Chapter Three

A few weeks after the shooting, my arm comes out of the sling. It feels a bit painful to move, but that's just because I haven't used it for so long. During this period of inactivity, because the principal had given me time away from classes to recover, I was afraid of growing lazy. Sissi helped me stay on track with my classes by letting me read, and copy Nicholas's notes. Whenever I leave my room I've taken to keeping my Tonfas in my school bag. Against a gun they're useless, but it makes me feel better to have some line of defense.

The others had given me some time to get back into shape. Finally the day comes when I can move freely again. The others decide that I's time for me to visit the factory.

They lead me to a manhole cover in the park, and we climb down. We find some skateboards, and a scooter down below. Odd explains that they always use these to get there, and now it makes sense why they said to bring my skates. We dash through the sewers, jumping a gap in the path at one point. At some point we come to a spot where the sewers are blocked off by bars, and we go up another ladder that takes us onto a bridge. After changing my shoes again, we run into the factory, and swing to the lower floor via some hanging ropes.

I follow them into an elevator, and Jeremie takes us one floor down. The door opens to a computer hanging from the ceiling. A holographic projection of, what at first glance looks like an atom, appears behind the monitor. Jeremie steps out here, and Aelita takes the rest of us down one more floor. Three tall capsules, the Scanners, stand in a ring, open and waiting. I walk into the middle of the ring, and turn to face the others. Yumi stands in front of the others, arms crossed. She's smiling, but her eyes are hard as she gazes at me.

"Do you swear to keep our secret, no matter what?" Her voice is just as hard as her gaze.

"I swear," I respond in a serious voice.

"Do you swear to do all you can to defeat XANA, no matter the cost?"

"I swear."

"Then there's only one thing left," Jeremie's voice comes out of a speaker in the ceiling. "I need you to step into one of the scanners, Shay, that way the computer can make a copy of your digital DNA. This will also make you immune to the Return to the Past."

I nod, and step backwards into the scanner behind me. The doors close around me, and I close my eyes. I feel myself lifted off of the ground. A light passes over me, and then I'm slowly dropped back to the ground. The scanner opens, and I step out grinning.

"How do you feel," Aelita is smiling at me with the others.

"I feel ready for anything now."

"Be careful what you say," Jeremie says. "We've been fighting XANA for so long, and we still don't know what we can expect from him."

I look up to the ceiling, "Jeremie, would it be a bad idea to go to Lyoko yet?"

There's a moment of silence, "Maybe so. That way I can analyze your Lyoko Avatar, and give you an idea of your abilities. Ulrich, and Odd should go with you, just in case."

I step back into the scanner, Ulrich, and Odd step into the other two. The doors close on the three of us, and the light appears again.

"Transfer, Ulrich... Transfer, Odd... Transfer, Shay... Scanner, Ulrich... Scanner, Odd... Scanner, Shay... Virtualization!"

I see a sudden bright light from behind my eyelids, and then everything goes dark.

When I open my eyes again, I'm falling. I instinctively try to put my feet under me, but I wind up landing on my bottom. A brief glance of my surroundings has me staring around in wonder. I'm on a walkway of what looks like ice. The area around me appears to be made of glaciers.

"This must be the Ice Sector," I mumble. Odd had described the sectors of Lyoko to me while I was on the mend.

In front of me Ulrich, and Odd land nimbly on their feet, and look back at me. From where I am on the ground I blink at them a few times. Ulrich is in a yellow, and black ninja suit with the handles of two swords poking over his shoulders from a disk on his back. Odd is basicly a purple cat with a human's head, torso, and feet.

"Wow, Jeremie, maybe you should send the girls in too, Shay looks pretty cool!" Odd is smiling at me with his arms crossed.

Confused, I look down at myself. I'm wearing what looks like a black surfer's suit with a little armor on top. I have bracers on my forearms that are decorated with red flame designs, and greaves on my shins with the same designs. A pair of shoulder-guards follow the same design. My shoes are kinda weird, they have a wide groove in the middle of the bottoms running from the toes to the heels. I look at the bottoms, and find small red domes inside. Other than that my shoes follow the same red and black pattern of my armor.

I stand, and look myself over, I can't find any obvious weapons. A pair of thuds make me turn to see Aelita, and Yumi landing behind me.

"Not bad," Yumi smiles. She's got a black unitard on, and a pair of shoulder-pads with little flowers on them. She's wearing boots, and fingerless gloves. A pair of silver wrist-guards complete the outfit. I notice that there is something metal-looking over each eyebrow, but I decide not to comment.

I turn my gaze to Aelita, she's looking me over with an appraising eye, hands on her hips. Her outfit is mostly pink, including a skirt that appears to be fashioned from Samurai armor. I spot a star-shaped bracelet on her right wrist, "What does that do, it is your weapon?"

She glances at her bracelet, and waves a had over it. It flashes pink, and a pair of angel's wings made of energy appear on her back. I raise my eyebrows, impressed.

"So Jeremie, what can he do?" Odd has his head tilted back to look at the sky.

Jeremie's voice comes from the sky, "Give me minute, Odd, okay?" After a minute, Jeremie speaks up again. "Alright, I have a list of powers, and equipment. It looks like Shay has short-ranged Teleportation, and Tactile-Telekinesis."

"What's that second one mean?" I look at the sky, confused.

"Long story short, you touch things, and they blow up." All of the Lyoko warriors take two steps back.

"Any hints on how to use it?" Ulrich grins.

"Just a sec... Okay, Shay you have the triggers on your wrists. Tap one, and you can use that hand to blow stuff up."

I look at the bracers, and tap a finger to one. As soon as I do the flame designs light up a deep crimson.

"Okay, wasn't expecting that." Jeremie's comment has us all looking skyward. "It looks like your powers are based on an energy level, Shay. Activating the trigger slightly lowered the level, but not measurably so. It looks like resting will regenerate the energy spent, but it'll be very slow. I'll see if I can't fix that later down the road."

I tap my wrist again, and the glowing fades. Aelita looks behind her eyes wide.

"Jeremie, XANA just activated a tower!"

"I see it on the Super Scanner, but it's in the Mountain Sector! I'm sending you your vehicles, the Way-Tower is a good ways away."

A purple hover-board appears next to Odd, a motorcycle mounted on a single large wheel materializes next to Ulrich, and some kind of hovercraft appears in front of Yumi. I step forward to hop on the back of Ulrich's Overbike with him, but my first step somehow puts me on my face. I get up while the others watch. If one could blush on Lyoko, I swear I would be.

Carefully I put one foot forward, and sigh in relief when nothing happens. As I shift my weight to my front foot, it rises off of the ground, and send me onto my back.

"Jeremie, is XANA just trying to embarrass us to death, because that's a new one." Odd is smirking pitifully at me.

"I can't see any tampering of XANA's with the Super-Computer, what's going on down there?"

"Shay can't find his Lyoko legs,"Ulrich is watching me rise into a sitting position, both of us scowling.

"Well, I don't see anything wrong with his avatar... Huh, it looks like his avatar's feet are configured with the same codes I use for your vehicles."

I tilt my head, and flex my toes. From around the edges of my feet I see the ground reflect a little red light. Carefully, I get back to my feet, and then I press my toes into the soles of my shoes. I'm taken by surprise a little when I rise a few inches off of the ground, but I quickly find my balance. Lifting a shoe to look at its bottom, I see a row of wheels made from light, like my roller-blades. I nod to the others, "Okay, I think I've got the hang of it."

Aelita summons her wings again, and takes to the air, "I'll stay with Shay in case he falls behind, or needs help."

I nod to my thanks to her, and we take off. Yumi rides her Overwing next to Odd on his Overboard as they take the point. Ulrich is slightly behind them on his Overbike, but glances back occasionally to check on Aelita, and I. I'm doing pretty good about keeping up by skating behind Ulrich, Aelita flying right beside me.

A few minutes later we come across what looks like a giant white pillar with white smoke spewing from the top. We dive into its base without hesitation, and I follow them off the edge of an inner platform into a stream of data below. After a few seconds we arrive at another platform, and dash out of the tower.

The scenery is much different here. If I had to describe it, I would say that it looks like large stones floating in the clouds.

"Okay," comes Jeremie's voice. "The activated tower is due northwest about one mile."

"Got it," says Odd, and we pick up the pace as much as we can. Before long we come across another tower, and a welcoming committee.

"Looks like XANA sent out two crabs, and three Tarantulas," Jeremie notes. "Be careful, Shay, these are some of the tougher monsters."

"Got it, thanks Jerr!" As I speak I slap both of my wrists. As the glow appears the monsters open fire.

Ulrich draws one of his swords, delfecting blasts as he charges them head-on. Odd, and Yumi take flanking positions from above either side of him. They spread out the draw the fire.

"Shay," Aileta looks over her shoulder at me. "I need to get to that tower, but I need cover."

"On it!" I look at the enemy. The squat creatures that I assume are the Tarantulas make a front line with the Crabs standing between, and behind them. Aileta flies low to the ground to avoid the Crabs lasers while the other warriors draw the Tarantulas' fire.

Ulrich back-flips off his bike, letting it crash into the monster sitting at the point of the attack. Both the vehicle, and the monster are destroyed as the crabs sidestep to avoid being hit.

I see my window, and dash forward. Leaving Aileta behind I charge one of the Crabs. The Tarantula on my left tries to turn its fire on me, but Odd takes it out with a laser arrow to the head. I shoot him a thumbs-up before leaping into the air.

It almost feels like it's in slow motion as I descend, and the Crab tries to zero in on me. I smack a hand to its eyes, and slide underneath it. A moment later I hear the telltale BOOM of its destruction.

"Touchdown," I grin, and look to see Ulrich dispatch the other Crab. Aileta flies between us, and enters the tower.

"The eagle is in the nest," Odd quips.

"Excellent," Jeremie says. "It doesn't look like anything has happened back on earth, so I don't think a Return to the Past is necessary. "

Yumi catches her fan as the last monster explodes, "I think this is a record for us, Jerr."

I stand, and stretch as the tower's smoke changes from red to white. Aileta reemerges from the tower with a smile.

"Is it always this easy," I ask the others.

Ulrich frowns, "Actually no... Am I the only one bothered by that?"

"Not in the least," Jeremie confirms. "Not much we can do though unless something happens. For the meantime I'm bringing you guys back to Earth."

The world around me turns black as I appear back in the scanner. I step out so it can be used again, and head for the elevator. Before too long we're all back in the Computer Room.

"Shay had a point," Odd says. "It's not like XANA to go easy on us like this. These days we usually see William at least."

I raise an eyebrow, "The warrior who's possessed right?"

Yumi nods, "Either XANA isn't taking us seriously…"

"Or this wasn't a serious attack," Jeremie finishes. "He knows about Shay, and probably staged this to see what he's capable of."

I nod, that makes sense. Then I decide to voice something that had been bothering me for a while now.

"XANA's attack on the school, why did he target me? I wasn't a warrior then."

We're all quiet for a minute, and then Aileta speaks up. "Lyoko is our only defense against him. If Jeremie's new room-mate was killed there would have been an investigation most likely. Lyoko could have been found out during then."

"And if we launched a Return to the Past then you would have simply disappeared," Ulrich reasons. "And we all know that makes him more powerful."

Odd folds his hands behind his head, "A win-win situation huh?"

"Not as such," I smirk. "All that happened was XANA earned himself an extra headache." We all share a smile.

Jeremie checks the time, "We should head back if we want to catch dinner."

"I second the motion," Odd yells. "Meeting adjourned!"

We all laugh as we head back to the academy.