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Ulrich looks rough and Aelita looks like death.

Both have lost weight. They're pale and little more than pale reflections of the man and woman they had left behind only a month ago. Both seem to have aged a decade in thirty days. They stand there, looking back at their friends blankly. They're a mess. Their clothes are tattered and torn. Both are covered in mud. Had they claimed that they had just run barefoot through a battlefield, nobody would have doubted their tale. Whilst most of what has befallen them looks relatively recent, there's no conceivable way for them to have gotten into such a state in just a couple of days.

Both parties can do nothing else but stare at one another. One group unable to physically comprehend what has happened and the second seemingly lacking the energy and the will to do anything more than stand there as statues.

Aelita in particular seems to be little more than a ghost. She sits in the chair in front of the screens. There's a blanket round her shoulders. Her usually bright eyes seem to be a good deal duller. She's scarcely even reacts to their presence. If she sees them, she doesn't quite seem to be capable of responding to them.

It's Ulrich who finally steps forwards. He seems more sprightly and aware than his companion. He's a mess. His hair has grown too long. His beard speaks of the fact that he hasn't had access to a razor in a considerable amount of time. At least though, he seems still capable of some form of free thought. He doesn't quite come over to them but instead stops a little short. His dark eyes trail over his friends but seem oddly cold, almost detached.

"Guess you got the message."

Hearing his voice is so strange. It's almost like a slap in the face, enough to shake the others out of their torpor.

It's Yumi who manages to pull herself together first to actually answer him.

"Message?"

He points back towards the screen and holomap. For some reason, it takes them a few moments longer to finally connect the dots. Even then, there's a fair amount of this which still makes absolutely no sense.

"You turned the Supercomputer back on?" Odd asks. "Why?"

"We needed to get your attention. Aelita said that Jeremie always kept tabs on it. So we figured it would be a good way of getting you here."

Jeremie shakes his head. He ignores Ulrich's words. The blonde man moves on past his old friend. His attention is focused solely on the young woman sitting in the chair. She looks up to see him. There should be a smile there, some form of recognition. Instead, her face remains fallen and her eyes dull. He crouches down in front of her, as if to hope that she might be able to get some form of a response. She does look at him but something isn't quite right.

"What happened to you?" He asks, his voice barely above a whisper.

Aelita manages to raise her gaze to see him. He reaches out to take her hands in his own. Even such a gentle action isn't enough to earn much of a response. Ulrich's eyes rest upon his companion, studying her quietly. She doesn't seem very comfortable, looking away from him. They give her a few seconds, just long enough to pull herself together if she's even capable of it. Finally, after taking a couple of deep breaths, she manages:

"They took us."

Her voice trembles. It sounds as if her vocal cords have been stripped raw. Yet somehow she manages to get across a feeling of absolute terror with just a handful of words. She doesn't elaborate, slipping back into whatever forced silence she'd been trapped in only a few seconds prior.

"Who? Who took you?"

"I-I don't know..." Aelita manages, forcing every word out as if it's a form of torture. "Men. Men in black..."

Men in black ring a few bells. They had met them once before and Jeremie knew how much they haunted his love's dreams. For all that, they knew precious little about them. They were dangerous and had been a favorite form for X.A.N.A's spectres for some reason. Who they worked for and what they wanted were two questions they were yet to answer. They were a shadow that had hung over the supercomputer for so long and that Aelita had never been able to fully shake off and forget about.

Yumi casts a nervous glance back towards the elevator, as if she half expects it to suddenly spit out some old enemies.

"Are they here now?"

"No. We gave them the slip." It's Ulrich who speaks now. "We're safe here. For the time being..."

Somehow, his words don't carry all that much reassurance. They do provide them with just a little breathing room though, knowing that they aren't about to be attacked at any moment. Jeremie stays next to Aelita, his expression growing all the more worried by the moment as despite his most tender efforts, the young woman refuses to open up even the slightest. She's closes her eyes and takes a few deep breaths. With her arms folded across her stomach, rocking back and forwards as she sits there.

"What happened to you?" Yumi finally asks.

"It's a long story." Ulrich begins.

"Yeah well… I think we need to hear it!" It's Odd's turn to speak up.

Ulrich casts Aelita an odd glance. For the first time since they have discovered her, she actually wakes up a little, just in order to give him a nod. She grants him permission to continue a tale that she herself evidently isn't up to the task. The young man looks away from her at back to his friends as they stand, bristling with impatience. He doesn't seem to need much time to gather his thoughts together, continuing almost instantly:

"We found Franz Hopper's cabin after the first two days. It was when we went back there on the third that they took us."

"That's impossible!" Jeremie shook his head. "You were in the mountains! We spoke on Tuesday!"

"I don't know who you were talking with but it wasn't us."

Odd gets his phone out. Yumi hadn't been aware of him exchanging any texts with his former roommate or their old friend. In retrospect though, she's not all that sure why she's surprised. They were all friends. He brings the device over towards Ulrich. The man only gave him a very quick and cursory glance before instantly dismissing them with a shake of the head.

"We spent a month locked up. That wasn't us." He repeats the last part more forcibly this time. "My guess would be you were talking with whoever took us."

The implication sends a shiver down their spines. For a few seconds, Yumi even finds herself struggling not to throw her own phone away in disgust. As if its somehow been tainted by association. She looks towards her friend, Aelita's pain is terribly plain to see and yet Ulrich stands there, almost unmoved by it all. Perhaps he knows that if he doesn't continue this tale, then there's nobody else who can.

"There's a lot that I-we don't know."

"Just tell us what you do." Jeremie pleads with him.

"They took us and locked us up. Ran tests."

"Tests."

"Experiments." He sees their perplexed looks and continues. "They wanted to see how going to Lyoko had affected us."

So many questions, some of which they want answers to, others less so. For the time being, there are more pressing matters. Most notably those who had taken their friends to begin with. Jeremy takes his girlfriend's hands in his own and squeezes them gently. The woman's eyes come to rest upon him. Her expression remains grim. Her attitude is as if someone has sucked all of the life from her.

"So who took you?"

"We couldn't exactly ask." Ulrich answered somewhat dryly. "All I know is that they knew about Lyoko. I'm not so sure about X.A.N.A. and the supercomputer but they know that something strange happened."

"Are we safe?"

Jeremie asks the question that's on all of their minds. It's impossible not to turn back towards the elevator. To wonder just who might be walking around above them or lying in wait, anticipating their return. Everything remains still and silent however.

"For the time being but they'll be coming. That's why we're hiding here."

"So why turn on the Supercomputer?" Yumi asked.

"To get your attention. We couldn't risk calling you. So we figured that Jeremie would pick up on the activity and that you'd come here. Aelita activated a tower to knock out your phones for a bit, we didn't want them tracking you."

It all fit into place. As insane as it might have been. None of them can quite process it though. So there's only silence. Feeling uncomfortable, knowing that something needed to be said or done. There's a certain unreal feeling. It's almost as if they feel that they might just wake up at any moment. In many ways, they hope that they will awaken to find that this is all some sort of a nightmare.

It's Yumi who takes a chance. Driven by instinct more than anything else, she manages a few steps forwards her boyfriend. He keeps his eyes on her but says nothing. She comes to stand only a few feet in front of the man who claims to have been through nothing less than hell. His expression doesn't show it though. He seems to be confused by her presence, as if he can't quite comprehend why she's here right now with him. It's with the utmost caution that the young woman reaches out and wraps her arms around his neck, pulling him in close. He tenses up as if someone has just run an electric current through the entirety of his body. Slowly though, he wraps his own arms around her and pulls her in close.

Aelita stares, as if it's a sight that she's never seen before or perhaps feared that she never would again. Jeremy tightens his hold around his hand, trying to bring her back to him. She does turn, even now though, her gaze seems dull:

"It's going to be okay." He tells her.

"You can't promise that..." Is all that the young woman is able to croak out.

She turns away from the man that she loves, closing her eyes and frantically trying to wake herself up from this nightmare she can't escape.