The Boy in the Computer

by SepticAbzies

Lyoko is back and the heroes have been upgraded, but XANA has shifted its goals yet again. / Jerlita Roleswap AU / Current Episode: Lab Rat / S1-3: Done, S4: WIP

17. 16: Cain and Abel

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.

Once again, I'm really proud of this one, because I barely had to use the original episode as a guide (I watch the original episode as I'm writing the chapter).

!~~~J~E~R~L~I~T~A~~R~O~L~E~S~W~A~P~~A~U~~~!

"Jérémie is suddenly left all alone when XANA traps the others in a simulation bubble. How far will he go to save them?"

Episode 16: Cain and Abel

(Based on Ghost Channel)

The tower with the red halo was in the Ice Sector this time, and there were at least five Bloks guarding it. All five Lyokowarriors were virtualized, so this was going to be a pretty even fight, minus Jérémie, who still didn't have any weapon aside from his power of Creation.

So Jérémie hid behind an ice rock for cover, watching the others fight and keeping an eye out for any other monsters that might ambush them. It was the only thing he could do.

Jérémie first picked this tower up on the radar via pulsations, and the monoscan, run by Aelita, confirmed it. And now, here they were. They didn't know what XANA's attack was, but hopefully they were onto it faster than XANA had anticipated. But just in case, he would run a Return to the Past. Just in case.

Ulrich blocked a few shots with his katana, before stabbing the Blok that was shooting at him in one of its four eyes. It exploded, signaling its defeat. One Blok down.

Odd used his agility to dodge lasers of the Blok he was fighting, until Aelita hit it with one of her Energy Fields. It exploded, leaving two Bloks left.

Odd then returned the favor by shooting the Blok that was in front of Aelita, and it exploded, leaving one Blok left.

Jérémie was itching to get to the tower. Knowing XANA, it probably had attacked the others' school by now, and being the only one who could neutralize its towers, the responsibility to ensure the safety of innocents rested on him. But the others had told him to stay hidden until the passage was cleared.

Though, from his position, he had a clear vantage point to see just how coordinated the others had gotten. All of their operations were well planned out and well executed. And he was proud of them for that.

Three Bloks down, but two more left, both standing right in front of the tower.

Yumi suddenly went down, her left shoulder glitching with lightning (where she had gotten hit).

"Yumi!" Ulrich cried, before turning to the others, "Aelita, cover Yumi! Odd, you and I will take out the last two Bloks!"

The two cousins both nodded, before running towards their new objectives.

Aelita slid in front of Yumi, her Energy Fields forming a shield she was using to absorb laser fire.

Ulrich and Odd, meanwhile, ran towards the Bloks. The two shared a nod, before going their separate ways. Ulrich used his katana to block laser fire from the Bloks, who were now focusing on him, while Odd ran towards a nearby ice rock and jumped up on top of it, before leaping off. In mid-air, he fired two Laser Arrows at both Bloks, and both targets were hit dead-on.

Odd landed as the two Bloks were destroyed. The passage was cleared now, and Odd was celebrating how he had the most kills this time (Jérémie really didn't understand why Odd and Ulrich had made it a competition, and he wish they'd cut it out). Meanwhile, Aelita had helped Yumi to her feet, and she and Ulrich were checking the Japanese girl over, making sure she was okay (she was fine).

"Yeah! He is amazing! How does he do it?!" Odd sang throughout his victory dance. "The crowd is going wild! Thank you, thank you!"

Jérémie, however, thanks to his goggles, could see what Odd could not, and he immediately called it out, "Odd! Behind you! There's another Blok!"

Odd stopped celebrating, "What? Another one?"

Behind him, the sixth Blok was successful in its ambush, as its laser hit Odd in the back when he wasn't looking. Odd flew back a few meters from the force, landing right beside Jérémie and the ice rock he was using as cover.

"Odd!" The other three called out in concern.

"Odd, you okay?" Jérémie asked, genuinely concerned.

Odd immediately used his agility to hop back to his feet, "Yeah! No sweat! Take cover, Jer, I'll be back in a second!"

He then ran towards the Blok, much to Jérémie's shock. "Odd, take cover! We don't know how many lifepoints you have left! It could be only ten!"

As Odd ran towards the Blok, he called back to the blue elf, "Ten's more than enough! Here we go!"

He leapt down to his knees, and slid on them as he fired three more Laser Arrows, this time at the Blok behind them.

All three Arrows hit their target, and Odd's sliding came to a stop as the Blok exploded, signaling its defeat.

The other three ran up to him, congratulating him on a job well done, with Ulrich naming him as today's 'MVP', whatever that meant. Jérémie honestly didn't know.

But he was about to ask when Odd turned to him, smiling, and said, "Hey, Jer, next time, just enjoy the show, and let the real pros get the job done, okay?"

'Real pros'? Did that mean that Odd didn't see him as a real Lyokowarrior? Why? Because he didn't have a weapon like the others? Because he was trapped on Lyoko, unlike them? It wasn't his fault...

Odd was giggling, still riding high on his victory, until Aelita cleared her throat. Odd stopped and saw Aelita, Yumi, and Ulrich all glaring at him.

Ulrich then turned to their fifth and said, "Don't worry, Jérémie. He didn't really mean that." He turned back to his roommate, still glaring, "Right, Odd?"

Odd finally saw the hurt in Jérémie's eyes. The blue elf was just standing there, in shock that someone he considered a friend could speak to him so nastily.

And Odd immediately grimaced, realizing his mistake. And he hastily tried to amend it, "R-Right! Sorry, Jer, I didn't mean it like that!"

Jérémie just turned around, facing the tower, and coldly asked, "Then what did you mean it as?"

"I'm sorry," Odd replied. "It was just a joke."

Jérémie was quiet for a moment, before telling the others, "I'll go take care of the tower now." He then took off towards the structure in a sprint.

"It was a joke, I swear!" Odd told the other three.

"It didn't sound like one, Odd," Ulrich calmly told him. "It sounded like you were telling him that you didn't consider him a real Lyokowarrior like the rest of us."

"But it was just a joke!" Odd still stuck to his guns here, but even he admitted that the claim was falling flat.

"A very bad joke," Yumi corrected, "that hurt his feelings."

"You know how bad his self-esteem is already!" Aelita looked like she wanted to punch her cousin's lights out, but instead settled on a lecture. "Your 'joke' probably just made it worse!"

"I know, I know," Odd hung his head, admitting defeat by waving a mental white flag. "I'll apologize as soon as I'm able to."

JEREMIE_

CODE_

LYOKO_

But the longer time Jérémie spent inside that tower, the more the fear of his anger cooled down. Odd just meant it as a joke, right? A joke that was in very poor taste, yes, but Odd really did seem unaware of how hurtful his joke was. The other three were probably in the midst of lecturing him right now.

As he entered the time coordinates, with his only light being the interface in front of him, Jérémie decided to forgive Odd if he ever apologized.

And he was certain Odd would.

Jérémie pressed enter, causing a bright white light to engulf the entire tower from the bottom, and them from the blue halo surrounding the tower. Eventually, it engulfed the entire world.

Though unknown to the five Lyokowarriors, XANA had done no damage whatsoever...

[Initializing: Operation: Ghost Channel]

[Launching: Operation: Ghost Channel]

[Launch Successful]

!~~C~O~D~E~~L~Y~O~K~O~~!

Time rewinded to this morning, when Jérémie had called the others about the pulsations he had felt. All four were in here when he had called, just waiting for class to start. He was still inside the tower he had just deactivated.

He logged onto Aelita's computer, and opened his interface, "Hey, great work, guys! You were better than ever! No hard feelings, Odd–" He stopped when he took a closer look at the room, and his smile immediately faded. He leaned his head a little farther to get a better view of Aelita's room.

No one was in there. No Aelita, no Odd, no Yumi, no Ulrich. Nobody.

A bit crestfallen, he logged off of Aelita's computer, before sending the connection to her laptop, knowing she always had it on her.

But the connection didn't go through. Something was blocking it.

"Don't panic, Jérémie," he told himself. "They could just be in class already..."

He began to relax, knowing that was probably the case and that they'd call him later. But as he brought up some more research on Earth customs on the interface in front of them, he couldn't get rid of a gut feeling.

The instinct that told him Aelita may be in danger...

!~~C~O~D~E~~L~Y~O~K~O~~!

Jérémie didn't have anything to worry about though, it seemed, as Aelita, Odd, and Ulrich were indeed in class already. They first had Ms. Hertz's biology class, and their teacher was currently taking roll.

"Pichon!"

"Here."

"Piranet!"

"Present."

"Poliakoff!"

"Here, ma'am."

Odd leaned to Ulrich and Aelita and whispered to them, "You guys are right. Completely. That joke never should've crossed my mind."

"Pujol!"

"Here."

"Glad you see it from Jérémie's perspective," Aelita whispered. "It's not his fault his avatar is incomplete." A piece of him seemed to be missing, probably from the supercomputer being shut down previously.

"Roux!"

"Present!"

Aelita was about to continue when Ms. Hertz called her name, "Schaeffer!"

"Oh! Here, ma'am."

"Stern!"

Ulrich replied, "Present."

"Suares!"

"Here!"

Aelita leaned back to Odd, and whispered, "But you are still going to apologize, right?"

"Of course!" Odd whispered back.

"Ürgüp!"

"Present."

"Xao!"

"Here."

Ulrich reminded him, in a low voice, "Just don't be surprised if he's still sulking and doesn't want to talk to you."

"Zlicaric!"

"Present."

"Perfect," Ms. Hertz marked Valerie Zlicaric as present as well, the last person on the list, before putting the list away and pulling out the class's biology textbook. "Now let's get started. Turn to page 43."

"Weird," Aelita muttered after turning her book to the mentioned page. "We already covered this three weeks ago..."

But no one except Odd and Ulrich paid her any attention, because only they seemed to remember.

!~~C~O~D~E~~L~Y~O~K~O~~!

After biology class let out, the trio went to the courtyard, where Aelita pulled out her laptop, "Jérémie, you there?"

After about a second or so, Jérémie's interface popped up on screen, "Yes. Something wrong?"

"No," Aelita reassured. "Odd just has something he'd like to say."

But before Odd could open his mouth, Yumi ran up to them. She stopped before hunching over to catch her breath. "I need to tell you guys something."

"What's wrong?" Aelita asked.

"Something really strange just happened in my English class just now," Yumi replied, before telling her story.

Yumi listened to Ms. Kensington drone on and on, lecturing the class about Shakespeare's "As You Like It". She already heard the same lecture three weeks before, but no one else brought up the strangeness of this, so she instead took this chance to skip taking notes and instead draw to pass the time.

As she was sketching out a Japanese paper fan, Ms. Kensington read aloud, "All the world's a stage, and all the men and women are merely players. They have their exits and–..." Yumi glanced up when she heard sudden radio static.

Just in time to see Ms. Kensington's image seemingly rewind before resetting itself.

"All the world's a stage, and all the men and women are merely players."

Yumi just blinked in confusion. It didn't happen again, at least not to Ms. Kensington. Later, out of the corner of her eye, she saw Priscilla Blaise write down the same sentence twice.

Current Yumi finished her story with, "It was so bizarre! Like a broken record! But it only lasted a second."

"And you're thinking that it could be XANA?" Ulrich asked.

"I really don't know," Yumi admitted, "but it sure wouldn't hurt to keep an eye on things, knowing XANA! Jérémie?"

Jérémie, still on Aelita's laptop, shook his head, "I don't feel any pulsations. Not at the moment, at least. I'll keep an eye out, though."

"And I'll run the monoscan, just in case," Aelita said, before beginning to type out the necessary commands. But she was stopped by someone she didn't expect to stop her.

"Don't," Jérémie said. The other four looked at him with shock and curiosity.

"What do you mean 'don't'?" Ulrich asked. "It wouldn't hurt to make sure, whether it's XANA or not."

Jérémie just shook his head again, "It will just waste resources. I'll keep an eye on XANA for you, I promise."

Aelita frowned, "And you'll tell us if it is XANA, right?"

"Of course."

But Aelita had a funny feeling that he didn't really mean that, and she didn't know where it was coming from.

"Alright," she said anyways, despite her better judgement telling her otherwise. It was not alright, and she didn't know why.

After a brief, and surprisingly tense silence, Odd broke it, slipping on a smile as he leaned in closer to the laptop screen, "Hey, Jer? I'm sorry about what I said before."

He meant it, but he was rewarded with silence on Jérémie's end, who narrowed his stoic gaze into a glare before logging off without another word.

"See? I tried to warn you, Odd," Ulrich said. "He's sulking."

"What do I do now?" Odd asked.

"Give him time," Yumi sent him a gentle, reassuring smile. "Remember, you did hurt his feelings."

But could Jérémie's behavior really be excused as him sulking?

While Odd and Ulrich thought so, both Yumi and Aelita had different ideas...

!~~C~O~D~E~~L~Y~O~K~O~~!

Aelita should've been out of class by now. Jérémie kept a close eye on what the time currently was at Kadic, and from the past year plus eight days, he knew for sure that right now was lunch time.

So he contacted Aelita's laptop again, but once again, the connection didn't go through. She had turned it off, but why? She never turned it off. It was too dangerous to even consider it!

He stopped trying to connect with Aelita's laptop and instead chose the computer in her room. Fortunately, the connection went through, and he saw Aelita's room form on the webcam.

But it wasn't Aelita who greeted him.

"What the–?" It was a big man, dressed in a red sweatshirt. "Who are you?"

"I-I'm Jérémie, Aelita's pen pal," the elf boy replied, remembering the cover story the group had been using for this past year. He hadn't expected this. "And you are...Jim, yes?" That was his name, right?

"Yep! Jim Morales, at your service," Jim replied, with a smile. "I'm surprised you know my name."

Jérémie returned his smile with one of his own and waved his hand to physically sign to Jim that it didn't matter, "Oh, I know pretty much everything about Aelita's life. She and I talk to each other all the time."

"Then, I'm very fortunate to have met you, Jérémie," Jim turned serious. "Miss Schaeffer wasn't in class this morning."

Jérémie's smile immediately faded. "She wasn't?"

"No," Jim continued explaining. "Nor was Ulrich Stern, Odd Della Robbia, or Yumi Ishiyama." With every name spoken, Jérémie felt his stomach sink even deeper. They weren't in class today? "We've contacted their parents, but they don't know where they are either. As you can imagine, they are now very concerned and demanding that we contact the police. I've been assigned to check their dorm rooms again, but I still can't find them. Since you know all four of them, Jérémie, I need to ask you if you know somewhere they could've disappeared to. Please think hard. Even the smallest clue can prove to be a great help."

Yes. Lyoko. But he couldn't just say that.

The elf shook his head, "No, sorry. Actually, that's why I was calling when I did. I wanted to know where Aelita was. She said she'd talk to me this morning, but she didn't answer then either."

"I see. So they must've disappeared sometime in the middle of the night," Jim muttered. "Don't worry, Jérémie. We'll find them."

The man was smiling, having seen Jérémie's disheartened expression for himself. Jérémie returned the gesture, "I hope so. Are you sure you searched the entire school for them?"

"Yep, we've searched everywhere. There's no sign of them no matter where we've looked."

"Understood," Jérémie replied. "Thank you, Jim. You've been a big help."

Despite Jim's confusion, the elf logged off.

Jim really was a big help. That wasn't a lie. Because if they weren't at school, maybe they were still on Lyoko somewhere.

But looking at the interface, and looking over the virtual avatars that were current active, his ID was the only one fully scanned.

Maybe in Virtual Limbo? He paused, trying to search for a disembodied emotion.

Nope, not there either.

Maybe they were on Lyoko, but in a Guardian of some kind.

Jérémie exited the tower, finding himself on the same bridge the others last fought the Bloks on. Slipping on his goggles, he took off across the numerous glaciers, looking for any brightly-colored orange spheres. Against this blue atmosphere, Guardians shouldn't be all that hard to find.

But with each plateau he ran across, he got increasingly disappointed. No signs of any Guardians.

Eventually, he stopped for a moment and climbed up on an ice rock on top of a glacier (underneath him was that one tower hidden in the ice cave), a very high vantage point.

But even from up there, he didn't notice anything on the horizon.

He closed his eyes for a moment to clear his thoughts of his emotions.

And he immediately opened them back up when he felt the faint beating of a heart.

Pulsations.

Faint ones, but they were still there. Whether they led to a Guardian, or to an activated tower, either way, it was proof of XANA's activity.

Jérémie hopped off the ice rock and followed them to the nearest way tower, and emerged from the other end of the tunnel in the Desert Sector.

Finding a Guardian would be harder here, since the Desert was also mainly orange, but this time, he had the advantage of the pulsations.

He would find them. Even if it took all day and all night, or for the next ten years.

He just followed wherever the pulsations were leading him, which, if his head was on straight, he should've realized was probably a bad idea. If XANA was behind his friends' disappearances, then it was probably using pulsations to lure Jérémie into a trap.

Still nothing. No Guardian, no activated tower, and still no sign of any of the others.

Stopping between two large sand dunes, he called out to the main controls in the lab, "Aelita?" He paused. "Anybody?"

No response. He really was on his own, wasn't he?

He shook his head, trying desperately to clear those thoughts. They would just drag him down. If the others were in danger, it was up to him to save them.

Suddenly, his goggles alerted him to a presence behind him.

He turned around, only to be greeted by a Krabe.

And he immediately turned and ran in the opposite direction.

He was no match for it.

!~~C~O~D~E~~L~Y~O~K~O~~!

"Pass the peas!"

"Reach them yourself!"

"Hey, have you heard the Subsonics' new single?"

"Yeah, it's great!"

Such was the usual chatter in the cafeteria at lunch hour. The group was at their usual table, but Odd wasn't up to his usual bubble demeanor. He was still feeling down about the accidental insult to Jérémie, and it was worse that Jérémie didn't want to hear him out.

"It'll be okay, Odd," Aelita reassured him, as she took a bite of her peas. "Like Yumi said, just give him some time." As someone who had fought with Jérémie previously, she knew how hard it was, waiting for Jérémie's response, but she also knew that Jérémie needed his space.

Sissi walked up to the table, wearing a new bright yellow top, and Odd immediately cheered up, "Hey, Sissi! Did you use canary feathers in the washing machine instead of soap?"

It was a joke, and Sissi knew it. Or at least, she usually did, because here, she retorted, "Shut up, you dork! Yellow is the in-color this season!" She then turned her nose up at him and walked away, her lunch tray in hand.

Odd was flabbergasted at this, "Has everyone gotten sensitive all of a sudden? I didn't say I hated it!"

Before the other three could respond, a rewinding sound occured, and a conversation they heard before repeated.

"Pass the peas!"

"Reach them yourself!"

"Hey, have you heard the Subsonics' new single?"

"Yeah, it's great!"

The four looked over at where that conversation had occurred from, before looking back at where Sissi was just standing moments before as she started talking again, repeating the same retort to Odd, "Shut up, you dork! Yellow is the in-color this season!" She then turned her nose up at him and walked away, her lunch tray in hand, all over again.

"B-But..." Odd was close to speechless. "I didn't say anything that time!"

The four all shared a concerned glance, before Aelita pulled out her laptop. "Jérémie!"

The blue elf's face appeared on her monitor rather quickly, "Is something wrong?"

"Yes!" Yumi immediately replied. "You remember what I described in my English class earlier?" Jérémie nodded. "Well, it's happening again, this time more frequently and with no longer durations!"

"Have you sensed any pulsations on Lyoko?" Ulrich asked.

Jérémie shook his head, which was more of a disappointment that it had ever been before. "No. But I'm still keeping an eye out."

"Search the sectors manually," Aelita urged. "Maybe XANA's hiding its pulsations somehow."

Jérémie sighed, "Alright. But I don't think I'll find anything."

He then logged off, but the gang felt worse than before.

"Our classmates and teachers aren't the only ones acting strange," Aelita told them in a low voice. "Jérémie is too."

"He could just be sulking," Ulrich reminded her.

"Yes, but he didn't want me running the monoscan earlier," Aelita replied. "Whether he's sulking or not, he knows that XANA is our top priority. He knows there's never any harm in running the monoscan, so why did he not want me to run it?"

The others had no answer for this.

!~~C~O~D~E~~L~Y~O~K~O~~!

The Krabe chased Jérémie across the vast expanse of the Desert Sector, but the elf didn't stop, even as one of the Krabe's lasers hit him in the shoulder, and then in the leg. When Jérémie saw they were approaching a large circular canyon filled with rock columns, he slightly altered his course to intercept it. He had an idea.

He jumped onto each of them without any trouble, thanks to his humanoid avatar, using them like skipping stones easily, before stopping at a rock column on the other side and turning around.

The Krabe, on the other hand, was having difficulties. Its four legs, all bending at an awkward angle stopped the monster from going at its normal speed.

Once all four of its legs were on the columns, and its body was a few meters away from the solid ground behind it, Jérémie took up a stance as if about to pray.

He imagined a few of rock columns, especially two right under the Krabes' legs, lowering themselves to the ground. After a couple of seconds, he then felt them go down.

He opened his eyes in time to see the Krabe struggling to keep its balance on the two legs still on top of the columns, but since it was its front right leg and its back left leg, it eventually failed.

"Bye!" Jérémie waved as he skipped across the remaining columns before landing safely on the other side.

The Krabe fell to the bottom of the canyon and exploded there, signaling its defeat, as Jérémie ran towards the nearest tower to regenerate his lifepoints.

It seemed that, despite what the others thought, he did have a weapon: his brain.

He entered the tower at a run, and stopped at the center of the first platform, but he didn't go up. As his lifepoints returned to him, he summoned the interface and checked the logs again.

Still no transfers to or from Lyoko. Still no IDs scanned except for his own.

But what was this? A radio or television transmission wave that was coming from somewhere on Lyoko?

He played it, and what he saw was really bizarre.

!~~C~O~D~E~~L~Y~O~K~O~~!

Jim was leading Ulrich, Odd, and Aelita's class with some stretching before their football game. Yumi, having free period right now, was watching them. Her mind started to wander until she heard something similar to the glitches earlier.

"Hey, watch what you're doing!" Hervé yelled at Nicolas, who had just punched him, as their classmates were stretching. "You did that on purpose, I saw you!"

Nicolas made a move to kick at Hervé, only for the whole scene between them to fizzle and repeat.

Nicolas punched Hervé, who immediately yelled, "Hey, watch what you're doing!"

Yumi's eyes wandered to Aelita's bag, which was sitting next to her, along with Odd and Ulrich's bags as well. Without hesitation, she reached in and pulled out Aelita's laptop.

"Jérémie?" Yumi called out. Her voice was low, seeing as how she wasn't exactly alone out here.

The blue elf's face appeared on the screen quickly, "Yes, Yumi?"

"The glitches are happening again," Yumi told him. "This time while we're not really looking, and they're happening all the time. Are you sure XANA isn't behind this?"

"I'm not sure, actually," Jérémie replied. "I still don't feel any pulsations, but it may be because Lyoko's core is beginning to weaken somehow..."

Yumi raised an eyebrow. That came out of nowhere. "The core is weakening? What does that mean exactly?"

"I'm not sure," the elf admitted. "But I think my hold over Lyoko is beginning to fade because of it. I'll keep an eye out, but I can't make any promises."

Yumi feigned concerned until Jérémie logged off. But once she closed the laptop, it immediately turned in a suspicious frown.

First, Jérémie was adamant that it wasn't XANA. Now he's not sure because Lyoko's core is weakening?

Something was wrong with Jérémie...

!~~C~O~D~E~~L~Y~O~K~O~~!

It sure wasn't a tape; he was in the picture somehow. It was happening somewhere right now.

The others weren't on Lyoko, or on Earth, nor were they in Virtual Limbo. If they were, he would've felt their emotions by now. And he went through all the transfer protocol data. So it was happening somewhere else.

Other than the Virtual Limbo, there was no such thing as an intermediate space. Unless...

Unless XANA had manufactured one!

That was it! A parallel world on Lyoko, modeled after their school. XANA couldn't have made a better trap!

Yumi and the others thought they were in reality, but it was only an illusion. They were living under XANA's control, completely at its mercy!

He had to save them!

But how? He was the only one left. And it was too dangerous, given how he would be deleted if he lost all of his lifepoints. In fact, XANA just tried to take advantage of that with that Krabe.

But he couldn't just leave Aelita, Yumi, Odd, and Ulrich all alone at the mercy of XANA! Because, if he knew he was the real Jérémie, then who was the other one...?

He had to find out where the signal was coming from. But he couldn't. The signal was all scrambled, and all he had was that sample, not the signal itself.

Jérémie assumed a lotus position and closed his eyes, letting his mind connect to Lyoko's core, as he sensed the activity of every Sector with his Second Sight, listening for any pulsations.

He caught the pulsations he was following earlier, but had lost thanks to that Krabe. He held onto them with his mind and willed them to become clearer. A flash of bright yellow amidst green trees popped up in his mind.

Jérémie opened his eyes, before leaving this tower to find the nearest way tower.

He knew where he had to go.

!~~C~O~D~E~~L~Y~O~K~O~~!

He emerged from the way tower in the Forest Sector, and he quickly followed the pulsations further. They felt stronger than before, telling him that he was indeed going the right way.

He followed them to a clearing, a plateau with numerous paths branching from it. And in the middle of that plateau was a large bright-yellow dome. It looked sort of like a Guardian, only larger and it was connected to the ground.

So that was the simulation bubble. Simulation Bubble, huh? That was a good name for it.

Jérémie's fists clenched tightly and ran towards it, stopping at the boundary. Great, now that he found it, what now?

He placed his hand on the surface of the Bubble, only for it to start phasing through, just like the towers. Jérémie pulled his hand back, startled at first.

But it went away the longer he remembered what he had to do, who it was he had to save, and who it was he was saving them from.

He'd have to go inside, and a world modeled after Earth awaited him.

He had expected Aelita's smile to be what greeted him once he was materialized to Earth, but hopes and dreams meant nothing when XANA was on the prowl.

He took a deep breath before closing his eyes and letting his entire body phase through the wall of the Bubble.

!~~C~O~D~E~~L~Y~O~K~O~~!

His eyes were still closed when he emerged on the other side, but he had to open them when he suddenly tripped and fell to his knees.

And he found that everything was blurry. On instinct, he felt for his goggles and knew that they had changed a bit. He slipped them down and was relieved to know that they had repaired his vision. Everything was a lot clearer now.

(His friends would later refer to his goggles as 'glasses'.)

His attire had also changed from his blue avatar, to a blue turtleneck and khakis, with blue shoes, and around his neck was a small rectangle-shaped pendant with the eye of XANA on it. He also no longer had the pointed ears. He didn't expect this, but okay.

He also didn't know where he was. He probably should've studied a map of their school first. But the environment seemed to be a forest, at least in front of him, along with a building filled with tools (Mr. Roulier's garden shed). Behind him was a fence and then square and rectangle-shaped structures beyond that.

"Aelita? Can you hear me?" he called out again, receiving no response. He sighed, "Of course not. That would be too easy..."

He looked around, searching for a path. He'd have to find the others on foot.

He chose the path in front of him, hoping that was the fastest way to his friends' school.

But as he ran, he passed by a flower whose petals fell to reveal the eye of XANA, in the center of which was a red dot.

!~~C~O~D~E~~L~Y~O~K~O~~!

XANA, having assumed the form of the boy Jérémie's virtual avatar, was in a rectangle-shaped room somewhere deep in the factory, with its walls decorated and designed to look like the interior of a tower.

From the screen of a computer monitor in front of him, his flower camera followed the blonde boy in the blue turtleneck.

"Ah, so you found your way inside, brother," XANA muttered. "Don't worry. I'll take care of you soon." He called out, "Jim!"

From a dark corner in the room stepped a silhouette. Whether it wasn't possible to see in that dark corner, or XANA itself pulled it from a shadow, was irrelevant. XANA needed Jim for something.

But this man wasn't the friendly Jim known and beloved at the real Kadic. This one had pale skin like a zombie, had eyes were were blank, white and lifeless.

"Yes, Master," the thing with Jim's face spoke, in a voice that was monotone, so unlike the real Jim's energetic demeanor.

"We've got an unwanted visitor. Take care of him."

"Yes, Master," the thing with Jim's face replied, repeating the same words as before.

It then stepped back into the shadows and disappeared to do XANA's bidding.

XANA, still using Jérémie's avatar as its disguise, turned back to its monitor, continuing to watch the real Jérémie struggling to find his way around Kadic.

"Soon, I won't have anymore obstacles. And that pendant is just an added bonus..."

!~~C~O~D~E~~L~Y~O~K~O~~!

It was afternoon now, and Yumi had just gone home. She had also warned them about what Jérémie had told her earlier, about Lyoko's core somehow being weakened, and how she suspected it wasn't actually true.

The other three were lounging in Aelita's room. Ulrich was pacing, thinking hard about what Yumi had told them, while Aelita was quietly staring at her turned-off computer screen, as Odd lounged on his cousin's bed, reading a comic book.

"Relax, guys," he was saying. "Yumi's what you might call intuitive, but she can be wrong sometimes. And let's face it, Ulrich, any girl with a crush on you can't be what I'd call 'normal'."

"Hey!" Ulrich took offense to this. "This is Yumi you're talking about!"

"So, you really don't find any of these glitches weird, Odd?" Aelita asked. "Or that Jérémie's constantly dodging our question of whether or not it's XANA?"

Odd sighed, mentally admitting defeat, "Okay, yeah, those are pretty bizarre. But Jérémie is still our friend and a Lyokowarrior like us. If he says nothing's wrong, then I don't want to doubt him so quickly." Ah, so that was why.

The door suddenly burst open, to their shock, and Yumi entered and immediately closed the door again. She leaned against the door, as if bracing for an army to start pounding on the door any minute now.

"Yumi?" Ulrich asked, concerned, as the eldest of them was catching her breath. "You okay? I thought you already went home?"

"I did," Yumi gasped out, and she sounded utterly panicked. "It started again, the glitches! But this time, they were so much worse! My own parents and brother kept making the same gestures over and over again, and they were acting as if I wasn't even there! It's as if they were phony imitations of my actual family! I don't care if I get into trouble with Jim, but I am not sleeping at home tonight!"

"Then don't," Aelita immediately replied. "You can stay with me."

Yumi breathed a sigh of relief, "Thank you, Aelita." But from the tone of her voice, she was still stressed out and shaken up.

"Should we tell Jérémie?" Odd asked.

"No." Yumi's answer surprised the rest of them. "Let's keep this between us from now on. I–...I have my doubts about him."

"Then what do we do?" Ulrich asked. "Jérémie's the only one who can deactivate the tower."

"If there even is one," Odd reminded them all.

Suddenly, Aelita's monitor turned on by itself, and Jérémie's interface popped up soon after. "I have a problem! There's something wrong with Lyoko's core! It's getting weaker! I think XANA implanted a virus into the supercomputer! I need your help!"

Aelita swallowed a lump in her throat, "We'll be right there."

Jérémie logged off, and Yumi immediately asked, "Why would XANA infect itself?"

"That's a really good question," Ulrich admitted. "Look, I know Jérémie's acting strange. Everything about this place since that Return to the Past is bizarre. But if the supercomputer really has been infected with a virus, then it means Jérémie's in danger. We have to go."

"Right," Odd replied. "We may find our answers there."

"Agreed," Aelita said, before sending their eldest an apologetic look. "Sorry, Yumi. But let's set one ground rule first: no one splits up. For any reason. We all stick together."

The other three nodded, before leaving the room one by one.

!~~C~O~D~E~~L~Y~O~K~O~~!

Apparently, Jérémie had picked the wrong path. All he could see around him and for kilometers on end in every direction was trees. Lots and lots of trees. It was official. He was lost.

But it wasn't like he could ask for directions. He was in XANA's world now. XANA would just lie to either steer him in the wrong direction or to lure him into a trap, or both.

He stopped for a moment to reorient himself. Where was the school? Or the factory for that matter?

How did the others communicate between them again? Through a distance? What did they call those devices? Cell phones?

Yeah. He really wished he had one right now.

Suddenly, he felt a presence behind him, and he turned around to see Jim. But this wasn't the Jim he had met earlier.

This Jim was just a shell of the real person.

And remembering that XANA controlled everything in here, Jérémie immediately got scared. XANA had found him. XANA knew he was here.

Jérémie stepped back, but the Jim-shell grabbed the front of his shirt and tossed him to the side. Jérémie hit the ground, though he was surprisingly not hurt. He was on Lyoko still, after all.

Regardless, he got back to his feet, picked a direction, and ran. Didn't matter where at the moment. He just needed to lose the Jim-shell.

This time, it seemed, he chose the right path, because he eventually came upon a clearing. In the center was seemingly heavy, large metal disc, and surrounding that disc were his friends.

At last!

He attempted to run up to them, but identical shells of Hervé and Nicolas emerged from the bushes to cut him off (he only knew their names thanks to the others telling him).

All of this was unknown to the other four, as they all immediately looked up the moment they heard rustling in the bushes.

"Hear that?" Odd asked.

"Yeah," Aelita admitted, "but then again, everything here today has been strange. So it could just be nothing."

"True," Ulrich said. "We all need to calm down." He then knelt down and removed the manhole cover from on top of the sewer passage. "After you guys."

Jérémie could only back up as he watched his friends climb down the tunnel that was being covered by that large metal disc. He wanted so badly to join them, but he couldn't, as he was now surrounded by the three shells of real people from the others' world.

"Aelita! Odd! Ulrich! Yumi!" he resorted to calling out to them.

But the Hervé-shell suddenly tackled him from the side. The two of them rolled to the ground, and mere chance allowed Jérémie to escape.

By the time he had reoriented himself, the others were gone, and the tunnel had been covered back up with the metal disc.

"Wait!" he called out, hoping they were still there, hoping that the metal disc wouldn't stop his voice from reaching them. But nothing.

And he couldn't wait for much longer, because the Nicolas and Jim-shells had almost caught up to him and the Hervé-shell.

He had no choice but to continue running, no longer able to try calling out to his friends.

But at least he knew where the factory likely was.

It was only five minutes, but the sun was almost fully below the horizon by the time Jérémie managed to evade his three pursuers. He hid behind a tree and used a large tree branch to knock out all three. It took a while, but he did it, and he was proud of himself.

The moon was coming out now, but even that was glitching, as Jérémie ran back to where that metal disc was.

It was heavy as he pulled it away from the tunnel.

But he took a deep breath to steady his nerves before going right on in.

Hopefully, he wasn't too late.

!~~C~O~D~E~~L~Y~O~K~O~~!

The four reached the lab, and Aelita immediately sat in front of the monitor and checked everything over.

"Everything seems calm," she relayed, unknowingly only reading what XANA wanted her to read. "Every tower is still standing, all four Sectors are calm and free of XANA's activity. Jérémie," his interface appeared on the screen, "are you sure Lyoko's in danger? I don't see anything wrong."

"Trust me, the threat is real," Jérémie replied, sounding a bit panicked. "XANA modified the virus to attack the supercomputer under the radar, which was why we couldn't detect it until now. I can feel it in here." He motioned to where his heart was.

Yumi narrowed her eyes in suspicion, but Odd made a horrified sound, almost like a choke.

Jérémie continued, "I've found the activated tower. It's in the Mountain Sector, but I'll need help getting through. It's pretty well-guarded."

"Then, let's go!" Odd made a move to run towards the elevator, but he and Ulrich were both held back by Yumi. "What?!"

"Yumi, come on," Ulrich insisted. "We have to go."

"Don't you dare press any buttons, Aelita," Yumi practically growled. "I don't trust this at all. There's been weird things happening all day, but your behavior," she nodded her head at Jérémie, still on screen, "is the strangest by far. First you reassure us there is no XANA attack, and are so confident in that fact that you don't even let Aelita run the monoscan to double-check. And then, you turn around and say there is something wrong! So what is the truth?!"

"Yumi, it's me, Jérémie," the elf on the screen said, his voice attempting to sound reassuring. "You can trust me. I have an innate connection with Lyoko that can't be broken so easily, you all know that. But if you're so unsure, then let Odd and Ulrich go before you and Aelita."

Suddenly, the elevator doors opened and revealed...another Jérémie?! "You're right, Yumi!" this Jérémie said, this one looking more human than elf. "It's a trap!"

Aelita blinked in surprise. "Jérémie?!" This was the first time she'd seen him so...human. His pointed ears were gone and he was in normal, human clothes, but his eyes were still same sapphire blue as when she first met him.

"Really, XANA?" The Jérémie on the computer screen seemed unimpressed. "Is that the best you can do? A cheap imitation of me to sow discord and delay us? Go on, you four. To the scanner room. I'll start up the program from Lyoko."

But the human Jérémie blocked the path with his arms, "Don't! It's a trap! You guys never left Lyoko during the last Return! You're in a virtual reality on Lyoko created by XANA!"

Aelita snapped her fingers in realization, "That would explain all the glitches!"

"Of course it would," human Jérémie replied. "XANA can make mistakes too. It only has theoretical knowledge of how humans are supposed to be behave. What it wants is to get you four into the scanners and delete you permanently! We have to get out of here–!"

The computer Jérémie, the image the other four were used to, cut him off, scoffing, "And how are we supposed to trust you?" He shook his head, disapprovingly. "You're just another distraction, like the glitches, while Lyoko slowly disintegrates into simple data."

"He has a point," Ulrich admitted. "XANA literally found a way to turn off gravity once. Creating glitches in reality doesn't seem that far-fetched at this point. And it wouldn't be the first time it's created a clone of one of us." Yumi sent him a glance, remembering how that clone took Ulrich's form.

Odd turned to human Jérémie, "Well? Any counter-argument to that?"

Human Jérémie shook his head, "No. The only proof you guys have is that I'm here with you. You have to decide which one of us is lying."

Aelita, Yumi, Ulrich, and Odd all stood between the two Jérémies, indecisive.

Computer Jérémie replied, "And it's not me. Even if, hypothetically speaking of course, I was XANA, and this, once again hypothetically, was an alternate world within Lyoko, you mind telling us how you got here? We're listening, XANA."

"I simply phased through the boundary," human Jérémie admitted. "You really need to tighten your security, XANA."

"Checkmate!" Computer Jérémie exclaimed. "You gave yourself away! The real Jérémie would never step foot inside an unknown world without the aid of his bodyguards! He'd be much too frightened!"

'Hey, Jer, next time, just enjoy the show, and let the real pros get the job done, okay?'

Human Jérémie swallowed a lump in his throat. Odd saw this, and he immediately knew, deep in his gut, which Jérémie was the real one.

"And I'm sure he would," he countered, "if his friends were in danger."

"No doubt about it!" Ulrich agreed.

"Absolutely none!" Yumi added.

"And even if Lyoko was being destroyed, XANA," Aelita hissed out the name with venom in her voice, "then Jérémie would gladly give his life up if it meant destroying you." And he had. Eight days ago, on his 'birthday'.

"W-What? But–" Computer Jérémie stuttered. His composure was crumbling. "It's illogical!"

"Logic has nothing to do with it!" Human Jérémie retorted, his confidence restored now that he knew the others believed him. "You're not infallible, XANA! Your knowledge of humans is only approximative!"

"That's right!" Odd agreed. "And as far as friendship goes, it's not approximative. It's double-zero. Good to see you again, Prince Charming." Human Jérémie, the real one, smiled. "Though it is a little disorienting to see you without the ears." Jérémie chuckled, liking that joke much better than the one made earlier.

The other three joined in the laughter, and for a moment, all was right in the world, despite this world belonging to XANA.

They were interrupted, however, when the fake Jérémie on the computer screen still, started shaking his head, muttering hysterically under his breath, "No, it's not logical, not logical–" electricity started crackling into the air, making the five teens tense up, preparing for the worst, "–notlogicalnotlogicalnotlogical–"

Jérémie's four bodyguards barely had enough time to put themselves between the two Jérémies before the supercomputer monitor exploded in a flash of golden light.

"NOT LOGICAL!"

[ERROR: System Error Detected. Commencing deletion of illogical elements.]

The light cleared away, revealing XANA standing where the monitor used to be. It was still wearing the disguise of Jérémie's Lyoko avatar, but now it was shaking in a spasmodic fashion, its fingers twitching, its hair charged with electricity and standing on end, and its eyes were black sclera and red pupils. XANA was floating, surrounded by dark smoke.

"Not logical, not logical, not logical," it chanted, its voice sounding deep, loud, and inhuman.

Now unrestrained, XANA moved at an unnatural speed and pinned the real Jérémie to the wall by his neck.

Jérémie had no time to react, only being able to gasp (or try) once his neck was in XANA's grasp.

"Not logical, not logical, not logical," XANA continued to chant.

"Jérémie!" Aelita cried, and she and the other three moved to help him, but XANA, like an orchestra conductor, summoned a horde of supercomputer cables from the ground.

Aelita was immediately restrained around her torso, her arms pinned to her side, and a second slammed over her mouth when she tried to yell. Odd was the next one snatched, a cable snaking around his ankle and lifting him upside down as others tied his wrists to together. Other cables tripped Ulrich when he started running towards his friends, a bunch of others restraining him to the ground as soon as his body hit it. Yumi didn't even have time to move, a cable tying itself around her throat and dragging her up against a wall, more cables restraining her against it.

"I'll deal with you four later," XANA growled, before turning to Jérémie. "You shouldn't have come here, boy." Its voice was horribly cold and robotic. "You just handed me victory on a silver platter. Now, you're all going to die."

But Jérémie managed to choke out, "You still don't understand humans, XANA, and that scares you. Doesn't it?"

"It's not logical, not logical, not logical," the AI's chant started up again.

"I told you..." Jérémie brought his left hand up to XANA's face, his right trying to hold off XANA's tight grip as long as he could, "logic has nothing to do with friendship." He then pressed his free palm to XANA's forehead, and a gentle humming immediately filled the air.

XANA immediately started screaming, as if in pain.

Jérémie let out one last word, "Checkmate," before passing out.

XANA disappeared from the Bubble in another flash of light, and the cables securing the others all fell to the ground, as the Bubble around them began to break down, before eventually bursting into millions of pixels.

The resulting explosion shook the entire Forest Sector with its intensity.

!~~C~O~D~E~~L~Y~O~K~O~~!

When the light faded, the first thing Ulrich, Odd, Aelita, and Yumi saw were the trees that littered the Forest Sector. And they all breathed a sigh of relief. They were alive, and they had escaped.

Aelita immediately looked around for their fifth. Her eyes locked onto a blue elf who was passed out on the ground. "Jérémie!" she cried, before running over to him.

The other three followed her, and stood as she knelt down and gently shook Jérémie to wake him up. Fortunately, his eyelids stirred and eventually opened.

He immediately smiled, "You guys are okay."

"Of course we are," Odd smiled, as Aelita held out a hand. Jérémie took her hand and let her help him to his feet.

"Are you okay?" Ulrich asked, slightly concerned.

"I'm fine," Jérémie reassured them. "Missing a few of my lifepoints, I'm sure, for attacking XANA directly, but I'll live."

Yumi sent him a gentle smile, "Thank you for saving us."

Jérémie shrugged, "Don't worry about it. We're friends, aren't we?"

The others exchanged knowing glances, aware that their gratitude was secretly building up his self-esteem, but they didn't mind.

"Whatever the reason," Odd leaned an elbow against the blue elf's shoulder, "you can join the daredevil heroes club now!"

Jérémie brightly smiled, "Thank you. No hard feelings, right?"

"Right," Odd returned the smile with a gentle one of his own. XANA made it seem like Jérémie was mad at him, but in reality, Jérémie had already forgiven him by the time the Return was launched.

"We know what happened to us," Yumi said, "but remind us anyway."

Jérémie, knowing why Yumi asked, explained, "XANA created a replica of where you live, so you'd think it was reality. It locked you up in a virtual prison where it could execute you anytime it wanted. But I did all I could to set you free."

"And you succeeded," Ulrich added.

Jérémie nodded, before remembering, "Oh, we'll need to run another Return. Your parents are worried about you all."

"How do you know that?" Yumi asked, after she and Ulrich shared a concerned glance.

"I had a run-in with Jim."

"Uh-oh," Aelita muttered.

"Don't worry, it was nothing bad," Jérémie reassured them. "Actually, he was the one who told me you guys were missing. You should probably thank him."

"We will," Aelita reassured him. "Somehow."

Behind the group, however, there was a massive army of Bloks assembling. "Behind you!" Jérémie exclaimed, and the group turned around.

"Looks like XANA's welcoming committee is here already!" Odd said, getting ready to fight.

"Quite the group!" Aelita added, referring to their sheer number. Yumi nodded in agreement.

"They're just the Bloks XANA used to act as humans," Jérémie admitted. "Can you guys hold them off long enough for me to get to a tower?"

"No need to worry, Jer," Ulrich replied. "We're used to this. It's a piece of cake!" He then unsheathed his katana, and the other three followed suit. "Here we go!"

With that, Jérémie smiled as his four friends all ran directly at the Bloks with a synchronized enthusiastic war cry, while he ran in the opposite direction towards the nearest neutral tower.

He didn't doubt them at all.

!~~C~O~D~E~~L~Y~O~K~O~~!

[ERROR: Operation: Ghost Channel has failed.]

[System Reset: Initiate]

[System Reset: Successful]

[New Data Collected]

[New Information Added to Database: Bonds make humans do illogical things, even if they know better than to do them.]

[New Secondary Objective Added: Collect more data on human bonds.]

[New Secondary Objective Added: Find a way to exploit human bonds for main objective.]

[New Primary Objective Added: Delete Jérémie -REDACTED-]

!~~~J~E~R~L~I~T~A~~R~O~L~E~S~W~A~P~~A~U~~~!

Next Episode: 17 - Code: EARTH / Aelita finally completes Jérémie's materialization, but XANA's not the one they need to worry about.

A/N: Fun Fact: "Ghost Channel" is another one of my favorite episodes.

A lot of you were wondering how I'd tackle this episode, since Aelita goes to Lyoko in this AU quite frequently. Well, here's my answer. It's still centered around Jérémie, because in this AU, he's still different from the others.

XANA's thoughts are inspired by hopeater on Tumblr, who has an amazing rewrite of 'Ghost Channel'. Go check it out.

The pendant Jérémie has will be important later, I promise. Also, a bit more lore to chew on.