A/N: Here is the next installment of my Jerlita Roleswap AU. Hope you all enjoy it~
Disclaimer: I do not own Code Lyoko in any way, shape, or form.
Note: Remember, any episodes not mentioned either as the inspiration for a chapter or just in passing are not part of the AU, mainly because the roleswap makes them useless, and those only mentioned in passing are just filler and/or would be the same no matter who has what role.
Here we go! Season 1 finale, part 1!
!~~~J~E~R~L~I~T~A~~R~O~L~E~S~W~A~P~~A~U~~~!
"Aelita finally completes Jérémie's materialization, but XANA's not the only one they need to worry about."
Episode 17: Code: EARTH
(Based on Code Earth)
Aelita smiled as the green plus sign flashed on her screen. It was late at night (her alarm clock was currently reading 12:37 AM), and she was in her pajamas, having changed earlier but never going to bed. But that would change soon.
She grabbed her cell phone from off her desk and speed-dialed Yumi's number. After about three rings, Yumi picked up.
"Yes, Aelita?" Yumi sounded like she was still half-asleep. Aelita darted her green eyes towards her alarm clock on her beside table and remembered what time it was.
"Sorry to disturb you, but I have excellent news." She did. She couldn't remember the last time she felt so giddy.
"Don't worry," Yumi softly replied. "I sleep with my phone pressed to my ear in case of a XANA attack. Now, what's the good news, and why can't it wait until normal morning hours?"
"It's time to launch plan alpha," was all Aelita had to say.
Because now, Yumi seemed more awake, "You've finished Jérémie's materialization program?!" Though she was still whispering, because her parents and brother were still asleep.
"Yep," Aelita exclaimed. She wanted to launch the program right now, but she knew she couldn't. Not until all the preparations were in place. Because after Yumi, she needed to give Odd and Ulrich the news as well. "I've launched five dry runs, and all of them were successful."
"Great job, Aelita!" Yumi's smile was obvious, despite the two not being able to see each other. "I'll talk to my parents at breakfast."
"Okay," the pink-ette replied. "I'll tell Odd and Ulrich. Good night, Yumi. Sweet dreams."
"You too," the elder girl said, before hanging up.
Two and a half weeks had passed since the failed materialized on Jérémie's chosen birthday. The group felt more confident in bringing him back to Earth because they now had a plan in place. Jérémie still needed an official surname, but they had all agreed to excuse it as him being an orphan, so he didn't remember his surname. At least, for the time being.
Aelita felt herself get even more excited as she dialed Odd's number (choosing her cousin due to remembering how Ulrich slept with earplugs).
Odd seemed much more alert, as he answered after just one ring, "Hey, Aelita. Shouldn't you be asleep?"
"I'm about to," she reassured him. "Anyways, you're one to talk." She could hear Odd's GameBoy going in the background.
"It's a tournament, okay?" Odd gently retorted. "Zombie Combat. Ulrich's currently trying to beat my high score."
"'Trying'?" she heard Ulrich scoff. "I'm the one who's winning!"
"Either way, Odd, you're not busy," Aelita replied. "Which is good, because I have some news to share. It's time to launch plan alpha."
"Ulrich, you need incredible skill to beat me–" Odd was in the middle of retorting as she was talking, before he stammered out a response for Aelita's news. "Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait! Aelita, did you say 'plan alpha'?"
"What?!" she heard Ulrich ask, right before the GameBoy announced a 'Game Over'. But he didn't care. Neither did Odd, as they both scrambled closer to Odd's phone.
"That's exactly what I said, Odd," Aelita replied, smiling still, especially how her good news had gotten their attention. "I've run five dry runs so far, and they've all worked. Yumi's going to talk to her parents in the morning, and you two also need to do your part."
"No sweat," Odd replied. "We've got that fake letter ready. We'll talk to Mr. Delmas at breakfast."
"Good," Aelita said. "But don't tell Jérémie just yet. I want to run a few more dry runs before we break the news to him."
"Fine," Ulrich cut in. "You're the boss, 'Lita. Good night."
"Go to sleep," Odd said, before hanging up.
"I will," Aelita replied, despite the call having already ended.
After plugging in her cell phone to charge it, she put her computer on sleep mode, before crawling into bed.
She couldn't wait. It wouldn't be long before Jérémie was with them. At least twenty-four hours. The clock was counting down now, to the end, to when they would turn off the supercomputer, pulling the plug on XANA and searching for Jérémie's missing past without XANA getting in the way.
Hopefully.
On a more personal level, she couldn't wait until she and Jérémie could finally be in the same room and feel each other's touch, until Jérémie could finally be a normal human being again, even if he didn't remember who he was before.
But whether he remembered or not, she would always be there for him.
It was this thought that she fell asleep to, dreaming of the Virtual Limbo, and that moment when she and Jérémie were able to read each others' thoughts, feel each other's emotions...
Her slumber was only six hours long, and she was surprised her excitement didn't make her stay up all night, but it was the best sleep she'd had in at least a year.
!~~C~O~D~E~~L~Y~O~K~O~~!
Yumi woke up again later around 7 AM, and after taking her bath, she went downstairs to the kitchen, where her mother was making breakfast, her father was reading the newspaper and drinking his coffee, and Hiroki, still in his pajamas, tried not to fall asleep while waiting for breakfast.
"Oto-san, Oka-san?" Yumi asked as she entered the room. "Can I talk to you for a second?"
"Of course," Akiko replied, as Takeho set down the paper and took a sip of his coffee. Akiko didn't turn around from the stove, and Takeho didn't say a word, but Yumi knew that both of them were listening.
"It's about Aelita's pen pal," Yumi admitted, and noted that Hiroki was paying attention now as well. They, the Lyokowarriors, had decided to indeed keep up the cover of Jérémie being Aelita's pen pal, because that's how he was already known as at Kadic. "Have you changed your mind about him staying here?"
"Of course not, dear," Akiko was quick to reply. "You said it was a favor from Aelita. Why? Has Aelita changed her mind?"
"No, no," Yumi hastily admitted. "I was just asking because last night, Aelita called me and said that the paperwork was finally going through." Not a lie, but not the full truth either. "He'll be transferring to Kadic."
"He'll be living here?" Hiroki asked, sounding like he wasn't too fond of the idea of a stranger living with them.
"Not forever," Yumi truthfully admitted. "Just until a dorm room at Kadic is assigned to him."
"Don't worry," Akiko reassured her daughter. "We're still willing to take him in, whether it's for a couple of days, or a couple of months."
"It should only take about a week," Yumi shrugged. She herself wasn't sure how long it would take for a room at Kadic to open up, but the numbers came from Aelita herself. "But thank you."
"Tell us more about him," Takeho finally spoke. "We don't even know his name."
"Jérémie," Yumi replied. "His name is Jérémie. We don't know his surname, and neither does he. He's an orphan."
Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Hiroki's shoulders drop, and she knew why. Hiroki had always had parents, even if they fought quite a bit, and he could never imagine not knowing his own last name because he was an orphan all his life.
"What is he like?" Takeho asked. "Is he loud, boastful? Does he play sports?"
"Takeho," Akiko warned. "I know Jérémie's a boy, but that's no reason to be rude!"
Yumi, appreciating her mother's defense, replied, "No, he doesn't play any sports, and he's rather quiet and reserved. Up until now, he's been sheltered and home-schooled. So he doesn't really understand everything that we would consider 'normal'." Again, not a lie, but not the full truth either.
"So you haven't chosen him instead of Ulrich?" Hiroki asked.
"Of course not!" Yumi retorted, a light blush dotted on her cheeks. "I'd never steal a friend's crush behind their back!" Truth. She wasn't that type of person. Her affections for Jérémie were also purely platonic; she saw him as a younger brother (one much nicer and more mature than Hiroki).
Takeho gently sighed, "Don't worry, Yumi. Jérémie is still welcome here. He can stay as long as he needs to."
Yumi couldn't stop her sudden burst of excitement. "Thank you, both of you!" she said, as she tightly hugged both of her parents. "You won't regret it, I promise!"
Takeho, Akiko, and Hiroki all watched her run out of the kitchen and back up-stairs to her room, probably to tell Aelita what her parents had just said.
!~~C~O~D~E~~L~Y~O~K~O~~!
At the same time, Ulrich and Odd had sacrificed their breakfast hour to deliver the fake letter to Principal Delmas, who was currently looking it over.
Aelita had written it, pretending to be an orphanage owner in La Rochelle, France, as they admit in the letter that one of their charges, Jérémie (surname currently known), wished to attend Kadic Academy to be closer to his pen pal, Aelita Schaeffer.
Mr. Delmas looked up from the letter, and asked, "Are you certain this Jérémie does not remember his surname?"
"No, Sir," Odd shook his head. "He said it's because he's never known his parents."
"I see," Mr. Delmas went back to the letter. "He'll need a proper surname to label his records here, but I'll leave that up to him to decide." Odd and Ulrich both nodded, as the man seated at his desk in front of them set the letter down before reaching into inside one of his desk drawers and pulling out a file folder labeled 'Hopefuls – Jérémie (surname unknown)'. "All of his paperwork thus far is in order," Mr. Delmas admitted as he placed the letter inside the folder. "This letter recommends him highly, so I see no reason why he can't attend school here." As he placed the folder back inside it's proper drawer. "Let me know when he arrives. Dismissed."
"Yes, Sir," Odd and Ulrich both said simultaneously, before leaving the principal's office together.
!~~C~O~D~E~~L~Y~O~K~O~~!
Once outside in the Administrative Building's waiting area, the two roommates shared a high five, both exclaiming, "Yes!"
Odd slung an arm around Ulrich's shoulder as the two headed towards the cafeteria. Hopefully, Rosa still had some food to spare for them. Success would never taste so good.
"Fantastic!" Odd cheered. "We did it! Jérémie will be with us in no time!"
Jim entered the building just then, and he scowled the moment he saw them. He stood in front of them, blocking their path, "What are you two up to this time? You know this building is off-limits to students unless they are given a note by a teacher. Especially at eight in the morning!"
Ulrich had a swift and calm explanation, "We had an appointment with the principal, Jim." It wasn't an excuse, not this time. It was the truth.
"Yeah," Odd added, "about Aelita's pen pal attending school here!"
Jim laughed out loud, "What a lame excuse! What do you think I am, huh? An idiot?!"
Odd shifted his eyes away from Jim and to his right, "Well..."
"Quiet!" Jim shouted, before leaning down to their level. "I'll bet you two think I'm not onto your pranks with Schaeffer and Ishiyama! You four disappear in the park like some sort of magic! You plot in your rooms!"
"Hey, it's not a crime," Odd shrugged, remembering Mr. Delmas telling Jim to back off, even though Jim didn't.
"Maybe not,"Jim admitted. "But listen up! One of these days, I'm going to find out what the four of you are hiding! And now, to the cafeteria! Hurry up!"
Ulrich and Odd had no choice but to leave, even though that's what they were planning on anyways. The feeling of celebrating had somewhat dissipated due to their run-in with Jim.
Hopefully, they'd bring Jérémie to Earth and shut down XANA before Jim could catch on to their secret.
!~~C~O~D~E~~L~Y~O~K~O~~!
The two reached the courtyard, where most of their fellow students had left the cafeteria, having just finished breakfast.
"You know," Ulrich said, concerned, as the two were walking towards their destination, "we need to be careful about Jim. If he keeps playing detective, he's going to find one of our secret passages..."
Hervé knowing (sort of) was enough. Even if he was convinced that Jérémie was actually an AI, he was still a hazard, because he could go public with this knowledge at any time. The only reason he hadn't was because he knew he would sound insane without Aelita's diary to back him up, and Aelita had hidden it behind a firewall on the supercomputer itself.
"Jim? Not a chance!" Odd joked back. "I've seen him searching for his whistle while he had it around his neck!" More serious, he continued, "Don't worry. Soon, we'll be able to shut down the supercomputer for good."
"I hope so, Odd," Ulrich admitted. "I hope so."
"Hey, Ulrich! Odd!" The two stopped and turned to see who had said their names. They were greeted with Yumi running up to and stopping in front of them. "Great news! My parents are still on board!"
"Good!" Ulrich finally smiled. "So is the principal!"
"And the best part," Odd cut in, with his own wide smile, "is that we're not lying at all. We're just keeping some things to ourselves."
Ulrich's phone ran before either he or Yumi could respond. He picked up, knowing it was Aelita, "Yes?"
"Come to my room. I want us all to be there when we break the news to Jérémie," Aelita said.
"We're on our way," Ulrich said.
Hervé Pichon watched, with nasty bitterness, as Stern, Della Robbia, and Ishiyama ran towards the dorms, probably Aelita's. He had heard from Sissi that Aelita's pen pal was planning to move to Kadic to be closer to the pink-ette. Knowing from Aelita's diary how she truly felt about her pen pal, Hervé couldn't stop the jealousy from rising.
!~~C~O~D~E~~L~Y~O~K~O~~!
With the other three huddled closely around her, all looking intently at her screen, Aelita typed in the commands to begin the last dry run.
The four watched closely as the simulation showed Jérémie's avatar losing color, showing the wireframe underneath.
It only took thirty seconds, but it felt like five minutes, before a green plus sign began flashing on screen.
And Aelita smiled, "We did it. We can rest easy now. It works. I can hardly believe it..."
She was suddenly engulfed in a group hug by the other three. She tensed up a first, not expecting it, but she quickly relaxed when she realized they were celebrating.
And she joined in.
They had a reason to celebrate, after all.
!~~C~O~D~E~~L~Y~O~K~O~~!
About half an hour later, Hervé saw Jim slinking into the courtyard, looking paranoid as he searched around for something, or someone.
He eventually approached Hervé himself, seeing the boy alone and watching everybody else from a distant. "Pichon, have you see Schaeffer and her friends this morning?" Jim asked.
"Yeah," Hervé replied.
"Where, in the cafeteria?" Jim leaned in a bit closer.
Hervé leaned back, not appreciating the sudden closeness, "No, I saw them going to Aelita's room. Hey, isn't it pretty strange to go to the dorms at this hour? Especially someone who isn't even a boarder?"
"Yes, it is," Jim replied. "Thanks for the tip, Pichon."
The man then left, heading towards the dorms, and Hervé finally smiled. He'd resolved to make Jérémie's life a living hell before he even got here.
"Careful, Hervé," Nicolas suddenly said, catching him off-guard. Hervé turned around to see his friend standing behind him. "Your green-eyed monster is showing."
Hervé turned back to his people-watching, "I don't know what you're talking about."
"Yes, you do," Nicolas shot back. "I'm warning you, Hervé, as a friend, because I don't to see you get into trouble or get hurt because of your jealousy."
"I'm not jealous," Hervé replied. "And you're one to talk."
"I may be dumb, but I'm smart enough to know when a girl's not interested in me," Nicolas admitted, and Hervé felt a ping in his stomach, knowing the truth in that. "I'm very lucky to be associated with Sissi at all, much less be her friend. And you are jealous."
"I am not!"
"Your repeated denial says you are," Nicolas pointed out. "And despising Aelita's pen pal before you've even met him just because Aelita knows him? Yeah, I'd call that jealousy."
Nicolas then turned around and walked back to the vending machines, where Sissi was.
Hervé, however, just turned back to the courtyard, mentally telling himself that Nicolas didn't know what he himself knew.
Jérémie wasn't who Aelita and her friends were saying he was.
But Hervé Pichon couldn't shout that to the world without people calling him crazy.
!~~C~O~D~E~~L~Y~O~K~O~~!
Jérémie's interface had popped up on screen the moment Aelita called out to him, telling him that they had good news for him.
"Good news, you say?" he was smiling. "Tell me what it is!"
The other three still surrounding her chair, Aelita couldn't wipe her excited smile of her face, now that she was delivering the good news to the one her plan alpha would affect the most, "Jérémie, we don't know how to tell you this, but believe it or not, we're waiting for you here!"
Jérémie instantly knew what that meant, "Really?!" Now he, too, was joining in on the excitement.
"Really!" Aelita heard Odd, Ulrich, and Yumi all say with her.
"You sure? The materialization's going to work this time?" Jérémie asked, and the others understood his hesitation.
"Of course it is," Aelita reassured him, before holding up the CD with the program on it. "It's all here! And I can tell you, it was really complicated! Defragmenting the inertial matrix wasn't enough, and so I had to start to recompile all the DNA correlations and–"
Odd cut her off, making a T-shape with his hands, "Time out, Miss Einstein!"
Aelita paused in her rant, and glanced around at the other three. Yumi was rolling her eyes and Ulrich was feigning a yawn.
Unimpressed with their antics, Aelita finished with, "To make a long story short: it works."
Despite his excitement, one could see Jérémie's hesitation to lose himself in the celebration. "Oh, Aelita, that's fantastic! I knew you could do it!" But he was genuine in his praise. "I can't believe it's true..."
"Better get used to it fast!" Odd told him. "Because it's time to take the big jump! And then it's 'goodbye, XANA'!"
"Time out, Walking Stomach," Aelita shot back, and Odd shot her playful scowl, as she placed the CD inside of a case and set it on the table beside her computer. "First, I have to set up the program on the supercomputer. Then, Jérémie has to get to the tower he first woke up in, the one in the Mountain Sector. It'll be the hardest to run the program in that tower, due to him sleeping in it for so long, but if it works there, it will work in any tower. Then, he'll get devirtualized and appear inside one of the scanners."
"In that case," Jérémie cut in, "I'm off to the Mountains right now!" Aelita couldn't see the holomap on her computer, only on the supercomputer, but she assumed Jérémie had begun his journey to the tower Aelita specified.
"Right," Aelita said. "And in the meantime, we'll head to class. And afterwards, the factory."
"I'll see you later, my friends," Jérémie shot them all a warm smile.
"We'll be five for dinner tonight," Aelita quipped, before Jérémie logged off.
It was time for class now, and knowing they weren't supposed to be in the dorms after breakfast or during class, Yumi, Ulrich, and Odd all kept a lookout in the hallways as Aelita grabbed the necessary CD from her desk. She closed and locked her door behind her, before setting off down the hall. The others followed her.
Jim suddenly emerged from a side hallway, and Aelita skidded to a suddenly stop, only for Yumi to bump into her, then Ulrich to bump into Yumi, and Odd to bump into Ulrich.
"What's wrong?" Jim taunted. "Up to no good again, aren't you?"
"No, we were just studying together," Odd was quick, "and we lost track of time."
"Right," Aelita cut in. "Now, if you'll excuse us, Jim, we need to get to class before we're late."
Jim grumbled, "'Studying', my foot! I've had enough of your lies, you hear?! The five of us are going to stay right here until you guys tell me the truth!"
Ulrich gaped. Jim couldn't keep them from going to class, could he? Would their teachers even understand or be told? He expected Jim to sneakily follow them, but not keep them from going to class by using his power to get what he wanted!
"Jim?!" came Mr. Delmas's voice, and the five already in the hallway turned to see Mr. Delmas joining them, approaching them from behind Jim. "What is going on?!"
Jim immediately smiled, as the four teens were filled with dread, "Ah, I'm glad you're here, Sir! I don't know what's going on either, but these little devils are up to no good and I intend to find out what it is!"
To the teens' surprise, Mr. Delmas seemed to inwardly roll his eyes, "Yes, Jim, another one of your absurd stories about secret plots and passages?" But then, Yumi and Odd remembered that Mr. Delmas reacted in a very similar way when Odd was taking the heat for Sam.
A button seemed to be pressed, as Jim demanded, "What do you mean 'absurd'?!"
"You heard what I said," Mr. Delmas remained unmoving. "Don't you have anything more serious to be doing?"
"Uh, yes," Jim stuttered, suddenly looking ashamed, as he remembered that he was a teacher. "But, uh..."
The four teens could only watch as Mr. Delmas went to town on their gym teacher, "Listen, your paranoid behavior and one-track mind concerning these children are getting on my nerves! You are behaving like a paranoid secret agent when you are a physical education teacher! So focus on your classes and everything will be fine!"
Mr. Delmas then left without another word. The four teens couldn't see Jim's face, but they knew he was angry at being humiliated by his boss in front of four students.
He didn't turn around as he lashed out at them, "What are you four still doing here?! Get to class already!"
!~~C~O~D~E~~L~Y~O~K~O~~!
Jérémie ran down the paths that wound around the mountains and summits of the Mountain Sector. He didn't need the holomap to know where he was going. The tower he was looking for was the one he slept in for who knew how long.
Aelita's instructions seemed simple enough. Get to the tower, get inside, and wait for the others' classes to be over. He couldn't wait. He could see the tower on the horizon now.
But he quickly took cover behind a large boulder, before peering out to get a better look at what was waiting for him.
Three Bloks, sent by XANA, of course.
Of course XANA wouldn't go down quietly. Of course it knew that without Jérémie, the others didn't have a reason to keep the supercomputer on.
Fortunately, the three Bloks didn't see him. XANA also hadn't activated the tower. Both of which meant Jérémie didn't have to tell the others.
He could wait.
He continued peering out from behind his cover, trying to come up with ways to get past these Bloks on his own.
!~~C~O~D~E~~L~Y~O~K~O~~!
While Yumi had gone to history, Aelita, Ulrich, and Odd were listening to Ms. Hertz's science lecture, which was on plants.
"It won't be long now," Odd whispered to Ulrich and Aelita.
"Just as well," Ulrich replied in a voice just as low. "I can't take this anymore."
Ms. Hertz continued her lecture, with the help of a diagram drawn on the board behind her, "And so a green plant emits oxygen under light..."
Odd, from the table behind her, saw his cousin discreetly taking her laptop out of her backpack.
Intrigued, he asked her, whispering, "What are you doing?"
Aelita, in a low voice, replied, "I just want to check if everything's okay with Jérémie..."
Ms. Hertz, from her position in front of the classroom, continued her lecture, "Obviously, this phenomenon depends on certain factors. Who can tell us which ones?" She swept the classroom with her gaze, and like always, most of her students were silent. She stopped on Aelita, who was looking at something on her knees (her laptop), and the woman frowned. "Schaeffer? Can you answer?"
Aelita sat up straight, startled, as she closed the laptop resting on her knees. Her face turned red as she realized that everyone was staring at her. She bit her lips, and answered with the first thing that came to mind, "Um...the frog?"
Her face turned a darker shade of red as the entire class started laughing at her.
!~~C~O~D~E~~L~Y~O~K~O~~!
The bell rang about twelve minutes later, and Aelita, Ulrich, and Odd all entered the courtyard, where Yumi was waiting for them. The four all nodded, knowing it was time for the big jump, and went off towards the park.
It was Saturday, a half day, and classes were over for today, so no one would ask questions if the group suddenly went out into town and came back with a new friend.
Jim saw the four from a distance, and he watched as they walked towards the edge at first, before taking off into a sprint into the trees once they confirmed that no one was paying them any attention.
Once they disappeared into the tree line, he took off in a sprint after them. Hiding behind trees and bushes, they didn't speak a word.
They stopped at a clearing, before glancing around their surroundings one last time. Jim took this chance to get even closer, but when he finally had the best vantage point, the clearing was empty.
Schaeffer, Della Robbia, Stern, and Ishiyama were nowhere in sight.
"Where did they go?" he asked himself.
His eyes completely missed the manhole cover near the other end of the clearing.
!~~C~O~D~E~~L~Y~O~K~O~~!
They knew Jim was likely following them, so they had waited until the bushes were rattling, a signal to them that Jim was trying to get closer, until they went inside the passage.
Now, the four were here at the factory, and they had decided to take the long way back to Kadic, through the city, just in case Jim was still waiting for them at the park.
All four of their school bags now ditched against the wall, Yumi watched as Aelita sat in the chair in front of the monitor and slipped on the earpiece, before typing in commands, "Jérémie? Can you hear me?"
"Yes, loud and clear," Jérémie replied, the holomap showing his yellow arrow in the Mountain Sector. "But the tower's being guarded by three Bloks."
"Of course," Aelita groaned, placing her forehead in one of her hands. "Of course XANA would pull out all the stops."
"Did you expect any different?" Odd asked. "It knows the end is near, and it's not going down without a fight!"
"Hold on, Jérémie," Yumi found herself saying. "Ulrich, Odd, and I are on our way to help."
"Okay," was Jérémie's response.
Yumi sprinted towards the elevator, with Odd and Ulrich hot on her heels. The elevators just barely opened all the way before Aelita began speaking, her voice heard over the comm system, "I'm sending you all a few meters away from where Jérémie is. If XANA sees you virtualize at his current coordinates, things could end badly." Her explanation gave the other three enough time to each get inside a scanner. "Everybody ready?"
"We're ready," Ulrich replied.
"Okay. I'm counting on you. Transfer Odd." Odd's scanner doors closed. "Transfer Ulrich." His scanner doors closed. "Transfer Yumi." Her scanner doors closed, sealing her inside the cabin. "Scanner Odd, scanner Ulrich, scanner Yumi." The white circular bar moved upward in a swirl, scanning her as the wind blew her hair and clothes upward. "Virtualization!"
A large gust of wind hit Yumi as she felt her body depixelize, before feeling it reform in mid-air.
She dropped to the ground, Ulrich and Odd on either side of her. Standing up, she saw familiar purple mountains against an indigo sky.
"There!" Odd pointed at the blue elf in the near distance as the latter peered at the three Bloks guarded the tower from behind his cover.
The three joined Jérémie in no time, who greeted them with a quick smile before turning back to the Bloks, which still had no idea anybody were there, despite expecting them and knowing who to expect.
"Alright, we're here, Aelita," Ulrich said. "Now what?"
"Hang on," Aelita replied. "I'm setting up the program now." There was a pause, before the group heard faint music on her end. "Oh no!"
"What's wrong?" Yumi asked.
"I grabbed the wrong CD!" Aelita admitted. "Odd, what have I told you about leaving your music videos in my room?!"
"To not to," Odd replied.
"Exactly! So why is 'The Breakdance Song' staring at me in the face right now?!"
"Because I didn't listen."
"Of course you didn't!" Aelita then sighed in frustration, and the faint music stopped.
"What now?" Ulrich asked.
"I have to go back to my room and grab the right CD," Aelita admitted. "You guys clear the passage in the meantime."
"Okay," Yumi replied, "but don't drag your feet."
Aelita didn't respond, which meant she had probably left.
Ulrich turned to Odd, somewhat unimpressed, "You made a music video?"
"Yeah!" Odd replied, as chipper as ever. "And it's very successful, believe it or not."
"Oh yeah, and how does it go?" the brunette asked.
Odd sang, "Break, break, breakdance! Here we gooooo!" Ulrich and Jérémie both winced at the final note, as Odd's voice was cracking a bit as he sang it.
Yumi rolled her eyes, before taking charge, "Okay, that's enough fooling around. We've got some cleaning up to do."
Odd and Ulrich both saluted, "Ma'am, yes, ma'am!"
Jérémie, like always, was told to wait until the passage was cleared. The other three took off, though they split up, with Ulrich and Odd going down one path and Yumi heading down another.
One Blok for each of them, the monsters all fired at a target, only to miss every single shot.
Odd and Yumi both leapt up into the air, with Odd firing a Laser Arrow and Yumi throwing her fan. Both weapons hit their targets.
Meanwhile, Ulrich used his Super Sprint to slice the last Blok in half as he ran by.
Once all three Bloks were down, Yumi turned back to the large boulder their fourth was using for cover. "All clear, Jérémie!"
The blue elf peered from behind the boulder and smiled. He then ran up to the base of the tower, but turned around and said, "Wait inside the tower with me."
As Jérémie entered the tower, Odd looked at Ulrich and Yumi, both of whom shrugged before entering after Jérémie. With no other choice, Odd held up the rear and was met with dark navy walls and bright cyan windows filled with binary code when he phased through the wall.
"Wow," he couldn't help but say. "Just think. This could be the last tower we ever step foot in."
Jérémie was sitting on the ground, in a lotus position, and Yumi had taken a seat next to him, with a Japanese-style position (sitting on her knees and shins). Ulrich remained standing, a hand resting on the hilt of his katana, before also taking a seat on Jérémie's other side, his position more casual than the other two.
"You really think you should be saying that to him?" Ulrich asked, nodding his head towards Jérémie. "These towers were his home for a long time."
"It's okay," Jérémie softly admitted. The smile on his face was sad as he look a glance at the walls around them. "To be honest, I've been thinking about that ever since this morning." When they delivered the good news to him.
"As we expected," Yumi told him. "Lyoko is all you've known, or at least all you remember. It makes sense you'd be hesitant to leave it."
"But you'll be okay," Odd reassured him. "Because we'll teach you everything you need to know about how to live as a human being."
Jérémie sent him a gentle smile, "I know you will." He paused. "I'm just...afraid of asking any more favors from you all. You've sacrificed so much for me, and I'm not sure how to pay you back."
"Just live," Ulrich told him, making the elf look at him. "Knowing it was all worth it is payment enough." Yumi and Odd both nodded in agreement.
Jérémie smiled, a real one this time, "Deal."
!~~C~O~D~E~~L~Y~O~K~O~~!
Jim was leading watching over the students that had chosen to play a football game during their lunch hour when he saw a familiar flash of pink run across campus, quick like there was something chasing her.
Where was Aelita Schaeffer going this time?
There were no more classes today, so he didn't have to worry. He quietly left the field and ran after Aelita.
He followed her to her room, and watched from a side hallway as she unlocked her door and rushed inside. He then slunk towards her open door frame and watched her pick up a CD from off her desk, next to her computer.
He stood there as she exited her room and closed the door, only to come face to face with him, and was startled by his sudden presence.
"Playing hooky, are we?" Jim asked, and he saw Schaeffer lower her surprise to a stern gaze. "You should be in the cafeteria."
"Odd left the CD of his new music video in my room, so I volunteered to get it for him," was her excuse. If he didn't know any better, he'd buy it. It seemed innocent enough.
But he did know better. "Mm-hmm," he said, not accepting her excuse but playing along.
Aelita stepped back, as he stepped forward, "If you'll excuse me, Jim, I need to get it back to my cousin before he has an aneurysm." She offered a smile to help sell it, as she went to walk past him.
But he stepped in front of her, blocking her path. He wasn't going to let her go so easily.
"Jim, please, I really need to go!" she said. He was almost thrown off by how closely she was sticking to her guns here. While her excuse sounded like a lie she was trying to tell, this time, she genuinely sounded like she was telling the truth, like she had to be somewhere or else bad things could happen. He almost asked himself why.
Almost.
Instead, he shrugged it off, "Not until you tell me what you've been plotting since last October! And this time, the principal's not here to come to your rescue!"
Schaeffer turned her gaze into a glare, a determined one. Whatever it was she had to do, or wherever she had to go, she was determined, Jim had to give her that.
The pink-haired girl moved to run to her left (Jim's right) and then to her right (Jim's left), and Jim followed her movements, only for her to fake it and take the path on her left, to his frustration.
Of course, Aelita Schaeffer was the second smartest student in this school, right behind Hervé Pichon. It made sense that she'd be clever too.
"Oh, you miserable little brat!" Jim exclaimed before running down the hall after her. "Get back here!" he yelled, as she turned a corner. He followed her path as quickly as he could.
But Schaeffer didn't stop. Again, wherever she had to go, she was determined to reach it.
"Wait until I get my hands on you!" he growled as the two came to the stairs. Schaeffer immediately ran down them, and Jim followed. He ignored the trio of students on the bottom floor, who had paused in their conversation to watch the commotion. Jim yelled at the pink-ette as she neared the bottom, "Schaeffer, stop! That's an order!"
But then, Schaeffer missed a step and she took a tumble, rolling painfully down the stairs and laying in a heap at the bottom. The CD she had grabbed from her room fell out of her pocket.
Seeing she was not moving, Jim immediately became concerned. If Schaeffer was hurt, it was all his fault. He was the one chasing her.
One of the students, Julie Vigouroux, quickly grabbed the CD and gave it back to Schaeffer, who gratefully took it before pushing herself off the ground and back to her feet. Jim prepared himself for her inevitably using these students as a cover to get away from him.
But the moment she came up, she immediately went back down, tightly clutching her ankle. The other two students, Paul Gaillard and Heidi Klinger, immediately caught her and gently set her back down.
If this was acting, Schaeffer was very good. But judging by the pain on her face, she wasn't acting. This was real. Her ankle really did get hurt in the fall.
Vigouroux and Klinger both remained at Schaeffer's side, soothing her through the pain, as Gaillard turned to Jim, angry, "What did you do, Jim?! This is your fault!"
!~~C~O~D~E~~L~Y~O~K~O~~!
"Forty-five minutes is a long time to go pick up a CD," Ulrich commented. He and the others were still inside the tower, still waiting for Aelita return. They were standing now, alert and concerned because their fifth was still not back yet.
Yumi and Odd both nodded in agreement as Jérémie kept calling out, "Aelita? Are you there?" He sighed, "I hope she's okay..."
"Come on, stop being so gloom and doom!" Odd tried his best to reassure his friends. "Let's not panic just yet. I'm sure she's fine. She's probably just trying to lose Jim."
Yumi shrugged, "True. She may be taking a different way to the factory."
"Is Jim someone we need to be concerned about?" Jérémie asked. "If so, why?" He remembered his previous encounter with Jim, remembering the man to be a responsible and reasonable authority figure. So why did they need to be careful around him now?
"Jim's catching on that we have a secret, and he's becoming more and more obsessed with finding out what it is," Ulrich explained. "It should die down once you're living with us on Earth, but we need to be extra careful around him. Just in case."
"And people like him are the exact reason we all need to be on the same page with your cover story," Yumi added. Ulrich and Odd both nodded in agreement.
"Got it," Jérémie said.
Odd then changed the subject, "So what do you want to do first?" The others looked at him and realized he was talking to Jérémie. "Once you're materialized, Jer?"
Jérémie shrugged, as he bashfully looked off to the side, "I don't know. And as long as I'm with you guys, I don't really care."
Odd suddenly smiled widely, and Ulrich immediately, sternly warned him, "Odd, nothing dangerous."
Just then, the whole tower shook. Odd barely managed to save himself from falling over the edge, before quipping, "Speaking of danger!"
"It's a Megatank!" Jérémie exclaimed, suddenly panicking. "XANA's trying to destroy the tower!"
"I was wondering why our enemy was so quiet," Ulrich muttered. "Just three Bloks? I had expected more than that."
"Now we have our answer," Yumi admitted, before turning to the others. "Jérémie, you stay here. Ulrich, Odd, I think we need to have a chat with this Megatank, don't you?"
Ulrich and Odd both nodded in agreement.
Jérémie watched as the three all exited the tower by phasing through the wall. He turned his thoughts back to the lab, and asked, "Aelita?"
No response.
He could only hope she got back before this tower turned into ruins.
!~~C~O~D~E~~L~Y~O~K~O~~!
Aelita cringed in immense pain as Yolanda wrapped up her bare right ankle in compression wrap. Despite the woman's gentle hands, just grazing her ankle as the girl's boot was taken off brought Aelita pain.
"This should bring down the swelling," Yolanda explained, as she sat on the edge of Aelita's infirmary bed. On the pink-ette's other side was the CD she came back to get.
Aelita powered through the pain enough to ask, "How bad is it?"
"Pretty bad," Yolanda wasn't holding back or sugar-coating the truth this time. "You'll have to wait at least a week before putting this foot on the ground."
"A week?!" Aelita exclaimed. Her friends couldn't wait on Lyoko for a week! It had already been forty-five minutes since she left. They were probably getting worried.
"And if you complain," Yolanda sternly retorted, "I won't give you crutches to get around with."
Aelita quickly cooled off, "You're right. I'm sorry." Yolanda was just doing her job. Getting mad at her wasn't going to make things better. "It's just–"
Yolanda gently nudged her verbally, "Just?"
"Today's the day I'm supposed to meet my pen pal in person," Aelita resorted to telling the truth. Kinda. "I don't want to stand him up."
Yolanda's smile was calming, "I understand that feeling. My current boyfriend and I met online, and on our first date, I ran late due to a paper for my college biology class. Fortunately, he was understanding and waited for me for the twenty-six minutes it took for me to get there."
Right. Jérémie would understand.
Whatever Yolanda was about to say next was cut off by Principal Delmas from outside in the hallway beyond the closed infirmary door.
"Jim, this time you've gone too far!" He sounded angry, and Aelita remembered this morning. Mr. Delmas had every reason to be mad at Jim. "Don't say I didn't warn you! This time, your paranoia has caused an accident!"
"I'm sorry, Sir. I really am." Aelita believed him. The tone of Jim's voice, though quiet, spoke volumes.
"So am I, Jim," Mr. Delmas was quieter, but his anger was still palpable. "I'm afraid I'm going to have to let you go."
Yolanda winced, able to sympathize with Jim as an employee working under Jean-Pierre Delmas.
"What?" Aelita softly asked. "Why?"
Yolanda turned back to face her, explaining, "Mr. Delmas has no choice. It's Jim's fault you got hurt. One of the top priorities of the Kadic staff is the safety of the students."
'It's Jim's fault you got hurt.'
As if able to read Aelita's mind, Yolanda continued, "Don't blame yourself. Jim is an adult and he knew better, and Mr. Delmas tried his best to give him a chance to straighten his act. There's also the fact that your parents need to be told, if they haven't been already, and they would likely demand the teacher responsible be fired."
Aelita, speechless, could only nod.
Yolanda smiled, trying to cheer Aelita up, "Why don't you focus on your pen pal?" Aelita nodded again, remembering the reason she was in here at all. "I'll go dig up some crutches for you. I need to leave the room to do it, so you'll be alone." Yolanda approached the door and turned back to her patient. "Remember, don't move." Aelita nodded again, meaning it.
Yolanda left the infirmary, and a few seconds later, Jim entered. Apparently, Mr. Delmas had left, but Jim hadn't. Not yet. And judging by the expression on his face, he had just hit rock bottom.
Aelita carefully watched as the man approached her bedside, "Aelita, listen, I..." He sat down on the edge. "I want to apologize. I'm sorry. I didn't meant to hurt you."
The pink-ette turned to face him fully when she heard a sudden tightness in his throat. Sure enough, there Jim was, his eyes filling with tears as he spoke.
Jim continued, "Seeing weird things happening all around the school, and you four always being in the middle of it...I guess I got a little carried away and assumed you guys knew what was going on. All the excuses and skipped classes..." Jim sighed. "I'm sorry."
Jim began to walk away, but something within Aelita (not her brain) called out to him, "Wait, Jim!" The man turned around. "You're not as crazy as you think. My friends and I...we do have a secret."
Jim was suddenly in her face, leaning over her, "Then that means I was right, after all!"
Aelita held up a hand, nonverbally asking him for her space back. Fortunately, he saw it and obeyed. Once the two were back in their respective spaces, the pink-ette continued, "Yes, you're right. We do know what's going on, and we know how to stop it. But we can't tell anybody because then Jérémie's life may be in more danger than it already is."
"Jérémie?" Jim asked. "Your pen pal? What does he have to do with this?"
"Everything," Aelita admitted. "If you help me get to where I need to go, I will tell you and then the principal everything, so you can get your job back."
Jim shook his head, "No, I deserve to be fired." Aelita blinked in surprise. He didn't want his job back? "All I want is the truth."
Yolanda's words echoed in Aelita's mind, how it was all on Jim, not Aelita, and with that, the pink-ette finally found peace. "Okay. Do we have a deal?"
"You bet we do!" Jim replied, smiling.
The door then opened and Yolanda stepped in, holding a pair of crutches. "Everything okay in here? Nothing else broken?"
Aelita shook her head. "No, ma'am."
Yolanda walked over to Aelita's bedside and presented her the crutches, "These should be about your size. But if they're not, we can easily adjust them."
Jim and Yolanda both helped Aelita onto her feet (or single good foot), and once she was outfitted with crutches that were the correct height and size, Yolanda saw Aelita off, with Jim escorting her to where her pen pal said to meet up (not really a lie, and hopefully Jim knew it).
"Return to me in about a week, Aelita," were Yolanda's last words before the trio parted. "Then, we'll see if you can go without the crutches."
Aelita promised to be careful before she and Jim headed off.
!~~C~O~D~E~~L~Y~O~K~O~~!
Once out of the Administrative Building, Aelita led Jim, not to the park, but to the gym, the two walking as fast as Aelita's crutches would allow her to go.
"So there's a secret passage in the park?" Jim asked, being caught up on the whole story as Aelita was telling it.
Aelita nodded, "Mm-hmm. The manhole cover."
"The sewers?" Jim asked. The pink-ette nodded again. "No wonder I couldn't find you guys! But then...why are we going through the gymnasium?"
"Because the park passage has a ladder," Aelita admitted. "And I can't climb with crutches. The gym passage, on the other hand, has a ramp."
As she said this, she opened the door, revealing the secret tunnel that led from the boiler room to the sewers.
"Woah..." Jim muttered. "I can't believe this. I was right!"
"Shh..." the pink-ette quickly whispered. They weren't exactly alone. Fortunately, Jim obeyed.
She continued to tell the story and answer his questions on the way. When the reached the ladder to the factory, Jim climbed up first with her crutches, before coming back down to climb up again, this time with her riding piggy-back.
Once inside the factory, she led him to an alternate and longer route down besides the ropes. It was another ladder, so the process from before had to be repeated.
Finally, the two had reached the elevator, and Aelita waited for Jim to stop playing spy as he kept a lookout.
"So your pen pal, Jérémie, actually is your pen pal," Jim repeated what she had just explained, "but he's not from an orphanage at all. But rather from a virtual world called, uh, Loco?"
"Lyoko, and he's not from there. Just trapped," Aelita corrected. "But yes. For the past year and two weeks or so, we've been fighting XANA in order to buy ourselves enough time to bring him back to Earth." Jim finally entered the elevator, allowing Aelita to press the button. As the elevator went down, she continued, "And that's what we're going to do today."
The lift stopped and Aelita watched Jim's face as the doors opened to reveal the lab. "Wow...to be honest, I was expecting aliens or something, but this? This is way cooler!"
Aelita giggled, before turning serious, "Next stop for me is that chair."
Jim's gaze locked onto the chair in front of the supercomputer monitor. He spotted her as she used her crutches to inch her way towards the chair, before helping her ease into it.
From there, he watched as she took the CD out of her pocket, the one she returned to the school to get, took it out of its case, and inserted it into the supercomputer's disc slot.
She then slipped on the earpiece, and asked, "I'm back, guys. Everyone okay?"
To his amazement, just as Aelita said, he heard Yumi from inside the computer exclaim, "Yeah, we're fine! What happened to you?! You just vanished!"
"Sorry, long story," the pink-ette admitted. "I'll tell you later."
!~~C~O~D~E~~L~Y~O~K~O~~!
The Megatank opened up its shell, revealing its insides. Odd ran towards it, before flipping over and firing an arrow. Only for it to bounce off the monster's shell as it closed back up to defend itself.
It then opened again and fired. Odd barely managed to dodge it and the laser barely missed the tower behind the trio.
"Hold on, guys," Aelita said. "I'm setting up the program now."
Yumi knew they had to buy time, so she said, "Follow me, Odd!"
She then ran towards the Megatank, with Odd right on her heels.
The Megatank fired again, this time hitting Yumi. Yumi devirtualized as Odd ran past her, knowing what he had to do.
He leapt onto the thing, and aimed an arrow at its eye as it was charging up its laser. Unfortunately, before Odd could fire, the Megatank fired first, devirtualizing him.
Seeing this, Aelita warned the last guard, "Ulrich, it's up to you. You have to protect the tower."
Ulrich took off in a sprint for this pest of a Megatank after unsheathing his katana. "Hey, meatball! Nobody messes with my friends! Triangulate!"
The monster was instantly surrounded by a yellow-colored triangle, Ulrich and his two clones surrounded it on all sides.
"Go on, Ulrich! Get him!" Was that...Jim? "Show this XANA thing who's the boss!"
Ulrich decided to question it later, knowing this Megatank was far more important.
The Megatank shot at one of the clones, leaving two left. Both ran in opposite directions, only for it the fire again, taking out the other clone.
But the real Ulrich had taken the path behind it, using Super Sprint to run around it to confuse it, then leap up on top of a nearby boulder, where he launched from that and pierced the Megatank's eye on the way past.
He had to leave his katana behind, but the resulting explosion sent his katana flying through the air and back into his hand where it belonged.
"Nice one, Ulrich!" Jim (he thought) exclaimed.
"Er, thanks," the yellow samurai replied. "I think."
"Ulrich, there's another Megatank behind you!" Aelita suddenly cut in.
The German boy suddenly tensed up, raising his katana, and turned around just in time to see a second Megatank approach the tower Jérémie was in from the other path and fire at the tower.
The tower shook when the wide circular laser hit it, hobbling on its base before evening out. Ulrich could only wonder how Jérémie was handling this.
The Megatank charged up to fire again, but when it did, Ulrich used Super Sprint to meet it halfway, using his katana to block the laser.
It was difficult, but it was working.
"Hold on, Ulrich," Aelita told him. "Just a few more seconds."
He would try his best.
!~~C~O~D~E~~L~Y~O~K~O~~!
The elevator doors open, and Odd and Yumi emerged. They made a move to run towards their friends, only to stop when they saw Jim at Aelita's side.
Tense, they turned to Aelita for answers, who just reassured them, "Don't worry! Jim's one of us now!"
Seeing her smile, the two relaxed, though their expressions still demanded answers.
Aelita noticed this, as did Jim, as he held up a hand to stop her, "You focus on this. I'll explain everything to them."
He then turned to Yumi and Odd and began telling them the story of what had happened, what had taken Aelita so long.
!~~C~O~D~E~~L~Y~O~K~O~~!
The tower shook again from the second Megatank's laser. Jérémie held out his arms to maintain his balance, "Aelita! The tower's not going to hold for much longer!"
"Ulrich's on it," Aelita reassured him. "I'm almost ready. Get into position, Jérémie. The center of the platform."
Jérémie could hear Ulrich's grunts outside as he moved to the center of the first platform. He had faith in him. The tower would hold. It had to.
"Ready to take the big jump?" Aelita suddenly asked him. To him, the question came out of nowhere.
But it was time.
"Ready," he replied.
It was time to finally be free.
"Then, here we go," Aelita ran her program. "Code: EARTH!"
Jérémie heard Ulrich cry out one final time before being devirtualized as the former was lifted into the air by a datastream. Unlike before, however, this one felt different somehow.
The remaining Megatank's laser shook the tower one last time, as the datastream carried him only halfway up to the second platform.
Jérémie felt XANA itself trying its best to hold him back as the windows on the tower wall suddenly sprang to life as they rearranged themselves according to Aelita's program.
Soon, he felt a (vaguely familiar) tug as he felt his body move from one world to the other.
She did it. She really did it.
!~~C~O~D~E~~L~Y~O~K~O~~!
Everyone gathered in the scanner room as one of the scanners had closed and whirled up, currently in use.
Aelita hated that she had to use the elevator thanks to her sprained ankle, because the ride down to the level below took a lot longer than she wanted it to. On the bright side, Jim had explained to the others why she was so late, so she didn't have to worry about that.
Jim stayed aways back, respecting that this wasn't his moment, while the four teens gathered around the operating scanner. That being said, he was craning his neck a bit to take a peek.
After what felt like forever, but was only about a minute or so, the scanner doors finally opened, and when the smoke cleared, there lay a familiar-looking boy, the human boy whose form Jérémie had taken in the simulation bubble, complete with the glasses and the pendant around his neck.
Jérémie was laying down in the scanner in a fetal position, on his side, and he appeared to be sleeping.
"It worked..." Aelita happily muttered. "He's finally here!"
Just like before, her escalated volume woke him up by accident, but Aelita was strangely comforted in the fact that his eyes were just as blue as when they first met.
Jérémie looked around very briefly before his gaze centered on the four teens in front of him, and he smiled.
"Welcome to Earth," Aelita greeted.
Despite her crutches, she held out a hand, which he took, as the other three cheered.
TO BE CONTINUED_
!~~~J~E~R~L~I~T~A~~R~O~L~E~S~W~A~P~~A~U~~~!
Next Episode: 18 - A Brand New World / Jérémie's finally able to live on Earth, but shutting Lyoko down won't be as simple as they made it out to be.
A/N: Again, here I am adding some lines to better connect scenes together in this chapter as well as the next few. This time, some of those lines are changed to make it easier to introduce Jérémie's surname, the one he gives himself in Season 2, because no matter how hard I try, "Jérémie Lyoko" doesn't sound right (because the spelling of Jérémie is very French and "Lyoko" is derived from the Japanese word "ryoko" meaning "travel"), and "Stones" already belongs to Taelia in this AU.
And don't worry. Aelita's ankle isn't magically healed. It will still remain in the next chapter/episode. Also, I changed the deal Aelita makes with Jim, because first of all, Lyoko is supposed to be a secret for a reason and the last time someone outside the group was told (in both canon and this AU), things went south real quick. Second, there's a reason Jim was fired, which I point out in the chapter, and it has nothing to do with the secret.
Also, some depth for Nicolas and set-up for Hervé and Jérémie's imminent rivalry.