~Kadic Academy; Bordeaux, France~

15-year-old genius prodigy, Jeremie Belpois, suited in his old mahogany sweatshirt and grey pants, was sitting in Calculous class, doodling old ideas of robotic prototypes he'd axed in his notebook instead of listening to the teacher. He never needed to listen. It was calculus, much harder than the algebra class he took last semester, but he could teach the class if he wanted. Sitting next to him was a quiet girl. A girl of almost equal intellect, dressed in all pink, (and matching pink hair) also not paying much attention to the teacher. Like Jeremie, she already knew the material, not to the extent that Jeremie did, but enough to fake it if she were to get called on. This girl was, of course, Jeremie's girlfriend, Aelita Schaeffer, or as she's known by all but four people, Aelita Stones. The two hadn't changed much in the last ten years except the fact that Aelita's hair had been grown out to her neck's length.

"And that covers the basics of calculus." The teacher said turning away from her chalkboard. "I know asking you to do work on the first day of class may seem taboo, but I cherish every second of class. Remember everything we talked about today, they're the building blocks you'll need for the rest of the semester." She smiled. "You are all dismissed for today."

As the various kids shuffled out of the room Jeremie slung his bag over his shoulder and quickly departed from his desk before he felt a hand on his shoulder. He looked over his shoulder to see Aelita looking into his eyes.

"Are you okay, Jeremie? You didn't even correct the teacher on her mistake in her chain rule example. That's like 3rd grade math for you! You actually let Herb correct her."

Jeremie sighed. "I'm just in a bit of a funk, that's all. I'm sure it'll go away soon enough. I've just had no ideas lately. Programming, robots, computer upgrades, I can't think of a single idea for anything!"

Aelita tilted her head. "Still? Jeremie I thought you told me your inspiration came back last week when we were picking classes."

"I thought it did! But as soon as it came back, it left again."

"I'm sorry, Jeremie. Maybe meeting up with Odd and Ulrich would cheer you up. You know, I get it's the first day, but one of them might already need tutoring." She smiled. "And who better to tutor them than the smartest mind in Kadic? They're probably waiting for us at the vending machines right now."

As they walked out of the classroom Jeremie looked over at Aelita. "There's no way anyone could be behind on day one. Have you forgotten that Ulrich's actually a good student these days? And as long as Odd has him to cheat off of..."

"Yeah, I guess you're right. Ever since we beat X.A.N.A., life's been good for all of us." She said wrapping an arm around Jeremie. "Come on."

As the two approached their usual meeting place they began to vaguely make out two familiar forms ahead of them. One was easily picked out by his cone-shaped hair and the other by his trademark beige jacket. Ulrich Stern and Odd Della-Robia. Longtime friends of Jeremie and Aelita. Odd was currently inserting his money into the machine and Ulrich was just sitting on a stone next to him. Jeremie and Aelita picked up the pace to meet their two friends at the meeting spot just in time to see Odd place his plastic cup in the compartment in front of him.

"So how goes classes this year?" Aelita asked.

"Hey Princess." Ulrich said looking back her with a smile. "It's fine, I guess. Except for you know, the fact that I just entered the tenth grade and I'm already wishing I was out of school, but the dictator says it's straight to law school after this."

"Your dad's up on his high horse again?" Odd asked. "How bad is it this time?"

"Worse than ever. After Mom died, I lost that little bit of sanity I had when I was with my parents. Now it's all about what my father wants. One more crappy report card, and he's taking me straight to a new school. Worse yet he still thinks you guys are the problem, not a problem, the problem. Even though my grades are the best they've ever been." Ulrich groaned, resting his head in his hands.

"He's going to pay for your law school?"

"Yeah, but he expects me to pay him back every penny as soon as I'm a successful lawyer." Ulrich groaned.

"Have you tried telling this to him?" Aelita asked. "He can't be all bad. Maybe he just needs to meet us formally. Then we can show him how happy you are with us."

"Not possible." Jeremie said. "Odd and I already tried that a while back. We were supposed to hang out all day. Do homework, goof off, watch TV. We made it one hour before Mr. Stern had had enough of us. My dad had to come and get Odd and I. There's no way I'm letting anyone talk to you like that, Aelita."

"Aww." Odd said wiping a fake tear from his eye. "That's so cute." He looked back to the machine to find his cup still empty. "I swear to whatever deity this messed up world has-"

"There's just no talking to him. It's like he was put on this Earth to torture me." Ulrich moaned cutting off Odd.

"Speaking of torture..." Odd said interrupting Ulrich. "this machine's going to get a lot of it if it doesn't spit out my soda!" Odd said angrily. He reared his leg back then slammed it into the lower half of the machine causing it to shake vigorously in response. "If I still had my laser arrows, I'd-"

"Della-Robia!" A voice boomed. The four sophomores turned their heads to find a large, brunette man clad in a red jumpsuit and grey sweatpants standing over them. Jim Morales. "That vending machine is school property! That's two hours detention and if I catch you manhandling it one more time, it's straight to Mr. Delmas's office with you!" He turned his head to Jeremie. "Belpois! I'm counting on you to keep your friends here, in line! Can you do that for me?" Jeremie nodded once in silence. Jim looked to Aelita. "What's his problem?"

"He's just in a bit of a low point right now." Aelita said. "He's out of steam."

"Huh." Jim said. "Reminds me of when I used to be a therapist for teenagers." He said smiling before shaking his head. "But before you ask-"

"You'd rather not talk about it?" Aelita guessed.

"Right. But how'd you know?"

"Lucky guess." Aelita shrugged. "No chance it could happen twice." She smirked.

"Right you are. I am not a predictable man." Jim said proudly. "Well, since Belpois is having troubles and he speaks so highly of you Stones, I'm counting on you to keep Della-Robia and Stern in line."

"Me?!" Ulrich said hitching a thumb towards himself. "It was Odd who kicked the stupid machine! I've just been sitting here!" He protested.

"Oh, yeah!" Odd shot back. "Throw your best buddy under the bus, real classy Ulrich!" Odd said.

"He already saw you! I couldn't throw you under the bus even if I wanted too." Ulrich growled.

"No backtalk Stern, or you'll join Della-Robia in detention!" Jim snapped.

"I'll do my best Jim. But for now, I have to take Jeremie back to his room." Aelita said. Jim nodded and made left to return to his gym. "Ulrich, Odd, we'll meet up in an hour for lunch, okay?"

"Yeah, sure" Ulrich replied. "We're gonna stay here and wait for Yumi. She should be showing up here soon. Our first lunch together of another year." Ulrich said happily.

"See you guys." Jeremie waved. The two made their way to the double doors leading to the boy's dorms. A quiet walk ended when Jeremie reached for the door, only to have it opened from the other side. As the door opened a shaggy black-haired boy, in a beige jacket was revealed on the other side. He looked up slowly. "Jeremie? Aelita?" The boy said instantly lighting up his face.

"Hey, William. How was your summer?" Aelita asked sweetly. "Any special family you got to see?"

William shook his head. "No, just me and the folks. As for the quality, I wanted to talk to you two. Are the others there?"

"No." Jeremie said. "But I can go grab the quick if you-"

"No!" William said jolting slightly. At the concerning glares he was getting from the two geniuses, he sighed. "Look, I'm getting bad vibes from Ulrich lately. I think he's still holding a grudge, I'd rather just talk to you two. I have a question. Are you sure X.A.N.A.'s dead?"

"What makes you bring that up?" Jeremie asked. "We told you that we shut it down after the multi-agent program successfully destroyed him. We haven't had any troubles for a whole year."

"Nightmares." William said. "Nightmares every night specifically of X.A.N.A. returning stronger than ever. He traps more innocent people in Lyoko. He throws all of us into the digital sea. He escaped the supercomputer again. They're so real." He said shivering slightly. "I haven't had these nightmares since X.A.N.A. was supposedly killed. Nightmares might not even describe it. If say I was hit in the chest, I'll feel it when I wake up."

Jeremy pushed up his glasses. He nodded a couple times catching William's attention. "A classic case of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder." He said calmly. "You were forced to do X.A.N.A.'s bidding for months without rest. It's only natural that this kind of thing happens. It's happened to Aelita and I, too. See if you can get yourself some medication. Sertraline, Fluoxetine, that kinda stuff."

"If you're sure. But in order to get medication, wouldn't I have to tell them what the incident that caused it was? I'd either out you guys, or be thrown straight to the looney bin."

Jeremy sighed. "Well, I've forged birth certificates and medical records before, so I guess a prescription wouldn't be impossible." He said ruffling his hair. "It'll give me something to do again, even if I am going back to being a criminal." Jeremie said half happily. "And I'm already a felon, so what do have to lose?"

"Thanks guys." William said. "I'll make it up to you somehow."

"You don't need to do that, William. We're friends." Aelita said. "We don't need to keep score."

"Friends?" William asked tilting his head. "But I-"

"What? Ya think I'd be doing this for you if I hated you?" Jeremie joked.

"Thank you. I really appreciate this." William smiled. "One last thing. Promise me, if you see or hear anything suspicious, you'll let me know. Those nightmares, they're so terrible, I just can't imagine my brain making those kinds of things up."

"We haven't heard of anything suspicious in so long." Aelita said. "If X.A.N.A. were alive he wouldn't hesitate to attack our world again." She added. "But If for whatever reason something strange comes up, you'll know."

"Thanks, guys. You're the best. I've got a class in ten, Delmas'll kill me if I'm late on the first day again, but maybe I'll see you guys around?"

"Of course." Jeremie said. "You know where my dorm is if you have any more troubles." William nodded and bolted out the door. Jeremie and Aelita continued through the doors and up the stairs. And straight to Jeremie's room.

"William seemed so much sadder than usual, no?" Aelita said sitting down on Jeremie's bed as the boy genius too his spot at his computer. "You had to have noticed it."

"Yeah. And I don't think it was just his fears of X.A.N.A." Jeremie said. "I think he misses having the five of us around. You saw the way he lit up when he saw us. Maybe we should have invited him to the lunch table. You know, reconnect with him."

"I think we should have too, but Yumi and Ulrich probably wouldn't like that so much." She added laying back onto the bed. "I don't want to exclude him, but I don't want to upset the others either."

"Well either way we upset someone so I say we choose what would best sits with us." Jeremie said. "I'm going to get started on getting William those medications."

"Oh, I'll help." Aelita said getting up. "Two sets of eyes are better than one." She said happily.

Back at the vending machine Ulrich and Odd both stood leaning up against the vending machine drinking their respective sodas. "So, Ulrich, how are things with you and Yumi?"

"Man, you really have a thing for my personal relationships." Ulrich groaned. "Look, if I tell you, will you find someone else's romantic life to constantly inquire about?" He said.

"That hurts, Ulrich." Odd said feigning a broken heart. "You know I only want what's best for you. I just want to make sure you're okay."

"Yumi is what's best for me." Ulrich said. "I know you're just trying to get under my skin, because there's no way you're doubting Yumi."

"Well she did organize a ploy to get rid of my precious Tamagutchi Jean-Pierre." Odd said with a fake resentful face. "And then she overreacted about that whole school newspaper photo incident."

"You were getting seriously addicted to that stupid piece of plastic, and you brought that second scenario on to yourself and dragged me into it so don't start complaining to me." Ulrich said. "Hey there's Yumi." Ulrich said pointing past the jokester and towards a tall, thin, Japanese girl in all black walking towards them.

"Ulrich! Odd!" She waved. She came to a stop in front of the two boys. "It's good to see you guys again. How was your Summer, Odd? You know, over in Italy?"

"Oh, it was great." He said sarcastically. "If by great, you mean being bullied by your five older sisters cause they think you're a lazy shrimp who's never done anything significant, despite the fact that I've saved the world from an evil computer virus, then yeah it was amazing." He huffed.

"Oh, come on they can't be that bad. Hiroki's annoying but I wouldn't trade him for the world. Say is Kiwi here?" Yumi asked.

"No. Those sisters that 'can't be that bad', Louise and Marie, told on me as I was loading him into his favorite bag with his snacks. Adele promised to take good care of him while I'm at school. I'm telling you they're the worst."

"Oh." Yumi said. "I take it back. I might actually miss the little mutt." She said sadly. "I can't believe he's actually not going to be here. It's a first."

"Louise said I could face time with him once a week-" Odd added.

"So at least they have some good qualities." Yumi noted.

"-in exchange for my entire secret candy stash I've been building up for years. Every. Last. Piece. I couldn't even get a daily face time." Odd slumped. "Let's just talk about something else. I miss him enough already."

"Maybe buying a lady a drink will make you feel better." Yumi said. "You know what I mean?"

"Thanks, but I already tried. Heidi didn't want to see me. She's still mad about the whole 'two girls' thing." Odd said sadly.

"One," Ulrich said gaining his full footing and reaching into his pocket. "Yumi meant you should buy her a drink." He informed him pulling out a coin. He quickly inserted one euro into the machine and mashed the button showcasing Yumi's favorite drink. "Two, what made you think she'd forgiven you? Things like that sting, Odd." By now the machine had dispensed a plastic cup but no fluids had come out. "What the-" He said hitting the button a second time. "Is this broken again?!"

Before Ulrich could say anymore, from the small dispenser came a slightly larger puff of black smoke. For a millisecond it just scanned the area. It eventually landed its sights on Ulrich. The little smoke shot forward with great speed and within just a blink, climbed Ulrich's body and entered his body through his open mouth.

Ulrich's eyelids shot open as fast and as wide as they could as he fell over flat with his back to the ground. He could very, very, faintly hear his name being called. He started screaming loudly, drowning out the faint sounds, and rolling around onto his side, then back to flat, then to his other side, then back to being flat, repeating this pattern as quickly as his body would let him, all the while his skin was variating from pale to a blackened pale.

"Ulrich!" Yumi called. "What's going on, Ulrich?!"

Ulrich's mind flashed several scenes into his view. He first saw the time X.A.N.A. created a virus to steal his memories of his friends and excommunicate him from his group, then it switched to Ulrich being shot in the back by a materialized Krab, in an attempt to protect Hiroki, knocking his smoking body down onto the street. The final vision showed had Ulrich staying out in the subzero cold with Yumi, who was under a tree, as she began dying, with no phone to call for help. The last flash revealed only one icon. It was a bullseye with a single prong on the top of the circle and three angled prongs at the bottom. The sign of X.A.N.A.

"Ulrich, talk to me!" Yumi begged with Odd standing over her and Ulrich. She looked up to Odd. "Go get Nurse Yolanda!"

The small black puff quickly exited Ulrich's mouth and darted to Yumi. Too fast for the human eye, the puff entered Yumi's body through her left ear. Yumi stumbled backwards, falling onto her backside, with both hands wrapped around her head. Her face cringed in pain as she slowly laid back on the ground. Making many audible reactionary noises. Like Ulrich, her skin was fluctuating in its hue constantly.

"I'm coming, Yumi!" Odd called, stepping over Ulrich's body and kneeling to grab Yumi.

Yumi's mind was going all out in showing her darkest side of her time fighting X.A.N.A. She could see herself falling, falling straight into the digital sea. She could see Aelita giving up her spot just to bring Yumi back. She could see herself inside a boiling hot room, with Ulrich, boiling alive. She could also see herself on a roof huddling her little brother Hiroki and his friends Johnny as a giant meteor hurdled towards them. The last scene she saw was herself all alone in a pod amidst the world wide net with no weapons and no power. The last flash revealed only one icon. It was a bullseye with a single prong on the top of the circle and three angled prongs at the bottom. The sign of X.A.N.A.

Ulrich moaned lightly as his eyes fluttered open. He grabbed his head with one hand and pried himself up in an attempt to regain his senses. He looked over to see Odd panicking over a, what appeared to be, epileptic Yumi. "Odd? What's wrong with Yumi?!" He yelled getting back to his feet.

"Ulrich!" Odd called. "You're up! Great, now help me with Yumi! After you fell over, she fell, too!" He yelled. "We gotta get her to Nurse Yolanda! We were gonna take you, but now-"

The black puff exited Yumi's body through her right ear, floating up higher into the air in front of the two boys. Under it, Yumi stopped with her violent noises and lay perfectly stationary. Instead of moving too fast for Ulrich and Odd to see, it remained in place long enough for the two boys to recognize its presence and analyze it as it bobbed up and down.

"Doesn't that look like-" Odd started.

"Shut up, Odd." Ulrich jabbed. "He's dead, remember?"

The little puff shot forward towards Odd. Before the joker could react, the little puff cloud entered Odd's right nostril and immediately started its assault. Odd shook for a moment as his skin grew a light grey before falling onto his knees and catching himself by outstretching his arms and landing on his hands. His body began shaking in a very violent vibration.

Yumi jolted up, immediately coming to her senses to find Ulrich awake and kneeling in front of Odd snapping his fingers to invoke a response. Odd, meanwhile, was in relatively the same situation Ulrich was in before the lapse in her memory. "Ulrich, You're up? Odd!"

"I'm just glad you're up and not changing colors anymore, because Odd's not responding and I have no clue what I'm doing!" Ulrich yelled.

Odd's mind had already begun the terrible slideshow. At the moment he could see a zombified version of himself attacking his best buddy Ulrich. He vaguely remembered Ulrich mentioning that at some point in their relationship. He could see himself locked in a deep gorge quickly filling up with water, it switched to the pit being completely filled and Odd being submerged underwater. Then next scene playing out in his head was him attacking Jim at a school play in a blur of dementia and insanity. It continued with his worst X.A.N.A. memory. He was on top of his roof, with both of his parents urging that he and Sissi be thrown off. The last flash revealed only one icon. It was a bullseye with a single prong on the top of the circle and three angled prongs at the bottom. The sign of X.A.N.A.

Its job finished, the puff flew out Odd's right nostril and zipped off into the sky, growing in size as it flew away. Left behind was Odd, still on his hands and knees and panting heavily.

"Odd!" Yumi and Ulrich called. Ulrich wrapped Odd's left arm around his shoulder and Yumi mimicked his movements on the right, both lifting the boy to his feet.

"I just had the craziest flashbacks. I saw myself in all different types of deadly situations." Odd explained resting a hand on his head. "Forget the nurse, we gotta call Einstein." Odd said.

"Why? Nurse Yolanda would have a much better chance at explaining what's going on." Yumi said.

"You didn't see it." Odd said. "It's X.A.N.A. I don't know how, but we saw him. I'd know that smoke anywhere." He said finally catching his breath. "We need to talk with Einstein."

"Are you sure Odd? I mean, don't take this the wrong way, but you loved being a hero...even if you were never recognized as one. Maybe you're just imagining things." Yumi said. "Ulrich talk some sense into him." Yumi asked.

"You saw X.A.N.A. attacks too, didn't you?" Ulrich asked the girl. "You can find Yolanda if you want but Odd and I are going to get Jeremie. If there's even the slightest chance he survived, they need to know."

"Fine. You're right." Yumi admitted. "It's just...we won. The program worked. Why can't we just live in peace? Be normal?"

"I don't know Yumi." Ulrich said sadly. "But we can't just ignore this, we have to be sure."

"Yeah, Einstein?" Odd asked into his phone. His head tilted slightly after a moment. "Oh, sorry Princess. Listen we need to talk, somewhere no one would ever hear." He said. "No, your dorm's too accessible. Meet us at the place. You know where." With that he closed his flip phone and pocketed the machine. "Let's go, lovebirds." He ordered.

"Where to?" Ulrich asked.

Odd turned around and smirked. "Memory Lane." Odd said slyly.

~Abandoned Factory~

As Jeremie and Aelita descended within the abandoned factory's elevator the two looked very displeased. Aelita could barely hear Jeremie's ranting over the screeching of the old machinery. "I mean, seriously, why can't we just talk in our rooms like regular people?!" Jeremie ranted. "This better not be another one of Odd's jokes."

"Maybe we can't be like regular people because we aren't regular people. I'm a human who was formerly a computer program who was formerly a human, and you've got enough brains to win a Nobel Prize at age 15." Aelita quipped. "Just try and enjoy the ride next time." The doors loudly unlocked and slowly slid open to reveal a large, mostly empty, room with a giant supercomputer in the center and a small ladder off to the sides. Gathered around the supercomputer was Odd, Yumi, and Ulrich. That didn't bother the geniuses though, what bothered them was that the supercomputer was glowing.

"What's going on?!" Jeremie called. "What did you do?!" He questioned running for the computer.

"We didn't do anything!" Odd shot back.

"You turned on the supercomputer!" Jeremie hissed. "Rule number one was: leave the computer off!"

"Easy, Jeremie, we didn't turn it on." Yumi interjected. "It was on when we got here. We're just as confused as you are. Only difference is, we can't figure out how it happened. That's your job."

"But first we need to talk." Ulrich said. "We have reason to believe X.A.N.A. is alive and kicking." He said. "The three of us were attacked by a cloud of black smoke that showed us our worst times with X.A.N.A."

"Black smoke?" Aelita inquired. "A specter?"

"We think so. It definitely wasn't friendly. It felt just like when X.A.N.A. tried possessing me for the first time."

"No." Aelita gasped. "X.A.N.A. can't be alive. What about Daddy's sacrifice?"

"All for naught, it seems." Ulrich said sadly. "I know what I saw."

"Impossible." Jeremy said, quickly dismissing them. "The multi-agent program was a complete success. We checked remember? X.A.N.A.'s dead." He said taking his place at the chair. "Now let's see why our old friend here is awake." He began typing as Odd, Yumi, and Ulrich closed the gap around him.

"There has to be something!" Odd argued. "A loophole, a malfunction, anything!"

At Odd's comment Jeremie halted his work. He readjusted his glasses before looking down. "There is one way. And only one way. But it's impossible." He paused to scratch his chin. "The only way for X.A.N.A. to have returned is if someone data-mined into the deepest pits of memory in the supercomputer and retrieved the most basic components of his code left scattered behind from X.A.N.A.'s destruction. Theoretically someone could've pieced him back together and revived him that way and because they would have only been able to retrieve the building blocks, it explains why it took so long for X.A.N.A. to return. But no one knows about this place other than us."

"And William." Yumi added. "He could've turned it on and revived X.A.N.A." She guessed. "We haven't really spoken in a year, giving him plenty of time to slip past us."

"He wouldn't." Odd said. "Sure, we didn't treat him the best, but we apologized for that! He wouldn't unleash X.A.N.A. back into the world just because he was mad!"

"Okay." Jeremie said leaning back in his chair. "Let's pretend for a second that William is a suspect. What's his angle here?" Jeremie asked. "He hates X.A.N.A. maybe even more than you do. What could he gain from releasing the virus that nearly took his life away?"

"Maybe he didn't have a choice." Ulrich said. "Maybe he still has some residue of X.A.N.A. inside his brain from when he served him. Like a sleeper agent." Ulrich suggested.

"Nope. We did a full anatomical scan the day we got him back. Not a spec of X.A.N.A.'s code in him." Aelita argued.

"Okay, so it wasn't William." Yumi summed. "That means someone has been down here recently and that means...someone at Kadic knows about the factory and X.A.N.A." She said.

"Even worse, they're our enemy now." Ulrich added. "What'll we do with them when we find them. We can't just erase them with a computer program."

"Oh, come on." Odd interrupted. "You don't believe it was someone here at Kadic is actually out to get us, do you?" Odd asked. "Who? Herb and Nicholas?!" He chuckled to himself.

"How else do you explain the sudden return of X.A.N.A.?" Ulrich asked. "And the supercomputer being on? You think it was a ghost?"

"Maybe." Odd retorted. "We're fighting a super-intelligent computer program bent on the destruction of the human race and you think ghosts are farfetched?"

"Now hold on." Aelita interrupted. "You all are making big assumptions, here. We haven't checked the computer. X.A.N.A. may be dead. You three could've simultaneously hallucinated these scenes. Unlikely, but not impossible."

"Aelita's right. I'll scan the supercomputer for any signs of X.A.N.A. Yumi, Odd, Ulrich, you guys go down and check on the scanners. If John Doe turned on the supercomputer, maybe they did something with the scanners too." Jeremie said. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a small earpiece. "Here, Yumi." He said tossing the piece of technology to the girl who held out her hands. "Put it on, and relay whatever you find down there to me."

As Yumi stepped into the Elevator between Odd and Ulrich, she adjusted the earpiece into her left here and gave a thumbs up. "Got it." She said as the doors closed in front of her.

With the three gone, Aelita turned to Jeremie who was already at work with the keyboard. "They have to be seeing things, right?" Aelita asked. Her heart and mind were telling her two different things, her heart said X.A.N.A. was dead and gone, thanks to her father, but her mind wasn't so convinced.

Jeremie sighed. "Honestly, all three of them having the same vision at the same time, black smoke, the supercomputer being on, it's not looking good." He said continuing to type. "I'm launching a system-wide scan... now!" He pushed down on the enter key with his index finger and leaned back once more. "If X.A.N.A. is alive, we'll know in a few moments."

'Jeremie.' Yumi's voice called into Jeremie's ear.

Jeremie put a finger to the communication device. "Yumi. What's up with the scanners?" The genius asked.

Below the computer room, Odd, Ulrich, and Yumi had split up to each examine one scanner. Odd was standing inside the first scanned looking up. Ulrich was on his knee examining the ground around the second scanner. Finally, Yumi was on all fours checking the wires connected to the back of the third scanner.

"The wires connected to scanner three are warm." Yumi reported. "It's been used recently, like 'in the last 24 hours' recently." She said getting to her feet. She looked over to Odd who was playing on his phone, presumably because he didn't find anything.

"Hey, Yumi!" Ulrich called. "Take a look at this." Yumi nodded and went to Ulrich who held a hand out in front of him, presenting a small, blue, pill shaped item to Yumi. Yumi looked back at the boy and shrugged. "It's candy." Ulrich informed her.

"So? That's nothing to go off of. Odd used all three of these scanners for years." Yumi argued. "With his loose pockets, I'd bet there's candy all over this place."

"You think?" Ulrich smirked. He tossed the piece of candy to Odd who caught it eagerly.

Odd threw the candy up in the air and caught with his open mouth. Yumi cringed slightly as he chewed the single pellet. As he kept chewing, he began smiling. "This candy is not years old." Odd said. "It should have gotten at least a little stale. Nope, that was from a recently opened package." He continued chewing. "Opened approximately one week ago." He said before swallowing the piece hard. "Scanner two has been used recently, too."

"Odd and Ulrich think scanner two's been used recently as well." Yumi reported to Jeremie.

'On what grounds?' Jeremie asked through the comm.

"It's totally ridiculous. They found a piece of candy, Odd ate it, and just like that-" Yumi started.

'Say no more.' Jeremie ordered. 'Odd's patented Candy Taste Test. It's been tested more than I care to mention. If he says it was recent, then it was. Thanks for checking, you guys can come back up now.'

Yumi pulled out the earpiece and pocketed it. Before gesturing her arm forward. "Works done here boys, back upstairs." She ordered.

The three teens loaded into the elevator and as soon as the doors close, immediately felt themselves going up. "If X.A.N.A. really is back, I don't-"

"Ulrich." Yumi interrupted as the doors began to open. "I swear if you jinx us, I will give you a swift kick..." She started turning her head back to Jeremie and Aelita. "...to...the..." She slurred as she took in the scene in front of her. She could see Jeremie and Aelita hugging each other tightly where Aelita once stood alone, she could hear Aelita crying, but what bothered her the most was the computer screen flashing a single image, one she knew too well. X.A.N.A.'s signature. "No." Yumi said softly.

Ulrich grabbed Yumi's shoulder causing her to turn around and hug him. He just continued to glare at the screen showing that cursed eye. "No more normality for us." He said.

"You gonna be okay, Princess?" Odd asked approaching the two.

After the two separated, Aelita sniffled and wiped a tear away. "I'll live...hopefully." She said. "But if X.A.N.A.'s alive, then what did my father die for?"

"He died so we could live." Jeremie said. "And now we have to honor that sacrifice once again. I won't force you three into anything but Aelita and I are going to fight. I know things have changed for you guys so it's totally up to you."

"I'm in." Odd said. "You'll get yourselves killed if it's just the two of you." He smirked.

"I'm in, too." Ulrich said. "Nobody else can do what we do. We need to be the protectors."

"What about your dad?" Aelita asked. "One more terrible report card, which is bound to happen if we're fighting X.A.N.A., and he'll drag you straight out of here."

"Screw him." Ulrich said vindictively. "You guys are my best friends. Your fights are my fights. So, if you're fighting to save the world, then so am I."

"Well, I definitely can't back out after Ulrich goes and says somethin' like that, can I?" Yumi said trying to make light of the situation. "Alright, then. I'll fight, too. But only cause it's you guys."

"Looks like the Lyoko Warriors are back in business," Jeremie said. "whether we like it or not. Back to our secretive ways."

"Double time, now that we suspect somebody at Kadic to be working for X.A.N.A." Aelita added.

"What difference does being secretive it make with that?" Ulrich shrugged. "As soon as we start to fight back, whoever's working for X.A.N.A. will know we're back. They'll have no trouble finding us either."

"What do we know so far?" Odd asked. "Did you find anything interesting in the computer scan?" He asked turning to the resident genius.

Jeremie let go of Aelita and climbed back into his computer chair. He began typing and nodded once. "Yeah, and I would've held out hope that it was just a glitch if you guys hadn't told me about the scanners." He said. "You guys remember the heart of Lyoko, right?" Jeremie asked. As he spoke the screen lit up with a spherical blueprint with three different dots located around it. One black and two red. "That," Jeremie said pointing to the larger black dot. "Is X.A.N.A." He told them.

"So who're his buddies?" Yumi asked.

"That's the bad part, they're people." He said as the screen zoomed in on one of the red dots. Once it came into view the red faded away to show a double-helix underneath. "See?"

"Oh cool! It's the spiral ladder from biology! What did Ms. Hertz call it?" He said tapping his forehead.

"Deoxyribonucleic acid. DNA." Jeremie said rolling his eyes, though at this point he should be expecting these kinds of remarks. "You'd think you would remember after all the times Hertz yelled your ear off for calling it a ladder instead of DNA." In response, Odd just shrugged and waited for Jeremie to continue. "Not just any DNA, it's human DNA. Whoever was here, virtualized two people onto Lyoko, and now..."

"They're prisoners of X.A.N.A." Aelita finished. "Just like William was."

"But why?" Yumi asked taking a step closer to the supercomputer. "If X.A.N.A. wanted to capture someone, why not strike us? Or William?"

"Because we know how to fight him. We know Lyoko like the back of our hands." Ulrich pointed out. "But that still doesn't explain why he wanted to capture anyone in the first place."

"It's simple evil battle strategy." Jeremie told them. "The best bet to destroy X.A.N.A. would've been to attack the core and destroy Lyoko altogether, killing X.A.N.A. instantly. But now with those innocent lives, it's a much more difficult call to make. If we destroy Lyoko without finding those two, they'll die with X.A.N.A. He's buying himself time. Wait..."

"What?" Aelita asked.

"Somethings happening." Jeremie said. The screen zoomed out of the dot and reverted back to its previous state. Except now the red dots had two separate streams of green light drawing from them and into the black dot. "X.A.N.A.'s taking something from them."

"What?" Yumi asked. "What could complete strangers have that he wants?"

"I don't know." Jeremie said honestly. "I'd have to do a scan on it like I did with the dots." Just then, the green streams disappeared gradually leaving the three dots behind once again. "And there goes my chance."

"Wait!" Ulrich said. "Was X.A.N.A.'s dot always that big?" He asked pointing to the black dot.

"No." Aelita confirmed. "Jeremie," She said turning to the blonde. "Do a scan on X.A.N.A. again, I have a theory."

"As you wish." Jeremie said. A green box isolated the dot and tinted everything inside it green too. "Examine is underway, should be done right about... now." On cue, several lines appeared pointing to several parts of the sphere representing X.A.N.A.

"I knew it!" Aelita said. "Look at his functioning capacity!" She said pointing to one of the stats. "Do you see it?"

"One hundred and two percent." Odd read. "So what?"

"Odd, X.A.N.A.'s a program. A hyper-intelligent, evil, government program, but a program nonetheless. It should only have a top functioning capacity of one hundred percent." Jeremie said. "Somehow, X.A.N.A. is able to override its original programming and go beyond his base capabilities."

"And the higher the functioning capacity, the bigger the threat he's going to be?" Yumi guessed.

"Sadly, that's right." Jeremie said. "And that's what he was stealing from those people, power."

"How does that work?" Ulrich asked.

"It's actually a very simple answer." Jeremie told him. "The human body is filled with electricity. X.A.N.A. must be harvesting that from them. It won't harm the hostages, but it could certainly harm our cause."

"But X.A.N.A. couldn't have done this on his own. Programs don't just grow the capabilities to defy their programming. Someone had to have helped him." Aelita added. "And it's probably the same person who's running around in the factory while we're not here."

"I'll get working on a security system for the factory. Nothing fancy, just enough to find out who's been here and hopefully scare whoever it is off the premises." Jeremie said. "It'll take some time, so for the time being, we need to be extra careful."

"Sorry, Einstein." Ulrich said. "We got gym class with Jim. Remember the new rule Kadic introduced this year? Any unexplained absence on the first day of classes will result in an automatic fail of the class they missed."

"You're going to have to get out of your chair and show Jim the Olympic athlete we all know you are on the inside!" Odd joked.

"Damn." Jeremie cursed. "Alright. Everyone meet me in my dorm later this evening."

~Jeremie's dorm~

Jeremie sat in his usual spot, in front of his dorm PC, typing away on his keyboard. To his left sat his pink-haired assistant, perched on top of the table, hanging her legs out in front of her. Jeremie stopped typing and pushed his keyboard forward and swung his swivel chair around to face the pinkette. "Now that we've scanned the super-computer, our worst fears are realized. X.A.N.A.'s back and stronger than ever." Jeremie said putting his hand to his chin. "The only question is, how do we combat him this time?"

"With him already stronger than he was before, we'll have to try and limit our returns to the past even more." Aelita said. "And I don't even know if that's possible. Without erasing memories, people will start to catch on and then..."

"Yeah, bad news." Jeremie agreed. "And then there are the hostages. Who knows what kind of torture they're going through right now? But I think I might have a solution, so let's wait until the gang gets here. They should be arriving any minute now."

Aelita sighed. "Is all this really worth it?" She asked.

"What do you mean?" Jeremie asked tilting his head. "Of course, it's worth it. You'll see, you're going to be so happy when we find Franz."

Aelita jumped off the table onto the floor and turned towards him. "Don't get me wrong, I would give anything for my father...well almost anything. Once again you guys are going to risk your lives just to make me happier. We don't even know if my father really is alive, only that it's possible."

Jeremie stood up slowly and took Aelita's hands in his. "Are you kidding? We owe everything to you. If I hadn't met you the day I turned on the supercomputer we wouldn't have met. I wouldn't have gone to Ulrich and Odd for help. Ulrich wouldn't have involved Yumi and then where would our group be? Nowhere. And me, I'd still be a hermit with no friends." He smiled. "Maybe you never realized this but you brought us together. We're friends because of you. Not to mention thank to your soundboard skills, I'm totally dating a techno-pop star!"

"Thank you Jeremie." She said squeezing his hands. "I feel like I owe everything to you guys to, you especially. Yumi, Odd, Ulrich, they're my family, they all accepted me and my naivety so quickly, but you? You turned the supercomputer back on. You materialized me and went as far as forging government documents just to have me in school with you. You spent day after day slaving over your computer to free me from the virus you thought I had, and most importantly you reminded me of my humanity, my family." She leaned forward and pressed her lips to his. Jeremie was so happy that his whole surroundings melted away. That is, until reality brought him back.

"Are we interrupting?" A familiar female voice said. Jeremie and Aelita and Jeremie turned to find Yumi, Odd and Ulrich had entered the room, joining the two. "We can give you two a couple minutes."

Beside her Odd nodded. "You know, you two are cute and all, but if you're going to do that you might want to lock the door. Never know when Milly and Tamiya might come looking for a scoop, then boom! You're front page of Kadic news! I don't know if Mr. and Mrs. Einstein could handle that kind of attention." Odd said laughing to himself.

"Leave them alone Odd." Yumi said kicking Odd softly. "Love is just something you don't understand."

"If you two are done," Jeremie said sitting back down in his swivel chair. "we have some business to discuss. Regarding you-know-who." Jeremie ordered. "We just need William."

"William?!" Yumi exclaimed. "No way. I like the guy, but if X.A.N.A. really is back we can't afford to give him his old pawn back. It's too risky, for us and for William."

"I'm with Yumi. He's too undisciplined." Ulrich said. "After all the trouble he caused us last time, I don't think we should let him back in."

"He didn't cause us any trouble; in fact, I remember him saving both our lives from a bomb. He got cocky, yeah, but it was X.A.N.A who made him do all those terrible things. And you saw what a powerhouse he was on Lyoko, we need him." Odd interjected. "Maybe you just don't want the competition for-"

"If you try and finish that thought, you'll finish it with a fist in your face." Ulrich threatened. "Don't make this about me, this is about WIlliam."

"Odd is right, though." Aelita said. "We need more firepower, and William is a good warrior if nothing else."

"And on top of being right, as always, we need to consider how dangerous it is to exclude him." Odd pointed out. "He knows everything."

"More importantly," Aelita interjected. "He's a friend. He was a prisoner of .A.'s for months. If anyone deserves to know what's happening, it's him. And I'm prepared to give him a chance to redeem himself." She said crossing her arms.

"I still say no." Ulrich said. "What if your second chance backfires? We'll be in even worse trouble."

"I had a feeling you'd say that." Aelita said smirking she reached into her pocket and pulled out her phone presenting it to them with one hand and waggling it back and forth. "That's why I already invited him. He knows everything about X.A.N.A.'s return." She said.

"What?!" Yumi exclaimed. "Jeremie, did you know about this?"

"I'm not Aelita's keeper. She's free to do whatever she wants. She doesn't need my permission to make a phone call." He swung around to face Ulrich, Yumi, and Odd. "Now we take a vote. William or no William. Raise your hands for keeping William on the outside." Jeremie said. Ulrich and Yumi both immediately raised their hands into the air.

"I." Yumi said.

"I." Ulrich echoed.

Jeremie looked around the room to see Aelita leaning back on his table with her arms crossed and Odd lying flat on his back looking at the ceiling. "That's two for and three opposed. Majority rules that William becomes a warrior once more."

"Interesting. So, this wasn't a joke." The door slowly slid all the way open revealing William standing in the doorway. He strode into the room and took his place on the bed. "And Ulrich and Yumi don't want me here." He said eyeing the two.

"Were you eavesdropping this whole time?" Jeremie asked slightly annoyed.

"Told you. Lock the door next time." Odd quipped not even looking back at Jeremie.

"William it's not like that." Yumi said rubbing the back of his head. "It's just...last time...well..."

"No. Stop." William said putting both hands in front of him signaling Yumi to stop talking. "I'd like to say something; I'm not the one to blame for everything I did. X.A.N.A. was controlling me, yet you still hold it against me. Do you know what it's like to lose 4 months of your life? And then you come back and the closest things you have to friends shut you out. Only Aelita would dare talk to me. Jeremie hadn't said a word to me either until a just a bit ago. And the three of you? Nothing. And if that's not bad enough, no one else wants me around anymore. They all miss 'Comedian William'." He said with distain. "It's not fair."

"William," Yumi said. "We didn't know it meant that much to you."

"Of course, you had no idea." William shot back. "You couldn't have known seeing as you were too busy pretending I never existed. A simple 'hey, William, how's it going?' would've made my day. But you couldn't even bother to go that far." William sighed. "I get that I did a lot of terrible things during my time as a puppet that made you lose your trust in me. That I can understand, but to act like we're not even friends afterwards?" He looked up at the two who voted against him. "That's colder than anything X.A.N.A. did to me."

"Hey, don't blame this on us!" Ulrich shot back. "We treated you like that for the good of the group. You've been nothing but trouble from the day you joined us. Do you know how many times you almost helped X.A.N.A. win?!"

"I didn't ask to be a puppet!" William argued. "X.A.N.A. took advantage of me and made me his little slave. That's not my fault!"

"You should have listened to Aelita! Who doesn't listen to the girl that spent an entire decade in that infernal place?!" Ulrich said.

"I let my cockiness get the better of me! Sorry I couldn't be the flawless hero you wanted! I didn't have years of training. I wasn't aware of just how strong X.A.N.A. was. So yeah, I got caught, that doesn't mean I'm not worthy to be here!"

"Maybe not to you, but we can't afford any more screwups! X.A.N.A.'s already got two prisoners and we can't afford to give him any more power!" Ulrich replied. "This isn't about your feelings, we're trying to save the world here."

"I'm not going anywhere. As long as X.A.N.A. lives, I have just as much of a right to be here as the rest of you. This time, no loose cannon, I'll follow your orders to a T. Once he's destroyed for good, if you guys still don't trust me, you can go back to ignoring me." He said looking at Jeremie.

"Jeremie, think about this." Ulrich said turning to Jeremie. "You're supposed to be the smart one! A risk like this? We can't do it!"

"We took a vote, and the vote says we keep William. But I'll meet you halfway. Willaim will officially begin his trial period. It gives us time to truly evaluate whether we're making the right choice. At any point we can take another vote and if at any point, majority rules negative, William's out. Deal?"

Ulrich and William shared a glance before nodding once at the genius. "Fine." Ulrich said.

"Well now that we're all caught up. I have an idea for a technique for fighting X.A.N.A." Jeremie said. "And it's not new to us either. X.A.N.A.'s stronger than when we last clashed, so I figured we needed more power as well. We've already got William, but we still need more." Jeremie said.

"No." Yumi said. "You can't be suggesting-" She started shaking her head.

Aelita nodded. "We need more Lyoko Warriors." Aelita said. "I agree with Jeremie on this. The five of us always had trouble being at the factory at the same time and I feel like six will go no better. We need people who can keep our secret, are capable of fighting or learning to fight, and won't create any tension within our group. Most importantly, we need people who can follow orders. If we had stressed that more last time..." Aelita paused before she could finish her sentence.

"Then I wouldn't have been a virtual prisoner for months." William finished. "You can bring it up, we all know it happened."

"Why not recruit the whole student body?!" Odd said getting up. "Even if we're stuck in class, there's gotta be tons of students with nothing to do but homework so there'll always be someone available."

"Odd out of all your pea-brained ideas," Jeremie said pinching the bridge of his nose. "that was the worst. First of all, it only takes one loud mouth to blow the whole operation and I can think of ten students right off the bat who couldn't keep a secret to save the world. Secondly if the entire school's grades go down at once Jim and Delmas wouldn't stop until they found out what was going on."

"So, who would you suggest?" Odd asked. "The new chick, Laura Gauthier? She's like a second Mrs. Einstein. And not too bad a looker either." Odd joked before getting silenced after being hit in the face with a pencil case. "Hey!" He said wiping the plastic case off of his face. "Why'd you-"

"There is only one Mrs. Einstein." Aelita growled. "Absolutely not."

"Ooh, who knew the princess had a jealous side?" Odd chuckled. "This is news."

"Getting back on topic," Jeremie said. "My suggestion would be Patrick." He smirked.

"Your cousin?" Aelita asked raising her eyebrow. "But he doesn't even go to Kadic. How could he be of any help?"

"Actually, we've become rather close over the holidays and I thought it might be fun to have him around, so I convinced his parents to give good ol' Kadic another chance. I didn't know about X.A.N.A. then, but it works out. He knows Aikido, so he's already a potentially skilled fighter."

"Isn't Aikido all about self-defense and not fighting?" Odd said. "You can't just block an attack from a mega-tank. You need a killer instinct or X.A.N.A. will destroy you."

"Don't worry. It's not like he's sworn of offensive attacks, he just needs training is all." Jeremie answered. "Overall I see him being a great asset to the team."

"But do you really want to get your family involved in this?" William asked. "And what if he blabs?"

"You don't know this, but Patrick is the best at keeping secrets. And he can most definitely handle himself. Not to mention that everyone but William are already friends with him. And knowing Patrick, William and him will get along just fine. Integrating him into our group would be easy." Jeremie answered. "And if he refuses, then there's nothing to worry about. He wouldn't tell a soul. So, we'll take our first vote, all for Patrick joining the group starting as soon as he gets here?" Jeremie smirked as he saw everyone's hand go up. "Good to hear. I'll contact him later."

"Well then it sounds like we found our recruit, can we go now?" Odd said impatiently, getting to his feet. "It's spaghetti and meatballs today."

"Hold on Odd, we're not done here." Aelita said. "We were looking for three recruits. Patrick makes one, but we need two more."

"Aww. Three? If we don't go now it'll all be cold when we finally get there." Odd complained sitting back down on the floor reluctantly. "I hate cold spaghetti almost as I hate X.A.N.A."

"What about Sissi?" William asked. "She's your friend now, right?" He turned to Jeremie. "And having the principle's daughter on the team could give us an easy escape for any trouble we get in fighting X.A.N.A." He said.

"Sissi?!" Yumi shot back. "She's given us more trouble than you did! Sure, she's been nicer lately but mainly to Ulrich. She still ignores me and Odd constantly."

"Not to mention she's always with Herb and Nicholas." Ulrich added. "If she left their side for one day, they'd probably follow her to the factory and discover our secret. And if you think either would keep their mouth shut for one day..."

"But William's right." Odd said. "Having Sissi in our circle could work. Honestly, I don't mind her ignoring me. It makes it easier for me to ignore her. But having her sweet-talk her dad every time we get detention for missing classes without a nurse's note, it'd be great."

"That could only work for so long." Jeremie said. "Eventually Delmas would overlook Sissi's opinion as a biased one." He said pushing up his glasses.

"So we recruit Principle Delmas too!" Odd yelled. "See, Problem solved."

"No." Yumi argued shaking her head slowly. "There's no way. The second we tell him, he'd call the cops, and we all know what happens then. They'll shut down the supercomputer."

"Wait!" William interrupted. "Why don't we just shut down the supercomputer?" He said turning to Jeremie. "X.A.N.A.'s not on the net anymore, he's been restricted to our supercomputer, so why don't we just pull the plug?"

Jeremie and Aelita shared a look. It wasn't William's fault he was being insensitive, after all he never knew about Franz possibly being alive. "First, shutting down the supercomputer is just running from the problem." Jeremie said. "Even if we do, someday another curious kid will come along and restart it. And at that point, we probably won't be here to fight him. And I don't need to remind you what kind of trouble we'd be in if someone found out everything we've done, with the document forging and impersonation to the whole not reporting a world-wide threat." Jeremie sighed. Time to let the cat out of the bag. "Second, we think there's a chance to find a trace of Franz Hopper."

"What?" Ulrich deadpanned.

"Franz? Aelita's dad?" William asked. "I thought he died on that mission."

"He did. But if there's just one single DNA strand of him left behind, it may be enough to bring him back completely."

"Were you going to tell us of this interesting news?" Odd asked incredulously. "Secrets, secrets, hurt someone."

"We weren't sure how you'd react." Aelita said. "Putting the entire world on the line just because I want to find my father, sounds a little foolish doesn't it?"

"I have to admit," William said. "it kinda does, but you guys are the experts here, what do we do?"

"Aelita, I know you want your dad back, but putting seven billion people on the line to do it?" Odd asked. "It just might not be worth it. We're only going on a hunch. I say we go to the core, and finish this for good."

"Even putting Franz aside, there are two other innocent lives trapped inside the computer. Shutting down the computer is an absolute no, not until we at least try to save them. If X.A.N.A. gives us too much trouble before then, we'll execute plan B and destroy Lyoko, agreed?" As everyone around him nodded, he continued. "Now, where were we? Oh yeah Delmas. We'll keep Sissi at a maybe, but Delmas is a definite no. Anyone else?" Jeremie asked.

"Maybe we were onto something with Delmas." Yumi said. "Delmas wouldn't work out, but what about Jim? He'd probably have stuck with us till the end of our last fight us if he wasn't affected by that return to the past. He's definitely proven himself capable of fighting."

"And if X.A.N.A. attacks during gym class, we'll have an easy out." Aelita added.

Ulrich shook his head. "But wouldn't excusing us all the time raise suspicions around Jim? Who knows? Delmas could even fire him again."

William leaned back slightly and met eyes with Ulrich. "But if we're able to call Jim, we can let him know about X.A.N.A. attacks early on so he can get the others to safety before X.A.N.A. kills them. Best yet, if anyone asks him about anything-"

"He'd rather not talk about it." Aelita finished for William.

William chuckled. "Exactly." He said.

"Yeah, but last time he was beaten within an inch of his life. Maybe we'd best leave the teachers out of this. Most of them couldn't keep up with us anyways. And Odd and I don't exactly have a good record with them." Ulrich said turning to Yumi. "Jim's happier being a teacher than he is a hero."

"All for Jim?" Jeremie asked. At the sight of only Yumi and Aelita raising their hands Jeremie shook his head. "Sorry, ladies. That's a no on Jim, then." Jeremie concluded. "And we're running out of people to choose from. Milly and Tamiya are to scoop-crazy to be trusted with anything confidential and Herb and Nicholas still hate us so they're out too."

"Ooh! Ooh!" Odd said raising his hand quickly. "Heidi Klinger! She could be a part of our group!"

"Interesting." Aelita answered. "Why her?" She asked. "Any hidden talents? Special training?"

"Well," Odd said eagerly. "she's really good looking, and...and..." Odd's face fell as he tried to think of another reason to bring Heidi in. "I'm pretty sure she threatened to punch me one time..." Odd looked back up at his friends.

"That's it?" Ulrich asked. "Jeez Odd. And I thought she told you to never talk to her again. We can't afford any tension within the group."

"Okay, how about Anais Fique?" Odd tried.

"Really Odd? Anais Fique?" Aelita said skeptically. "Are you out of your mind? We need strong people. People we can trust. And Anais is well..."

"An airhead? A snowflake?" William finished. "And she's probably one of the worst gossipers in school. Not a very good fit for a Lyoko Warrior."

"Odd, this is serious. We're looking for the strongest students. You can't just keep recommending girls because you find them attractive." Jeremie said.

"The hell I can't!" Odd shot back. "You asked for my-" Odd stopped in his tracks when he felt his phone buzz in his pocket. He whipped it out quickly and brought it up to his face, scanning the screen. After a few moments he looked back up at Jeremie. "Hey!" He exclaimed happily. "Listen to this!"

"Odd..." Jeremie said pinching the bridge of his nose. "Now's really not the time for memes. We still've only one person and a maybe!"

"I think I can make it two!" Odd shot back confidently. "If you'll let me speak, Einstein." Ahead of him Jeremie waved for him to talk. "I just got a text from Sam. She's going to be here in two days." Ulrich moved from his spot down to Odd's side to see the text for himself. "Her parents are hoping the discipline of boarding school will set her straight." Odd closed and pocketed his phone. "So did I just save the day, or did I just save the day?"

"You want Sam to be a Lyoko Warrior?" Jeremie asked.

"Isn't this the same girl that allowed you to take the fall for stealing that laptop? You know the one that almost got you expelled?" Yumi asked.

"And she nearly screwed us on Lyoko by not giving you my message. The same mission William was captured on." Ulrich added. "How is recruiting her going to help?"

"So she was in a bit of a rebellious stage. It's only because she doesn't have any real friends. Besides me, anyway." Odd said. "She's actually a very loyal girl. All we need to do is let her in, show her the way, give her something to fight for." Odd said making a fist in front of him. "She just longs for friendship just like everyone else."

"Is she a fighter?" William asked.

"No. Not right now, anyway." Odd said honestly. "But she's a fast learner. Show her a few beginners moves and she can pick up the rest in the field."

"I don't know..." Yumi said. "How do you even know about all this?"

"I may have stayed with her family for a week during break." He said scratching the back of his head. "Like I said, she doesn't have many friends."

"You flew all the way back here, just to stay for one week with the Knights and then fly straight back to Italy?" Ulrich asked. "That had to be more than you can afford."

"My parents payed for my flights. Anything beats being at home with my sisters to bully me around. You're just gonna have to trust me on this one. She's cool." Odd pleaded.

"Anyone opposed to Sam Knight being recruit number two?" Jeremie asked.

"Sorry, Odd." William said raising his hand. "If she really was a driving factor in you not being around to help me and Aelita on that day, then I have to object."

"Me too." Yumi said. "We barely know this girl and Odd's judgement is rarely the best."

After scanning the room for any more raised hands, he nodded. "Overruled. Good, then we only need one more." He told them.

"Theo?" Aelita offered. "He's athletic enough." She pointed out. "He's so athletic that I don't think we'll even need to train him. He gets along with everyone which automatically makes him a better choice than Sissi." Aelita said.

"I don't know. He's also an attention hog." William argued. "I've hung out with the guy a couple times, and I can confidently say he'll do anything for attention." He said. "If he sees himself as a hero, there's no way he wouldn't brag about it to at least one person. Especially Sissi, who you've said yourself, can't be trusted."

"I see your point. But I still think he could be very valuable to the team." Aelita said. "We have Sam who definitely needs training and Patrick who might need training, it'd be nice to have someone who doesn't need it."

"Hey, what about Emillie? She's smart, fast, not much of a heavy hitter, but we can work around that." Ulrich suggested. "Plus, me and her are already close so there's no need to fear any tension."

"Isn't she also a ball of anxiety, though?" Odd pointed out. "All we would need to tell her is that the world's in danger and she'd probably faint. And I thought we weren't supposed to make tension between the six of us. Me and her have a rocky relationship to say the least." Odd said looking to Ulrich for a response.

"That's because you had the bright idea of going out with two girls at one time." Ulrich countered. "But she obviously found something about you charming, so you shouldn't be too worried. It's not like her to hold a grudge forever."

"But forever isn't even close to over yet!" Odd cried. "She promised to kick me where it hurts if I ever said a word to her again!"

"I'll second Emillie." Aelita said. "Ulrich's right, that girl has one heck of a brain on her."

"So," Jeremie said getting to his feet. "It seems we have three potential candidates for our last new Lyoko Warrior. Sissi Delmas, Theo Gauthier, and Emillie LeDuc. We only need one more warrior, any more and we might not be able to keep control of this group. So, before I put it to a vote, is there anyone you guys can rule out right off the bat?" Jeremie asked.

"Sissi." Yumi said confidently. "It just won't work with her on the team."

"Sissi." Aelita agreed. "Too unpredictable."

"Sissi." Ulrich and William said in unison. The two looked at each other for one moment making eye contact, before looking away. "Sissi has a huge capability a creating a rift between us, it's not like she's never done it before." Ulrich said.

Odd sighed. "Sissi. You're right she couldn't sweet-talk her father every time. It's for the best."

"Sissi is officially off the list then." Jeremie nodded. "With that we vote. Hands in the air for Theo, hands down for Emillie." Jeremie ordered. He scanned the room twice just to be sure, then nodded a second time. "Alright we have our third Warrior. You guys can go to lunch, I'm going to stay here and see if I can reach Patrick. He's landing here in France tomorrow." He said waving them off. "I want him all caught up before he gets here so if X.A.N.A. attacks he'll be at least somewhat ready."

"I'm staying here." Aelita said putting a hand on Jeremie's shoulder. "You might need a second party to convince him none of this is a joke." As Odd, William, Yumi, and Ulrich left the room for the cafeteria, Jeremie began typing away at his keyboard rapidly. "Do you think Patrick will believe you? Even from someone who's known about X.A.N.A. and was trapped in the supercomputer with X.A.N.A., I know this is all farfetched."

"Farfetched, yes, but fiction? Not a chance. Honestly, I have no clue whether or not he'll believe us, but I sure hope he does."

"There is one more problem though." Aelita said. "If we bring in new members, there's no doubt in my mind that X.A.N.A. will attempt to gain at least one more puppet. What are you going to tell your aunt if her son goes missing because he was taken?"

"That, my dear Aelita, is one of the main reasons we really need William back." Jeremie answered. "I didn't tell him this yet," He started typing on his computer and a transparent 3D diagram of William came into view. "because I didn't want to freak him out, but X.A.N.A. hasn't left him completely, not yet at least."

"What? How? I thought you said you didn't find anything."

"I didn't say anything because that would give the group ample reason to suspect William, when he wasn't the one to turn the computer back on. This diagram is from the scanner that he was in from the day he got back to the real world. See that?" He asked pointing to a blipping red dot inside Willam's head. "That's an imprint that X.A.N.A. left on him from the time he was under his control. Also, from what I can tell, it makes him mind more susceptible to X.A.N.A.'s tricks. If X.A.N.A. wants his body guard back, it won't be hard to override his mind once again thanks to that little sign."

"That's terrible!" Aelita said. "So William's in even more danger? There's gotta be something we can do for him."

"There is. Thanks to the scanner I can truly analyze this little imprint. If I can find out how it works-"

"You could reverse-engineer it to work against X.A.N.A.! We can make some kind of resistance for William!" Aelita finished. "That's brilliant Jeremie!"

"Not just William," Jeremie said closing the model of William. "if I can find out enough about it, I can make a resistance imprint for everyone. No one will be in danger of becoming X.A.N.A.'s new puppet."

Aelita leaned over and kissed Jeremie on the cheek once more. "Excellent work as usual Jeremie." She smirked.

"It'll take some time. So, to begin with, the new recruits will have to be extra careful." Jeremie said. "Once I've got the imprints figured I'll start work on the security system."

Jeremie hit the enter key on the board and the screen in front of him turned to an animatic phone wagging back and forth. "Get ready to share your life's story, Aelita."

The phone blipped away with a flash of a strobe and the screen revealed a slightly low-resolution image of Jeremie's cousin Patrick. A brunette boy dressed in all black. "Jerry! And Aelita! To what do I owe the pleasure?" He said smiling.

"Jerry?" Aelita asked.

"I told you we got really close. Hey, Patrick. Uh...are your parents home?" Jeremie asked. "Or your sister?"

"Nope, sister's on a date and Ma and Pop are at a movie for their own date night." Patrick answered. "I was just finishing packing. I can't wait to meet up with you in France, Jerry." He said happily. "Your friends seemed so great the last time I saw them."

"They are." Jeremie assured him. "Listen, Patrick. I need to talk to you about something extremely important. But if I do, I need you to promise not to tell a soul." Jeremie pleaded.

"Alright Jerry, what did you do?" Patrick smirked. "You got a B on a test? Were you late for class and got five points off your participation grade?" He guessed chuckling to himself.

"I'm serious Patrick, this isn't a joke."

"Oh." Patrick said setting his suitcase of the bed behind him. "You're serious. Alright, yeah. You know me. Best secret keeper in the world."

"Time to rip off the band-aid, Jeremie." Aelita told him. "Tell him."

"Patrick, for the last couple years, me and my friends Ulrich, Odd, Yumi, and Aelita have been fighting an evil artificial intelligence called X.A.N.A., in a virtual world called Lyoko. Located inside a giant supercomputer."

Patrick let out another chuckle. "What are you talking about?" He said smiling.

"All I wanted was to find parts for my robot, but I found a giant supercomputer with what I perceived as another artificial intelligence inside called Aelita. By turning the supercomputer back on I awakened an evil program created by a man named Franz Hopper to destroy a government program. But something happened and X.A.N.A. got corrupted. Now he wants nothing but the extinction of the human race." Jeremie said quickly. "X.A.N.A. gets to our world by activating towers in the virtual world Aelita lived in-"

"Jeremie, you're freakin' me out, man." Patrick interrupted. "I thought Aelita is that cute Pink haired girl standing next to you."

"That is the same Aelita. You see, only she could deactivate the towers so I assembled a team consisting of my other friends, to escort Aelita safely to the towers and protect her from X.A.N.A. while simultaneously working on a way to materialize Aelita onto Earth to save her. We kept our secret by using a program I created called Return to the Past which erased everyone's memories of the last 24 hours. Eventually I succeeded in making Aelita human with a program called Code: EARTH, but we couldn't destroy X.A.N.A. because he had taken part of her DNA code keeping her still connected to the supercomputer. We couldn't shut it off without killing Aelita, so we continued to fight X.A.N.A., learned Aelita was the daughter of Franz Hopper, and many months later defeated X.A.N.A. We thought we killed him. But he's back. And we need help."

"You mean to tell me that Aelita was a computer program when you met her, trapped in virtual world with an evil entity, until you, Jeremie Belpois, eighth-grader, created a program to bring her to Earth with a physical body? And then killed the evil program saving your school?"

"We actually saved the world." Aelita said. "X.A.N.A. had called on asteroids and satellites, created a zombie virus that infected nearly the whole school, and even sent his monsters to the real world to attack us. He can even possess people with what we call specters and give them superhuman strength. He's a much bigger threat than you realize."

"So, you're actually a virtual girl turned human after losing your humanity by somehow being trapped in a computer?" Patrick asked with his right eyebrow raised.

"Yes. My father virtualized me into Lyoko to protect me but I had lost my memories of him because of X.A.N.A." Aelita answered. "But thanks to Jeremie I got them back and remembered my humanity."

"Anyway, X.A.N.A.'s back. And he's stronger than he ever has been before. He's back to being restricted to our supercomputer but he's growing stronger as we speak. We need help. Will you help us save the world, Patrick?" Jeremie asked.

Patrick sat down on his bed and just stared at the screen for a moment. He started to laugh very lightly before exploding into hysteria and laying back on his bed. A couple seconds of pure laughter later he got back up and looked the screen wiping a tear from his eye. "Oh, Jerry. You actually had me going there for a second. And you said you were terrible with jokes. Aw, man. Listen Jerry, I gotta finish packing. I got a lot to do tomorrow before I can leave for the airport."

Jeremie let out an angered sigh. "If only we hadn't used the return to the past on you!" He growled. "Then you'd remember our fight with Herb and Sissi! Sure, it wasn't much of a fight. They beat us both to a pulp with their electricity but-"

"A fight with electricity?" Patrick asked to no one. On the other side of the screen Patrick grabbed his head. "Aaaah!" Patrick quickly fell over onto the floor of his room and cried out some more.

"Patrick!" Jeremie and Aelita yelled.

Patrick began rolling back and forth on the rug with his head still in his hands. His mind started flashing images inside his head. He could see himself in Jeremie's dorm. Before he could confirm anything else. A black-haired girl grabbed his coat frills of his coat and slammed him up against Jeremie's dresser with more force than a girl her age should have. Another flash and he was in the corridor, grabbing the girl by the arm, and tackling her against the wall. She growled back at him he looked into her eyes. Her eyes. They had some weird emblem glitching in place of her pupils. She easily shrugged him off and kicked him into the ceiling. A third flash showed him on a stairwell with the girl below him. He could see himself jump of the stairs and tackle the girl once again. As he she got up, he looked to her, still on his knees, to find bolts of electricity fire into his person knocking him back into the stairs and knocking him out. Patrick halted his movements and let out a deep gasp as he jolted his body upwards. He grabbed the table in front of him and staggered to his feet.

"Patrick!" Jeremie exclaimed. "Are you okay? What happened?"

"I saw things. It's like I was in another life." He said panting. "I saw me and some girl in pink fighting. She threw me against a dresser, kicked me into the ceiling, and even fired lightning bolts at me. And her eyes...there was something wrong with her eyes. There was some sort of bullseye in her eyes." He told them. "Jeremie, you're smart. What's happening?"

"I have a theory but I don't know how it happened." Jeremy said. He turned to Aelita still beside him. "You thinking what I'm thinking?" Jeremie asked.

Aelita nodded. "That wasn't a dream, it was a flashback." She informed him. "Somehow the Return to the Past must not have worked on you. Everything you saw must have happened before we reversed time. But I don't know how you did it."

"I can't confirm it right now, but I think that the return in time has a flaw we never encountered. It happened right after I mentioned the fight so maybe giving certain details of a past encounter can trigger your memory to come back. I'll have to look into this, but Patrick, that symbol you saw is the sign of X.A.N.A." Jeremie told him. "You can always tell who's possessed by that symbol."

"So X.A.N.A. is real? The story of Aelita, asteroids, monsters, it's all true?" Patrick asked. "Why didn't you call the cops?"

"They would've shut down the supercomputer and killed Aelita in our early days, and we kinda became criminals after that." Jeremie said sadly. "There were times when we really wanted to tell someone but I didn't want to risk Aelita."

"Criminals? What did you do?" Patrick asked.

"We didn't know I was actually a human turned virtual in the beginning. We thought I was just a program codenamed Aelita." Aelita said. "So in order for me to live on Earth without leading anybody on to the supercomputer, Jeremie had to...forge my records. Setting me up under the name Aelita Stones."

"You forged government records?!" Patrick yelled incredulously. "I knew you were good but...wow." He said shaking his head. "I'm going to assume you know what kind of trouble you could get in if you're found out."

"Of course. I knew what I was getting into as soon as I promised Aelita I'd materialize her onto Earth." He smiled. He wrapped his left arm around Aelita. "But it was worth it. We got Aelita out of it." Aelita smiled down at Jeremie. She leaned down and gave him a quick peck on the cheek.

"As happy as I am you got yourself a girlfriend, don't you think forging her an identity would be going a bit too far?"

"Maybe. But I wouldn't change a thing." Jeremie smirked. "So, are you in, Patrick? We need your help."

"I suppose if I say no, you use your time reverser thing to erase my memories again."

"We can't." Jeremie said pushing up his glasses. "The return trips make X.A.N.A. stronger. We have to use them only when absolutely necessary. But more importantly we wouldn't have to. I trust you. I don't think you'll out me. You know me, I'm a good guy. I just had to do some bad things to give Aelita a second chance. But on the slight chance you do tell someone, we'll always be cousins."

"Nice speech, Jerry. I'll admit, your story is crazy. You're crazy, and your girlfriend seems crazier. But..." He started ruffling his hair. "those visions were so real. And if you're really risking your life fighting for the world, I guess I can't let you do it alone. I'm in. But I still don't approve of your choices."

"Glad to hear you're in. And the gang will be too. It was a unanimous vote to bring you in. By the way, there's a guy here you haven't met. His name is William, he's cool, but he'll be hanging out with our group a lot more from now on." Jeremie said. "Once you get to Kadic, we will take you to be scanned in and you'll officially be immune to the return in times."

"I'd better go." Patrick said. "My parents are home and I need time to process all this." He said.

"Remember you can back out any time, Patrick." Jeremy assured him. "William and Yumi have a class, but the rest of us will be there to meet you at the airport."

"See you then, cous." He said waving off.

The screen blipped back to a pure blue screen, and Jeremie turned to Aelita offering his hand up in the air in front of him. Aelita nodded and high-fived the blonde smiling. "That's one down. With Patrick on board, things are already a hundred times better." Jeremie said happily.

"But I think you're forgetting the fact that Patrick just remembered his fight with a X.A.N. Sissi after we launched a return to the past." Aelita said. "If he can do it, who says Sissi can't, or Jim, or even worse the principle. There are countless people in this school who could regain their memories of our escapades." She frowned. "And if they shut down the supercomputer..."

"I know. We'll lose any chance of finding your father or saving the hostages and probably be taken in for an interrogation too." Jeremie said sadly. "But as long as we don't discuss the past with outsiders, we should be fine. You can go down to the cafeteria and eat, I'm going to the factory to take a look at what caused the loophole in the return program."

Aelita's eyes narrowed. "Oh, no you don't!" Aelita said grabbing his wrist tightly. "We aren't doing this again. I let you miss too many meals the last time we fought X.A.N.A. You're going to supper." She asserted.

~ Kadic Cafeteria ~

Dinner hour was mostly over and as Jeremie and Aelita approached the cafeteria, hand in hand, the two caught a glimpse of Ulrich, Odd, Yumi, and William leaving the building with smiles on their faces. Odd spotted them quickly and started waving at them. "Hey, look!" The joker called. "The Einstein's finally came to get their portions!" He said laughing to himself.

"And with only twenty minutes left of dinner hour, they'd better eat fast or Jim'll end up locking them inside when he closes it for the night." Ulrich added. "Not to mention they'll miss class."

Jeremie and Aelita finally came to a stop in front of them. "We would have gotten here sooner, but Jeremie's been fighting me every step of the way." Aelita groaned. "He really doesn't want to take a break."

"My efforts are best spent countering X.A.N.A., not stuffing my face!" Jeremie protested. "If we're going to win this fight, I need to get to the factory to-"

Odd put a finger to his mouth shushing Jeremie. "Easy Einstein." He hitched a finger over his left shoulder and everyone followed the direction to find Sissi, Herb, and Nicholas standing by the vending machine. "Any louder and we'll have to recruit the entire school after all." He said. "Although it would be nice for my plan to be used for once."

William quickly laughed at the younger boy. "You're not good at making plans and you know it." He said. "More importantly how'd it go with your cousin? Is he going to help?" William asked tilting his head.

"Yes. He'll be here tomorrow. But only because he remembered his fight with Sissi from a couple years ago."

Ulrich's eyes widened. "How is that possible? I thought we launched the you-know-what that day." He said.

"We did." Aelita confirmed, nodding. "But it seems discussing certain details of those erased memories can trigger a recovery of some sort. This could be our undoing. If the right person hears us talking about the wrong thing, they could regain their memories and call the authorities. No more discussing Lyoko related things at the lunch table." She said.

"But we could easily use it for our own purposes too." Jeremie said. "Patrick has agreed, but we still need our other two warriors and using this method could be the deciding factor as it was with Patrick. Tomorrow, Aelita and I will go to the factory to see what we can find out about this glitch in the program. Odd, Ulrich, I need you two to call Sam before you start your homework. We need her answer right away in case we need to fill her spot with someone else."

"What if she doesn't fancy the whole situation. Having someone know of what we're up to could be extremely dangerous. Especially if there's already someone around here who's against us." William pointed out.

"If she threatens anything, we may have to launch a return in time. I've weighed the risk and rewards, and I think we're doing the right thing. Sam's too much of a rebel kid to contact any authorities, anyways." Jeremie said confidently.

"All right." Aelita interrupted. She got behind Jeremy and pushed him lightly toward the cafeteria door. "Enough business, time for some break time." She asserted.

"But can I just-" Jeremie started before Aelita grabbed his arm again pulling him towards the door. "Aelita. I need to-"

"Eat." Aelita interrupted stepping up the two cement stairs in front of them. "I know. And if I have to drag you to every meal, I will."

"William, Yumi, go find-" With the Aelita finally got Jeremie into the cafeteria, cutting his voice off mid-sentence. She waved goodbye to the others as she stepped into the room.

"I'd feel so emasculated if I were him." Odd said. "If this were a dating sim, he would've just gotten minus two sex appeal." Odd sighed. "Well, nothing to do now but get to our room and let the torture begin. Yumi, if I don't make it past tonight, do you promise to take care of Kiwi?" Odd asked.

"It's just Botany homework." William chuckled. "It won't kill you."

"Oh yeah! Laugh it up! You weren't there for the tree roots!" Odd howled pointing a finger at William. "You haven't seen the bad side of botany!"

"Roots?" William asked turning to Yumi. "Is that supposed to freak me out?" He inquired slyly. "I think Odd needs to find scarier movies."

Yumi shivered in response as Odd and Ulrich sulked away. "X.A.N.A. roots are freaky, especially when they get grabby."

William shrugged. "If you say so. Say, shouldn't we see what it was that Jeremie was trying to tell us? It was probably important."

"You didn't get it?" Yumi asked raising an eyebrow. As William shook his head Yumi smirked. "Come on, William. He just gets back from recruiting Patrick, then immediately tells Ulrich and Odd to call Sam, so logically it would make sense for us to-"

"Okay." William interrupted. "I get it. Do you know the way?" He asked. "Cause I have no clue."

"Follow me, Casanova." Yumi ordered. "We're heading to the art room; their class ends in roughly a half-hour."

"If it ends in a half-hour, why are we leaving right now?" William asked. "I was gonna go get something from the vending machines."

"Later." Yumi said sternly. "You and I need to have a talk, now." She said.

~Odd and Ulrich's Dorm~

Ulrich was on the floor leaned up against his bed, head buried in his textbook, while Odd was laying on his back on top of his bed, phone to his ear. "Sam? Yeah, it's me." Odd said. Across from him Ulrich plugged two earpieces into his ears and groaned. "Yeah I had something to talk to you about...no it couldn't wait." Seeing as Ulrich had headphones in, and Odd could hear the music from his spot, he quickly hit the speakerphone button.

'Odd listen, now's really not a good time. It's one AM here in America and I have things to do tomorrow. What is it?' Her voice spoke irritably.

'How do I break this one to her?' Odd thought to himself. "Do you believe in the supernatural? You know, like ghosts or evil forces?"

'Seriously?' Sam said, obviously not amused. 'You woke me up to ask me that? Are you trying to piss me off? Just let me be.'

"No, wait!" Odd yelled holding his hands out in front of him.

"Odd! I'm trying to study here!" Ulrich scolded. "Did you forget that they just added pop quizzes to our class?!"

"Well, I'm trying to SAVE THE WORLD! Really? After running my ear off about your William angst, you're going to get mad at me when I'm being productive." Odd shot back. "And a little backup wouldn't be unappreciated." He snapped.

'Did you just say save the world?' Sam's voice asked. 'Odd have you been playing that stupid alien invaders game again?'

"Listen, Sam. I'm going to tell you something and I need you to promise not to tell anyone. Not even your diary, okay?" Odd asked.

'Sure, anything to get me back to sleep.' Sam said. 'Just make it quick.'

Odd looked to Ulrich who nodded carefully. "Sam we need your help. We've been hiding something big. Something that if the wrong person found out, we aren't the only ones who'll be in trouble."

'Odd I told you Kasey didn't know what he was talking about! Eating that stuff is-' Sam started.

"No! No. You see...a couple years ago my friends and I, we fought an evil computer program. It's inside this giant supercomputer just outside the school, deep underground. It's called X.A.N.A. and it won't stop until humanity is destroyed. Years ago, we thought we defeated it. It was supposed to be erased forever, but someone revived it and now it's stronger than ever. We need more people to help us fight it. I can't explain it all right now, but we could really use your help." Odd said. "Will you?"

'Let me get this straight. You call me in the middle of the night to tell me that years ago you, who would've been an eighth grader, and your friends, more eighth graders, fought an evil program called Xanax-'

"X.A.N.A." Odd corrected.

Sam sighed. 'X.A.N.A., who was bent on humanity's destruction, but despite being just kids, defeated it and saved the world without anyone knowing? And now it's back for vengeance or something like that and you want me to fight, too?'

"I know it's a big request-" Odd started

'I'm going back to bed. I suggest you go see the nurse to check for any head injuries. If something serious comes up don't hesitate to call, but otherwise... let...me...sleep!'

"A little help here, Ulrich?!" Odd snapped. "She's gonna hang up!"

Ulrich rolled his eyes and approached the phone. He leaned over to get close to the microphone. "Sam, it's me, Ulrich. Before you hang up can you answer me one last question?"

'Ugh, fine, but then I'm done.' She gave. 'I really need my sleep.'

"Do you ever have weirdly real dreams? Ones with me and Odd in them. Maybe a school building sinking into the ground with you trapped inside a computer lab? Anything like that?"

'...Who told you that!? Was it my therapist?! I knew his ethical code was bologna from the start! Telling people about my recurring dreams is so not cool!' Sam ranted. 'I've had that dream constantly for years, but don't know what it... means...' There was a long pause between the two lines.

"Sam? Did you hang up?" Odd asked. "Aw, man she thinks we're crazy!" Odd panicked.

'Something's wrong with my... head.' Sam groaned. 'It hurts. Bad. I think I'm getting a migraine.'

"I don't think that's a migraine. Think, Sam. Sam try to remember." Ulrich said. "All that stuff you think is a dream really happened. But we erased your memory and reset time."

'Impossible.' She managed. 'You guys...watch too many cartoons.'

"You tried to steal a computer, but you got caught. Odd took the fall and you got locked in a computer lab. Remember? We busted you out and took you to the factory. You saw the computer for yourself." Ulrich pressed. The two boys heard a loud, painful, groan from the other side along with what sounded like a creaking bed.

'...I'm not dreaming, am I? X.A.N.A. It's real isn't it?' She said bewildered. Odd could hear her breathing getting heavier over time.

"He's real." Odd confirmed after a moment. "And someone has to fight him. Somehow that duty falls on us." He told her.

'The authorities? Or surely you can just shut down the computer.' She tried.

"Yeah...about that. One of our friend's dad could be somehow stuck in the computer along with two other innocent people. I don't have time to explain, for now, all that's left is...are you in? I won't lie, you could get seriously hurt...or killed." Odd told her.

'Listen when I arrive at Kadic, first chance you get, I want you to take me to this supercomputer. You sound serious, but it is you and you have to admit, you sound crazy. We'll talk more tomorrow. Good night, Odd.'

"But-"

'Don't worry, I won't tell anyone...for now. If this isn't some sort of bad dream, then I'm kinda flattered you want me to help.'

"Of course, we want you to help, Sam. You're my friend. And if you'd like-"

"Dude." Ulrich said interrupting him pointing at the blank screen. "She hung up, man."

"Oh."

"Call Einstein and let him know Sam's probably in. He'll want to know right away so he can do whatever it is that he's got up his sleeve. Then I need you to do me a favor." Ulrich said.

"Sure. What do you need?"

"Keep it down." He said sternly. He plugged both earbuds back into his ears and buried his nose back into his textbook.

~Art Room~

Yumi and William were patiently waiting outside the Kadic art room for the current period to end. William was leaned up against the side of one of the pillars holding the ceiling above them while Yumi sat down in front of the column, knees bunched up close. Yumi was currently holding her dark blue phone up to her ear attentively listening to Jeremie's report. "Yeah. Okay...I understand Jeremie, we're right outside waiting for the class to end." She spoke. "Good to hear. I'll let William know. Keep me posted on anything else that comes up." She hung up and returned the phone to her pocket. "According to what Odd told Jeremie, Sam more or less agreed."

"So that's two." He said staring forward. "Are you gonna tell me why we needed to be here about thirty minutes before the class is even over? Or am I supposed to read your mind."

"We need to talk, William." Yumi said seriously. "And it needs to be done now."

"Yeah you told me that part but nothing else. I really hope you didn't drag me away from my snack time just to discuss gas prices." William retorted. "What's this about?"

"You." Yumi said honestly. "We need to talk about you."

William let out a sigh. "I had a feeling that's what this was about. You don't feel like I should be part of the team. You don't think I have what it takes to be a Lyoko Warrior."

"No, I don't." Yumi answered. "I think you're hotheaded, you're cocky, and you nearly got yourself and Aelita killed on multiple occasions. So in my humble opinion, should you fight with us? No. And after hearing your side I have one thing to say to you: I'm sorry."

"What?" William said turning to her.

"It's true that you don't scream 'Lyoko Warrior' to me, but that was no excuse for what I did...what we did." Yumi said. "Excluding you like that, especially after such a traumatizing experience was cruel of us, and if I could undo it I would."

"Really?"

Yumi nodded. "All those times when you wanted to sit with us, talk to us, know what we were up to, all you wanted was a friend, we turned you away. I had no idea it hurt you that much. Did you really have nobody for that whole time?"

"Yes and no. I always have Mom and Dad." William said. "But there's a form of companionship that they just can't fulfill."

"Did you hate us?" Yumi asked sadly.

"Honestly? For a while. I wasn't asking you to marry me, just talk to me. But after the first few months of silence, I started to get it. I couldn't force you guys to be my friends. Then the nightmares came. For months every dream and daydream I had was something to do with X.A.N.A. I think, somehow, I knew he was alive, like I was still connected to him somehow. The dreams kept getting worse and worse before I finally broke during break. I knew I had to try one last time. So, I went to Aelita."

"And here we are." Yumi finished for him. "Outside an art room waiting for a class that isn't ours to end so we can ask another kid if they want to join the fight. Well, at least I have you here with me so if I end up looking crazy, I won't be lonely in the looney bin."

William chuckled. "You know, we may be facing certain death, but at least I got to make jokes with you again, so if we fail, maybe it was worth it. I honestly expected you to be a lot more opposing like Ulrich."

"Give Ulrich time." Yumi smiled. "Believe it or not, he doesn't hate you. He doesn't even dislike you. He's just going through a lot of stress right now. His dad's being a pain, he's worried about keeping his grades up, and now his whole life just turned upside down again now that X.A.N.A.'s back. Just keep your flirty side to a minimum and show us you're a team player and he'll warm up to you in no time."

"I just have a bubbly personality!"

"You were hitting on me. Hardcore." Yumi said sternly. "And we both know that Ulrich's got a jealous personality, admittedly so do I. Just don't try to 'woo' me, and you and Ulrich will be best buds by the end of the week." She smiled.

"I suppose it was a losing battle from the beginning, huh?" William said.

"Yeah. Ulrich and I had fallen long before you came into the picture." Yumi said. "So, what do you say? We put this whole situation behind us and start anew?"

"That sounds great." William smiled. The doors behind them flew open and the upperclassman began spilling out of the room in a series of moans and laughs. William and Yumi both turned to face the oncoming crowd searching for their target. "I hope Jeremie was right about this class."

"He hacked into the list of students. He couldn't be wrong." Yumi replied. "There!" Yumi said pointing ahead. As the crowd dispersed, they revealed a single girl holding her books close to her chest heading towards the two of them. She had long dark hair and a pink and red t-shirt on with light brown pants and shoes to match.

"Emillie!" William yelled, waving his arm up high. "Over here!"

Emillie snapped her head towards William and cocked her head to the side. She made her way towards the duo at a leisurely pace. "William? Yumi? What are you guys doing here? You don't have this class."

"We wanted to talk with you." Yumi said carefully getting to her feet.

"Me?" She asked, confused. "Why?"

~Abandoned Factory~

~Two days later~

Jeremie was sitting in his chair typing away on the supercomputer getting everything ready for the initiation. Beside him William and Odd watched patiently in anticipation. In the two days the gang spent waiting for Patrick and Sam to arrive at Kadic they had been closely monitoring X.A.N.A., who had surprisingly not launched an attack yet, while also waiting for Jeremie to finish the security system for the factory so they could catch whoever it was who was conspiring with X.A.N.A. "Alright Aelita, everything's set up. Whenever you're ready." He spoke into his headset.

In the scanner room below the rest of the Lyoko Warriors stood proud. In front of the first scanner was Patrick, to his right stood Sam, and in front of the last scanner was Emillie. Aelita stepped forward and nodded. "Jeremie said to start the initiation. Once the three of you are scanned in, you'll officially be fully immune to the return trips. There's still time to back out." Aelita said. After a moment of silence, she turned back to Yumi and Ulrich. The two nodded and stepped forward as well. "Patrick," Aelita said turning to the first new recruit. "Do you promise to keep our secret, to fight by our side to the best of your ability, to watch our backs, to sacrifice free time and your grades, to stay loyal to the Lyoko Warriors in the fight against X.A.N.A. and his accomplices?"

Patrick decked out in black pants and a leather jacket, took a deep breath. "I promise." He said with passion. The pod on his side slid open And Aelita gestured towards it. Patrick carefully took a step inside and the doors closed behind him.

'Transfer, Patrick. Scanner, Partrick.' Jeremie said over the intercom. The pod lit up with a bright white light before the doors slid back open revealing Patrick holding himself up against the scanner wall.

"How do you feel?" Aelita asked.

"Drained. But determined." He said smirking

"Sam," Yumi said moving on. "Do you promise to keep our secret, to fight by our side to the best of your ability, to watch our backs, to sacrifice free time and your grades, to stay loyal to the Lyoko Warriors in the fight against X.A.N.A. and his accomplices?"

"I promise." Sam nodded. Like Patrick the doors to Scanner two slid open and Sam took a step inside, turning around as the doors slid shut.

'Transfer, Sam. Scanner, Sam.'

After another brief lightshow Sam stepped outside the pod and looked at her hands. "I don't feel any different. Huh."

"Emillie," Ulrich copied. "Do you promise to keep our secret, to fight by our side to the best of your ability, to watch our backs, to sacrifice free time and your grades, to stay loyal to the Lyoko Warriors in the fight against X.A.N.A. and his accomplices."

"I promise." She said before turning around. She took a good look at the scanner in front of her. She turned to face Ulrich with a weird look on her face. Ulrich's heart dropped as he feared his friend was having second thoughts. "This thing doesn't use radiation, does it? Cause I really like my arms and legs where they are now and-"

"It's perfectly safe. We've done it hundreds of times before and we're just fine. There's no need to worry." Emillie nodded before she too stepped inside a scanner.

'Transfer, Emillie. Scanner, Emillie.' The doors shut behind her as Yumi guided Sam and Patrick back upstairs. By the time they were all the way up the ladder, Emillie was stepping out of Scanner Three to see the welcoming smiles of Ulrich and Aelita. The three of them climbed the ladder to find Odd, Yumi, William, Patrick, and Sam gathered around Jeremie who still sat in his chair. The joined the semi-circle and all eyes were on Jeremie.

"You're all officially immune to the return to the pasts." Jeremie said. "the plan went off without a hitch, which worries me."

"Why?" Emillie asked. "Your team is three stronger now. Isn't it a good thing that X.A.N.A. left us alone?"

"Yes and no." Aelita said. "It's not like X.A.N.A. to just sit back and let us do what we want. Jeremie and I predicted at least two separate attacks in an attempt to stop this plan. But X.A.N.A.'s been silent for three straight days. Why?"

"It's possible that he doesn't feel threatened by our increased numbers." William pointed out. "Which could also mean he's got new tricks up his sleeve."

"Or worse..." Jeremie sighed. "This is exactly what he wants."