"Nnnngh! Huahhhh!" Strains of grunts can be heard. Its another day at the academy and things are going good for most of the student body.

Well, almost good. After Odd sort of annoyed Jeremy a bit, the yellow haired Lyoko warrior left the genius to his own devices as he works yet again tirelessly to try to get the materialization program working for Aelita. Since they had to use it before to save Alex, they are back to square in terms of figuring out a way to get her out of Lyoko. Since the program worked in the first place, Jeremie has decided to just go for broke and try to replicate the coding used to make the program work so they can be done with XANA.

But enough about them, right now the focus is firmly set on the rest of the warriors as they help out one of their own with a project. Alex and Ulrich are pushing a large object covered by a sheet through the exterior arches of their building.

"Nnnnh!" Alex grunts as he pushes around the middle of the object. "You know Yumi! Mmm! I would feel better about hauling this metric-ton weighing thing if we knew what it was." Alex grumbles as he pushes again, exaggerating a little on the weight but mostly because he was annoyed with the work.

"Yeah Yumi!" Ulrich is in the same boat and pushing down low, wanting some answers from Yumi. "This whatever-it-is of yours weighs at least a ton!"

"It's not a 'whatever,' it's been in my family for hundreds of years!" Yumi informs them, being close with her arms out and ready to catch the object if it tips over. Soon enough they manage to wheel the object into one of the empty classrooms. Unbeknownst to them, the local school reporters Milly and Tamiya are creeping along behind them and watching intently at what the trio are doing.

Soon enough the group is able to make their way into the classroom where is able to navigate the object into one of the large cupboards. It still has the white sheet over it, covering it and still an unknown to the boys helping her out. Yumi closes the cupboard doors on her mystery object.

Alex and Ulrich take a moment to catch their breath as Alex looks over the cupboard. "So… Yumi, what exactly is it that you brought?"

"Yeah, and when're you going to unveil your thingamabob?" Ulrich adds onto the question.

"At the very end of my report. You'll see, it's going to be a smash hit, a real showstopper! Worth an A, I hope." Yumi is really hyped up for her project and whatever it is she has that will guarantee her an A.

"Well you sure wouldn't find a thing like that at my house. First of all, your whatchamacallit doesn't go with the drapes in the living room." Ulrich states. This gets Alex a little confused as he looks at his friend.

"Wait, you know what it is?"

"Yeah. Don't you?" Ulrich asks confused.

"No he didn't." Yumi answers. "Remember I had showed you Ulrich and you helped me get it to the front of the school." She then looks at Alex. "And then you saw us and offered to help."

"Oh right, yeah that's how it was." Alex mutters. He was walking around before his class and found Ulrich and Yumi struggling to get their object to where Yumi needs it. It just so happens he's still not sure what the object is. "Huh, soooo… what is it?"

"Don't worry about it." Yumi replies and walks out the room followed by the others. "It'll be even better when I reveal it." She closes the door and smiles at Alex. "Trust me."

"You know I have to admit Ulrich 'Whatchamacallit?' 'Whatever?' What I like most about you, Ulrich, is your rich vocabulary." She laughs a little at what Ulrich said before.

As they begin walking away, Alex grumbles at being kept in the dark and not knowing what the object is. He sighs in defeat and just keeps on going in order for them all to get to their next class.

It just so happens that they were so focused on heading out that they did not notice the duo news reporters Milly and Tamisya sneak their way into the classroom the Lyoko warriors just left out of.

"Wait, am I even in that class with you?!" They quickly hear Alex call out to Yumi.

It isn't until a short time later that the bell rings and signals for all students to get to their class. This time around Jeremie, Odd, Ulrich and Alex are sitting in their science class and watching as the teacher gets ready to instruct them on the lesson.

Of course Jeremie in his focused and determined way is tired as he lets out a yawn from all the work he's done to help Aelita.

"You know, Jeremie, most people use the night hours to sleep." In a quiet tone, Ulrich can't help but sarcastically state to their resident genius.

"I was trying a new program for materialising Aelita! With this last one I was trying, I almost succeeded. I was nearly there." Jeremie replies quietly, a little excited at the idea he's very close to succeeding.

"And what are you going to say to her when you do succeed? You never knew how to talk to a girl." Odd jokes to their genius friend quietly, much to Jeremie's annoyance.

"With Aelita, it's not the same." Jeremie fires back.

"You're right, it's not the same."

"Oh come on, Odd. Just lay off him." Alex says to him in a quiet tone. "The faster he gets to finishing it up, the faster we can finally see Aelita in the flesh." As he says that is when the class lessons stop and their principal Delmas walks in.

"Good morning, everyone! Before the start of your first class this morning, I would like to introduce your new classmate. Come in, Taelia. I'm sure your fellow students are anxious to meet you." As he says that last part, a girl enters the room.

"Wha—?" Much to Alex's confusion and surprise as he is rendered speechless at what he is seeing.

"Ok, here's your chance! Imagine she's here right in front of you, right now, in flesh and blood. What're you gonna say?" Odd proposes the idea for Jeremie. Unfortunately this is also the perfect moment for Jeremie to spot the new student that walked into the classroom.

"Oh, wow…! Oohh!" Jeremie is completely surprised at what he is seeing he can't come up with a good enough answer for Odd, although its probably likely that Jeremie didn't even hear what the blonde was asking about.

"Beep! Sorry, your time is up! You could do with a few pointers in flirting." Odd quietly says with a smile and jokes about the fail that Jeremie did. Of course Alex proceeds to swing his hand to the blonde and continues to hit him softly multiple times, intent on getting his attention but still keeps his own attention on the classrooms new arrival. "Ow ow hey!" Odd mutters annoyed as Alex's hits gravitate towards his face, making him try to smack away the offending hand. "What's gotten into and—" Before he can finish asking what's going on does Alex grab the blonde's chin with one hand forces him to look forward. It takes him a second to see what it is that's got the others stunned in surprise. "Oh, wow… this is… I don't believe it…!"

And just like the others, Odd is too gob smacked at the fact that those involved with Lyoko are staring at what is essentially a real life, flesh and blood copy of Aelita. Pink hair and all.

Class has passed but the Lyoko warriors that saw the new student are still reeling from what they have seen. Now Yumi has joined them as they sit in the quad, a free period they have, and watching the new girl Taelia from afar.

Jeremie himself is staring intensely at Taelia, who's sitting on a bench reading a book a distance from the group.

"You're right, she sure does look like her… but if it really is her, she ought to be able to recognise us, don't you think?" Yumi comments and points out that bit of information for them. None of the group has talked to Taelia yet and even though they were for sure that she had so much as glanced at the Lyoko warriors, she made no indication or looked to be familiar with them at all.

"Not necessarily. She may have lost her memory when she was materialised." Jeremie assumes is what happened. While the genius has become quite the expert with the super computer, theirs still many things about the whole machine and technology they still are not one hundred percent on.

"Well talk to her! It's the only way you can find out." Odd points out that they can't just stand there and speculate. If it turns out it is Aelita then that means she's safe and sound and that the group is able to shutdown Lyoko to put an end XANA.

"But what if it's not her?" Jeremie though is still not that convinced and wary about the whole thing.

Odd and Ulrich exchange a look before they both turn to Alex with small smiles on their faces. Alex takes one look at them before he sighs. "Nah, I'm good. Yumi and I will just wait here and watch the train wreck."

They smirk and Ulrich sets off first, and then Odd gets up and follows, sighing with a smile on his face. The two waste no time to grab one of Jeremie's arms each, leading him away and right towards Taelia.

"Go on."

"Hey! Wait…" Jeremie protests as he's just effectively dragged away by his friends to the supposed Aelita.

"Have fun!" Alex calls out to them, ending with a smile and a small laugh alongside Yumi. He doesn't say anything as they watch the trio make it to Taelia. "… How long do you think it'll take for them to crash and burn?" He nonchalantly asks Yumi.

"Ohhh… not long. I'd say maybe a few minutes. We're still not sure and they didn't exactly come up with a plan for how to tell if it really is Aelita." Yumi answers, still willing to give them some leeway in terms of trying to talk to the girl but not by much.

"Maybe. They could also surprise us and actually… fail in less than a minute." Alex's voice goes from sort of supportive to the guys before it turns to deadpan defeat.

"What?" Yumi looks at him before she looks back to the others. Ulrich, Odd and Jeremie are standing there as Taelia walks away with a look of frustration and annoyance on her face. "Wow they did bad."

"Yep." Alex makes no effort to disagree with her. He sighs and stands up. "C'mon. Let's go see what they learned."

Yumi agrees by standing up and following Alex as they make their way to the others as they stare after the retreating pink-haired girl.

"Well?" Yumi asks.

Odd sighs and shakes his head. "It's not her."

Ulrich denies Odd's answer. "He's only saying that because he just got the brush-off, big time. 'Watch an expert and learn,' huh! Anyway, if it is Aelita, it's for sure she's got amnesia." He surmises what the situation is for Aelita, Taelia, whatever.

"Wait a second… hold on! Let's say it's her! If it's really her, I mean, for sure…then she can't still be on Lyoko." Jeremie frantically begins to reason out the situation that they have found themselves in if Aelita is no longer in Lyoko.

Unfortunately they don't have the opportunity to continue to discuss the situation as the bell rings for their next class.

"You can check it out later. Right now, we have a date with Mrs. Meyer." Ulrich informs them. They all nod and begin walking to their next classes.

"Wish me luck for my report, everybody!" Yumi says to them as they all walk past her in silence except Alex.

"Good luck." He gives her a small wave as they go.

"Thanks." She mutters, happy one of them wished her luck but still a little annoyed at the others not saying a thing.

Things progress as normal all things considered. Alex was right earlier that he was not in the same class as Yumi when she was going to present her project. So he's still not sure exactly what it is that Yumi brought as her project but at this point he supposes that if she needs help to get it out of the school, he can help out again and find out what it is.

Despite that, Alex does hope that Yumi is able to get a good grade for her presentation. A little bit ago the bell had rung to signal the end of class and get all the students going for either their free period or lunch. Alex made a quick detour to his room to put away his backpack and go meet up with the others. All in all the whole situation with Taelia and the near striking resemblance she has to their pink AI friend in Lyoko is way too canny and just on the mind of many of the Lyoko warriors, some more than others.

Alex sighs as he closes his door and stays staring at the door. "… Is it really her?" He questions quietly to himself. 'Is it possible? We still don't know everything about the computer. Aelita was in there… I don't know how long. Was she ever human? Or just a AI construct? Amnesia? A new personality if she comes to earth?'

*Thunk*

"Huuuuuuughh." Alex groans as he places his forehead against his door, his mind in turmoil and confusion as to the whole situation. So far with everything that happened, he's still just not sure if the girl he saw was truly Aelita. He grunts as he pushes himself off the door. "No use griping about it. Maybe Jeremie can try to contact her, or maybe we can go to Lyoko to find her." He decides to go ahead and try to get to the cafeteria to meet with the others and figure out a plan. "There's got to be some way we can—" His eyes widen.

*SHINK*

It takes a second, barely a second, for Alex to duck under the object that was swung at him. Without wasting a beat he throws himself forward and tackles the person that tried to attack him. Whoever the person is they are heavy as Alex barely manages to push him back few feet with all his strength.

"Puh!" Alex grunts as his attacker brings his knee up and hits him in the stomach, forcing him to step back and grab his abdomen in pain. The attacker follows up with a much harder kick this time, one that Alex just barely manages to pull his arms up to block but the force is still immense as he's sent backwards through the air and lands on the floor." Arhhhh." Alex lowly groans as he holds his arms and stomachs together, slightly curling his body a little from the pain. "What… in the…?" He manages to get out through the pain before he looks up in anger.

It is quickly replaced with surprise.

He stares and watches as the one that attacked him looks like an honest to god samurai, completely clad in ancient Japanese samurai armor. He watches as the figure reaches for his door and proceeds to wrench the katana sword out of his door, which the blade had easily sunk half into. "Wha-? Who are—?" He begins to question who the person is that attacked him… until they turn to stare at him.

Theirs nothing. Theirs no one inside the armor.

Somehow the look just adds even more of an intimidation factor to the thing as it looks fully at Alex. Ever so slowly it makes its way forward towards him. Alex is frozen in fear as it steps close to him. He lays there on the ground as sweat begins to form on his brow and his heart begins to pound in his chest. His hands shake as the samurai brings his sword high into the air above his head as Alex remains frozen on the ground.

'MOVE!'

Alex's pupils dilate as he blinks.

*Woosh*

"Nrrroh!" Alex grunts as he rolls to the side as the sword is brought down onto him. It clanks as it hits the floor, then the samurai turns to Alex as he throws himself to his knees and wrenches the door open to another dorm room. The samurai swings his sword horizontally in an attempt to slice Alex in half.

Just in time Alex was able to put the door between himself and the deadly weapon. He throws himself backwards as the weapon is stabbed almost hilt deep into the door, just barely missing Alex. If he didn't throw himself away he would have gotten got. This time without wasting time to gawk at the enemy, he quickly begins scrambling to his feet and sprints as fast as he can down the hallway while the samurai can be heard behind him splintering wood to get his weapon back.

Alex almost slides on the ground as he takes a corner and makes it to the stairwell quickly begins making his way down, even jumping over several steps all at once just to make as much stride down the stairs as he can. By the time he makes it to the bottom floor his legs are aching and he's breathing like crazy. He almost collapses onto the floor as he makes it down. He takes a moment to catch his breath before he looks up the stairwell. He waits a few moments as he looks to see if he can spot any movement from above.

"…"

After a few tense moments where all he hears is the pounding of his heart in his chest, he sees nothing a few floors up and lets out a breath of air he didn't know he was holding. "What…? What was…? Who…?" His thoughts are jumbled mess as he tries to figure out what he just saw as he tries to walk away. 'Japanese… armor? Who in the hell would have that here? And why was it—?' His thoughts are interrupted as he hears movement above. He snaps his head up and his eyes widen. "Oh you have got to be—!" Without finishing his complaint he sprints towards a nearby doorway, one of those glass ones with the wooden framing. Just as he goes through and locks it…

*CRASH*

He jerks back just as the figure lands on the ground. He stands there staring at the figure, the hunched down kneeling on one knee samurai figure. Slowly it lifts its head and looks directly at him. Despite not having any eyes, just the presence and the sort of aura it exudes allows it so Alex knows that they are definitely looking at each other. Alex takes a few more slow steps back as his attacker slowly pushes himself to his feet, pulling his katana sword as well until he stands tall. It doesn't sprint towards him at first, instead showing its intimidating and dominating state of being as it slowly moves, sword held off to the side right to the glass and wooden door. Alex spins around and sprints to the nearby metal door and quickly throws it open before slamming it shut. He backs away a little from the door as he tries to get his bearing on what his next course of action should be.

"Hey!" A hand suddenly grabs his shoulder.

"No! Aah! Stop! Get off me!" Alex frantically tries to get out of the hands grip as he swings his fists about.

"Hey hey hey! It's okay! Calm down Alex! It's just me!"

Alex continues to resist until both hands grab his shoulders and force him to look at the person directly. When Alex finally looks he sees that its Jim that startled him. "J-Jim?!" Alex shouts in surprise but also slight relief he sees adult here.

"Yes its me! What's going on? I hear noises and- What happened to you?" He begins to ask but soon his look turns to concern as he takes in Alex's appearance. No doubt the Lyoko warrior doesn't exactly look like a good sight from the near death experience he just had.

"Something- Someone- I don't know! I was just attacked and—

*CRASH*

Alex flinches hard as the sound of the glass breaking and the wood splintering can be heard on the other side of the door he just came through. Both of them look towards the metal door. "It's coming." Alex fearfully states as he turns back to Jim and tries to pull him away from the noise. "Let's go. Jim c'mon! We need to get help!" He tries to bring him away from his attacker but the gym coach isn't having it.

"Hold up now. Someone attacked you? Not on my watch no one does." Jim threateningly states as he pulls his grip from Alex and stalks up to the metal door.

"Wait, Jim no don't!" Alex stays rooted in his spot as he watches Jim almost stomp up to the door he escaped through earlier.

"Hey!" Jim pounds on the door. "I don't know who you are but no one messes with my students but me!" He tries to open the door. "You hear me?! You—"

In that moment, before Jim can try to get through the door, it's suddenly kicked in.

Violently.

Jim lets out a loud cry of pain as he's suddenly sent flying through the air.

Alex widens his eyes and just barely manages to duck under the flying coach before he has to outright drop to the ground as the door itself almost takes him out too. The door makes a lot of banging sounds as it repeatedly hits the floor before settling down. At the same time Jim slams hard into the ground several feet away from Alex as he gets to his hands and knees. "Jim!" He shouts the coaches name and scrambles to him to quickly check the coach. "Jim! Jim! Jim! Are you okay?! Wake up! Wake up!" Alex frantically tries to shake the coach awake but finds the gym teacher is completely knocked out cold from the impact. Alex just about curses before he realizes why this happened. He turns to the door and his heart just about drops into his stomach.

Just like before, the samurai is right there and staring right at them, sword in hand and slowly making its way towards Alex and Jim. Only this time Alex cannot run from it as that mean leaving Jim alone with that thing.

With waking Jim up failed and his attacker slowly stalking up to him, Alex frantically looks around, trying to find something or anything that could help both him and Jim survive or getaway from the thing. The hallway is pretty bear with several doors leading to the science classes in the area. Nothing else can be seen or used to help him… except one.

Before the samurai can get too close, Alex jolts to his feet and grabs the fire extinguisher from its bracket on the wall and holds it by the nozzle on top of the red tank to his side.

The samurai stops for a second, then it proceeds to grab its sword with both hands and slowly raise it above its head. They are still a bit of a distance away from each other but the threat is still the same as they both stare at each other, a challenge set for the both of them as they ready their weapons.

The samurai takes one step forward.

"Hraaahhh!" Alex throws the fire extinguisher towards his opponent and goes down to Jim. With the object thrown at it, the samurai makes no attempt to dodge the weapon thrown at him and instead swings his sword down right at the red tank.

His sword hits right at the top of the tank where the nozzle is.

*CRINK*

The loud sound of metal hitting metal can be heard, followed by the intense sound of pressurized air being released. Just as the nozzle is broken off, a large cloud of white smoke engulfs the front of the samurai, blocking its view from its target. Naturally it would push forward to rush the Lyoko Warrior before it can escape again except the fire extinguisher is still going off. The red tank slams into one of the lockers on the side wall, denting it severely but this only makes the red tank redirect across the other side of the hallway and slam into more lockers and vice versa. All the while the extinguisher smoke continues to leak out of the red tank, creating an even bigger cloud of smoke to obstruct its view. Several seconds pass as the extinguisher makes a mess of the hallway but when it finally calms down and isn't a deadly flying object is when the samurai pushes through the smoke to look for its target.

Theirs nothing.

It lets out a menacing growl and looks around all of the hallway as the rest of the smoke dissipates onto the floor. It's hand grip on its sword tightens a fair bit in anger as it lets out an audible growl of frustration. With its target gone, it stalks forward and makes its way out of the hallway to continue its search.

Alex though is nearby still. His hand is covering his mouth as he tries to get his breathing back in order. While the extinguisher did its job, it took as much of Alex's strength as he could muster and promptly dragged Jim into the closest science room he could get to and locked it. The smoke and sounds the extinguisher made were the cover he needed to escape its line of sight.

After a long tense and silent moment of what feels like hours for Alex, he concentrates in his hearing to see if whatever was trying to kill him is still outside. When all he hears is silence he removes his hand from his mouth and lets out a long breath of air as his body relaxes. He just sits there in the science class and takes lungful's of air to get his breathing back in order and keeping him from having a panic attack. After almost a minute of him calming himself down he looks to his side. Jim is still on the floor, unmoving. "Jim?" Worry starts to set in for him as he notices a trail of blood starting to run down the side of Jim's head. He reaches over to try to wake the knocked-out gym coach.

He freezes as he hears sounds coming from outside. Panic begins to set in for him on the close proximity of movement. Alex frantically looks around until he looks again at the unconscious coach, a look of pain on his face and the still red line on the side of his face.

Soon enough, anger begins to rise in Alex he remembers what Jim tried to do earlier. While Alex was frantic and trying to run, scared out of his mind Jim didn't hesitate to try to help and confront the person that had attacked him. Alex's hand clenches tightly in anger as he quickly begins scanning around the room for anything he can use. His search doesn't take long as he spots one of those fake skeleton stands on a pole near the door. He steps up to it and grabs the skeleton before tossing it to the ground, no longer caring about the noise factor and just wanting his weapon. The sounds outside stop as he takes off the hook for the skeleton and pulls up the metal pole. Thankfully the wheels section at the bottom are able to detach from the rest of it. With his metal pole weapon in hand, he smirks.

Then the handle begins to turn but he was able to lock it beforehand. Stepping up to the door, he casts one last look at Jim before gripping his pole tightly. 'I need to get him help. Force it back, get it to chase me.' With the door trying to be open more frantically, Alex grits his teeth as he lets his anger try to take over, wanting nothing more than to do as much damage to his attacker as possible. He reaches forward and swings the door wide open before swinging wildly out the door. "Get away from us!" He yells loudly in anger as he swings widely around in front of the door as he steps out, making sure nothing gets into the room. He hears yelling as he forces the figures back and away from him.

"ALEX!"

The sudden shout and yell of a person for his name causes him to pause. He is breathing heavily as his blinks his eyes a few times, trying to clear the haze he about put himself in as he tries to take stock of the situation. His makeshift weapon is still held high and tightly in his hands but he's soon able to see what happened exactly.

It wasn't the samurai from earlier that was trying to get in. It's the principal, the nurse, and some other faculty members that are around him. Some of them are even on the floor, not injured but just fell back when Alex burst forth.

The Principal is in front of him, a look of shock and worry on him as he has his hands out in a calming gesture. "Alex, its okay. You don't have to worry."

"P… Principal Delmas?" Alex blinks a couple times as he recognizes the man. "Nurse… you…" He can't even finish saying her name before he relaxes and lets go of his weapon. It clatters to the ground with an audible metallic noise. He almost collapses if the principal didn't catch him.

"Alex! What going on? What happened to the hallway?" The principal asks in an even concerned tone. As he says that Alex manages to take a little look around the hallway. The door from the hallways entrance is still laying on the ground with the broken hinges still attached. Much of the hallway is also covered in a powdered white dust that came form the fire extinguisher going off. Said fire extinguisher is laying off to the side with one of the teachers looking at it closely and noting the broken nuzzle piece, along with the various dents and caved in lockers around.

Alex blinks a few times as he just barely manages to get himself oriented over the whole thing. "Their… was… their was… something and… Jim and I—" As Alex just barley manages to get his thoughts together after the ordeal, he suddenly remembers who just tried to help him. "JIM!" He shouts just as the nurse tries to come up to him and check him for injuries but Alex quickly scrambles out of the principals grip. They shout at him but he heads back in the science classroom, cursing as he does when he slips and hits the ground as he tries to take the corner into the room. That doesn't stop him from moving forward and getting to Jim. Still the gym coach is still out of it. "Nurse!"

Nurse Yolanda bolts in and widens her eyes as she stares at the unconscious man. "Jim! Give me some room." She quickly begins checking him for injuries as Alex steps back and lets her do her job. "I need a first-air kit from one of these rooms now!" She yells to the door as the other faculty members poke theirs heads in to see what's going on. Some of them leave to check out the other science classrooms. Since theirs experiments that are usually done in the science classrooms it's a given for most of them to be stocked with some form of medical aid.

Alex sits next to Jim as the nurse looks him over, his back to some of the cabinets in the room. He just tries to calm his rapidly beating heart before the principal kneels next to him. "Son, what happened to you both?"

"…" Alex tries to speak before he takes a deep breath and swallows the lump in his breath. "… Attacked… we… attacked…" He barely manages to get out but is all that is really needed to say about the whole situation.

"Who? Who attacked you?" Principal Delmas does what he can to get more information from the shaken student.

"Alex…" He looks over at the nurse as she calls his name. He looks over at her to see her staring at him with a critical look. "Your injured."

'… Injured?' He questions in his own head before notices a trail of red on the ground… leading up to him. While the nurse yells at the other faculty members to grab any first aid kits in the science classrooms as well as for the principal to call the police, Alex is looking down at his arm to see a very noticeable amount of red on his arm. He brings his arm up and sees what happened. Somehow in all the mess he was cut on his arm, a large clean cut going almost all the length of his forearm and was bleeding quite a bit. Now that he notices it, the adrenaline is starting to fade and he takes note of the amount of blood he dripped all over the place.

"Oh… sorry." Despite how everything went, his mind defaults to simply apologizing as the nurse begins to wrap his arm tightly in bandages and gauze.

The building that was the point of the attack was a bit aways from the cafeteria so the majority of the student body was at lunch when everything went down, including the rest of the Lyoko warriors.

While the rest of the group sit around eating, one of them has a bit of a dilemma in terms of the sole subject of her report is gone.

"Maybe one of the kids took it." Ulrich suggest to Yumi.

"Don't forget the electric plugs." Yumi points out. She had brought a real life and authentic ancient Japanese samurai armor complete with an intact katana saber along with other Japanese curious for the subject of her report for class to almost guarantee her an A.

The problem is the fact her family's armor is gone and she has no idea what happened or who took it with the only indicator she was able to note is the shorted out electrical socket near the cabinet she stored the stuff in. Common occurrence when it comes to XANA possessing some objects is the electrical socket it uses to travel and almost always leaves them shorted out, blackened and unusable.

"Yeah. Look, if XANA is in on this, we'd better not count on Aelita. We can't reach her on Lyoko." Odd points out another subject of importance for them all, whether Taelia is Aelita or not.

"Odd, we can't reach her on Lyoko," Jeremie begins to say calmly before he suddenly leans over the table to yell in Odd's face. "'CAUSE SHE ISN'T ON LYOKO!" Jeremie sits back down and they all turn around to look at Taelia. She looks back at them.

Yumi shakes her head in disbelief at the claim. "Sorry, you guys, but I can't believe that that girl is Aelita." She makes her opinion known.

"Well I know somebody who's dying to believe it." Ulrich states as he glances at Jeremie.

Before anymore conversations can be said and they discuss more on the subject, the door to the cafeteria is open and in walks Principal Delmas, along with several police officers. The mood in the cafeteria turns low as the whole place quiets down.

"Children, please give me your attention. One of your fellow students, as well as our own Jim, whom you all know and whom you respect, I know…"

"Let's not go overboard, huh?" Odd quietly jokes to the others at the table.

"…have recently been attacked. Their attacker was a person who uh… well, a person who was wearing armor, the armor of a samurai. Ahem. And this individual is still at large. Any information you can contribute to the police would be more than welcome."

"We can't wait any longer!" This gets Yumi's attention and now she's on edge with the fact her family's armor is gone and now its on a rampage.

"We have to go to Lyoko, find Aelita and deactivate the tower." Ulrich proposes that they do.

"When are you going to get it into your thick heads, that if the samurai is controlled by XANA, that he's after Taelia? It makes sense, doesn't it, huh? Because Taelia is Aelita! Grr!" Jeremie grunts in frustration before he gets up in a huff and leaves the group.

"Wow, he's really flipped his lid, huh?" Odd comments on the annoyed and pretty angry Jeremie. They don't notice the officer walk up to them until he's right next to them and speaks.

"Excuse me, Miss." He speaks to Yumi. "It seems that this armor belongs to you." He informs her and the group.

"Uh…" Yumi mutters in unsureness at what this means.

"You better come with us to answer some questions. And it also involves your friend? Alex I believe his name was." He adds and walks to the door.

"Wait, what about Alex? What happened?" Ulrich asks worriedly as he gets up.

Principal Delmas looks at them worried. "He was the student that was attacked."

Yumi and Odd join Ulrich in standing up.

While Jeremie is working to try to convince Taelia of her special situation that he claims she is, Yumi is inside the principal's office with some officers, the principal himself and Alex with his arm bandaged up.

"It's not true." Yumi states to the officer interviewing her.

"Anyway, this samurai's armor does belong to you…?" The officer clarifies one more time for her.

"Well, yes, t-to my parents…" She hesitates in answering about the whole thing, even looking fearfully to the side at the person sitting in another chair next to her

The officer nods and looks at Alex. "And you are sure it was her armor that attacked you?"

"It was A samurai armor that attacked me. I never saw the armor that Yumi brought since it was covered by a sheet when we brought it in. But I don't know anyone else who would bring something like that to school so…" Alex doesn't finish his statement since everyone already knows what he's implying.

Yumi looks down at that, no doubt feeling bad at the fact it was her family's armor and weapon, and her project, that hurt him.

"Point being we left the armor in the cupboard in one of the classrooms and left it there for her presentation. That was it." Alex finishes explaining what happened in the morning.

The officer nods, writing a few things down before looking back up at them, "And either of you have no idea who might have stolen it?" The officer asks them.

Both student's shake their heads no at the question.

"Alright then." He nods and looks at Alex. "Alex, I think we got everything we need from you. Your free to leave. Miss Ishiyama we still need more information from you."

"A-Alright." Yumi hesitantly replies, still unsure and worried about the whole thing. Alex stands up and turns to walk out the office.

"Ngh!" Alex grunts as he cradles his arm with the bandage on it.

"Alex!" Yumi shouts in worry as he leans a little next to her.

"Are you alright?" The officer asks as the others take a step to make sure the student is alright.

Alex hums a little as he leans close to Yumi's head. Her eyes widen for a second before she looks normal again. Alex stands up and waves them down. "I'm good. Was just surprised by the aching."

The officer purses his lips and relaxes. "Very well. Be careful out there and take it easy.

"Yes sir." Alex replies and walks out the door. He casts one last look at Yumi as she sees him out of the corner of her eye. He walks out, leaving Yumi with the officers and for her to sigh.

Outside of the office sits Odd and Ulrich on the bench nearby, waiting to see what happened and how their friends are.

"What do you think happened?" Odd asks Ulrich.

He sighs at the question and rubs his head with his hand. "I'm not sure. With Jim having been attacked and Alex too, it's definitely bad since they have the police here and cancelled classes. We just have to hope—" He's interrupted as the office door opens and Alex walks out. "Alex!" Ulrich shouts in relief, shifting Odd's attention to their friend too.

Alex looks up in surprise as his two friends get up from the bench to go to him. "Oh! Hey guys." He gives them a small smile as he waves at them with his bandaged arm.

This gets the both of them to pause and stare at his injury. "Duuuuuude, what happened?" Odd asks in surprise at his injury.

Alex sighs as he rubs his arm. "Certain… people wanted to get at me." He takes another look at the office door before he walks away and leads them away. "But right now we need to go."

Ulrich looks at him surprised as he and Odd keep step in behind him. "What why? What about Yumi?" He asks.

"Yumi still needs to give as much information on her family's armor as she can. So she's not going to leave anytime soon." Ulrich looks to protest what Alex said before Odd stops him.

"He's right Ulrich. Look, we can't do anything here for Yumi right now. We have to tell Jeremie to meet us at the factory."

Ulrich mumbles in frustration but nods soon after he grabs his phone. "Your right. Best thing we can do is get this threat dealt with as soon as we can." He calls Jeremie and waits for him to answer, only he doesn't. "Jeremie's voicemail is on now…"

This gets them to double time it to the factory.

At said Factory is both Jeremie and Taelia with in the confines of the building. After Jeremie had left to find Taelia, he found her but they had also been attacked by the sabre and samurai armor wielding figure. They were able to make it out of the building and went into the schools basement to get away from their attacker. The two of them were barely able to get away from it and Jeremie still on the idea that Taelia is Aelita used the boiler room path to get them both to the factory post haste.

Jermie was hoping that by bringing her there that this would somehow trigger some memory in Taelia/Aelita so he can confirm it is in fact her.

"Wow… this place is weird." Taelia comments as she looks around the inside of the factory.

"Follow me." Jeremie orders her to do.

The two enter the elevator lift where Jeremie checks his watch and enters a code into the lift control panel, and Taelia watches. A short ride down and soon enough the two of them make it to the supercomputer lab.

"Come on." Jeremie leads her into the room and takes his seat as usual and punches up a map of the virtual world. "That's Lyoko. The virtual world where you once lived. Doesn't that ring a bell at all?" He asks her.

Taelia is still stumped by the question and shakes her head. Even so she still has to ask a question as she gazes around the room some more as she remembers the thing that tried to attack them. "And this um, this XANA you talked about, does he also live in the same world?"

"Yes. He's got total control." He answers her.

"But if he's so dangerous, why don't you destroy Lyoko?" She asks him like it's the most obvious answer out there.

Jeremie hesitates to answer for a second. "B-because you're part of… it… because you were part of this world."

Taelia shakes her head. "You're totally crazy! This whole story is crazy!" She outright declares for Jeremie and pretty everyone and everything that is with Lyoko. The computer whiz himself sighs at her words. "You know what I think? If all this stuff is so dangerous, it's time you destroyed it once and for all." She declares firmly to him to do.

This gets Jeremie's attention as he looks at her. "Do you… do you really think so?" He asks her, unsure if he really should and just be done with the whole thing of XANA's attacks. Taelia wastes no time and nods that he should shut down Lyoko. Jeremie lowers his head in acceptance. His fingers hover hesitantly over the keyboard, getting ready to set things up for a full shutdown of the supercomputer.

"Jeremie, stop!" Jeremie jerks a little at the shout. Both Taelia and Jeremie look to the side to see Ulrich, Odd and Alex climbing down the ladder to the lab.

"Huh?!" Jeremie shouts in surprise as he sees them.

"Have you gone mad or what, Einstein?! What if Aelita is still on Lyoko?" Odd proclaims and tries to make Jeremie see reason.

This annoys Jeremie as he glares at them. "But she isn't, I tell you! Look, she's there. She's right in front of you." He counters as he points to Taelia, who looks a little uncomfortable about the whole thing/

"That's not enough Jeremie." Alex answers firmly. "We need actual proof and not on blind faith." While Alex is in agreement that it would be nice and a joy to finally have Aelita in the real world and not stuck on Lyoko, unless he or anyone of them actually sees Aelita appear in a scanner then he's going to be skeptical.

"He's right." Ulrich chimes in now. "Jeremie, we know you've dreamt of seeing Aelita in reality for months. But please come down to Earth. You can't be sure! And what if you were mistaken?!" He asks the brainiac.

"You mean you're ready to take the risk of destroying Aelita by destroying XANA, huh?" Odd adds on how crazy the whole thing is.

"We've got to make sure. You've got to let us go to Lyoko." Ulrich proposes they do. The best option they can go for to confirm Aelita is truly in Lyoko or not is to go there themselves.

Jeremie looks at them skeptically. "And if Aelita's not there, who's going to deactivate the tower?" He tries to counter their idea of going.

"We have to take the risk!" But Ulrich and them aren't having it. They want to go.

Jeremie purses his lips in annoyance before he sighs and nods. Taelia looks on in confusion as Odd and Ulrich go into the elevator. "Alex? You coming?" Odd asks when he notices that Alex is still next to Jeremie.

He shakes his head and nods for them to go. "We don't need all of us to go into Lyoko. With that… thing still out there prowling around, we can't afford to leave the supercomputer undefended." He gives them his reason for staying.

"You sure about that?" Ulrich asks just to make sure Alex is sure of his decision. "You really want to take the chance of going up against that thing again?"

Alex doesn't answer at first. Instead he simply rubs his arm that's bandaged up with his other hand. A look of determination is firmly set on his face. "I'm sure."

With that done, Ulrich and Odd set the elevator to head on down to the scanner room. Alex lets out a breath of air and steps up next to Jeremie. "You okay?" As much as Jeremie is annoyed with them not believing him about Aelita, he's still concerned for his friend, especially now that he sees Alex is injured.

"I'm okay." Alex answers back without looking at him, flexing his fingers as he does while he looks at the map of Lyoko. "Just wanna be ready. I've got a score to settle with XANA." He finishes saying with a firm voice of determination. Jeremie looks at him worriedly before he looks back at the computer to virtualize the others down below.

Taelia looks warily at the duo.

Minutes pass as they stare at the screen and watch as Ulrich and Odd make it to Lyoko and begin looking around for Aelita in the Mountain sector of the place.

"Can you see anything?" Jeremie asks them.

"Yes, Jeremie. Mountains. Lots of them." Ulrich replies in an obvious tone.

"We need a lead." Alex mutters lowly before looking at Jeremie. "Do you have any idea where exactly she was last?"

"I'm not sure. She had just left the tower and that was it." Jeremie grumbles before he begins typing on his computer. "I'm starting the scan to trace the tower that XANA activated. You have to understand, Taelia- if you're not Aelita, then we've got to—" Alex notes as Jeremie pauses while he himself is staring at the screen for any sign of Aelita. "Taelia?"

Alex gets a bad feeling as he turns back and looks around. His body sulks as he looks annoyed to all hell. "Oh you have got to be freakin' kidding me."

Taelia is gone.

"She's gone!" Jeremie shouts.

"Yes I see that genius!" Alex shouts back at Jeremie, making the blonde flinch at the yell. "Why did you have to show her this place?" He mumbles under his breath before waving to the computer. "Camera. Bring up the camera of the factories entrance." Jeremie wastes no time in typing in the commands to pull up the camera feeds for the inside of the factory with him looking for the one for the entrance. Alex takes another look back at the room and notes the elevator is still there with them. 'Okay, so she instead decided to climb the ladder up. Quieter and much less likely for us to hear her.'

"Got it!" Jeremie announces as an another window pops up on screen over the Lyoko map that shows the factories front entrance camera. They both look on and barely manage to catch Taelia sprinting away from the factory. "There she is."

"Yeah there she goes." Alex grumbles frustrated before he pushes himself away from Jeremie and his computer. "I'm going after her." He begins walking to the elevator.

"What?!" This causes Jeremie to whirl around in his chair to stare at him. "And do what?

"Well for one thing to try to convince her to not say anything, but I also want to go and make sure Yumi is okay. That thing wants those of us involved in Lyoko and if Taelia isn't Aelita—"

"Then that means it's going to focus on Yumi." Jeremie states before he sighs and nods to Alex. "Alright then. I'll keep monitoring the others and hopefully we can get this done."

"Good." Alex replies and hits the elevator to bring him back up.

"Good luck!" Jeremie wishes him luck as the doors begin to close.

"You too!" Alex calls out just as they close. From there he's left in silence with the only thing he hears is the whirring sounds of the elevator moving. He sighs and leans back in the elevator. "… Alright then."

Back at the school, Yumi is done in the pincipal's office. She steps out of the room and begins making her way out of the hallway. As she goes, Taelia moves through the hallway and they pass by each other. The two of them exchange looks as they walk. Neither of them stop and Taelia walks into the principal's office.

Yumi narrows her eyes at her before she pulls out her phone and calls Jeremie as she begins walking.

Jeremie is still at the lab for the supercomputer and gets the call from Yumi. He picks up albeit a little nervously.

"Oh, hi, Yumi. Well, is everything ok?" He asks.

"Yes, they finished questioning me, but I just saw Taelia and she looked like she was in a hurry to go and see the principal." She quickly informs him of what she saw.

"Oh, that can't be! This is awful! Horrible! Alex was too late." Jeremie sulks in his seat. "Yumi, I took Taelia to the factory…" He reveals to her what happened.

"You what?!" Yumi shouts in surprise as she begins almost running down the halls. "She's going to tell the cops everything! Be right there."

"See if you can call Alex. He took off to try to catch up to and stop Taelia but looks like with him being too late you both might as well get back here." Jeremie sighs into his chair.

"Will do." Yumi replies and ends the call. She just about starts sprinting while calling Alex, even remembering what he said earlier ago. 'Factory.' That's what he whispered to her when he feigned his arm hurting when they were both in the principals office. With her familys armor and sword going rogue, its important that all of them head for the factory to keep other people out of harms way and for as many of them is needed to deactivate the tower. The number rings a few times as she sprints towards the boiler room. "C'mon Alex! Pick up."

"Hello?" Alex answers his phone as he enters the school ground, coming from the forest entrance.

"Alex! It's Yumi! Where are you?" She asks almost frantically. Alex can barely hear the sounds of her heavy breathing and the sounds of her shoes stomping on the ground.

"Just got back to school. I'm trying to find Taelia. She—"

"Is already telling the police about the factory! I just saw her.'

"What?!" Alex shouts into his phone. He stops in place and growls to himself at his slow place. "Of course she did damnit!" He shouts in anger before he tries to calm down. "Alright, head to the factory as fast as you can. The others are looking for Aelita as we speak. I'll double back and start making my way there and meet you at the factory."

"Alright. I'm just entering the boiler room so I should be able to- AAHHH!"

"Yumi?! Yumi what?! What's going on?!" Alex shouts into his phone as he hears Yumi yell over the phone. "Yumi talk to me!"

"Yumi!"

*Crack*

A large armored foot steps on and crushes the phone. The samurai looks up and stares as the Lyoko warrior Yumi is sprinting down the boiler room halls and into the sewers. A menacing growl emanates from it as it begins chasing after her.

Alex looks down and stares at the dial tone coming from his phone. The call was disconnected, leaving Alex in the dark as to what exactly happened but he has a pretty good idea of what it is that happened.

"Yumi…" His tone is quiet for a second… right before his hand tightens considerably around his phone, almost threatening to break the thing if he does it any tighter. He grits his teeth in anger as he begins sprinting forward towards the boiler room, hoping to catch up to Yumi and her pursuer.

"There! Him!"

Unfortunately he's going to be delayed.

Alex slides to a stop before he can enter the main building, in one of the arched hallways outside the building, and looks to the side to see Taelia and some police officers walking towards him, or more specifically fast walking towards him. "Oh no come on." Alex mumbles in annoyance.

"He knows who or what it was that stole the armor and has been attacking everyone. He and that girl Yumi." Taelia outright accuses him with a finger point to add. They stop a few steps away from Alex.

One of the officers looks cross at Alex as he crosses his arms. "Looks like you didn't tell us everything son."

Alex tenses up as he stares warily at them. The other officer sighs as he walks up to Alex and grabs his arm. "C'mon kid. Your going to tell us everything we need to—"

"Hrah!" As the officer grabs Alex's left arm, the Lyoko warrior swings his arm to the side, pulling the officer a little off-balance but its enough for Alex to use his free hand to launch a palm strike into the officers solar plexus. The man lets go and leans over a little as he tries to get his breath back. Needless to say Taelia and the other officers widen their eyes in surprise at the action but the officer is quick to spring into action as he rushes forward to subdue Alex.

Alex is already moving though as he swings around and launches a kick to the breathless officer. With him still off-balance and trying to get his breathing back in control, he stumbles back and falls on top of his fellow officer, taking both of them to the ground.

He sighs in relief at his moves. "Those classes with Ulrich and Yumi really paid off." He comments under his breath before looking up at Taelia.

As soon as their eyes meet does she look scared and takes a step back from him. Normally Alex would be willing and happy to give her a piece of his mind but right now one of his friends is in serious danger. With one last glare towards Taelia, Alex turns around and begins sprinting away before the officers can get up.

He hears yelling from behind him but he takes off past some of the other buildings, taking as many corners as he can to break line of sight from them. It isn't long till he manages to make enough distance from them that he stops to take a breath. "Okay, lost them. Need to get back to the factory before Taelia and them get there. Can't let them catch, not until I can make it to Yumi."

He steps forward… then stops as he realizes a small conundrum. 'But that thing has a sword as a weapon and I currently have nothing. I need a weapon. Or at least something to defend myself and I can't guarantee theirs something I can find at the factory to help to—'

His thoughts are stopped when he spots a lone building on the edge of the school campus. The old garden shed he remembers Millie snuck into one time. He smiles as he bee-lines it for it. It's pretty easy for him to get in and allows him to take a gander of what he has access to.

A smile forms on his face.

Back at the factory, Jeremie, Odd and Ulrich are doing what they can to make progress in finding Aelita and dealing with XANA. Jeremie was running a search for the tower and was able to find it.

"Odd, Ulrich! The tower XANA's activated has been localised at 30 degrees north in… in the Forest area!" He quickly informs them.

While that is good news for them that they found the tower but unfortunately the only one who can do anything with it is not there to help them. "Without Aelita, that's not going to do us a lot of good." Ulrich annoyingly states as he looks around. Him and Odd are still looking around to find Aelita. Earlier ago Odd had another vision that showed him that Aelita was trapped, but it didn't say exactly where hse was trapped, hence their search.

Odd looks out over the edge of the platform of ice they are on and sees the location from his vision, the Guardian creature that XANA used before with Yumi and all with Aelita trapped within.

"Look there! That ball of fire! That's exactly what I saw before. Aelita's inside it!" Odd points out towards it. "YAAAAH!" And just like that Odd wastes no time in jumping off the edge to get to Aelita.

"Jeremie, we found her!" Ulrich says to Jeremie as he jumps off and heads after Odd. Jeremie sighs in relief that they truly found her. Odd and Ulrich reach the Guardian.

"That ball is what's blocking the communication with Aelita." Odd points out. Just like with Yumi the first time, they aren't able to talk to Aelita until they get her out of there.

"It's a Guardian. The same monster that imprisoned Yumi." Ulrich reminds them of what had happened before.

"Right. And Aelita saved her by convincing the monster he had the wrong prisoner." Odd also reminds them of the trick that Aelita used on the monster.

"Yeah, but Aelita is the prisoner this time." Ulrich states their problem they have now for their situation. "So now, the only solution is to use force." Without missing a beat and wanting to get her out now, he draws his sabre and strikes the Guardian a couple of times.

While Jeremie watches them try what they can to make the Guardian release Aelita, he glances over at the camera. He jerks up in his seat as he spots Yumi running into the factory. "Guys! I just spotted Yumi. She made it to the factory. Maybe she can help you guys—" Jeremie stops as he spots something else following Yumi. His eyes widen when he spots a figure decked out in Samurai armor and carrying a sabre following after her. Jeremie quickly switches the camera feed till he spots the ground floor in front of the elevator. Yumi steps up to the elevator and is about to go in but stops for a some reason. "What? Yumi what are you doing?" Jeremie quietly whispers to himself as to what she's doing.

She takes a few steps away from the elevator. She jerks around just as the Samurai lands on the floor, cracking it a little. Yumi looks to yell at it, even goading it a little, before she takes off to the side and sprints elsewhere into the factory. The Samuria stands tall and follows after here, away from Jeremie.

"Oh Yumi you genius! Thank you!" Jeremie shouts out loud in thanks to her. Guys! The Samurai armor that XANA is controlling is here at the factory but Yumi led it away. Any luck with Aelita?"

"Jeremie! Nothings working. We're going to need some help down here or else we'll never be able to get Aelita out of here." Ulrich calls to him and informs him of their situation.

Jeremie grumbles in annoyance at the situation. "Okay okay give me a sec." Jeremie says as he begins to think on what to do with closed eyes and crossed arms. 'Last time we tricked the Guardian it was because of Aelita. She simply made the Guardian think it had the wrong person by making a copy of Yumi at the time when she was trapped. With Aelita trapped she can't make a copy to get herself out of there and none of us can make a cop—' His train of thought halts as he opens his eyes. 'Or maybe… I can…' He gets to work inputting the commands onto his computer. "Hold on guys. I think I got an idea." I informs them over the mic as his fingers fly across the keyboard.

Meanwhile in another part of the factory, Yumi is slowly moving her way through the depths of the factory itself. After having led the possessed Samurai armor deep into the factory as a means to keep it from messing up Jeremie and the others.

She goes and hunkers down near a stack of wooden crates as she reaches for her pocket. She mentally grumbles in annoyance at the fact she can't even call the others to wonder where they are and if she can get some help. With the armor having surprised her at the school, she had inadvertently dropped her phone and now she can't call them. She peaks around the crates and looks around to see if her pursuer is still after her.

When theirs nothing there, she lets out a sigh of relief.

*Tap*

Her eyes widen as she throws herself to the side.

*Shink*

She rolls on the ground a couple times before she lands on her side and looks back. Just barely she was able to dodge out of the way of the sabre that was going to hit her. The Samurai wrenches its sabre out of the crate, wood splinters flinging off it and onto Yumi. She holds her hand up to shield her face but she looks back up real quick to her attacker. The Samurai slowly stands tall and turns to Yumi, a menacing growl emanating from it. It takes a step towards her, prompting Yumi to fearfully begin to crawl away from the monster.

She doesn't move for long though as her hand brushes against a metal pipe. She looks down surprised before she quickly grabs it and pushes herself back to her feet. She takes a few long stride steps away from the possessed armor to gain distance and properly set herself up. She takes a ready firm stance with her pipe held tightly in her hands. The Samurai continues to walk up to her unperturbed as it grips its sabre with both hands. Yumi grits her teeth as he readies herself.

'Alright then. Let's do this.'

In the rest of the factory, Jeremie is hard at work trying to make his program work, especially since this is the first time he's going to try to make something like this work. Midway through his typing he glances at the security screen and almost jumps up when he notices more people coming to the factory.

Taelia leads the principal and police officers into the factory.

"Already? To think I blew our whole cover by talking to a perfect stranger…" Jeremie mumbles in annoyance with himself over the deteriorating situation for them.

"Hey, how 'bout that idea of yours?" Ulrich calls out from Lyoko, urging Jeremie to hurry up and finish his work.

"Almost there. Taelia finally made it to the factory and she's got the police with her. The programs almost ready. I just need to…" His thoughts are interrupted when he looks at another security screen and sees the entrance of the elevator. More specifically theirs someone standing in front of it. "What? But how…" Jeremie shakes his head and puts the finishing touches on his program. "It's ready! Here goes." With the enter key pressed and his program sent, he looks back at the security footage.

On the surveillance footage, the police and Talia make it to the bottom floor of the factory. They stop from the elevator though as Alex is shown to be standing there in front of the keypad with a new hatchet in hand. Well, its not exactly new, pretty old with a slightly rusted blade worn wooden handle but overall still perfectly working.

"Stand aside young man." One police officer begins to order him. "We have to get into that elevator."

Just as he takes a step forward, Alex aims the hatchet towards him, surprising the man and making him step back a little.

"I'm sorry, but I'm afraid I can't let you through."

"Alex what's going on?" The principal tells him.

Alex sighs as he lowers his weapon and gives them a tired expression. "Something you can't and won't understand and I do not have the time to explain to you everything." Alex presses the button on the elevator and sends it away, not to the lab but to another floor entirely. "I can't let you get down there and stop the others."

"That's not going to stop us! You're all crazy." Taelia shouts in defiance at him.

"Taelia please." The principal tries to calm her down but she's still angry.

"I know the code to that elevator and you'd be stupid to attack the police of all people." Taelia points out, which prompts the police to pull out their batons or one of their tasers.

"Please Alex. You've always been a good student." The principal tries to placate to Alex and get him to stand down. "I don't know what's going, or what you've gotten yourself and the others into, but please let us go through. Taelia says that the reason for that… thing that attacked you and Jim is through the elevator, then we must stop it by any means necessary."

"…" Alex doesn't reply. He continues to stare at the worried principal, the angry Taelia, and the firm set looks on the police officers.

Seeing the police not backing down, even the offices as they look to get ready to rush him with batons, Alex sighs. He knows that he's no match for the officers, not when they have batons, pepper spray and tasers to incapacitate him. He knows some martial arts thanks to Ulrich but not enough for him to be confident enough to win. Besides he also knows Yumi is in trouble and needs to get to before and becoming exhausted from fighting the officers is not going to help.

He takes one last look at Taelia. "I can't believe you look like her."

"Huh?" Taelia mutters in confusion.

There's only one option Alex can see for himself to do.

"HRAAAAH!"

*CRASH*

With a swing and a yell, Alex swings the hatchet right into the wiring for the elevator above the button. The system goes crazy as sparking wires go off in it's place as Alex recoils away from the it to prevent an electrical discharge on him. The others all stare wide-eyed at the action as now Alex has just prevented them from calling the elevator back to them.

"Wha-What did you do?" The principal asks incredulously.

"Bought my friends some time." Alex replies as he begins to step away from the group. "Good luck finding the elevator. Now if you'll excuse me, I need to help another one of my friends."

"Hold it!"

"Stop!" Both officers try to stop Alex but he's already sprinting away towards the stairs on the side. He doesn't hear them chase after him so hopefully he can help out Yumi without them interfering. While it would have been nice to have their help, he can't take the risk of them getting hurt or more than likely killed by the possessed armor.

He just hopes he's fast enough to help Yumi.

"Yes! Nice job Alex!" Jeremie loudly and happily shouts at his friends action. With the means to call the elevator broken for the police, it'll take them longer to get to Jeremie and potentially stop him and the others from stopping XANA and saving Aelita.

"Jeremie? What's going on?" Ulrich asks as he tries to stop himself from getting shot by some Bloks.

"Alex just did something to stall the police. Don't know how long it'll give us but he did good. How is it going over there?"

"Nngh!" Odd shouts as he barely manages to dodge a laser shot towards him. "Just peachy. We got some friends to deal with and almost got Aelita to the tower." Now that they were able to rescue Aelita from Guardian using the fake copy of Aelita Jeremie programmed, it's business as usual for them to defeat XANA's monsters and get Aetlia to the tower.

"Great work and hurry." Jeremie tells them before he sighs in his chair. "I just hope Alex and Yumi will be able to hold out." He mumbles in hope for his friends.

"Ahh!" Yumi is not doing good at the moment. She shouts as she's hit back and slammed into one of the walls. Her metal pipe clatters to the ground loudly. She groans as she props herself up against the wall as she grabs her side. Her moment of trying to compose herself is halted as she hears the familiar sounds of heavyset footsteps coming to her.

Her eyes widen as she looks up. The Samurai slowly makes its way to her before stopping just in front of her. "Oh…" She mutters weakly at the vulnerable position she's in. Fear seeps into her as she watches the monster slowly grips its sabre tightly with its right hand. "No… no no…" It raises it high into the air above its head. "No! Noo!" She shouts and futilely closes her eyes and looks down as she holds her hands in front of her in a weak defense.

A growl emanates from the armor… right before it strikes downwards.

*Shink*

*Thunk*

Yumi waits to feel the pain… but none ever comes for her. She slowly opens her eyes and looks at the ground. To her surprise the sabre is laying on the ground, including a gloved hand. A quick look up and she sees the armor in the position as if it was slashing downwards, except this time the sword is on the ground and one of its hands is missing. She looks to her left and spots something lodged into a nearby crate. A closer and more focused look and she sees what looks like a hatchet.

"Get away from her." Her eyes widen as she hears the voice. Both she and the armor turn to Yumi's right, the armors left, and spot someone. Yumi smiles as she sees Alex standing there down the hallway from them.

"Alex." Yumi says his name in relief. The armor though lets out a menacing growl as it slowly reaches down and grabs the sabre on the ground using its last hand. Yumi's eyes widen as she quickly scrambles back and away from the possessed armor, putting it between her and Alex. "Alex watch out! That things fast." Yumi quickly warns.

Alex doesn't say anything at first. Instead he reaches behind him and pulls something else out from a sheathe on his back. It's old with the sheathe slightly worn away but Alex pulls out a machete. It's a slightly worn out but still sharp and gleaming as the blade is revealed.

"Whoa… where'd you get that?" Yumi can't help but ask.

"That old garden shack we have slightly off campus. It may be off-limits but they have such good stuff in there." Alex smirks as he widens his stance and glares at the armor. The Samurai stops several feet from Alex and holds its sabre in front towards Alex. Alex himself holds his machete firmly in one hand and waits in a ready stance for it.

Both of them stay still and waiting for the other. The area is silent as they wait with Yumi watching the two of them. She looks around before looking back at the crates for a second before looking back at the front.

…

…

…

… The Samuria rushes forward, raising its sabre high above his head. Alex stiffens up at the rush tactic but his skills so far manage to allow him to just barely deflect the slash of the blade with his own. As the sabre skirts against his machete off to the side, he uses the Samurai's off-balance state to tackle and push it away from him with his free arm.

It doesn't move all that much before it kicks Alex back. Alex grunts as he stumbles back but he's able to barely pull up his machete and block the sabre as it nearly cuts into his chest. He deflects the sabre away from him then he tries to slash at the armor but it deflects his attack this time. This goes back and forth between the two of them as the one handed samurai armor tries to strike Alex down with its one handed sabre strikes, limiting the strength it can put into its attacks. Alex is able to hold his own but his smaller size and shorter blade means he can't put as much force into his attacks, nor reach as much as he would like. XANA also doesn't seem to know the absolute fundamentals of sword combat as its mostly just swinging around and trying to hit Alex or overpower him in general.

The darkened space is slightly illuminated with the flurry of sparks appearing as their blades clash.

In one particular hit, Alex manages to hit away the Sabre as the samurai tries to block it. With it open momentarily Alex quickly brings his machete up and is prepared to strike it down.

"Paah!" Before he can, the samurai uses its stump arm and punches Alex in the stomach, knocking the air out of him and forcing him to step back as he holds his stomach.

"Alex!" He jerks up as he hears Yumi call out to him. Its because of her that he manages to bring his machete up and block the sword strike that would have killed him. He isn't able to deflect the blade away and for a second both blades stay locked together. This is when that despite the Samurai only having one hand on the blade, it's sheer strength overshadows Alex as it simply presses its whole body and strength into his sword, even pressing its forearm on its handless limb onto the back of its sabre to add more pressure. Alex is forced backwards until he is pressed up against a wall. As much as Alex tries to hold the sabre back, he doesn't have a proper angle to put his all into it and can just barely hold it but not for long. He grunts and groans as he strains with the weight of the samurai on him. Ever so slowly the sabres blade inches closer and closer to his throat as Alex is forced to look at the faceless smoky expression on the armors head. He closes his eyes as he can barely feel the blade begin to touch his neck.

"Get away!"

And just like that, Yumi comes out from behind with Alex's thrown hatchet. She yells as she brings the hatchet in an overhead strike and buries the hatchet right into the back left shoulder of the armor. A growl escapes the armor as it gets hit. It swings its stump arm back and knocks Yumi away with a yell from her.

But what she did is just what Alex needed as he pushes the samurai off him and quickly strikes its face. It doesn't do much as the samurai tries to strike him again soon after but Alex quickly rolls to the side and away from as it misses and strikes the wall behind him. The force of it makes the tip of the sword shatter as it impacts the wall. Alex quickly gets up and moves close to Yumi and helps her up. "Yumi! You okay?" He quickly grabs her arm and pulls her up.

"Mm! Yeah, yeah I'm okay." She grunts as she's pulled to her feet. "That was close." Yumi comments once she's to her feet.

"Yeah, thanks for that." He pats her shoulder and gives her a grateful smile. "If you hadn't stepped in I would have lost my head and- WATCH OUT!"

*CLANG*

Just glancing back at the samurai, Alex was able to spot the flying hatchet heading for Yumi. Swinging his machete up he is able to deflect the thrown weapon off to the side. As the weapons clangs on the ground Alex grunts as his hand has pins and needles running through it from the force of the sudden hit. As he rubs his hands together, he looks towards the samurai and narrows his eyes.

The samurai stands there, a gash on the face mask of it as it tightens its grip. Yumi had left the hatchet lodged into its shoulder when she attacked but after the samurai had ripped it out tried to throw right back at them. Alex is relieved his reflexes were able to stop the flying weapon from hitting either of them.

"Looks like he's ready to continue." Alex comments as he readies his machete again.

"What should I do? I don't have a weapon." Yumi comments as she looks at the hatchet some distance from them.

Alex takes in a deep breath breath but keeps his focus on the possessed armor. "You do have a weapon. Just look."

Yumi looks at him confused before her foot grazes against something on the floor. She doesn't immediately look down. Instead she relaxes herself and gets ready alongside Alex.

This time around as they wait for the fight to start, XANA is thoroughly angry with them as just from its stance shows it wants to them sooner rather than later.

Without wasting anymore time, the samurai sprints forward towards them. Yumi drops to the ground but Alex stays standing and keeps his eyes focused on that of opponent's sabre. As raises its weapon high up, Alex raises his machete up and meets the blade as it tries to strike him.

*CLANG*

The weapons impact together, a small flash of sparks appear but what's concerning for Alex is the crack that forms on his weapon.

He's thankful he's got a friend with him. The reason the samurai isn't trying to push Alex back again is the fact that Yumi grabbed the metal pipe she was using before Alex got to her and let the samurai run itself right into her weapon as she propped it into the ground. The pipe was able to slip under the chest armor of the samurai and is no poking out the back collarbone of the armor.

Yumi smiles before she grips the pipe tightly wrenches it to the side. Parts of the armor's straps tear from age and the angle and loosens up but the body still remains intact. With a groan from the armor pushes Alex back and kicks Yumi hard in the stomach. The air is knocked from her as she goes flying back and slams into one of the walls. With that done it brings its sabre down again onto Alex. He blocks it with his machete but that's where the breaking point is. Alex's machete breaks in half but that's what he was expecting. He pushes forward as the sabre goes past him and he grapples onto the samurai's arm.

"Gotcha!" He yells and with the angle he is on, it can't stab him or slash at him. Alex quickly starts stabbing the shoulder of the armor to make it lose its arm now and its final means to hold its weapon. "Arhh!" Unfortunately he's nearly knocked unconscious as the samurai smacks him repeatedly on the back of his head with its other arm. Alex begins to feel dizzy from the multiple blows before it swings one more time at his face. Alex is knocked back and off the samurai as he stumbles back and tries to keep his vision from swimming. Even with that, he still manages to spot the sabre coming for him. He goes to block it.

But he forgot his weapon was broken.

"Ahhhhh!" He shouts as he attempts to back up and the broken tip of the sabre clips the remaining piece of the blade on his machete. It still continues down and Alex shouts as a long cut is driven down his chest. He falls back onto the ground and remains there lying against the wall. Alex groans as he feels the sting of the cut on his chest. He looks down and finds some relief in the fact that the cut isn't deep thanks to the broken tip of the sabre. If it was intact Alex is almost sure he would be dead.

Alex tries to get up but finds himself completely and now feeling the fatigue of everything in the day, not to mention the multiple trips he took going back and forth from the school to the factory and so forth. He doesn't have long to think as the samurai is now standing over him and looking down at him.

"Hehe…" Alex chuckles a little at the position he's in, especially at the fact that he has no energy anymore to move. "Oh I hate you XANA." Alex can't help but snark at the controlled armor. It raises its sabre high into the air. Alex closes his eyes. "I really hate you." He adds one final time as he braces himself.

"Alex!" He hears his name called out by a weak Yumi.

…

…

…

"… Alex?" After a few tense seconds, he hears Yumi speaking again, this time in confusion. He peaks his eyes open and finds himself staring at the tip of the blade as its inches from his head.

"Yumi? What happened?"

"I don't know." Yumi grunts as she braces herself up against the wall and pushes herself up weakly. "It just… stopped." She answers.

At first Alex is confused, until he remembers and smiles, relaxing his body and laying his head back against the wall as he closes his eyes.

"Thank you Aelita."

Jeremie smiles as he watches Aelita deactivate the tower.

"Jeremie what's going on?" At the new voice, Jeremie turns around. He was so focused at checking on the others and making sure Aelita made it that he didn't notice the police and their principal used the ladders to make their way down to him. One police officer is on the floor, with Principal Delmas, who asked the question, and the second officer just stepping off the ladder with Taelia making her way down as well.

Jeremie smiles as he inputs a few commands into the computer. "Don't worry about it sir." He takes one last look up at the computer. "Everythings going to be just fine." He finishes inputting the last command and turns around in his seat to stare at the confused expressions on the adults. "Return to the past now." Just as the officers begin making their way to him, the white light comes up and engulfs everyone.

Just like before, the group finds themselves back in their usual classes, one of which happens to be the principal having an announcement for their class.

"And this is Taelia, your new classmate. I'm sure your fellow students are anxious to meet you." He informs the class and Taelia. A small chorus of greetings come from the surrounding students for the new student.

"I heard Sissi say that the new girl was an orphan. That's why she didn't want to talk about her family." Ulrich informs them, which fits with the groups attempts before in trying to get any sort of information from Taelia but she wasn't speaking to them.

"That's rough." Alex mutter quietly. He's happy to have his own parents but can't really fathom not having parents himself and feels a little bad for Taelia, despite her attempts before at sabotaging the supercomputer.

"Well anyway… if you look closely, you can see their eyes aren't the same. The nose is different, and so is the hair! They're not similar at all. How could you have possibly thought she was Aelita?" Jeremie tries to make the obvious excuse that the girl in front of them is not Aelita.

"Did you just say that we thought…?!" Ulrich mutters in slight surprised confusion from them.

"He sure did." Odd smirks at Jeremie.

"You'd have to be blind to think that!"

"Oh Jeremie." Alex mutters with a tired smile and a shake of his head, remembering how not long ago for them the genius was complete head-over-heels at the idea that Aelita was here. He shakes his head at the thought and looks out the nearby window. 'Hopefully Yumi's presentation will go okay, despite our… precautions.' Alex grunts as he idly scratches his chest a little.

Later, Yumi is presenting the crown jewel of her reports presentation.

"And now to finish my report, I'd like to show you something that's been in my family for centuries. It's a living symbol of Japan. Here."

Just like before, Alex and Ulrich helped Yumi move the object into the classrooms cupboard and now she is ready to unveil properly this time. She opens the cupboard to reveal the suit of authentic Japanese armor with the sabre to match.

The students are impressed as many of them voice it.

"Whoa, man!"

"That's so cool!"

Yumi smiles at the compliments and words that the students and her teacher give her on her report and the end piece she had.

One littler stipulation that she and her friends all agreed on was the multi set up chain-linked metal cuffs and straps. No need for the armor to make another disappearing act on its now is there?

Merry Christmas everyone. Another time for the Lyoko warriors to deal with a XANA mess. This one more focused in attacking them but equally as dangerous considering what was involved. Was debating whether this would be the opportunity for Alex to head to Lyoko to fight there or deal with the samurai in the real world. After I thought of the opportunities for Alex I decided to go ahead with the decision for him to fight the samurai with Yumi. A machete is used sometimes for yard work or construction so it wouldn't be much of a stretch for him to find those types of old tools in the old sheds. Not to mention the time is in the past and in France so I feel like people weren't as strict in terms of locking this stuff up.

Sorry for how long this took. Bouts of inspiration kind of took over for my others stories so those were my focus for a time. I also didn't want to focus this chapter solely on the what everyone was talking and doing and such, which is why I opted for Alex to get into his first scuffle with the armor and show how things went with him, especially in the show we were told some students were attacked and Jim but we only saw what happened with Jim exactly. Felt like things in a realistic sense and how XANA operates restraint against civilians was something XANA isn't exactly known for. I hope you all like this as it was really nice to write and show a bit more combat for Alex and Yumi to get into.

Admiral809: Thanks. Life just has the way of getting in the way I suppose.

It's no worries. I remember how this goes and have some ideas on how things will for Alex further down the line. I understand the worry and hope I'm able to do it justice and incorporate the right plot point.

Reggielacey2 (Ch. 7): I can't say I never thought of the idea of Alex and Yumi together, especially since their angst towards each other at the beginning when Alex first joined would have been an interesting past for them. But even we'll just see how things progress. Currently have no plans for shipping but who knows as things progress.

Thank you all for your continued support. I hope you all have a great Christmas, a Happy Holidays, and a happy soon-to-be New Years. Go ahead and fave, follow, review, whatever you wish. Have fun reading, but most of all, have a great day each and every one of you.