Code Xana Episode 13: So Close

Author: James the Lesser/The Bunnyman

Disclaimer: I Do Not Own These Characters! Moonscape Does! Actually, I own most of these characters, I made them up, but the place and the settings and the back round stuff is Moonscape.

Please read my episodes, 53-119 plus the OVA of Code Lyoko to know what is going on. Oh and Code Xana the Movie and Episode 1-12

Ark is in the cafeteria sitting with Mira. "You know, my father wrote the theme music for his Extreme videos."

"Which ones? I like the one from the snowboarding down Mt. Everest. The world record for the fastest descent down the world's tallest mountain held by Mark Manderin. The angles from the helicopter were so cool.

"My dad did that one, and the one for the sky diving video."

"The one where they played baseball?" Ark nods. "Cool. How did you get such cool parents?"

"Lucky I guess. Doesn't hurt my dad's friends got rich on their own." Jeremie through his inventions and J Inc. Ulrich from when he cheated to win the lottery and kept some of the money. "One sky dive costs over seven hundred Euros. Try paying for two full baseball teams and five camera men."

"Speaking of your friends, what about telling me what you and they do?"

"I can't tell you. They always vote no when I ask to let you in."

"Why can't you just tell me?" Mira holds Ark's hand.

"You wouldn't believe me unless I showed you everything and my friends might kick me out of the group for doing that."

"It can't be that big a deal." Mira smiles but the look on the Ark's face makes her frown.

"Don't do that, smile, you look beautiful when you smile." Mira does. "To them it is. Maybe today something will change and they will let you in." He laughs but knows they won't.

Sanne is working on her computer when a beeping noise starts. "Super Scan, attack, Ice Sector." Sanne gets her Jcell out and calls Skitz. "Skitz, guess who."

"Xana? Could have told you that." Skitz had heard screaming and ran to find a Tarantula on Earth! "Xana sent a Tarantula. He hasn't seen me or hurt anyone so far. I'm guessing it won't attack anyone but us so let's go to Lyoko before it sees us."

"Ok, I'm calling Ark, you call Krieger."

"You're still not talking to Krieger? He was just listening to my advice…" Sanne hangs up on Skitz. "Ok, Krieger, pick up." He doesn't.

"Over here, come on." Krieger had been in the gym when a Tarantula broke through the doors. Now he was trying to get it over to the exercise room to try and lock it inside. It fires lasers but Krieger dodges them. "I need a weapon or something." He knows where he can get one and runs into the exercise room. The Tarantula fires lasers at the door but the metal doors resist the lasers. Krieger comes back out with a pole. It was one of the poles from a weight bench that you put weights on. "Now that I have a weapon lets have fun." Krieger is away from his phone and never hears it ring.

Ark had answered his phone. "Mira, stay here, don't come out until I say so ok?"

"What's going on?"

"Just stay and don't come out no matter what." Ark runs out of the cafeteria and heads for the Kadic Academy sewer entrance.

"Crap." Skitz had been headed for the sewer entrance in the woods when another Tarantula came out from the woods. It fires lasers at her as she runs off into the woods.

"Ark? Where's your sister?"

"I don't know." Ark and Sanne use skateboards to go down the sewers towards the Factory. "Maybe she took the entrance in the woods." They continue towards the Factory.

"Missed!" Krieger had tried to hit the Tarantula on the Eye with the pole but the Tarantula dodges it at the last second. "Stay still!" He swings at it and misses the Eye again.

"Krieger!" Krieger turns around to see Jim.

"Not good." Being distracted Krieger is hit with a laser. "Jim, get, to the Factory." They would need help, his friends would need help. He could handle one Tarantula, so Krieger thinks.

"It was you! You turned the Super Computer back on!" Jim is stunned but knows he will have time to yell at Krieger later. "Hey, Xana, over here!" The Tarantula turns its head towards Jim and fires a laser from one of its legs. Jim dodges it then grabs his right knee. "I'm not in as good of shape I use to be." He stands up. "But I can handle you."

"Jim you have to help the others at the Factory!" Krieger tried to hit the Tarantula on the Eye when it fired a laser at Jim but the Tarantula expected that and blocked the pole.

"Others? Who else is in on this?" Jim looks towards the door of the gym, he could escape easily but it would leave Krieger alone with a Tarantula.

"Who do you think?" Krieger blocks several lasers with the pole then drops it. "Ow, man that's hot." The laser had heated the metal of the pole up. The Tarantula knocks Krieger down.

"I can't leave you." Jim runs at the Tarantula to help Krieger.

"The Hermitage, I can't get near there. If Sanne sees the Tarantula…" Skitz ducks when she sees a laser fly over head. The Laser hits the Hermitage and breaks through a window.

"What's going on out here?! All land past the wall is private property!" Sanne had come out to see which punk had broken her window and sees Skitz being chased by a Tarantula. "Oh God no." She puts a hand over her heart. "No, Xana, how could this happen!?" Sanne goes after the Tarantula and Skitz hoping to get some answers.

"Oh crap, Sanne stay back." Ark and Sanne had made it to the Factory only to find a Tarantula waiting for them! "Now what do we do. If I distract it you can make it to the elevator."

"I can't go to Lyoko alone. We need at least two Warriors to protect Dante." Sanne gets her Jcell out and calls Krieger. Krieger hears his phone ring now that he was close to the locker room and gets his phone.

"I can't come to help! This Tarantula is really giving me and Jim a hard time!" Krieger and Jim had been struggling against the Tarantula.

"Jim?!" Sanne is confused.

"He followed the Tarantula after making sure there weren't any others on the campus!" Krieger ends the call when he is hit with a laser and drops his phone.

"Ok, I'll try Skitz." Sanne calls Skitz.

"Aaaaa!" Skitz is running through the woods with a Tarantula after her.

"Skitz, what's wrong?"

"Tarantula, and your grandmother!" Samantha had tried to distract the Tarantula from Skitz but it ended with both being attacked and running through the woods.

"Samantha? Then you're near the Hermitage, take the sewer entrance there to get here."

"I can't it won't let me near it!" Skitz hangs her phone up and continues to run.

"We have to find a way around the Tarantula. The other two can't make it." Sanne looks at Ark hoping he had a plan.

"I know a way to distract the Tarantula and getting two warriors to Lyoko." Sanne raises an eyebrow. "Let me go and get Mira, she…"

"No!" Sanne cut Ark off before he could say anything else. "We are not letting anyone into this group! The only way we will have more warriors is if we have to call out parents to help."

"Fine then you figure out how to get by the Tarantula and have two warriors on Lyoko." Ark crosses his arms while Sanne thinks.

"Ok, get her, I have an idea, but you have to make it to Lyoko with me." Ark nods and heads back to the school through the sewers. "I better be able to figure out how to do it." Sanne waits for Ark to get back.

"Mira!" Ark runs into the cafeteria and sees her. "Come with me."

"What? Why?"

"You want to know what me and my friends do?" Mira nods. "Then follow me." Mira follows Ark to the sewer entrance in the school.

"Ew, the sewers."

"Don't worry they're clean unless you plan on licking the walls." Ark gets on his skateboard then grabs Skitz's. "You can board right?" Mira nods and takes the skateboard from Ark. They head down the sewers, Mira following Ark, until they get to the end and Mira sees Sanne.

"Whoa, hey Sanne." Mira waves at her.

"Yes, Ark, you distract the Tarantula, then Mira will run ahead and I will follow. I'll distract the Tarantula and you get into the Factory. We'll get to the elevator and I'll send her." Ark climbs up the ladder followed by Mira and Sanne.

"Hey! Over here! That's it, come on, after me!" Ark waves and gets the Tarantula's attention. It fires lasers at him and leaves the bridge after Ark.

"Come on Mira we have to get to the elevator." Sanne and Mira run to the Factory. "Jump and grab the rope." Mira does and swings down. "Hey, Tarantula, leave Ark alone it's me you want right!?" The Tarantula turns and starts to fire at Sanne. Ark runs past the Tarantula before being hit by a laser.

"Sanne, just get to Lyoko!" Ark gets up and turns to fight the Tarantula.

"No! You have to help me, and Mira!" Sanne's words work and Ark turns away from the Tarantula and runs into the Factory. Ark and Sanne jump and swing down to the Factory floor. They run towards the elevator. "Mira push the button!" Mira does and the elevator doors open. They run inside and push the button to close the door and escape the Tarantula. It fires lasers that slam into the elevator door but don't pierce.

"Um, what was that? And this?" The elevator doors open and Mira sees the Control Room. "Whoa, wow, am I tripping on that yogurt? I thought it looked a little weird."

"No Mira this is where Sanne sets up the Transfer Program. We're going to Lyoko soon." Ark smiles at Mira's astonished look. "You'll see."

"Ok, back to the elevator." The three get on and take it down to the Scanners. "Mira, you get the honor of the middle Scanner." Mira gets in the middle Scanner.

"This won't hurt, will it?" She sees the Scanner doors on the other two Scanners close. "Hey, why didn't this one do that?" She stays in the Scanner for a couple more minutes before giving up.

"Hey, where is she?" Ark and Sanne land on Lyoko in the Forest Sector outside of the Way Tower.

"I guess I forgot to make the middle Scanner scan." Sanne's plan had worked. She needed to get Ark to Lyoko and he wouldn't until she promised to send Mira. It was a mean trick but it was what she needed to do. "Dante, we go east, I think, right?"

"Wait, what did you do to Mira?" Ark was expecting to see what Mira would look like on Lyoko. Instead he was on Lyoko and Mira was on Earth, with the Tarantula. "She's in danger with the Tarantula at the Factory."

"No she isn't, if she isn't stupid enough to stay in the Scanner Room she is but really are you going to say she is?" Ark stares at Sanne but doesn't respond.

"Sanne, we go south not east. Who is Mira?" Dante is confused at why Ark seemed angry at Sanne.

"Doesn't matter we need to deactivate the Tower." Dante runs south, followed by Sanne and an angry Ark.

"Jim!" Krieger and Jim were trying to keep the Tarantula from escaping the gym and it gets Jim hurt. "Damn it come after me. You have to go after an old man?"

"I'm not that old." Jim sits up. "But I'm not that young." He rubs his back.

"Samantha, if we split up it will take time to choose who to go after."

"I'm not done with you! I can't believe you idiots! How could you unleash Xana after all…" Skitz cuts Samantha off.

"We don't have time for that Sanne!" Skitz and a stunned Samantha not expecting to be called by her real name split apart. The Tarantula stops, spreads its arms, and starts to fire lasers at both. "Not what I wanted!" Skitz hoped the Tarantula would come after her since she was the newest thorn in Xana's side, not Samantha.

"Why didn't you send her!?" Ark is on his disc so he can yell at Sanne. "She's helped us multiple times, she's saved my life! How can you not send her!?"

"Because she isn't one of us."

"So you have to be 'one of us' to fight Xana? Our parents let others in to fight Xana!"

"Yes they did, Sissi betrayed them, William was already dead, and Samantha wasn't left with the memory of it. Only Jim was allowed to remain in the group." Sanne turns to Ark. "You can fit me and Dante on there, it will be faster then running."

"Fast? It would be easier if we had another member to rely on to but you won't do that will you?" Now Sanne was getting mad.

"Skitz and Krieger are in danger! Are you going to let me not sending that bimbo here get in the way of saving them!?"

"She's not a bimbo!" Ark clenches his hand into a fist. "Just because her parents aren't, I don't have to defend her! She's not a stuck up little princess whose use to having a room bigger then some houses. She's not a snobby little brat who thinks she's better then everyone else because her mommy and daddy are billionaires who fought against Xana! She's not a…" Sanne cuts Ark off.

"Shut up! Let me and Dante get on so we can get to the activated Tower and save the others!" Ark stops and lets the two on.

"Don't, touch me." Sanne was trying to hang on to Ark as he took off but pulled her hands back. She puts a hand on Dante's shoulder to keep from falling off.

"Dragon, two, coming from behind us." Dante turns around to confirm his sense.

"Ark, I'll get off and try to stop them." Sanne jumps off the disc and lands on the platform below. She turns towards the Dragons as they fly towards her. She closes her eyes and starts to charge an energy blast. She opens her eyes to see where the Dragons are. She uses more and more energy then fires a Scattershot. The Dragons split up but one is hit by several beams and is destroyed. The second one is missed completely and fires on Sanne. She dodges the lasers as best she can before getting hit on the leg. She falls and is pounded with lasers until she goes back to Earth.

"Sanne?" Mira sees Sanne fall out of the Scanner. "Are you ok, what happened?"

"Ouch." Sanne rubs her thigh where she had been hit. "I'm fine."

"What happened though? Where's Ark?"

"You won't care because you won't remember." Sanne would make sure of that. She goes over to the elevator and takes it up to the Control Room.

"She must have been defeated." Dante had felt Sanne leave and a Dragon coming towards them.

"Well, are we close yet?" Ark did not want to leave Dante on his own to get to the Tower.

"Yes, a little bit farther and we should be able to see the Tower." Ark goes as fast as he can on his disc with Dante and soon they do see the Tower and no guards!

"He must be busy controlling the Tarantulas on Earth." Ark was correct which wasn't a good thing.

"Jim, get out of here!" Jim had been hit with multiple lasers and now Krieger was trying to protect him. "Aaaa!" The Tarantula hits Krieger with an arm knocking him away from Jim. "Leave him alone!" Krieger has to protect Jim, he had fought Xana and his monsters years long ago. Krieger and the others were not going to have their parents, grand parent, or Jim dragged into this.

"Dante if I…" Ark is hit by a laser and falls off his disc. He and the disc crash into the Forest Sector. Dante falls off the disc after it crashes and barely stops himself from falling over the edge. "Get on my disc, I'll distract the Dragon and send the disc towards the Tower." Dante runs back to the disc and gets on it. Ark uses his psychic connection with the disc to move it and Dante towards the activated Tower. "Just have to get him to the Tower." Ark runs away from the Dragon as it fires lasers. He jumps off the platform and uses his long tail to grab a tree. He swings himself around and tries to kick the Dragon. He misses and the Dragon hits him again.

"Must hang on." Dante had to lay flat on the disc and hang onto the edge as the disc drops towards the Digital Sea. It goes back up after Ark gets his concentration back after being hit with a laser.

"He's almost there." Ark runs and jumps using his tail to launch himself into the trees. He jumps around between trees dodging lasers.

"Skitz!" Samantha had stopped running when the Tarantula went after Skitz. She grabbed a branch to try and fight the Tarantula. It has Skitz pinned to the ground and fires lasers point blank range. "Leave her alone!" Sanne hits the Tarantula in the leg with a branch. The Tarantula turns around and knocks Samantha down. It shoots her with lasers causing her great pain. Skitz knows the lasers have stopped hitting her but the pain clouds her mind so badly she can't get up to continue running away.

"Krieger, run." The Tarantula had broke Jim's right knee and was going after Krieger. Krieger was getting tired after fighting for nearly half an hour. He trips and falls on the gym floor. The Tarantula pounds him with lasers.

"Finally." Dante jumps off the disc and runs into the Tower. He goes up to the next platform, brings up the screen, and deactivates the Tower. "The Tower is deactivated. Sanne, are you able to launch a return to the past?"

"Yes, I'm launching it now." The white bubble comes up reversing time and blanking memories.

"Ouch." Krieger rubs his stomach where most of the lasers had hit. "They did it, but Xana is stronger now." Krieger sits down on a weight bench. "We really can't let them in, Jim was practically helpless."

"That hurt." Skitz rubs her back where she had been hit. "Samantha was pissed, we really have to keep her from finding out. She could probably figure out how Sanne fixed the return to keep her and the others from remembering."

"Damn it!" Ark stands up from the cafeteria table.

"What's wrong Ark?" Mira doesn't know why Ark went from himself to being mad.

"I, I have to go yell at someone. I'll be back ok?" Mira nods as Ark leaves. Ark barges into Sanne's dorm room. "Who do you think you are?"

"Sanne Belpois. I know you're upset that I didn't send Mira to Lyoko…" Ark cuts Sanne off.

"Upset? Upset?! If she had gone with us we could have gotten Dante to the Tower a lot faster then we did! We got lucky there were no guards at the Tower or Dante wouldn't have made it!"

"Be quiet Ark someone might hear you."

"Whatever, I'm, don't talk to me." Ark walks away from Sanne and leaves her room.

"Fine, leave me alone." Sanne closes her door and goes back to her Jtop. "Dante?" A screen comes up on the monitor.

"Yes Sanne?"

"At least you still talk to me." Sanne smiles. "How about we find a way to get the vehicles to work?"

"I don't believe we have the resources for them yet." The vehicles had been found but the Super Computer could not handle them, yet.

"I know and hopefully the Super Computer won't get that powerful." It would mean a more powerful Xana. "Maybe we could…" Sanne and Dante work on different programs for the rest of the day.