"This is probably the dumbest thing we've ever done." Aelita sighed, watching the snowy plains surrounding the train tracks.
"I'm sorr-" "It's not your fault, Jeremie," Aelita said, and looked at him, as he was looking through the files on his laptop. "No one could have possibly known that this would happen."
"But it ruined everything." "Not everything," Aelita said, taking her shoes off and throwing her legs on Jeremie's. "Christmas isn't here yet, so we can have a nice holiday...after we deal with this."
"You are right." Jeremie nodded and rubbed his eyes as they were getting tired from the reading. "There's no clear saying that it was your father that even materialized someone."
"We are almost there anyway, so we can check everything." Aelita reminded him.
The train ride was fairly short, just an hour, but it was a long hour for them. Neither of them knew what to do when they came to the factory. Because of what Yumi said, there was a girl that she thinks is XANA.
If it was, then why didn't she attack? Was it a plan to act normal and then attack? Was this the reason XANA wanted the supercomputer to stay online?
These questions were going to be answered in less than 20 minutes because they were arriving in Boulogne-Billancourt. Jeremie packed his laptop and the pack of sweets he brought for Aelita into his bag, and Aelita put on her shoes and the coat that she successfully stole from Jeremie.
"There should be a taxi waiting for us," Jeremie said, as the train came to a stop. They both exited the train and ran through the crowd to get in front of the station, where there stood a single taxi. They both quickly jumped in.
"Belpois?" "Yes, sir." "Okay, to the Rue Troyon 5." The driver said and drove away.
"Rue Troyon 5?" "A house across the bridge to the factory," Jeremie whispered back to Aelita.
/-/ Laboratory /-/
Yumi, Odd, and Ulrich were standing on the opposite side of the interface, looking at the girl. She was sitting on a blanket that they found there and had a bottle of water next to her.
"Am I the only one scared about this?" Ulrich said. He was hurt that his date with Yumi was canceled but hoped that tomorrow he would have another chance.
"She hasn't spoken a thing," Yumi replied, clearly annoyed by what happened, since she was looking toward the date.
"She looks creepy." Odd added, that his only problem besides being taken out from dinner was that the girl was creepy but pretty.
Suddenly, the door to the elevator began opening, and in them stood Aelita, along with Jeremie. They all met in the elevator, huddled together.
"What did she say?" Jeremie asked.
"Nothing. I led her out of the scanner room up here and gave her water just in case." Yumi said. Aelita looked at her.
The girl had black hair with a few purple and red color streaks, wore a black, long-sleeved shirt, and paired with sports sweatpants. Despite knowing that it would alarm Jeremie, she let go of his hand and slowly walked towards the girl, who seemed to have noticed her.
Aelita sat down in front of her, having enough distance between them to be able to run away just in case.
"My name is Aelita, what's yours?" Aelita softly said, trying to not alarm the girl. The girl looked at her, allowing Aelita to see her vibrant purple eyes.
"Xana."
Aelita, despite internally almost fainting decided to be still calm.
"That name doesn't suit you. Do you remember your real name?" Aelita asked again.
"I think...Lexy." She said, making Aelita nod.
"Don't be afraid, we are going to help you," Aelita reassured her, hearing the chair behind her move. She turned around, seeing Jeremie was about to launch a return to the past.
"NO!" She slapped his hand before pressing any more buttons. "Don't."
"Ael-" "No, Jeremie, don't," Aelita said, and shooed him out of the chair. "We need to know what happened, Lexy."
The girl was quiet as if she was scared to talk. Jeremie looked up at Aelita who was worried.
"Were you a prisoner of XANA?" Aelita asked because she found it hard to believe that this girl was XANA since it should be just a multiagent program, not a human.
"No," Lexy replied.
"So then...how were you connected to XANA?" Aelita asked again, feeling sorry for putting so much pressure on her.
"I was supposed to be Xana," Lexy said. "But..."
"...the supercomputer shutting down..." Jeremie said, and turned around, looking through a file on a computer.
"What are you looking for, Einstein?" Odd asked, coming closer to Jeremie as well as the others. Jeremie opened more files, until stopping at one certain line.
"The day before it has launched a virtualization, but without a target character," Jeremie said. "So..."
"My father virtualized a girl on Lyoko before me and himself?" "I doubt it." Jeremie said. "I think something else happened."
"Either way, we need to go to Lyoko. Right now." Aelita said. "We need to know what is going on with the program."
How can I say no to you? Jeremie thought as Aelita walked into the elevator.
"Lexy, come, you, me, and Odd will go back to Lyoko," Aelita explained, as Odd joined her in the elevator.
"Okay." The girl stood up, and nervously walked into the elevator, as it closed.
"Okay, now what?" Ulrich asked.
"I don't know," Jeremie said, cleaning his glasses. "I guess we can make her live on Lyoko for some time, with a few materializations, and then try to enroll her into Kadic."
"What if it's just a trick?" "This? I doubt it." Jeremie said, turning around. "If it was, she wouldn't look like a real girl."
"And that you know how?" "When she was sitting I also saw something," Ulrich said, as Jeremie nodded, obviously implying something with the sweatpants.
"My god." "Jeremie, we are ready." They heard from Aelita.
"Okay." Jeremie began typing. "Transfer Aelita, transfer Odd. Scanner Aelita, scanner Odd. Virtualization!"
He then opened a separate window and began typing.
"Okay, transfer Lexy." Jeremie began, looking at the scanners already. "Scanner Lexy."
Surprisingly, her avatar was found rather quickly, as if she had already been scanned correctly once.
"Virtualization!"
/- LYOKO -/
"Virtualization!"
They both heard and looked up. In a few seconds, Lexy began appearing, and then she fell to the ground.
"No monsters nearby." "I'll summon you something Odd, you can go and take a tour of the sector," Jeremie said, summoning a purple board next to him.
"Thanks!" Odd said, and flew away, circling around the ice plains. Aelita helped Lexy up, seeing she was wearing a completely black suit. The only visible thing was her face, and the wavy hair with purple strands randomly changing position, looking like it was glowing.
"Jeremie, we are all here and alive," Aelita said.
"Okay. Can I send Ulrich and Yumi, too?" They heard. "They want to see Lexy's look."
"Send them." Lexy now said.
Soon, the rest of their team was on Lyoko, as Odd joined them back with news.
"I saw one Kankrelat close by." Odd said, jumping off the board. "By the way Jeremie, this is cool."
"It's not all," Jeremie said. "But if there are monsters, then the real program is still fully functional."
Two more vehicles appeared close to them, one being a bike with a single wheel, and something that could levitate.
"And now this," Jeremie said, as they all had their clothes changing. But as soon as Jeremie began changing Aelita's appearance, she was shot down, devirtulized.
The problem was that Jeremie didn't notice it right away.
"Aelita!" They all said, gaining Jeremie's attention.
"Aelita?" He said. "Aelita!"
They all heard as he threw the headset down and was heard opening the hatch.
"So...this was what Jeremie worked on?" Yumi asked, looking at herself.
"I still look like a cat," Odd said, shooting down the single kankrelat that killed Aelita. "But at least I have faster arrows."
They all looked at Lexy, who was looking onto the plains with icy spikes randomly generated.
"You okay, Lexy?" Yumi asked. The girl looked at them and nodded.
"Aelita's fine." They all heard from Jeremie, but neither of them cared since they got devirtualized the same way many, many times.
Suddenly, Lexy began running.
"Lexy, wait!" Yumi shouted as she was the only one watching her, while Ulrich was trying his new swords with Odd.
She jumped on the flying thing with a fin on the bottom and flew after her. She heard the two boys curse and also heard as they began following her.
Lexy suddenly stopped at a cliff, where the rest stopped too. They slowly approached her, as she was looking down.
"What i-" Yumi began, but stopped when she looked down.
There were about 30 krabs, all doing basically nothing.
"As much as I am awesome, there's no way we can destroy all of them," Odd said, also seeing the amount.
"We don't have to," Lexy said and jumped down from the cliff. She walked up to the krabs, making them notice her.
"Poor Lexy, she'll get obliterated," Ulrich said.
The girl stopped in front of all the krabs, but they didn't fire at her. She extended her arm, a battleaxe appearing in her hand. The Krabs walked backward slightly, obviously scared of her.
Lexy smirked, the battleaxe hiding in a black cloud, and walked away, finding a route to get back on the cliff.
The rest were watching her from the top, surprised. If they had gone down there, the Krabs would have killed them even before they would have had the chance to defend themselves.
"How come they didn't attack you?" Yumi asked as Lexy got back up on the cliff.
"I think...they can't," Lexy said. "I don't know."
"Jeremie, send us back," Yumi said. "That's a superpower, don't you think?"
"Kinda," Lexy said, as the boys behind Yumi began disappearing into pixels.