To the readers

I appreciate any comments on the story.

Notes

[] are used to indicate stage directions

All dialogue follows a "Speaker: dialogue" format

{} are used for author comments.

CONTINUE

[Pan down from the hazy sky to the floating islands of mossy land. In every available space, trees grew infinitely upward into the sky. But their roots were just suspended in midair below the plateaus. What is different from the previous forest sector is the trees whose branches grow together to form walking paths above the plateaus. They could be seen every so often, in between and around the trees. There was no end to the forest in any direction, only larger trees and towers seen in the distance. Some plateaus undersides formed a thorny overgrown ceiling over some parts of the sector while in the middle of others, pools of dark water formed from waterfalls that flowed from plateaus above the tree canopy.

Jeremy: Transfer Odd, Scanner Odd. Virtualization!

[Odd's purple cat avatar appears in midair and drops to the plateau below.]

Odd: YESSS. The trees!

[Starts climbing up the bark, then jumping off and swinging from branch to branch while firing laser arrows wildly.]

Jeremy: This "mirror" must store backups of all the sectors. Transfer Ulrich, Scanner Ulrich. Virtualization!

[Ulrich lands in a superhero landing pose on one knee.]

Odd: I've missed this place.

Ulrich: Are you a cat or a gorilla?

Odd: [while hanging from a branch upside down.] I can be both.

Jeremy: Transfer Aelita, Scanner Aelita. Virtualization!

[Aelita lands next to Ulrich.]

Aelita: Okay, let's go find the-

BING
"Self_Actualization,hpx" is being run.
Detecting compatible networks.
"Self_Actualization,hpx" is being shared with compatible networks.

BING
There are missing files in "Odd_Della_Robbia/Dev_Tools".
Files have been restored.

[Aelita glows pink, Ulrich glows yellow, Odd glow purple. He's still hanging upside down from the tree, staring at the purple aura on his hands.

After the glow fades, Aelita has a 3rd wing sprouting from the small of her back. It softens and folds over her skirt, creating an pink curving pattern layered on top of the left side of her skirt. It's glowing pink.

A strand of Ulrich's headband extends out into a ribbon behind him. It's glowing yellow.

A purple triangular cat ear appears on the left side of Odd's blond hair. It has a translucent purple hue.]

Odd: NOOOOO! It's back.

Ulrich: Don't worry Odd, it's only one.

Odd: Then I look even more weird.

William: [voice from above] Physically impossible.

[Purple aura briefly flashes around Odd's left eye.]

Odd: Woah.

Ulrich: You okay?

Odd: I have no idea.

Jeremy: Aelita can you get a visual of what is going on?

Aelita: [examining the addition to her avatar] Sure. It doesn't seem to be bad.

Jeremy: Maybe Franz has an explanation for us. The access point for the whatever Franz left is 900 meters to the north-north west. You can take-

[The screen in front of him immediately blips out of existence. The bulb above them lighting the room blips out of power too.]

Yumi: Jeremy, what's going on?

Jeremy: I have no idea. The power to the entire house went off. I can't communicate with them at all. If they get devirtualized, they they-

William: They what?

Jeremy: Look, I have no idea. This is technically part of Lyoko, but at the same time, it's purposely separate. They could be lost forever if we don't have a working scanner for them.

William: So, will they be okay?

Jeremy: If we get the power back, we won't have to answer that.

[William, Yumi, and Jeremy run out of the room.]

Aelita: Jeremy, what was that? [no answer]

Odd: Maybe he forgot to pay the electric bill.

Ulrich: What do we do now?

Aelita: He's probably working on it. Nothing to do until he gets back. [Odd continues to swing around. She notices Ulrich staring off into space] You good?

Ulrich: Ah… yeah.

Aelita: Why did you want to come here? Odd I get. [Odd is swinging from trees in the background.] Buuuuut…

Ulrich: I just lost a year.

Aelita: So, did I.

Ulrich: Yeah but. Everything changed for you. Nothing changed for me. [Aelita waits for an explanation.] Nevermind. Let's just wait until Jeremy fixes the power.

[More awkward silence as teenagers refuse to be open with their feelings.]

Aelita: Since we have some time, could you teach me some moves. I wanted to learn martial arts from Yumi but since we're already here…

Ulrich: [glad to be doing something he's good at] Ah sure!

[Aelita uses her creativity to create a wooden dummy of Ulrich. Ulrich demonstrates some kicks on it.]

Ulrich: This is a hook kick. You rotate at the waist, use your core to pull your leg and then hit it like a whip with your heel. Now you try.

[She epically fails.]

Ulrich: Okay okay. Now, try not sucking at it.

[Aelita fails again.]

Ulrich: [serious] Maybe you should take it one step at a time.

[She gets it halfway right and she slowly goes through each motion.]

Ulrich: Good.

[Annnnd she fails again.]

Ulrich: That was … that.

Aelita: [frustrated] Maybe it would help if you talked about strategy. Or the mindset of fighting.

Ulrich: Give me a scenario.

Aelita: What's your plan for fighting William.

Ulrich: I don't have a plan, I'm going to beat him…How do you know about that?

Aelita: [thinks] Quick, use techno babble to confuse him.[speaks] Oh I absorbed some of your neural circuits from the down wave of the Return to the past since I was in the middle of a restoration process that was never completed.

Ulrich: ...That makes sense. [thinks] What did she just say?

[She tries, and fails, again.]

Ulrich: That's it. We're done.

[He tries to pull her away from the dummy, but she shrugs him off.]

Ulrich: Why is this such a big deal?

Aelita: I'M NOT GOING TO BE THE WEAK LINK!

Ulrich: Aelita, you're not weak.

Aelita: [frantic] Now that everyone can deactivate towers, I'm not special anymore. And when I'm fighting on my own, I'm not... not enough.

Ulrich: You have the strongest hitting attack out of all of us. You can't be that bad.

Aelita: [desperate to be heard] In the last few months, I've been taken out four times before I could get off an attack, two times you've had to come and rescue me, and just last mission I got taken out by a creeper's-

Ulrich: Laser? They take out 40 LP. You get hit a couple times by surprise and you're done. ["simple as that" gesture]

Aelita: It's tail.

Ulrich: [surprise] Oof.

Aelita: Yeah, that bad. [takes her stance again.] Why [tries to kick again] did you say nothing had changed?

Ulrich: Things are still the same for me as they were when we brought William back. Yumi and I are great one day, we hate each other the next, and by that afternoon I think we could… I dunno. And now with William in the group, I feel like I wasted a year and I'm in deeper trouble than before he came back. So I … hit first.

Aelita: You just want this to be all over with. If you know this is going to be a happily ever after…

Ulrich: Then why do I have to go through all this trouble.

Aelita: Exactly. [She smashes the target's head off. The dummy shatters into pixels.]

[She smiles. Ulrich gives her a thumbs up]

Ulrich: I'll help you with martial arts. It's the only thing I'm good at, so why not?

Aelita: And I'll help you figure out your love triangle situation. Dealeo?

Ulrich: Never say that again and yes. [shakes hands.] Though while he can't hear us, you really don't know what a normal relationship is.

Aelita: Yes, I do!

Ulrich: Half of it was through a computer screen and the other half is you trying to drag him away from a computer screen.

Aelita: You you you-

Ulrich: AH you can't deny it.

[Aelita playfully throws an energy field at him. He dodges.]

Ulrich: Ey! I'll take it back if you can hit me.

Aelita: No super sprint.

Ulrich: No energy fields or shields.

Aelita and Ulrich: Fine!

[They each take up a martial arts stance. Just as they are about to begin…]

Odd: I found it!

[They each turn to the sound of Odd's voice.]

Ulrich: Super sprint.

[Aelita's hits her bracelet and her 3rd wing unfolds as the original two appear. They fly and super sprint to where Odd was shouting.]

[They exit out of the Hermitage from the door leading from the basement to the side of the house. Next to them is a door they've used before that leads to the sewers. The back of the house is more elevated than the front. So they had to climb around the hill that formed the top of the door to the sewers. They see the damage. The breaker box is on the back of the house. There is burn marks around wires and some of the breakers have been ripped out.]

Jeremy: Sabotage.

Yumi: You think you can fix it?

Jeremy: Yeah, I just have to cannibalize what's left intact. Just keep watch in case he comes back.

[Yumi and William guard him. They take up a position facing out into the backyard with their backs to Jeremy and the wall, leaving no blind spots.]

Yumi: Does this mess up our plan?

Jeremy: No, we don't have to RTTP for this.

William: So, who do you think he works for?

Yumi: Tyron. It only makes sense. He's the only one who knows about us.

William: He sent Graven.

Yumi: A distraction for Grigory. And Ulrich and Aelita both lost their memories. It has to be the same tech.

William: I don't think a businessman would get a hitman involved.

Yumi: I wouldn't put it past a man like that.

William: Why.

Jeremy: [while still working] Tell William what he did.

Yumi: [sighs] Fine. When you guys were infecting the Cortex, [speaks with loathing] Tyron was willing to kill all of you just to prevent the virus from transferring.

William: [miffed] Why didn't you tell us he did something like that.

Jeremy: She told me.

Yumi: I didn't want to worry anyone else. If I can keep the rest of you happy with finals coming up, great.

William: You know I don't care about those.

Yumi: Don't you want to finish strong?

William: Nope. I'm deterring and going backpacking around. Maybe to Asia. Getting to understand myself.

[Yumi raises an eyebrow in suspicion]

Yumi: You already know yourself. You just hate school.

William: No, I don't. I messed up. And not just with XANA. It wasn't the first time I messed up royally because I was overconfident.

Yumi: What do you mean?

[Ulrich and Aelita arrive at the giant redwood tree with the same black biomass the towers have around its base.]

Ulrich: How do we access the memory?

Aelita: It looks like a tower, so I guess we just…step in?

[Aelita's elf ears twitch. There's the sound of fleet footsteps behind them.]

Aelita: Behind!

[Ulrich blocks a kick with the flat of his blade and reposts, forcing their attacker to super sprint back a few meters.

He has Ulrich's face, but with long brown hair in a warrior's wolf tail. After the knot, the hair gradually turned from brown to burnt orange at the end of the tail. Instead of Ulrich's yellow skin suit, this avatar dresses in an orange gi with a black liner. His arms couldn't be more polar opposite. His right has completely unarmored and the skin was showing from hand to shoulder seem where the sleeve seemed to have been shorn clean off. The exception was a small bracer, the same type Ulrich wore, except negative colored orange to Ulrich's yellow. But his left was heavily armored from the metal shoulder pad down and ended in a thick gauntlet that attached itself to the back of his gi, pinning his left arm to the small of his small of his back. Beneath that, he was equipped with a quickdraw rifle scabbard complete with trigger to fire the blade out. The scabbard was currently flat against his tailbone allowing for easy maneuverability. From the loose flaps of his gi emerged baggy pant legs that tapered off into the tops of his boots. Those were tall with thick tongues and cuffs.

Odd: XANA this is a private server. I need to see your invite.

[Ulrich prepares to engage the threat.]

Aelita: Something is off.

Ulrich: What? It's a doppelganger monsters. Easy.

Aelita: No, if it was a doppelganger, it would be identical. And the scanners went offline so there's no way XANA could have sent a polymorphic specter.

Ulrich: Whatever it is, I'll fight. You guys find whatever Franz left in here.

Aelita: Don't let it hurt the tree. [She enters the tower.]

Odd: [as he enters the tree tower] Have fun playing with yourself!

[Both Ulrich and the Ulrich-like avatar flip Odd off.

Ulrich and the new avatar start to right. Ulrich use series of slashes forcing the orange clone to dodge back from each one. He turns and runs away. Ulrich pursues.]

[Cut back to outside the house.]

William: [hides it] I just, just mean I've been making mistakes, getting into ambushes on Lyoko, misspeaking when I know the answer, you know. So, I'm trying to reevaluate myself. It's nothing really. …What about you? You want to come with me. It would be fun just exploring places we've never been.

Yumi: [Very clearly seeing he's hiding something but drops it.] My parents want me to attend college. No question about it.

William: Ahuh. And what do you want?

Yumi: I haven't decided on anything yet.

William: Okay, I'll rephrase. What sounds more fun? College or exploring for a year?

Yumi: …

William: You know you're going to have to take a risk one of these days?

Jeremy: You know, most people use high school as a way to experiment. Try new sports, learn an instrument, get in relationships. Wait. Have you even been in a relationship yet?

Yumi: [turns to face Jeremy] I don't need to tell you that. Besides it's too late to start anything now. It's almost graduation and anything I would start I would-

[William sees her go wide eyed. Then he feels something on the back of his head.

Yumi kicks away Grigory's hand before he can get a grip. He raises his other arm as Yumi sweeps away the clawed arm.]

BANG

[Yumi jerks to the side, a bullet hole on the chest of her black jacket. Grigory shoves her aside against the house and goes for Jeremy with the claw on his other arm outstretched. Jeremy throws a piece of metal at some exposed wires on the breaker box and sparks blind Grigory.

All the time Yumi needed. The end of her emerald staff slams into his rib cage. He stumbles back.]

Grigory: [amazed] Well this is the strangest thing I've seen today.

[Yumi is in her Lyoko avatar form. She has her black jacket on over her dark violet gi and is looking quite badass.

He panics and reaches into his jacket…

…only to find nothing there.

Instead, his grenades, desert eagle, and knife are floating in from of Yumi, surrounded by an orange glow.

Yumi tilts her head a smirks.

Grigory raises his pistol. Yumi throws her fans. They both hit him dead center and he goes flying over the edge of the sewer passage stairway without being able to fire a shot.

All three of them run over to the edge, but Grigory is nowhere to be seen.]

William: Where did he go?

Yumi: I don't know. Both doors are closed. And [she reaches up and touches her forehead]… I don't sense anything moving.

[She deactivates the pixelated mode. The floating weapons drop to the ground as her body returns to her normal outfit.

She checks her smart watch. It reads:

Codes: 4%
pixilation: 10%

Jeremy: I'm almost done with the breaker. You need to find and capture him or today will be waste. We'll have to RTTP and try again. He won't believe we were this careless to wander out into the open again.

William and Yumi run out to the front yard of the Hermitage. They whirl around searching frantically. No one is there.]

Graven: I've been looking for you.

[They turn to see Graven in the Hermitage doorway.]

[Odd and Aelita appear to be back in real life, but in their avatar forms. They are in a blizzard. Aelita is hovering on her wings and Odd is on his overboard. They are circling above an isolated property with a military base on top of a flat top mountain buried in a forest of birch trees as white as the snow that buried them and everything else atop that mountain.

The military base itself had stonewalls topped with barbed wire and searchlights flickering across the grounds. Inside the compound, every square foot was equipped with attack dogs, helicopters, sirens, and army members with guns. The view from atop the walls, only allowed a view of the birch trees covered with snow that went on past the horizon.

Franz voice breaks out above them.]

Franz: From 1985 to 1991, Anthea and I were in change of research for Project Carthage. I was still living under my real name. While my name now is Franz Hopper, I was originally Waldo Scheaffer. When we first started on the project, we believed we were creating a type of electronic communications network, something where everyone on earth could be connected and astounding scientific advances would be like taking a simple stroll down the street.

I thought we would be advancing the world on to a brighter future. I had given up everything for Project Carthage. I thought I was saving the world. And in the end everything about it betrayed me.

Just after, we finished development on a computer that could allow communication across the globe, we learned the truth. The real leaders of the project were a group we only heard whispered about as The Division or as we called them, "The Men in Black".

It all started during the cold war. A military project was authorized to conduct research to develop a weapon that could utterly cripple the communication of all other nations on Earth. There wasn't much advancement and once the Cold War ended, the project quickly slipped into shadows of the federal government. But "The Division" managed to bring the project back under their leadership.

We eventually learned what they actually wanted to use our invention for and wanted to leave immediately.

[A waypoint appears. And it was moving. The two drop down into the base. In the main courtyard, they find the marker above an older Swedish man with white frizzy hair and a short grey beard. He had a sharp nose and long jaw that looked like it was good for talking. He has the badge "Nickolas Erikson", pinned to his chest that labeled him as "Project Carthage Lead".]

Odd: Hello, can you-

[He walks through Odd and his overboard, flickering as he does.]

Odd: Hey watch the paint.

[The officer doesn't respond. Everyone ignores them like they are invisible.]

Aelita: It's a memory. We can't change events no matter what we do.

Odd: Ah, RPG dialogue trees.

[Erikson was making haste over to the door. It was almost like a bunker door with the building slopped into the ground. They follow him through the door, through the military base's green walls and cold hallways. They arrive at a laboratory. The workspace was a huge deserted laboratory without any windows. It was cluttered with metal tables, machines, big microscopes and computers, but no chairs. And a series of harsh neon lights illuminated the room.]

?: Ah, sir you're here already.

Erikson: Yes Waldo, I am here. At the time and place I said I would be when I gave you that deadline. Now what's this about an additional "Four architects" to add to your team?

[Aelita sees the man Erikson is speaking to and goes pale. She watches as her father stumbles up to his superior. Unlike what she knew him as, his hair was only starting to grey and he wasn't wearing his signature reflective glasses that hid his eyes. Other than that, he was in a standard lab coat.]

Waldo: You said I could use any number of resources to reach a solution as long as it went through you first.

Erikson: Yes, and have you?

Anthea: Yes. Yes we have. We'll be ready to display the communication network tomorrow.

Erikson: That's good to hear…if it's true.

[He turns to leave with a stiff face. As he exits, the door to the labs opens. The waypoint appears in the door frame. Aelita and Odd shrug at each other and exit through the door.]

[Yumi immediately pivots to run away.]

Graven: If you leave now, I'll report that you assaulted me. You know your principal will believe me over you.

[Yumi's hand warps slightly.]

William: [whispers] No. If you use powers to get rid of him, we'll have to RTTP.

[Yumi growls. Checks her watch again.]

Codes: 4%
pixilation: 5%

Graven: I came looking for Mrs. Scheaffer. I know she's around here somewhere. [He glances backward at the stairway to the basement.]

William: [sharply inhales] We left the secret entrance open didn't we.

Yumi: …we are the worst.

Graven: You have 10 seconds to tell me where Mrs. Schaeffer is, or I'll find her myself and report you anyway. [he takes a step toward the stairs of the house]

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