Lyoko Warriors in The Shutdown

XANA had been quiet for a while and the five Warriors were just happy to have a break, not having to run out of classes, wake up at random hours, and just be together without the weight of the world being on their shoulders. Jim injured himself that morning while demonstrating an exercise for Yumi’s gym class and wouldn’t be able to walk for at least a day. The polyqule took that as an opportunity to have a cuddle session in Jeremie’s room. Despite the size of the bed, everyone was comfortable in the limbs of their partners as they talked and laughed. They randomly kiss whoever they could reach. It was perfect. Then the computer lit up with bright red warning signs as it started to beep. A silence fell across the group, one thought crossed all of their minds: “XANA.”

They untangled themselves and Jeremie ran to his computer, the rest stood behind him as he typed in a few lines of code to see what was going on. Even though only Aelita, who let out a horrified gasp, could make sense of what was on the screen, the other three could tell it was not good by the look of dread they could see on Jeremie's face being reflected on the screen. “We need to get to Lyoko, NOW!” he spun the chair around and ran out of the room.

If what he said wasn’t enough to convince them how important this was, Jeremie running did. That was enough to put all of them in high gear as they ran out of the dorms and to the sewer entrance.

“Ok, Einstein What’s going on?” Odd asked as the main programmer stopped to breathe in the elevator.

“XANA hasn’t been quiet, he’s been busy amassing an army of monsters...and their all attacking the core of Lyoko, the third layer was already a quarter of the way... gone by the time we left my room, it won’t take XANA long to finish... that one before destroying the other two, and you know what happens if that’s destroyed.” He explained as he caught his breath.

“No more Lyoko, so there would be no way to stop XANA from doing whatever he wants to do on the web, satellites, power plants, nuclear weapons, XANA could use any of them and no one would be able to do a thing about it?” Ulrich whispered it as a question hoping that he was wrong.

The silence was all of the answers, not even Odd tried to make light of it.

They reached the room containing The Core and it was lined with monsters, Jeremie wasn’t kidding when he said that XANA had made an army. “The second shield is almost gone!” they heard the disembodied's voice laced with urgency and anxiety. They tried to take out as many monsters as they could but there were just too many. Ulrich had gotten devertualized, but there were still way too many monsters. “The second shield is gone there is only one more! And it’s going fast” they heard the blond cry out, but they were too busy fighting to process his words. “They're doing the best that they can Jeremie!” Ulrich snaped.

“the last shield is gone!” he cried, furiously typing, as the core got destroyed. It was over. He finished the command for Code Earth to bring the three of them in, but the terminal had shut down. “I can’t bring them back!” he sobbed into the mic, the display was going in and out and he could only hear bits of what Aelita, Yumi, and Odd were saying. “If my terminal doesn’t work chances are the scanners won't either…” his voice was small, and the boys just stared at the blank screen. Then they heard the hiss of the scanners. Their partners were alive! It didn’t matter that XANA won, their partners were alive! They practically slid down the latter to the scanner room. But, only two of the scanners were opening.

In Lyoko, The Core disintegrated, and the platforms they were on were disappearing as well. Everything was devirtualizing around them. It was over. They heard Jeremie start to speak, but got cut off. They were on their own and were falling, and they were not even close to each other.

“I think Jeremie’s locked out, We need to devertualize each other,” Yumi summed up. “It’s a good thing we all have distance weapons so we can attack each other, Aelita, hit me I’ll get Odd, and," she turned to them, " you get Aelita.”

The two of them nodded at the plan. “On the count of three!”

Yumi’s through her fan as Aelita sent an energy blast her way and Odd was out of laser arrows.

“Where’s Aelita?!” Jeremie cried out as soon as they noticed that she was the one who didn’t return.

“I was out of laser arrows,” Odd’s voice was numb as they processed what happened. “I couldn’t devertualized her.” There was not a dry eye in the room as they held each other crying. Odd and Jeremie were taking it the hardest. Jeremie was beating himself ups saying that he should have been monitoring XANA more, and not letting it come this far, Odd was upset by not knowing that they were out of arrows. But everyone was going through all of the things they could have done differently that might have saved her as the tears fell.

“What do you think would happen if we turned to supercomputer off and on again, maybe it would reboot Lyoko and she would still be there,” Odd suggested. Everyone looked at them.

“I don’t think it will work but It couldn’t hurt,” the genius responded. The group got up and took the elevator down a level still holding each other. If he wasn't so desperate, he wouldn't even have entertained the idea but he needed to do something, no matter how illogical it was.

The base of the computer was black none of the rusty gold lines and patches that normally cover the computer were there. Ulrich walked forward and pulled the lever, cutting the power. He took a breath and turned it back on. The lights came back! They all stared in shock. None of them actually thought it would work, now they were rushing up the ladder to see what they all hoped for.

The terminal was on and all sectors of Lyoko were active according to the holographic globe. They all ran to the chair that Jeremie sat on, he grabbed the headset. The terminal was starting to come back to life, and none of them dared make a sound as they waited. Finally, it was fully operational. He wasted no time as his fingers flew across the keyboard. They were moving faster than ever before. Then the monitor zoomed in on a tower in the mountain sector, and in there, their girlfriend lay still. “Aelita! Princess are you ok!” Jeremie called into the mic. She didn’t move. “She-she’s there but she’s not moving!”

“Maybe you can devertualized her and she’ll be ok!” Ulrich's voice was laced with the desperation they all felt, the same desperation that got them this far.

“It’s worth a try,” he tentatively typed the command to bring her in. The one he made to bring her in for the first time, he was terrified of messing up the command.

You could hear a pin drop as they went to the scanner room and waited.

Eventually, the scanner opened. She lay curled up, just as she was when she was first devertulized.

“Princess?” Yumi whispered as if she was afraid a loud noise would break her.

Aelita’s eyes fluttered open as she started to stir, she groaned as she started to sit up and grasp her head. “Yumi?” Her voice was a question as she came to. She picked up the pink-haired girl, as she brought her out of the scanner and to the rest of their partners This was enough of an invitation for everyone to approach crying with joy. They all showered her with love.

“Wh-what’s going on? It’s not like I mind the attention, but you acked like I just died, or something,” she smiled weakly before noticing everyone’s expression growing grim.

“What was the last thing you remember?” Ulrich asked seriously.

She hesitated as though she needed to think. “We- we’re stopping XANA from cloud seating I deactivated the tower, or I thought I did was I too late?!” She was rightfully terrified of the prospect of XANA succeeding.

“But That was three months ago...,” Ulrich whispered.

“Does that really matter!?” Jeremie asked, “she’s alive and well!” His voice was full of glee.

After Everyone calmed down Aelita asked what happened to make her partners act this way.

And they told her.

“Wow so I really did die…” she whispered, from the middle of a cuddle pile.

Everyone was so focused on the fact that she was alive, and well to realize that the other sectors are back.

XANA did and was ready to go back on the offensive, he now knows that he only needs to hold the life of one of them to control the rest.

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If you like this story? I have others in this collection, and I have and several different series that I am working on, as well as a poetry collection. I keep a google doc housing summaries of each story and all of the installations that I've posted in an easy to navigate google doc: Click Here

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~~Ben