, that I have observed, said Xana. They had a chance to save you.

Now her attention was immediately garnered. "W-What?"

The program, the materialization program, could've saved your life. But they chose the virus instead.

"Was there... like a voting or..?" Xana's words chilled her. She knew better than to believe the enemy A.I, but for some reason she could not pull away.

No, it was unanimous. The virus could live on Earth, and you could remain extinct forever.

She wiggled her fingers, hoping for feeling there. There was. So she clenched them.

"I have just one question for you, Xana. Why do you keep calling Aelita a virus? She's better than you. She's saving the world."

No, she's poisoning the system. The code that she enters in the towers to eliminate my so-call threat? She is poisoning the broadcasting system. For now it is still too early to notice, but in due time you shall experience the deterioration of Lyoko. From there shall your world be profoundly affected.

"No, you are just saying that to mess with my mind. Aelita would never..."

You believe her because she is organic to your liking. Aelita was designed first as a virus protection program when Lyoko was originally designed. She could not handle it, and it warped her into a more humanoid form. Thus, I was created, to protect Lyoko from being infected by her ways. Because of you, I fail every time.

"But you attack the real world!"

I do not mean to, but if it is the only way I can stop you from assisting Aelita's careful destruction of my home, then it must be done.

"You tried to kill us! On multiple occasions!"

Again, as I stated previously. You can choose to accept which is the truth, but is there any denial that your friends have completely forgotten about you and are living better lives?

"I don't..." She cleared her throat and said, much too loudly for her liking, "They're happy. That's all that matters."

Software and computers are much easier to understand than you humans. This time Xana's voice was softer, fading away slowly. Much to her own disgust, Yumi wanted to cry in protest - please don't leave me!

How sick was that? That she was willing to turn for help to the A.I, a program that, for the past year, had been trying to kill them and stop their efforts to save their world in more ways than one. But when Xana came to her, he brought light. Yumi didn't want to fall back into the darkness.

Calm down Yumi, you can do this. You're not even here anymore. You're... nonexistent. At once, the vivid images of the world where her friends had left her behind came back to her. It had to be a trick by Xana, she knew it had to be so. He was doing something to manipulate the images just to break her. Well, the joke was on him because Yumi prized herself in being a stubborn person, too hard to break.

Nonetheless, it did little to soothe her fears. It was that what-if in the back of her mind that continually haunted her - what if they did move on without her? What if they didn't miss her like how they missed her? What if... what if she meant less to them than how much they meant to her? The darkness was feeding on her doubts, making her pain grow stronger. She missed her life - she missed her friends, her family, even doing schoolwork at 2 in the morning after a late night shift of stopping Xana's attack.

She couldn't move too much, but if she were allowed to she would curl into fetal position, try to block out the world. "I just want to go home..." she sniffled.

A home where you are unwanted? Illogical. Xana's bitter monotone voice returned to her, but Yumi did not mind it. She just wanted the darkness to fade.

"Not illogical," she bit out, wanting to say something harsher, and even swearing at herself for barely daring to challenging the demented A.I.

Then what? What do you pitiful humans desire?

"A life. Free will. Family. Friends."

Again, illogical. A program does not need any of those.

"I am not a program. I am a human being."

Correction. You were a human being. As stated your friends abandoned you for their own desires. You barely live as a program to the network. You do not feel. You do not love.

Yumi closed her eyes. No, I am a human. I do love... She repeated the phrase over her head what must've felt like a hundred times. I do love, I do love... Yet every time she did so, it felt fake.

Was that it? She was just a program now, like Aelita?

No, she had to remind herself. Aelita still had life through her programming, whereas Yumi... She could not laugh. She could not smile. And all she had to look forward to, instead of a bespectacled blonde-haired boy who would open the program window to talk to, was just never-ending darkness. Aelita had Jeremie, Yumi had darkness.

"Xana?" Her voice barely sounded anything like herself. "I don't want to be left behind anymore. I can't stand the darkness."

There is a solution for you.

"Can I come out of the dark?"

A moment's hesitation, but Yumi did not register it. She was becoming claustrophobic, she needed out. "Please, take me out of here."

There was no confirmation from Xana of what he was planning to do, but Yumi saw the light as soon as her words fell from her lips. She felt like she was being lifted from the ground, and it felt... absolutely wonderful. She was in the light, and there was no more darkness.

She was free.