Chapter 21: Remembering

"We could stay here for the night," Odd said at the end of the day, and Nicholas and Sissi fell to the ground, very tired. It had been a long, tiring day and when Odd said they wouldn't be taking a break, he meant getting up early to stop only a few seconds ago. Nicholas looked up at Odd, and he asked himself another question, because Odd didn't show any sign of exhaustion. And even though Odd had been walking behind them and hadn't spoken one word, Nicholas was sure he had been with them all the time. He could have left them, and if he had, they wouldn't have heard it. Odd stared at his co-travelers with a confused look.

"You guys are already tired?" he asked them, "After just one day of walking?" Now Nicholas just looked up, to tired to say anything to the young Lyoko Warrior.

"But we don't have a condition like you!" he told the Warrior, panting with each word he spoke. The respect and solidarity he once might have felt diminished every minute. Not because Odd could walk long distances without getting tired, but because he acted as if it was nothing. Odd just shrugged as an answer.

"Yeah, nothing to do about it. Everybody has its own qualities, right?" He awaited an answer, but he continued when he got none, "Anyway, while you guys were asleep last night, I found this." From behind his back, he took a small plastic sack. This one had some white-pink letters written on it, with a picture of candy. Inside the sack, exactly the same sort of candy could be found, all sharing the same sweet taste.

"Are those real marshmallows?" Sissi asked surprised while Odd held the sack with candy where the two of them could see it, "How… how did you find them?"

"I don't need to tell you this xanafied jungle once was called the city of love and had a lot of stores to satisfy the people and multiple tourists? Well, in the ruins of once was a candy store, I found this sack! Don't be worried about the expiration date, it's somewhere in 2015, and I know we're not that long under XANA's tyrannical rule." Even though he had a weak argument and they didn't believe him, they decided to try it anyway. Carefully, they took one bite of a marshmallow, while Odd just took one and put it in his mouth. The taste was surprising – apparently this sack had an expiration date somewhere in 201, because the taste was just as good as the last time they ate them. In silence, they ate all of the marshmallows until all of them were in their tummies.

"My mom bought marshmallows sometimes," Nicholas said all of a sudden, "for the special days and holidays. Birthdays, marriages, et cetera." Sissi immediately gave him a jealous look.

"Lucky you! Daddy didn't want to buy those, like ever, because there still was enough candy when in fact there was almost nothing left. It's so frustrating!" she exclaimed. It was quiet for a while, until the two of them started to laugh nervously. All those times, they had tried to sort of push away their past so they wouldn't have to remind themselves of all the things they could do and eat before the invasion. And now, partly thanks to the marshmallows, they had been connected with the past and the present seemed a dull, bad nightmare. I mean, the kind in which you want to wake up, but you can't for some reason.

"What about you, Odd?" He hadn't been following the conversation, so he just looked up when he heard his name.

"Wha?" Nicholas rolled his eyes.

"Do you have a good memory with marshmallows?" For a while, Odd thought about it, and he answered when he was done thinking.

"Nothing you would want to know or understand, but alright. On a sunny day, me and my friends…" And then Odd stayed silent. His smile disappeared and his facial expression changed to a worried one. And, even though his two companions couldn't see it, Odd concentrated on the noise he heard to place the familiar sound in the right direction. Nicholas already wanted to ask what was going on, but then he also heard that sound – it was weak, but audible when everyone was quiet. When they grew a bit louder, Sissi heard them, too.

"XANA?" Nicholas asked, and Odd nodded, knowing what was coming, how many of them from each type would arrive when, plus how to beat them easily. He was prepared, as usual, and slowly he pointed the Laser-Arrow at the small monster army that was heading towards them, but wasn't visible to them yet.

"Yep. I'm afraid we have to…" Without any warning beforehand, Odd fell down to the ground. Suddenly, just like that, with no sign which could have given them a hint of what just happened. Scared by the impact, Sissi and Nicholas turned their heads towards the sound of Odd hitting the ground. When the danger neared them, Nicholas kept a close eye on that danger and Sissi inspected Odd to see if he was alright. The danger (or part of it) came closer as Sissi looked up and told Nicholas what she had discovered. No movement, no breathing, no beating heart. Nicholas found this to be strange, and very frightening. This couldn't happen, right? Those monsters hadn't fired anything at them, yet, and there was no wound to be seen. Poison was a possibility, and for some fearsome moments he was scared the marshmallows did that to Odd, and feared soon Sissi and himself would follow.

The first enemy construction stood in position, ready to fire. And since the two refugees never really learned all of their names (exception of Hornet, Tarantula and Kankrelat), they called the monster in front of them the bowling ball because of its size. This bowling ball was stuck at a row of trees – it couldn't pass because it was too large – but this didn't stop him to continue what he was about to do. It opened its shell and pulsations lead to the middle of the Eye, which slowly started to glow a white light. Instinctively, Nicholas jumped out of the way, and Sissi imitated him – mostly because she was scared, actually. And the strange laser was being fired, and was pulled back in after it hit something – it just had been a tree. Despite this, the bowling ball didn't change the course and hit the tree two more times, charging up for the next hit.

That tree had already permitted Odd to be saved from that laser three times, possibly four after the next one.

In that short time, Nicholas knew a bigger black-white Hornet with bigger wings would soon arrive for back-up, and in the distance he saw three cubes come closer. The cubes were the slowest out of three, so they wouldn't arrive any time soon. Their weapon was a long distance one, and that's why an attack from the cubes couldn't be excluded. With this information, Nicholas could glue the pieces together and form the reason why those monsters were attacking them, even though it couldn't be very accurate.

The bowling ball needed to keep him unconscious, and to get that tree out of the way, the bigger Hornet had to keep interested people out of the way and three cubes could easily guard him. If Nicholas was right, William/XANA would eventually show up and finish Della Robbia off, just to be sure with him in this position. They wanted him because off… yeah, why did they want him dead? Because he helped the friends of a traitor? Because he took down a lot of his troops without getting a scratch himself? Because of some unknown reason they would never know? Probably the last one. Anyway, Odd was in danger!

Well, who would be stupid enough to risk his life for a clearly dead body of a friend? The answer to that question, was Nicholas. When he was very close to Odd's body, he wondered what and why he was doing it for – he became an involuntary target – but now he finally had reached Odd's body, it was just wrong to leave it behind, wasn't it? Pity Nicholas was now target practice for the bowling ball and the bigger Hornet, maybe also for the cubes. The help Sissi offered him was needed, but because of this action, she also became another target the two monsters could shoot at.

The pulsations to the center of the bowling ball started up again, and in the meantime the bigger Hornet was targetting them, too. There was no time to move Odd's body, or to go away themselves. Nicholas would tell himself he was going to see Herve again, while Sissi was kind of brain-dead due to her being very frightened. Without looking, Nicholas' left hand found Sissi's right one, and together they awaited their fate.

They certainly hadn't thought the bowling ball would be destroyed in front of them. They looked around, surprised. What the hell did just happen? And who, and how, and with what? Nicholas looked up in the sky, to the bigger Hornet, who was flapping its wings wildly, trying to get some stranger off of its back. Eventually, the person jumped off of the Hornet, which exploded – with screeching – just a second after the stranger got away. Within ten seconds, the person landed on his feet on the ground, perfectly balanced, sinking through his knees, ready to take on the three cubes. Now the person was known again, sitting in that position to shoot down those cubes under the well-known motto "Laser arrow!" Nicholas looked at him, astonished.

"Odd?" that was enough to make Odd turn around and aim his Laser-Arrow at the two, but not shooting anything. The eyes of the Lyoko Warrior were filled with hate for the enemy, and almost automatically Nicholas put his hands in the air, like Sissi. While Odd slowly lowered his Laser-Arrow, Nicholas and Sissi also slowly lowered their hands, until they only watched each other.

"I remember…" Odd said slowly, and carefully Nicholas set one step forward.

"What?" Odd shrugged.

"Hard to explain. I only know all of us have to be at the factory before it can happen. Or at Kadic, if it's impossible to do it at the factory." The two friends thought this to be confusing.

"Who's 'all of us'?" Sissi wanted to know, and Odd shook his head.

"Everything will be explained in time," Odd said, and he sat where he just lay, right behind Sissi and Nicholas, and looked up at the two friends, "So… who's hungry?" he asked, as if none of what happened today never actually happened. And, after living with him for almost two weeks, they'd gotten used to his behavior, and without saying a word sat down next to him as he made a fire.

I bet you're all wondering what exactly happened to Odd... you know all will be explained (eventually) but just not the next chapter. Speaking of which, Hiroki, Milly and Ulrich are all three gone, so who's going to fill that gap to keep the quartet intact? You'll have to find out by reading the next chapter on the evening of May 29th. Yep, still updating each Thursday. Now, on with the reviews:

Bluedog197 (To clear things, this invasion happened during Season 4, so XANA should be freed from the supercomputer. And for now, nobody knows how to place a tracker or anything like that - they're too busy with stuff described in the next chapter)

tiffanywoodruff161 (...Thanks for the review, and Aelita will wake up if the timing's right, or when I decide Jeremy's suffered enough... After all, everything I do to them is because the plot needs some things to happen, like Ulrich's death)

See ya next time!

-Dutchwriters2