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G-Force 4
Author of 6 Stories |
Special Thanks:
Thanks to Trillinka and ViciousAssassin for pointing out some critical errors in my story. Usually I'm not THAT sloppy but my head was swimming when I wrote it.
Disclaimer:
Man I'm getting really tired of writing these so I'll just keep putting abridged versions of this stuff. (Don't Sue me please)
Episode 6: Cruel Dilemma
Two new occupants were being introduced to the students of Kadic Junior High. The two visitors were really getting the red carpet treatment that day, the principle was so overjoyed by their arrival, that he prepared a special speech for their introduction and even called out the students to the field to see the sight. These two were special indeed, not many visitors got such a grand reception...
Then again, not many visitors to the Kadic Junior High campus were composed of metal and required the consumption of gasoline to move.
You see, that visitor's that the principle was so eager to show off were not even human at all. They were two machines, bulldozers to be exact. Bulldozers from the construction company hired to partake in a special building project to the school. Kadic Junior High was a very well-to-do school as it carried the same prestige and reputation as many of the respected collages in the area. Sending your child to attend classes at Kadic was a good investment in their academic future.
With the school's academic record loaming over his head, the principle of the school was always constantly pushing himself to maintain its status. He ways always trying to get the best teachers, the best equipment and the best facilities for his students because only the best would do for him. He also had his own personal reasons, his daughter for one. With Sissy both attending AND living in the campus, she served as his personal motivation to keep things in tip-top shape, and this latest project that he was undertaking was all in the name of improving the school's already revered image. Whenever he would walk around the campus there was always one area of the school that put him unease, the outside field. Oh sure, it looked fine but it seamed so...so...ordinary. The principle had his own vision of what the field should look like and he had plans, BIG plans in store for this humble area and that's what drove him to set out in the construction of a school stadium. He couldn't wait to tell the students of his grand vision and that was why he called them out here today.
"Hello there students, I have an important announcement to make." The principle spoke in a voice that was both bold and confident while at the same time being natural and eloquent."The bulldozers you see behind me will aid in the construction of a brand new stadium for our school." The principle saw all the student's wide-eyed stares of excitement before turning his back to them to face the vehicles that he was mentioning.
"As principle of this school, I believe that it is my sworn duty to provide the best for my students and I promise you that this stadium will be one of the best sports facilities that a single school can offer." He stopped his speech temporarily to clear his throat before continuing.
"I can't believe he's doing this" Jin said in a monotone voice that was obviously the result of the boredom he was experiencing.
"I know, it's like he's going to be talking all day. Doesn't he know we have lives to live and we really don't have enough time to just stand here and listen to him drag on and on about some stadium." Odd said, filling in the blanks of Jin's open-ended statement.
"That too Odd but I was talking about that brown suit he always wears. Man that this is so awful. If you're going to wear a suit, make sure it's either all black or all white, those are the only colors that I will accept."
"Since when did you have a fashion sense?" Ulrich asked curious about Jin's last remark.
"I don't, I just know what looks good. There are two purposes to wearing a suit, to make yourself look professional, or to make yourself look like a badass."
"A badass?" Ulrich replied a little unsure of the message that Jin was trying to convey. "What's so badass about wearing a suit and tie?"
"Look at Dirk and Clayton. Ok I know that this is a bad example since Dirk doesn't wear a suit but he does wear formal clothing so bear with me here, ok? Have you noticed, that of the two, Dirk looks more intimidating than Clayton even though he's the smaller one."
"No I haven't Jin. I don't spend that much time looking at how people dress."
"Ah, you'll never understand, Ulrich" Jin said folding his arms across his chest and looking away from his confused friend.
"Just like how I'll never understand you" He said underneath his breath.
Odd, Ulrich, Jin and Yumi stood still and patiently listened to the principle as he continued to talk with his back turned to the audience. Yumi was frustrated with the man's presentation and vocally voiced her opinion.
"You would think that with all the time he's spent with his back turned, that he was giving the speech to the bulldozers instead of us."
"That's it! I am officially bored right now." Odd said throwing out his own opinion.
"Well you didn't have to come here." Yumi said showing Odd the error of his ways. "You could have stayed behind like what Jeremie did."
"You know what, Yumi?" Odd said as his voice brightened. "That sounds like a good idea. I'm gonna pay Einstein a little visit." Odd then turned his back towards his friends and began to walk away.
"Arrg, I can't take this anymore" Jin grumbled to himself. Seeing Odd walk away, he decided to take his leave too. "Yo Odd!" He called out to his friend. "Wait up!"
Odd stood in place and waited for Jin to catch up with him before resuming his walk to the dorms. Thanks to the principle, the campus was mostly empty at that moment as everyone was either outside on the field or relaxing in their rooms. Odd looked around the school grounds and finally realized how big it really was.
"Man I never noticed that this place was so huge" he thought to himself. As his eyes glanced around the area and noticed that they were the only two people there. It was at that moment, Odd got an idea to help cure himself of his boredom.
"Hey Jin, wanna spar?" Odd asked frankly.
"WHAT?" Jin was startled by the request. Odd just asked if he could fight him, treating the question just as casually as if he were discussing the news or checking the weather.
"You heard me. You want to fight?"
"Now? Are you crazy?" Jin asked, finding Odd's suggestion rather absurd.
"Check it out" Odd spun in circles to get a full three-hundred and sixty degree view of the area. "We're the only ones here."
"Why are you so hell-bent with wanting to spar with me all of a sudden?" Jin asked still confused.
"Ulrich and Yumi have been training me ever since I've known them but I'm afraid my skills are getting a little rusty. Sure I kick butt in Lyoko, but I want to see how I fair in the real world. Ever since you, Jeremie, Ulrich and Yumi knocked out Dirk and his gang of thugs, he's been messing with our group ever since. I just want to see if I could take him out incase we got into a fight."
Jin pondered the strange request for a minute before giving Odd an answer. "Fine, you want a fight, you got a fight, but listen, I'm not going easy on you because you're my friend. I'm going to let you have it!" Jin removed his cordless headphones and set them on the floor before getting into his fighting stance."
Odd responded by going into his own stance. "Now that's more like it"
Jin moved his neck repeatedly back and forth and produced a slight cracking noise from the area.
"What, you're not going to crack your knuckles this time?"Odd asked noticing Jin act outside his normal pattern of behavior.
And thus began and intense standoff between Odd and Jin.
"Now how am I going to do this?" Odd thought to himself as he thought up his strategy. "Jin is just standing there. Is he waiting for me to attack or is he just stalling?" Odd looked at Jin's face and saw that he was wearing a very casual expression. "Ok that's it I'm taking him down now!"
Odd snapped out of his trance and recklessly charged Jin. He raised his left fist and threw out a quick jab. Odd soon found himself punching through air as Jin sidestepped his attack and grabbed his wrist with his left hand and placed his right hand underneath Odd's arm. Before he knew what was going on, Odd found himself being flipped over Jin's shoulder and on his back. The throw did not cause a lot of damage, but it did do a good job in knocking the wind out of him and forcing him to rethink his battle plan.
"Finished yet?" Jin asked calmly as he stood over Odd.
"Far from it" Odd said as he stood back up, dusting himself off in the process.
Odd fired a middle kick aimed at Jin's rib cage with right leg. Jin saw the oncoming attack and lowered his left arm to block. Drawing his leg back, Odd threw out another kick, but this time it was with his left leg and it was aimed at the right side of Jin's face. Jin raised his right arm and blocked Odd's second kick which got dangerously close to his head.
"Just like I wanted him to do" Odd thought to himself, hoping that Jin would defend himself from such a strike. Before Jin could place him arm back in its original position, Odd had already managed to place his left leg on the floor and used both of his legs to jump. Odd spun himself like a top in mid air to gain momentum and launched a spinning roundhouse kick with his right leg,smashing his foot into the side of Jin's jaw making him stagger backwards.
"How's that?" Odd yelled at Jin expecting him to give up after being hit by such a powerful strike.
Jin stumbled over his feet trying his best to keep his balance. He was able to catch himself before he fell to the floor and rubbed the left side of his jaw where Odd struck him and noticed that his hand was slightly stained red. Blood began to trickle down Jin's mouth creating a small red river on his face. Odd looked at Jin and was horrified by the sight.
"That guy took my best kick and he's even bleeding. Yet he still wants to fight?"
Jin didn't even bother to wipe his face clean as he turned to face Odd.
"Nice kick" He said as his mood began to darken. "Now it's my turn."
"Man, looks like the only thing that my kick succeeded in doing was pissing him off!" Odd thought to himself as he prepared for Jin's counter offensive.
Jin ran at Odd and jumped high into the air, lifting his right leg over his head. He then sent his heel crashing down which struck Odd's forearm whiched he raised to block the attack. Odd's arm went wild with pain as a result but Jin wasn't done yet. Odd didn't even get a chance to breath as Jin unleashed a barrage of punches all aimed at his face. Odd used a combination of dodges and blocks to protect himself from the barrage of jabs, hooks, straights and uppercuts that Jin was throwing at him.
This was no longer a friendly match, Odd soon figured out. Now, he was fighting for his life.
Jin stopped his punch rush and hopped backwards to put more space in-between him and Odd before lifting his right leg from the ground and holding it in the air, like a flamingo. Jin then rushed Odd once more but instead of using his fist this time, Jin unleashed a series of lighting-quick kicks aimed at various places on Odd's body.
If Odd had a hard time defending against Jin's punches, he was definitely in deep trouble when it came to his kicks. It took every once of skill and concentration that he had just to keep up with the rapid assault and avoid taking damage but he couldn't last too long. Odd's arms were getting tired from the sheer abuse that he was putting them through as the nerves in them howled out in pain. It was at that moment Jin snuck in a middle kick into Odd's left side right before drawing his foot back and striking the opposite end with the back of his heel. Odd watched Jin then perform a back handspring to create some more distance between them as he did before.
"Man if Jin keeps this up, I'm going to be a goner!" Odd thought to himself in a slight panic. "I gotta break this guy's rhythm."
Odd used this break Jin gave him to get another kick in. He shuffled his feet towards his target and launched his right leg forward into a side kick aimed at Jin's face, little did he know that he fell right into his ploy.
Jin used his hop to bait Odd into throwing a long-range attack. "Allow the enemy to come at you first, that way you're forces will fresher for the upcoming battle" He remembered a passage in the Art of War and he now had the perfect moment to seize the momentum in the fight once more. Jin slammed himself to the floor, back first and watched Odd's kick fly right over his head. From his laying position, Jin took his right foot and kicked through Odd.s left leg, the only thing that was keeping his balance. Jin continued with the circular motion with his leg and whipped it above his head and used the force he created to spin on his head and stand up in a move that looked very similar to breakdancing.
Odd fell flat on his back right after Jin knocked his leg right out from under him. He struggled to get up after getting the wind knocked out of him and soon saw Jin walk over to the side of his head. Odd stared wide-eyed as Jin raised his right leg once more and saw his right heel come crashing down onto his face to finish him off. He closed his eyes and prepared for the worse but it never came. Odd opened his eyes and saw Jin's heel hovering just inches above the bridge of his nose as if it were frozen like when Aelita deactivates a tower right before a return to the past trip. Jin pulled his heel away and extended his hand forward to help Odd up.
"Man Odd, you sure gave me a run for my money back there." Jin said flashing a light-hearted smile as if the fight never happened.
"Whaa?" Odd blurted out confused by Jin's sudden change in demeanor. First he looked like he was going to tear his heart out or something and now he looked like the living, breathing incarnation of Mr. Rodgers.
"I said that was pretty good Odd." Jin said sounding casual as if he played a game of Go Fish with the guy.
"But that fight was still yours Jin. You could have killed me back there" Odd replied regaining his senses.
"It's just that you thought the fight was over once you landed that roundhouse kick on me. Damn that's gonna sting." Jin rubbed his jaw once more to illustrate his point. "Remember Odd, in a fight you're your own worse enemy. You allowed yourself to be beaten once you declared an early victory. By the way, who taught you that kick? It was really powerful."
"Ulrich did."
"Figures" Jin replied already knowing the answer.
"What made you think that you're sister didn't teach me that move."
"My sister is not that good at spinning kicks. She prefers simple hand techniques but what she REALLY loves to use are holds and throws. That's what Master Fong taught her."
"Then how come you're fighting styles are so different, didn't the two of you take the same class?"
"We used to" Jin's looked at the floor with downcast eyes as he thought of his life before the incident. "Until I went to America."
Odd decided not to push on the subject of why Jin left his home two years ago seeing how there were some issues that he had yet to resolve.
"So where did you learn how to fight Jin?" Odd asked changing the subject for the better. "You used a lot of different styles back there."
"The group of friends I met in America were a strange bunch. They were very close to each other and treated one another like family. They took me in once they noticed that I was having a hard time fitting into their school, next thing you know, I was a full fledged member. They were all into martial arts and practiced different styles. At least once a week they would hold impromptu classes where they would teach each other on what they learned and well all created our own hybrid martial arts styles."
"I just hope I could be just as good as Yumi and Ulrich" Odd said quietly knowing that he wasn't at the level he wished to be at.
"Don't worry, you've only been training for a short while. Those two have been in the game for a LONG time but don't cut yourself out. Who knows, maybe you'll come rushing to our aid like you always do in Lyoko."
Odd's eyes brightened once he heard Jin's words of advice. "Well that was fun" Odd said as he shook Jin's hand. "But I'm going to Jeremie's room now. You coming?"
"Naw, I'm gonna walk around the here a little more, I'll catch up with you later."
Odd walked away from Jin and disappeared into the school's doors. Jin looked around the campus to see if no one was watching him. Satisfied knowing that he was truly alone at the given moment, Jin allowed all the feelings that he was bottling up from the fight to come out.
"DAMNIT ULRICH! WHY DID YOU HAVE TO TEACH ODD SUCH A KILLER KICK! GOD MY JAW HURTS!" Jin yelled out complaining about his present condition.
"I'm ready to begin when you are Aelita." Jeremie said to his friend as his fingers anxiously hovered over his keyboard.
"Ok Jeremie, let's begin." responded the pink-haired girl.
Jeremie didn't waste a single millisecond as he struck the return key as fast as he could. His computer began to process the long list of commands that were required to materialize Aelita. As the computer executed the steps needed for such a complicated process it ran into an error. Jeremie's program still had flaws in it and he had all the time in the world to reflect on his mistakes as he stared at the giant red exclamation point being displayed on his screen.
Jeremie couldn't believe it. All that hard work and for what, a crimson exclamation point. He lowered his head and placed his hands on his temples too ashamed to look at the girl that he had failed countless times.
"I'm sorry Aelita for getting your hopes up only to let them come crashing down." Jeremie's voice was laced with doubt, sadness and even a little self-loathing. "Maybe I'm not cut out for such a complicated matter. I just don't know If I can do this!" He screamed out venting his frustrations and blaming himself for his shortcomings.
Instead of being angry at the boy, a wave of concern washed over Aelita. There was Jeremie, one of her closest friends, practically beating himself up over his mistakes. There was no way she could be angry at him, not after seeing all the good he was capable of. Jeremie had spent many sleepless nights in his room painstakingly crafting every singly code for her materialization. She calculated in the past week he spent working on the program, Jeremie had only gotten about twenty-eight hours of sleep. That was four hours a night. On many occasions, Aelita would see Jeremie typing on his computer with heavy bags underneath his eyelids and would just fell asleep at his desk when he got too tired to go on, using his keyboard as a crud pillow. Why even this morning, Jeremie was hard at work, missing both breakfast and lunch to stay in his room to work and only relied on a simple bag of candy to provide himself with enough nourishment to get through the day. It was just physically impossible for Aelita to be mad at Jeremie, when he invested so much time and energy towards her and asked for nothing in return. The least she could do was let him know that she appreciated his efforts.
"It's ok Jeremie. You've obviously are a very gifted individual when it comes to computers. Don't let one set back discourage you, if you stop now then for sure you'll never succeed. I just don't want to see you like this, I care for you as much as you care for me." Aelita surprised herself when she said the last part. She never really meant to say it. She just got caught up in the moment and just blurted it out but then again, it wasn't something that she was ashamed of saying.
Aelita's serene voice flowed into Jeremie's ears instantly relaxing the overworked boy putting him at ease with himself.
"I really needed a the pep talk like that Aelita."
"No problem" She smiled back at him warmly causing his cheeks to redden.
"I'm going out for a walk to clear my head. Maybe then I could find out what went wrong with my program. Goodbye and Aelita, thank you." Although Jeremie said the last part softly it spoke volumes to the girl that it was addressed to.
Odd climbed the building stares still hazy about what just happened moments ago.
"I almost DIED back there! Jin could has easily killed me if he wanted to." Odd thought to himself. "Maybe he's a lot more serious person than he lets on." Odd rubbed his arms and the sides of his ribs which were still aching after receiving so many high impact attacks. He was happy that Jin did not hold up his end of the bargain for he did held back a lot. He was lucky to walk away from the fight almost unscathed. He'd never seen Jin so angry before. Odd could recall the look he had in his eyes, Jin was mad, that was for sure but those attacks were precise and calculated, and were not blindly thrown out like a caged animal. He was in complete control of himself and only used his rage to sharpen his moves and not let it consume him. Odd gave up his analysis of Jin's personality. It was like what he told Yumi the last time they were at the gate, Jin was one in a million and a strange one to boot. Even if he believed in reincarnation, Odd figured out that he would not live enough lifetimes to finally under stand the walking paradox know as Jin Ishiyama. How could someone so bright, childlike and goofy could harbor so much rage and be capable of so much destruction.
While Odd was lost in thought, his legs were able to subconsciously guide him to Jeremie's room. Seeing that he was at his desired destination, he grabbed the doorknob with one had and twisted it to gain entry to the dorm.
"Hey Jeremie what's up?" Odd greeted the empty room. Odd noticed that his work station was still in use as the computer on and he saw several letters and numbers scroll past his screen.
Obviously this was a foreign concept for Odd.
"Must one of Jeremie's materialization projects" Odd said out loud. However, there was something on Jeremie's desk that he did understand and he truly enjoyed.
"OH YEAH, CANDY!" Odd yelled in celebration as he greedily took the blue bag into his hand, spilling the little pieces of strawberry hard candy all over Jeremie's keyboard.
"Now this is something I can get into" Odd proclaimed as he began to ingest the tiny morsels one by one.
"I care for you as much as you care for me"
Those words stuck to Jeremie as he roamed the hallways trying to think straight. He wished at that moment he had a tape recorder so he could forever save those eleven words and play them over and over again. Aelita wasn't mad at him for failing so many times. In fact, all of these shortcomings had only strengthened their already close relationship that they already had. A huge smile began to form on Jeremie's lips when he realized that. Now he was more determined than ever to get that materialization program up and running. He just couldn't stand another moment of not working and ran to his room, eager to get down to business.
"Strawberry isn't exactly my favorite flavor of candy but then again beggars can't be choosers." Odd said as he continued to eat the contents of the bag.
"ODD!" Jeremie yelled from the room's doorway at the sight. "What are you doing in my room? I've got important stuff to do."
"Whoa chill out Jeremie, I just came here cause I was bored. I didn't mess with your little program if that's what you were worried about.
Jeremie walked over to his computer to inspect the damages himself and saw little bits of candy all over his keyboard.
"You're such a cosmic creep Odd, there's candy all over the place. You could have damaged my computer, these keys are really sensitive you know!"
"Relax man, I didn't break your little toy" Odd said trying to calm Jeremie down.
Jeremie looked at his screen and began to see all the errors that were made by Odd but found the exact opposite...he had managed to do the impossible. Odd actually improved Jeremie's program.
Jeremie looked at his screen in disbelief. "This is insane!" he yelled out scrolling through the commands to see if his eyes were playing tricks on him from the lack of sleep. "When the candies fell on the keyboard they must have hit a bunch of keys in the right order and made all the corrections for me!" Jeremie couldn't control himself as he eagerly hit the enter key and watched his screen on the edge of his seat and finally saw the sight he was hoping for, a green plus sign.
"Odd you're a genius, my program actually works thanks to you!"
"So wait, am I a creep or a genius?" Odd asked not knowing heads or tails what to make of Jeremi's remark just now.
"You're a creepy genius, now let me use the computer real quick."
Jeremie barged right by Odd and connected with Aelita once more.
"Oh Aelita, guess what?" He said being playful with the girl.
"What is it Jeremie?"
"Odd and I got the program to work!"
"You mean..."
"Yep, we can materialized you right now."
"Do you mean it Jeremie?" Aelita was excited for the sudden break through and was finally going to be brought into the real world.
"Yep so get ready now. I'll contact Yumi, Ulrich and Jin and tell them about the good news."
Yumi and Ulrich both climbed the building's staircase as they walked to Jeremie's room.
"So what did Jeremie say?" Ulrich asked not knowing why his friend would call such a sudden meeting.
"Beats me, all he said was to meet him in his room." Yumi said trying her best to recall Jeremie's message.
"Does Jin know about this?"
"Don't you remember Ulrich, he went to Jeremie's room along with Odd, of course he knows that there's a meeting."
The two friends entered the room and found Odd sitting on the bed and Jeremie happily talking to Aelita.
"Man what's gotten into Jeremie? I've never seen him so happy. It's like he just materialized Aelita and is just dying to tell us the news." Yumi said sarcastically.
"You hit the nail on the head with that guess." Odd said still in his sitting position.
"WHAT!" The two said at the same time.
"Did I stutter or something?" Odd asked using his own sense of sarcasm.
"If I heard your correctly, you said Jeremie had found a way to materialize Aelita." Ulrich said as his head was swimming from the mere shock his revelation.
"That I did."
"WHAT?" Yumi and Ulrich screamed once again.
"Yep Einstein finally got it right, with a little help from me of course. He's going to bring her here right now."
"Wait, right now?" Yumi asked concerned that Jeremie might be rushing things a little too quickly than they were meant to be. "We need to talk before we proceed with this thing any further."
Jeremie turned around in his chair and finally noticed the fact that Ulrich and Yumi were in his room.
"Oh hi guys, I finally..."
"We know Jeremie, Odd told us" Ulrich said flatly as he began to share Yumi's concern.
"Well I'm going to materialize Aelita right now. What do you think?"
"I think you shouldn't do this right now. Jeremie you have to..."
Yumi was interrupted by Jin as he opened Jeremie's door and slid into the room.
"Cosmo Kramer, eat your heart out" Jin thought to himself as he copied the character's trademark entrance from the old ninety's sitcom Seignfeild. He turned his head to face his friends and spoke out loud. "Who shouldn't do what in the what where?" Jin asked curious of the current topic of the conversation.
"Who shouldn't do what in the what where?" Odd repeated Jin's previous question. "What the heck does that mean? You are a weird person you know that?"
Yumi turned her head to face her brother and made a startling discovery. "ANIKI, YOU'RE BLEEDING!" Yumi yelled noticing the small stream of blood running down the side of Jin's lip.
"Huh?" Jin asked confused on why his sister would react so strangely until remembered he was slightly injured. "Oh yeah I am bleeding." Jin didn't even bother to wipe the blood from his face as he casually took a seat in Jeremie's room.
"How did you get hurt Jin?" Ulrich asked wondering how a guy could get hurt by just walking to another student's dorm.
Jin looked at Odd from across the room and gave him a smug look before answering his sister's question.
"I was running over here and I tripped and fell on my face...again."
"Geez Jin" Ulrich commented on Jin's accident. "Remind me to get you a helmet for your birthday. Keep this up and you'll kill yourself before you turn sixteen."
"So would somebody please tell me what's going on? I kinda missed all the big important news when I was walking here."
"I found a way to materialize Aelita." Jeremie said whose joy held no bounds.
"YOU DID WHAT?"
Fortunately for the rest of the people in the dorm, Jin finally got the idea that having a small line of blood hanging down your lip was pretty creepy so he wiped it off with one of Jeremie's tissues.
"Are you saying that Jeremie's program finally works?"
"Yep and I'm going to bring her to Earth right now." Jeremie said still excited.
"Hold it Jeremie I think you should wait. Its too early to be doing this." Yumi said addressing her concerns.
"What do you mean too early. Everything is ready, the scanners are running, the program is working. Yumi, we only have one shot at this so lets get it over with. Why do we need to wait? Everything is fine."
"Yeah inside your head" Ulrich retorted. "Did you ever once think what you'll do when Aelita gets here. She needs a place to stay and she needs to be enrolled in this school and she needs a family. We need to give her an identity so she could live with others and not arouse suspicion."
Odd then began to add on to Ulrich's explanation. "Yeah think of it Jeremie the only thing she could say for an introduction is. "Hi my name is Aelita, I just came from a virtual world." That's a sure fire way for her to get thrown in the nut house."
"Ah don't worry guys she won't be alone in that particular scenario." Jin said slyly. "Just think what will happen if Jeremie's tries to explain her true origins."
Jin cleared his throat and attempted to do his best impression of Jeremie, which sounded pretty good for his first time. "Well you see, Aelita is our virtual friend in a parallel world called Lyoko. Along with my friends, we help stop XANA from destroying mankind. The reason why you don't know all of this is because we reset time after ever attack wiping your memories clean of the incident."
Jin the began to speak in his normal tone of voice. "You guys see how crazy that sounded and that was the truth. Don't worry Jeremie" He said while patting his friend on the back. " I'm sure those nice people at the asylum will give you a nice, comfy, padded cell right next to your princess."
"The point is Jeremie" Yumi said trying to bring the conversation back to it's original focus. "Is that we need to make preparations for her here on Earth. Once we find a place for her to stay, get her enrolled in this school and all the other stuff she needs, then you can materialize her. But in the meantime, you'll just have to wait."
Aelita was the next one to speak. "Yumi is right Jeremie, materializing me is a pretty big step. We should make all the necessary preparations before I come over there. Besides, it wouldn't hurt if I were to stay virtualized for one more day."
The sudden reality of the situation finally dawned upon Jeremie as Aelita helped him see that. He was going WAY too fast.
"Thanks guys, my head wasn't on straight a few moments ago."
"So what so we do then?" Jin asked still confused.
"Well I'll try my best to come up with an identity for Aelita while the rest of you start thinking of things to give her to make her life here more bearable. We'll get started on that first thing tomorrow. In the meantime, we should head back to class, the principle should almost be done with his speech right now. Let's try to put this behind us and just focus on the day."
"Sounds good enough for me." Ulrich said as he exited the room.
Focus on the rest of the day and wait till tomorrow? What the heck was he thinking? Jeremie tossed and turned underneath his bed sheets as his restless body demanded that he would go to sleep in which he flat out refused to do. Those were the only two things he couldn't do at that time. Jeremie struggled to get through his studies and behave like a good students but that proved to be almost impossible for him. He just could not stop thinking about Aelita. Every unoccupied desk he would see in class, he would picture Aelita patiently sitting in it looking dead ahead at the board. Every sight that the school had to offer, he could imagine Aelita right by his side asking him what their significance was to his world. Every emotion he experienced that day he could see Aelita's puzzled, innocent look as she tried to make sense of life as a living breathing human. There were so many thoughts he had running through his mind. He had to do something with all of this pent-up energy and he knew just how to spend it...
By talking to Aelita.
Jeremie quietly got up from his bed as not to alert anyone who might be standing outside his door before sitting in his chair and turning on his computer.
"Hello Aelita, are you awake?"
"Of course I am Jeremie, virtual programs don't need sleep." Aelita could tell by Jeremie's sudden change in wardrobe and the tired look in his eyes that it already night time on Earth.
"I'm just excited about your materialization, I can hardly sleep a wink right now."
"I know I am too Jeremie there are so many things in Earth I want to experience. Just think of all the possibilities. We can be in the same room together and see each other eye to eye without having a computer screen be in our way. We could finally touch each other and even kiss."
Aelita was not aware of the effects that her words had on the young boy.
"Yeah ...that's...real...nice Aelita" Jeremie stammered trying to maintain his natural composer in front of the girl but failed miserably once his cheeks started to redden. However, there was one thing he wanted to get off his chest ever since they last spoke this afternoon. Since he couldn't get any sleep right now, Jeremie figured that he might as well tell her right here, right now.
"Aelita, when you said that you cared for me as much as I cared for you, did you really mean it?" Jeremie asked wanting to dispel any doubts he had before he continued.
"Of course Jeremie, why would I not mean it. You're a very thoughtful and trustful person Jeremie and there is no way that I could think of to pay you back for all the warmth and kindness that you have shown me ever since we met."
"Well Aelita, I have something to tell you too." Jeremie took in a deep breath, he was past the point of no return, he might as well get it over with. "I care for you too Aelita, I care for you a lot. I'm not just trying to materialize you so that we could finally end our war against XANA but also because I've got to known you a lot better than before. You have always been there to cheer me up and you never seemed to care that I would always contact you at random periods of time. I'm glad that we know both of each other and me materializing you is just my way of showing you that I truly enjoy your companionship. I know it's a roundabout way of saying things Aelita, but let me just say thank you, thank you for allowing me to be your friend Aelita."
There he finally said it, it wasn't a profession of his undying love to the girl. That he wasn't quite ready for. With XANA running lose all over the city and the daily challenges that come with being the best student at his school, he just wasn't ready to start a serious relationship with someone...at least not yet. He just wanted to tell her that he cherished all the time they spent together. Jeremie looked up at his computer screen and saw Aelita give him a warm smile, her own unique way of saying "you're welcome". Jeremie let out a sigh of relief once he realized how easy that really was and that his attempt did not crash and burn like he feared.
"So what else do you want to talk about?" Aelita asked showing more iinterest in the world that she would soon inhabit.
Kadic Junior High's two latest visitors had yet to leave the campus. The two large bulldozers still stood in their original position in the middle of the soccer field and were just calling out to be used in further construction of the school's stadium.
However, someone else had plans of a different sort, plans that involved the opposite of what the bulldozers intended to do, plans that involved destruction.
A black shadow soon stalked the field and forced its way into the bulldozer's doors, gaining access to it's desired target, the automated controls on the dashboard. The bulldozers soon sprung to life and were ready for their reign of chaos.
This had been the third vehicle related attack it commenced since he gain possession of the automated bus but now things were different. The two previous attacks were too indirect for its liking. It was time it tried something new, something a little more aggressive. This time, it was going to take the fight close to home...very close to home.
"Well you're going to have to collect your information about our planet a little differently than you do on Lyoko."
"What do you mean Jeremie?" Aelita asked still in awe of thinking of all the sights she will see in the near future.
"Well in Lyoko you could just assimilate all the knowledge you want by just coming in contact with a tower since you are a computer program but on Earth you have to gather information about the environment with your senses."
"Senses?" Aelita asked eager to learn more.
"Senses are certain stimulates your body receivers to gain information about your surroundings. Right now you only have two senses, sight and hearing."
"I'm aware of those two Jeremie. Sight is when I pick up visual cues while hearing is when I pick up audio ones."
"That's correct Aelita."
"What about the other three?"
"Well first there's taste, that sense is primarily done with your mouth. Whenever you put something inside of it, you get a sensation. This sense is most closely connected to eating."
"Why would a human want to taste things Jeremie?"
"It's a survival mechanism. Whenever someone would eat something that could potentially kill them, like poison, or food that's been spoiled, the offending object usually has an unpleasant taste and prompts the person to eject the foul food from his mouth."
"I understand now Jeremie, what about the other two."
"Well the other two senses are smell and touch. Smell involves the use of your nose and works similar to taste. Smell detects an objects distinct odor and can also serve as a defense mechanism from hostile substances since they usually carry a putrid aroma. Touch is a little complicated to understand given your special background Aelita. It's when you get tiny sensations from your fingertips when ever they come across something."
Aelita thought she felt a strange presence outside and momentarily shifted her focus away from Jeremie.
"There are so many things your going to experience there. All the new, sights sounds and..."
Aelita felt a dark, evil feeling wash over her.
"Jeremie I think XANA has just awoken!"
"WHAT?" Jeremie yelled, not caring who he woke up now. "Are you sure?"
"Yes, I can sense that he's awake."
"Fine, I'll wake up Ulrich and Odd, you stay put in Lyoko until I send them over."
Jin was sent flying through the air and came crashing down in a nearby pile of leaves. All of his attempts to gain the upper hand against his opponent were futile, he was just too good for him there was no way he could win. Jin slowly stood up and extended his hand for a hearty handshake.
"Damn Odd, you are really good. Maybe you should teach me how to fight like that sometime?"
"Right after I finish with Yumi and Ulrich, those two have been begging me for lessons for mounts now."
"I can see why Odd, you're the best"
They say humans dream for two reason. It was either to bring up subconscious thoughts that the individual was not aware of, or to just satisfy wishful thinking.
Guess which category Odd's dream fell under.
It's not that Odd, hated the fact that Jin won the fight they had this morning. That was a well obtained victory that Jin seized and it only because of his mistakes that he was able to do so. It's just that he wished that he was a better fighter that's all. He wanted to be as useful in a real fight as he was in a fight in Lyoko and Jin showed him that he still had a long way to go. Odd continued to snore loudly in his sleep and he interacted with the many people in his dream, but he was about to make a quick departure from dreamland, compliments of his friend Jeremie.
It was a good thing that Odd and Ulrich did not lock their doors as Jeremie was now able to barge into their room unannounced.
"GET UP YOU TWO, XANA IS ATTACKING!" Jeremie yelled out after a performing a sudden entrance that would have made Jin give him a standing ovation. He was already dressed in his school clothes and was pumped up on adrenaline.
"Huh, what about carpet tacking?" Odd asking, mishearing the words as he slowly got up from his bed.
Ulrich too was roused from his slumber. The beam of light that seeped through the door shot across his eyes causing him to wake and, like Odd, he wasn't able to get Jeremie's full message.
"What did you say Jeremie?" Ulrich asked now fully awake. He sat up in his bed and removed two small objects from his ears.
"I SAID WE HAVE A XANA ATTACK!" Jeremie screamed at the top of his lungs. Ulrich and Odd wouldn't have been surprised if the whole floor was woken up.
Odd finally noticed that Ulrich wore earplugs to bed and decided to ask about them. "Do you always wear those things when you go to bed?"
"Yeah I do and maybe in the near future I'll tell you why." Ulrich said pointing an accusing finger at him.
"Well then let's head to the factory!" Jeremie said as the adrenaline continued to flow through his body.
"I can you wait?" Ulrich asked dryly.
"What do you mean wait? We have a XANA attack here! This is an emergency we have to head to the factory NOW!"
"I would love to, but let's just say that Odd and I don't exactly meet the dress code"
"What do you mea..." Jeremie halted his question once he finally got the clue what Ulrich was hinting at for all this time. Unlike him, Ulrich and Odd did not have the luxury of having the time to change their clothes. There was no way they were going to go outside dressed in their sleep wear.
"Fine them, meet me outside the building when you're ready." Jeremie said no more and bolted out of the room.
Odd walked over to his dresser and pulled out his familiar purple outfit. "A Lyoko battle" he thought to himself. "At least I can kick some major butt there."
Jermeie had to hand it to Odd and Ulrich, they came outside sooner than he expected.
"So Jeremie, what exactly is XANA up to?" Ulrich asked.
"To tell you the truth, I don't know. I only figured out that XANA activated a tower was because Aelita told me so."
Odd looked uneasily ahead as he stared at the school's field.
"Jeremie, what can you tell me about bulldozers?" Odd asked calmly.
"Well they're large vehicles used to move away debris."
"So if a bulldozer were to suddenly drive on its own and start moving in a particular path, that wouldn't be normal. Correct?"
"No it wouldn't Odd. Why do you ask?" Jeremie replied a little frustrated on why Odd would choose this moment to talk about construction equipment.
"Because the bulldozers I see ahead right now are doing just that!"
"Huh?"
Jeremie and Ulrich turned to where Odd was facing and saw the horrific sight. The two bulldozers that were formally parked in the field were now going on a rampage. Knocking down whatever was in their way.
"Ok Jeremie listen up" Ulrich said as he gave him the rundown of what he was planning. "You head to the factory and contact Yumi and Jin. Odd and I will stay back and try to stop those monsters. Let's go!"
Jeremie gave a nod towards Ulrich and made his way to the factory. Ulrich then focused on the bulldozers and saw that they stopped their destruction in the field and were driving away from the school.
"Ok Odd, I'll take the one in the front. You go for the one in the back!"
Because of technological limitations, the top speed of an average bulldozer was not that fast making it an easy target to catch even at its top speed. Ulrich and Odd opened the vehicles doors and began to do whatever they could to try to shut the bulldozers off. Every button was pressed, every switch was pulled but nothing worked. Seeing the futility in their efforts, Ulrich opened the door and stuck his head out to attract Odd's attention.
"Odd this is useless!" He yelled out to his friend. "Head to the factory now. I'm going to stay behind and see what XANA has in store for these machines!"
Odd complied with his friend's request and hopped out of the bulldozer and ran to the factory. Ulrich closed his door once more and heard a click from it. Ulrich wondered what it meant and twisted the door handle once more, only for it to be stuck.
He was trapped.
Sleep was a foreign concept for XANA but it was an activity relished by Yumi, this was soon cut short by a cell phone ringing. Yumi reached over on her windowsill and felt around the area until her hand came across the ringing object before placing it next to her ear. All of this was done while she was laying down and still wrapped in her blanket.
"Jeremie, why are you calling me so late?" Yumi asked groggily knowing full well who the caller was.
"Yumi, XANA has launched an attack. He's gained control of two bulldozers and is wreaking havoc around the school. Ulrich and Odd decided to stay behind to try to stop them. We need you here now!"
Hearing the words XANA, attack and havoc made Yumi forget how tired she really was.
"Ok Jeremie, I'll be there."
"And don't forget about Jin. We need all the help we can get."
"Don't worry I won't and besides I don't think Jin would be so willing to sit this one out."
Yumi stood up from her bed and got dressed in a heartbeat before making her way to Jin's room.
Jin's room was a lot more decorated than his sisters. His night stand was littered with various books that he was reading along with his CD player and the pair of "fake" headphones he wore in case he didn't want to carry his player around. His wall was adorned with several Chinese weapons such as tonfas, bo staffs and nunchackus, all of these he had been trained in and can wield them with expert proficiency, thanks to the efforts of Master Fong. Right next to them was a picture of Jin's martial arts idol, Jackie Chan. Sometimes Yumi could see Jin as a younger version of him, being goofy and lovable while at the same time defeating his enemies. However, Yumi had no more time for moments of introspection like this. She had an older brother to wake up. Yumi walked over to Jin's sleeping form and saw him lying soundly on his back. She had only placed her palm on Jin's shoulder and was about to shake him when all of a sudden, he shot straight up from his lying position and had his eyes wide open.
"Yumi, for what reason may I ask that you are in my room at such a late hour?" Jin asked his sister politely about her intrusion.
Yumi was a little less calm about his sudden awakening. "How did you...I mean..." She stuttered, still surprised after seeing how fast her brother woke up.
"Remember sis, I'm a light sleeper. It's very easy for me to wake up and stay awake after that."
"XANA has activated another tower Jin, we gotta go."
Jin responded by slipping the covers off of his body and placed both of his feet on the floor. Unlike Ulrich and Odd, Jin's sleep wear was a lot more modest. Jin wore a long sleeves black shirt with the Chinese character of fire embroidered on the back in red and a pair of black fleece pants with a red stripe running along the side of it.
"Just let me get a new set of clothes sis." Jin said calmly.
Yumi exited the room to giver her brother his privacy. Once the door closed, Jin quickly changed out of his current outfit into his school clothes. He then placed both of his arms into the black sleeves of his jacket before he made his way to his night stand. Knowing that he was in for a rough night, Jin grabbed his "fake" headphones and placed it around his ears and looked at the picture that was near it.
"Wish me luck" Jin said to the photograph of the thirteen year old boy before he stepped out his room.
"Are you ready Aniki?" Yumi asked her brother.
"Not yet" Jin answered back perplexing his sister even more. He then turned his head to his left arm and rolled up the sleeve that was covering it, moving the fabric up until it was at his shoulder, exposing the red shirt her wore underneath it.
"Now I'm ready sis. Let's rock!"
"It's about time you got here Odd and Ulrich." Jeremie scanned the elevator and saw that Odd was by himself. "Where's Ulrich?"
"He stayed behind to see where those bulldozers were going."
"I've already contacted Yumi, she'll be here shortly along with Jin. Now to find out where that tower is."
Jeremie brought up the world map on Lyoko and ran a scan through all the areas.
"Bingo, the tower is in the forest region."
Suddenly Ulrich's cell phone was displayed on the computer screen.
"Interested in a status report Jeremie?"
"Ulrich where are you?"
"The bulldozers have taken me to the docks and guess what familiar building is nearby."
"OH NO THE FACTORY!" Jeremie realized. "Ulrich this is serious, we need you here right now."
"I'd love to Jeremie, but XANA has locked the doors. Look I'll be there any minute but I'm not promising a graceful entrance.
Odd and Jeremie felt a violent crash resulting from the bulldozers forcing their way into the factory.
"XANA is out to destroy our computers. No more computers, no more Aelita." Jeremie said worryingly as he figured out XANA's intentions for the night.
"Hey don't forget about the scanner Jeremie. If XANA wreaks those then our access to Lyoko would be cut off."
Ulrich did not see the iron support beam that was drawing ever so closer nearby.
The bulldozer then rammed itself into the iron beam, spilling debris all over the factory floor and some on the catwalk. Ulrich was caught completely off guard as the momentum form the crash threw him forwards and slammed the side of his head against the bulldozer's dashboard instantly knocking him out.
"ULRICH! ULRICH COME IN! ARE YOU OK?" Jermremie screamed frantically trying to find out the present condition of his friend. "We lost contact with him, this is serious Odd."
"I'll head to the scanner room then."
"Jeremie watched through his camera Odd take the elevator down and slowly stepped into one of the scanners.
"Transfer Odd"
Odd's body was covered in an almost angelic light as the scanners hummed loudly.
"Scanner Odd" Jeremie watched a 3D outline of Odd's body as it slowly began to form on his computer screen showing that he was now ready for the next step.
"Virtualization!"
"You're looking awfully stressed out right now Odd" Aelita said placing her hands on her hips, not caring of the fact that Odd had almost shot her."
"Oh it's just you Aelita. Yeah I am a little on edge right now so I got to stay on my toes, anything can happen."
"Well then, let's head to the tower. It's straight ahead."
Odd and Aelita ran as fast as they could through the forest region until they ran into a three-way fork in the road.
"Don't worry about the fork in the road Odd" Aelita said confidently. "As long as we follow the pulsations we'll never get lost."
"I wasn't stopping because of the fork, I was stopping for the roaches." Odd was able to spot three roachsters that were right in front of him.
"That's strange" Aelita said more puzzled than frightened. "Usually roachsters attack in groups of five."
Suddenly two more roachsters appeared behind them, blocking their escape route.
"As much as I like a good fight Aelita, this will prove to be a little tricky for me."
Odd turned his head away from the girl he needed to protech and faced the roachsters that he need to destroy.
"Now which one of you wants to go first?" Odd asked, taunting the enemies before him.
Odd waited for the enemy to begin the battle. The roaches behind him fired first causing him to turn around and shift his attention away from the tower. Odd did a series of sideways handsprings all while dodging the oncoming lasers. Odd was soon hit in the chest but quickly recovered and fired at the nearest roachster sending it to an early grave however his fight was far from over. Odd made one critical error when he evaded the roachsters's attack as he left Aelita completely unguarded. He quickly rushed to her slide by performing a baseball slide and aimed his wrist at another unlucky monster.
"Laser Arrow!" Odd fired the small dart at the roachster that was giving him grief and was happy so see it explode in a nice shower of sparks and pieces of scrap metal. The surviving three roaches that were guarding the tower gave him no time to celebrate as they shot Odd in the back sending his lifepoint count to a dangerously low level.
"Odd, chill out!" Jeremie screamed, trying his best to get his friend to focus. "There are still three enemies in front of you. You have to hold on until the others arrive or else Aelita will be an easy target for them!"
"That's kinda hard to do right now Jeremie! You better send some help down here now! I don't know how much longer I can last."
"Yumi and Jin should be here shortly, just try not to get yourself killed back there."
"I'll try Jeremie, but I'm not making any promises."
Yumi was slightly behind her brother as the two ran down the street towards the docks. She looked ahead and saw Jin placed his headphones around his neck and pull out his cell phone.
"Jeremie, how are things looking at the factory?"
Jeremie was relieved to hear the sound of Jin's voicing, meaning that he and his sister will be there any moment to lend their assistance. "Not good, not good at all. Odd is alone in Lyoko with Aelita and has only twenty lifepoints left. XANA has sent the bulldozers into the factory to try to destroy the computer and the scanners, thus ending our contacts with Aelita and Ulrich is trapped in one of the bulldozers and I lost all contact with him!"
Out of all the disasters Jin heard, only one of them struck a deep cord within him. "Ulrich is trapped?" Jim said in shock now concerned if his friend was safe. Now things were going to get real ugly since a human life was now in danger.
"ULRICH IS IN DANGER?" Yumi repeated behind him, hearing the grim news.
Jin regained his composer before speaking again. "Ok Jeremie, Yumi and I'll are fast approaching the factory's window. We'll see what we can do about Ulrich then we'll head over to Lyoko. Just remember this my friend, it always looks the darkest before dawn. We will see this through safely, we just gotta keep fighting." Jin didn't bother to hear Jeremie's response as he hung up his cell phone. He arrived at the large window and stared at the two bulldozers driving aimlessly around.
"This will not be easy" Jin grumbled to himself as he saw his sister stand by his side.
"ANIKI LOOK!" Yumi was able to spot Ulrich's dangling arm, hanging limply outside of the bulldozer's side window.
"Looks like he's knocked out. Ok Yumi we need a plan. Yumi? Yumi what are you..."
"Don't worry Ulrich, I'll coming!"
Yumi wasted no time in grabbing the rope and swinging towards the bulldozer that held her friend captive as she charge headlong into the situation without discussing a plan with her brother. She saw Ulrich's unconscious form lying inside the bulldozer but had now way of gaining accesses to him. The side windows were too small for her to fit through and the door was still locked. The only entrance she had was in the giant glass barrier that was before her but that window was still in perfect condition, blocking her rescue.
"JIN, I CAN'T GET TO ULRICH. THERE'S A GIANT WINDOW IN THE WAY!"
Jin looked to his side and spotted a reasonably large steel pipe that was jarred lose when the bulldozer stuck the factory's support beam. He quickly grasped it and swung to the bulldoze, landing right beside his sister.
"Ok Yumi stand back!" Jin commanded as he lifted the iron rod over his head.
"KIYA!" He screamed as he swung the pipe as if it were a baseball bat with all of his strength. He was able to crack the gigantic window in front of him. Yumi watched as several fault lines ran through the pane of glass as the formed a spider web-like pattern. Seeing that the window was still in tact, Jin readied himself for another swing.
"WAIT ANIKI, STOP!" Yumi ordered, worrying about Ulrich's safety.
"What is it Yumi?" Jin asked wondering what the problem was.
"If you hit that window with the pipe then you'll shatter the whole thing into a million pieces that could slice through Ulrich. You have to find a way to break the glass that would minimize the number of shards that go his way.
Yumi was right, another swing from his pipe would do exactly that. Jin needed to use something else but his options were limited. The bulldozer was still moving so he couldn't hold his balance too well on it to unleash some of his more powerful kicks. There was only one option left for him but it wasm't pretty, but it was the only way he could help Ulrich.
"Yumi" Jin spoke seriously once more. "This is going to hurt me a lot, but if it means saving Ulrich, then I'd gladly do it again if I had to."
"What do you mean Aniki?" Yumi asked not knowing what her brother meant when he said that but Jin didn't answer her verbally. She watched her older brother rear back his right fist and sent it barreling towards the end of the window that was furthest from Ulrich.
"NO!" Yumi screamed as it finally dawned on her what Jin was intending to do. Jin's fist smashed into the already weakened glass sending a few glass shards his way and succeeded in making a moderately-sized hole in it. The glass shards danced around his hand cutting it in several areas. Jin winced in pain but continued his attack knowing that Ulrich's life was on the line. He drew his fist back once more and struck a different area of the glass and tried his best to minimize the amount of fragments that were coming at Ulrich. More glass shardes pierced his soft skin amplifying his pain even more.
"This is the final blow!" Jin yelled out as he sent his fist flying for a THIRD time at the glass and was finally able to make a hole wide enough for Yumi to enter the bulldozer and carry Ulrich out.
"Let's get him out of here!' Yumi screamed as both her and her brother draped the unconscious boy's arms on their shoulders and proceeded to hop off the bulldozer. Jin and Yumi's movements were perfectly synchronized as each step was perfectly timed thus allowing their escape to the far end of the factory where they gently let Ulrich down to get a closer inspection of him.
"Ok let's get a look at him." Jin said as he let his right arm dangle by his side limply while he clutched his shoulder.
Yumi knelt down to get a closer inspection of Ulrich's body and noticed right away that the side of his head was slightly bleeding.
"Aniki Ulrich is injured!" Yumi said, concerned. However, Ulrich was not the only one who was damaged that night. Yumi turned to her brother and saw that he was trying his best to hold back the pain in his right arm. Blood dripped from the side of Jin's hand while she saw the tiny glass fragments that were embeded into his flesh.
"Aniki, your injured too!"
"I'm fine sis, it's Ulrich that I'm worried about." Jin said trying his best to divert her attention away from his own suffering.
"Ulrich is bleeding" Yumi watched Jin cringe after hearing those words and thought that he was in pain.
"Aniki are you alright?"
"I'm fine." Jin clutched his right shoulder tightly to help himself deal with the throbbing ache that his hand was giving him. "It's just that I'm afraid of blood."
"What?" Yumi asked confused this being the first time she heard about his fear.
"That's right sis, I'm a hemophobic. Whenever I see someone else bleed or injured I kinda take a step back but it's not too bad, I can easily overcome it." Jin decided to change the topic of the conversation. "Ok sis what should we do now?"
"I'm going to stay behind while you get to Lyoko."
"ARE YOU CRAZY? THOSE BULLDOZERS ARE OUT TO GET YOU!" Jin said as his protective instincts began to kick in.
"Listen Aniki, ever since you got here, you've been risking your life just to protect me and the group and you're always rewarded by nearly getting yourself killed. Even right now, I bet your hand is hurting like crazy but you're acting like nothing is wrong."
Jin bowed down his head because he knew that deep down inside, his sister was telling the truth.
"Please Jin, let me handle this. You've made enough sacrifices for one night. Now it's my turn to see what I'm made of. There's a secret entrance nearby in the floor, use it to gain access to the computer room. I'll try to bring Ulrich there as soon as I can."
Jin could see the eagerness in his sister's eyes and walked away from her. He found the passage that Yumi indicated and stepped inside the shaft but not before saying some last words to his sister.
"Yumi, please. Take care of yourself" and with that Jin disappeared into the night leaving Yumi alone with Ulrich.
"Uh oh" Odd said as he watched the roaches charge up the lasers for yet another attack.
"Man, I just can't seem to win today can I?"
THUD!
Jin had decided to jump off from a low rafter and landed in the computer in his patented "Hero Crouch" as he lifted his right hand from the floor, Jeremie noticed a strange red mark that was left behind where his hand once was.
"Need some help?" Jin asked casually.
"Thank goodness that you're..." Jeremie looked at a small red puddle that was being formed right underneath Jin's arm.
"Jin your hand!" Jermie said alarmed as he noticed that it was heavily bleeding.
"Oh you mean this thing?" Jin said as he held up the bloody apendage. "Yeah, sucks doesn't it."
"I'll get the first-aid kit!"
"Save it for Ulrich, he's in worse shape than me. I have to get into Lyoko right now!"
"Are you crazy? You're hand it's..."
"Yeah, yeah, yeah Jeremie, tell me something I don't know for a change. I can plainly see that my hand is a bloody mess but I don't care right now. Just get me to Lyoko pronto!"
The sheer determination that Jin had in his voice was stunning. "Ok you win."
Jin made his way to the scanners, leaving behind a small blood trail. He removed his headphones and stepped into the scanner.
"Scanner Jin. Transfer Jin"
Jin wondered how he was going to fair in Lyoko with his right hand injured like this, looks like he was going to find this out the hard way.
"Virtualization!"
"Not now!" Odd thought as the vision ended. "Why did I have to get one at that moment?"
Odd was completely open for another barrage of fire as he felt three more laser hit him in the chest.
"ODD" Aelita screamed as he watched his body fade away in Lyoko leaving her at the mercy of the three roachsters.
"I'm sorry Jeremie, I did the best I could do but now Aelita has no one to protect her from those monsters!" Odd said in dispair.
"Don't worry, I've already sent Jin into Lyoko."
"But he's so far away, there is no way he can get there before the monsters finish Aelita off."
"Oh don't worry Odd, you'll see what nasty surprises he has in store for them." Jeremie said with a slight grin.
Suddenly Aelita saw all three roachsters explode as if they were hit by a single shot but when she turned around, she saw no one nearby.
"Nope, that was Jin."
"Wait a minute, Jin's pistols can't shoot THAT far. Plus you even said yourself that he needed to hit a monster twice before he could defeat it and I heard three shots, not six."
Jermeie brought up a small menu on his screen and displayed a picture for Odd to see.
"Odd, meet the second feature that Jin carries around."
Odd stared at the picture in amazement.
"No way" he whispered to himself.
"How did you take them out so fast and at such a great distance?" Aelita asked curious on how Jin accomplished the feat.
"With this." Jin held up a large black black gun with a bayonet attached to the end of the barrel and a scope fixed to the top. "Looks like in came in real handy today huh?"
"Yep"
"Are you telling me that Jin has TWO sets of weapons at his disposal?"
"That's about right Odd, but like I said, we had to make some MAJOR sacrificers to make room for this. For one, ever noticed how Jin' always arrives on Lyoko unarmed?"
"Yes"
"That's because he does not arrive there with a weapon. The program I gave him gives him his weapon depending where he reaches for it. If his hands go into his shirt, then the program will give him his twin pistols. If he reaches behind his back, then he will draw out the sniper rifle. Once he selects his weapon, there is no way he could ever switch it again so he has to use his best judgment to pick the best gun depending on the battle conditions that arise."
"Let me guess, the rifle stinks in close combat too huh?"
"That's right, however, unlike his pistols, the rifle can actually destroy the monsters in one hit as long as he hits the XANA symbol. It's only flaw is that he can't shoot it in rapid burst like he can with his pistols. The only way he could accomplish that is if activates his power but he can only lock onto three enemies. I added that bayonet at the end as a last resort, but it's very weak. Let's just hope he doesn't have to use it."
Odd finally noticed the red splotches of blood that littered the floor. "Jeremie, what happened here?"
"I don't exactly know. All I could conclude was that Jin injured his right had for it was bleeding but he still insisted on going into Lyoko."
"Man, talk about dedication. Let's just hope that's the only sacrifice he have to make tonight."
"It's down there" Aelita said pointing towards the general direction.
"Hmm, let me see." Jin raised his rifle and scanned the path ahead of him. The tower was on the other side of a doughnut shaped path where the walkway was in a circular motion with a gigantic gap in the middle. Soon he felt three searing sensations right into his back, knocking him down and landing on his right hand.
"AHH!" Jin screamed out as he stared at his hand, it was covered with several slash marks of various sizes and shapes. His injury carried over to him in Lyoko but the pain wasn't so bad thanks to Jeremie's program.
"Looks like we have some more unwelcome guest to deal with" Jin said as he raised his rifle once more. "Aelita, get behind me! I'll take care of this."
"Jin be careful. You have only forty lifepoints left." Jeremie warned him through his communicator.
Jin got the drop on the enemies by firing the first shot at the leftmost roach, striking it in the middle of the XAAN symbol. Knowing that he couldn't wait for another opportunity to fire again, he ran up to the next nearest roach and raised his rifle high in the air so that he could slash it. The roach took the smart way out and fired it's laser at Jin's injured hand forcing him to remove it from his gun and to only swing with the aid of one arm. Despite his handicap, Jin managed to successfully dispose of the annoying roachster before setting his sights on his last opponent. He was too tired for another swing as the battle and the pain in his right hand proved to be too tiring for him. Using a less demanding attack, Jin ran up to the roach and gave it a vicious soccer kick which sent it flying into a nearby tree.
"That was easy enough. Ok Aelita, let's deactivate that tower."
Jin had just repeated the same mistake that Odd committed when they first fought that morning. He too had just declared an early victory for himself and just like how Odd lost the match because of his errors. Jin would also receive a similar consequence.
Odd took one good look at Ulrich and saw that he was indeed in bad shape. "You go get the first-aid kit Jeremie, I'll help Yumi with Ulrich."
Odd climbed the ladder and with Yumi's help, were able to prop his body against the wall. Jeremie soon returned with the first-aid kit and began dressing the wound near Ulrich's temple.
"It doesn't look that bad. He'll be fine once he wakes up."
"I'm going to Lyoko to help Jin out." Yumi said determined to end this attack once and for all as she boarded the elevator.
"He didn't even bother to get his wound dressed." She thought to herself. "Looks like he's still beating himself up after what happened to him two years ago."
The elevator doors opened and Yumi stepped into the scanner, all while eyeing Jin's slightly blood-covered headphones.
"Transfer Yumi. Scanner Yumi."
Yumi clenched her fist and prepared herself for the challenges she was about to face in Lyoko.
"Virtualization"
"NOOO!" Yumi screamed out as she leapt into the air and threw her fan which sliced the roach in two.
"Thank goodness you're here Yumi" Aelita said joyfully.
"No time for that now. We have a tower to deactivate."
"MY FLASH VISION!" Odd said remembering the tragic sight he saw just before he was devirtualized.
"What did you see Odd?" Jeremie asked, curious of the sight.
"Well I saw Yumi running down this pathway and then I see her falling into the abyss."
"WHAT?" Jin's voice boomed across the factory as he stepped out from the elevator and made his way to the first-aid kit. He then removed a large gauze roll and proceeded to wrap it around his still bleeding hand making himself a very curde bandage. "Did you say that my sister is going to fall off that ledge?"
"Yes"
"BUT THAT WOULD MAKE HER VIRTUAIZED FOREVER! I'M GOING BACK THERE NOW!" Jin screamed out in a frenzied panic as he thought about the potential death in store for his sister.
"Jin you can't. Once you've been divirtualized, it takes at least twelve hours for your character to reform in Lyoko."
"DAMNIT!" Jin cursed out loud at his failure to be more careful in Lyoko. "There's gotta be someone here who can stop this from happening!"
"I'll go" Ulrich said as he recovered from his unconsciousness.
"Ulrich are your crazy? Just look at yourself!" Jeremie said worryingly.
Jeremie had every right to be concerned. Ulrich had seen better days. His head had a gash in it which only recently, Jeremie was able to patch up. He also had several small cuts on his arms resulting from the flying pieces of glass that came at him. However, those cuts could have been worse if Jin continued to use the pipe instead of using his fist.
"Do we have a choice Jeremie? I can see that both Jin and Odd have been devirtualized and that only leaves me to stop this disaster from happening. Now will somebody help me to the scanners?"
Both Odd and Jin lifted Ulrich onto their shoulders and helped carry him to the elevator and later the scanners. Before Ulrich stepped inside, Jin had something to tell him.
"Please Ulrich, for Yumi's sake."
Ulrich flashed Jin a thumbs up sign before the scanner doors closed on him.
It was time for her to take some drastic actions.
Yumi threw herself at the Mega Tank and knocked it off the cliff. However, she tackled it too hard and soon found herself tumbling over the walkway. Yumi quickly grabbed onto the ledge and held on for dear life just when Aelita made her way into the tower and walked up to the computer screen to imputed the necessary commands needed to deactivate the tower.
AELITA
Ulrich hit the ground and started running at full speed towards Yumi not wasting a single second.
"NO!" Ulrich called out to the girl as he saw her fall into the abyss below.
Ulrich expected the worst treatment possible from Jin. He was so protective of her as he was with everyone else he knew. Ulrich looked up and saw Jin placed his recently-healed right hand on his shoulder.
"Thanks" Jin said quietly.
"Thanks?" Ulrich thought confused by his words. He just lost his sister and he was thanking him now.
"Thanks, for trying to rescue my sister. You risked your life back there by going into Lyoko after sustaining so many injuries and you tried your best and for that I thank you." Jin's voice lacked any fire or emotion what so ever as it sounded flat and hallow...
To Ulrich, Jin's voice sounded as if he himself died at that moment
"Don't thank me Jin, I failed you. I failed Yumi!" Ulrich cried out of despair. "If you want to hit me in the face right now I wouldn't mind. I deserve it." Ulrich was consumed with guilt for his failure and felt a need to be punished.
Both Odd and Jeremie looked up at the discussion and wondered what exactly would Jin do, until Odd saw Jin's eyes. Once again they were filled with rage and a burning anger just like when he landed his spinning roundhouse kick on Jin's jaw. Ulrich didn't even flinch when he saw him draw his hand back and sent it speeding towards his face. He closed his eyes to brace himself for the pain, but felt nothing. He turned his looked to the side and saw Jin's fist fly past his head and punch the wall nearby.
"Hitting you will serve no good Ulrich" Jin said calmly as his anger gave way to sadness. "Besides, my sister would really hate it if I were to hurt you. Look it was all of our faults that night, if we were all more careful, then none of this would have happened but if you want to blame someone, blame me."
The rest of the group was shocked upon hearing this. Aside from Ulrich, Jin was the second person who made some serious sacrifices that night.
"I promised that this wouldn't happen again and now look. MY SISTER IS GONE FOR GOOD!" Jin ran up to another nearby wall and slammed his fist into it once more, keeping it in place as tears began to fall from his eyes.
"I just wish we could materialize Yumi like we could with Aelita." Odd said wishfully.
Jeremie heard Odd's remark and soon his eyes began to fill up with hope. "THAT'S IT ODD! MY PROGRAM!"
Jin and Ulrich heard the excitement in Jeremie's voice and ran to his side to see what the big deal was.
"I can use the program that we modified yesterday to materialize Yumi, but I can only choose one person, Yumi or Aelita." Jeremie said as he was now faced with a tough decision.
"CHOOSE YUMI!" Jin yelled out as he wanted to see his sister once more.
Jeremie had a tough decision to make. Yumi and Aelita were both his close friends he had to choose one of the girls. Jeremie hated this choice, it was like he was playing God, getting to decide on who lives and who dies.
"Jeremie, I think you should materialize Yumi." Aelita suggested. "She's already a part of your world. She has friends and family that will miss her dearly and I don't even exist on Earth."
Jeremie bowed his head and felt a single tear escape from his eyes. He had come so close into brining her into the real world only to have that opportunity taken away from him thanks to XANA. Slowly he selected Yumi and began his program. The four friends stared at the 3D outline of Yumi's body and were at their wit's end hoping that the program would work. The instant they saw the green plus sign they boarded the elevator.
"Welcome back Yumi" Odd said casually as if nothing happened.
"Huh? Where am I?"
"Welcome back Yumi. We missed you on Lyoko." Odd said once more.
The group was too busy celebrating Yumi's return, that they didn't notice Jermeie ride the elevator to the top of the factory.
Yumi stepped out of the scanners and suddenly felt a body wrap around her. Her first thought it was Jin hugging her thinking that he was happy to have her back she looked down and was in for a surprise.
"Ulrich?"
"It's great to have you back Yumi. Ulrich said happily as their episode in Lyoko was finally over."The whole scene proved to be too much for him. All the pain, all the sadness instantly melted away and was now replaced by joy. Boundless unbinding joy which expressed as a warm hug. Ulrich soon realized the compromising position he was in and quickly let go of his embrace.
"See Yumi, you share more similarities with me than you think." Jin said while taking is turn to hug his sister.
"What do you mean?"
"Did you suddenly lose your memory Yumi?" Jin said jokingly, "First you jump onto a moving bulldozer without a battle plan, pull someone out of a vehicle by yourself and to top it all off, throw yourself headlong into the jaws of death. You really are my sister!"
"Oh be quiet Aniki?' Yumi said not wanting to believe his statement. She then noticed that there was someone missing from this celebration.
"Where's Jeremie?" She asked.
"Jeremie had to use his materialization program to bring you back but he looked pretty bummed out." Ulrich answered.
"Wow, Jeremie was willing to give up materializing Aelita in order to save me. We all need to thank him."
"You know, candy can fix anything. Even a broken heart." Jeremie turned towards the sound of Yumi's voice and saw her extend a small blue bag towards him.
"I can't thank you enough for saving my sister from the virtual void." Jin said as he slowly emerged on the opposite end followed closely by Odd and Ulrich.
Slowly but surely, Jeremie was feeling a little more better about his choice as he began to smile.
"Now come one everyone group hug!" Odd examined as everyone began to circle round one another and held each other affectionately.
Jeremie looked up at Yumi once more and began to speak. "Yumi that has got to be one of the lamest lines I've ever heard you use to cheer someone up...Thanks."
"Don't mention it."
END
Well I don't have too much to say to my readers right there, since there haven't been any questions or concerns circling around here. First off, I FINALLY HAVE A WEBSITE! Yep, you can find it underneath my profile, I posted the link there. Basically I just link to my stories using but I'm now able to post up all the fan art you've been sending me. Pretty soon, I'll have a "staff" page where I will show all the people who have been contributing to my fic.
Now fALLEN ANGLE, a new reader to the retelling series, has brought up an interesting question. If Yumi calls Jin Aniki, how come she doesn't use similar titles for her parents. The answer is simple really, Yumi doesn't use the name Aniki in the tradition way. Jin is only older than her by three minutes and twenty-two seconds. Usually Aniki is a formal title given to an older brother. Yumi uses it as a stand alone name. Notice that in the fic, she calls him Jin sometimes. Aniki is just her nickname for him just how Jin calls her sis most of the time. They're using these titles as just simple nicknames.
Now for some author wishful thinking. I think the HIGHEST honor that I could receive is that if Antefilms calls me up and says that they would like to make a character based off of Jin and make him a regular on the show. Of course, they would ask me to do the voice but then again that's just a fantasy. Oh well.
Odd walked away from Jin and disappeared into the school's doors. Jin looked around the campus to see if no one was watching him. Satisfied knowing that he was truly alone at the given moment, Jin allowed all the feelings that he was bottling up from the fight to come out.
"DAMNIT ULRICH! WHY DID YOU HAVE TO TEACH ODD SUCH A KILLER KICK! GOD MY JAW HURTS!" Jin yelled out complaining about his present condition soon Jin got a killer idea of his own as he made his way to the field.
Jin found Ulrich talking to Yumi and gently tapped his shoulder.
"Hey Ulrich, did you teach Odd how to do a jumping round-house kick?"
"Yeah, why?"
POW!
"Damn that felt good"
"Ulrich, we need you down here right now!"
"I can't Jeremie, I keep pulling this door but it just won't budge!"
It took Jeremie an entire three seconds to figure out what was going on here.
"Did you trying PUSHING the door Ulrich?"
Ulrich pressed his hand against the door and pushed it. The door offered no resistance as it swung open on its hinges.
"Oops"
"Why did I choose to work with these people?" Jeremie cried out to the heavens.
"Thanks?" Ulrich thought confused, he just lost his sister and he was thanking him now.
"Now that my sister is gone I can finally get her room, it's WAY bigger than mine. TOUCHDOWN! BOOYA BABY!"
Ulrich began to wonder if Jin really did care for his sister after all.
"It's great to have you back Yumi. Ulrich said happily as their episode in Lyoko was finally over."The whole scene proved to be too much for him. All the pain, all the sadness instantly melted away and was now replaced by joy. Boundless unbinding joy which expressed as a warm hug. "Oh by the way, Jin said if you didn't return he was going to take your room."
Yumi's flared up with anger as she approached her brother.
"JIN!"
"Aw crap"
POW!
"Damn that felt good!" Yumi said while kissing her fist.
"Do we have to keep doing this?" Odd wined to Jeremie.
"Not until we get this right. Now begin."
Odd opened the bag of candy and spilt it on the keyboard. Jeremie walked over to the computer screen and checked his program.
"Attempt number three-hundred and fifty two failed. Now preparing attempt number three-hundred and fifty three."
"Why me!" Odd called out as he grabbed another bag of candy from the huge stack that Jeremie bought.
Well first we need to celebrate a giant milestone here people. Code Lyoko: A Retelling has finally reached over 100,00 words (random party sounds can be heard in the background) but in all seriousness here folks you guys are the only reason why I continue to write since you guys show that you care about this series. I think this chapter differs greatly from the previous one for that it's a lot more serious and emotional while Big Bug was light-hearted and funny. The only thing harder than writing a fight scene is writing a WAFF (warms and fuzzy feelings) scene between a guy and a girl. I hope you guys really liked the scenes I wrote with Jeremie and Aelita.
Also another way I made this fic more emotional was by having the characters suffere through a lot more here and acutally show thier physically injuries. I really tried to play off of the desperation that the characters had in the original episode and made it seem like this was a life and death choice. I'm just a little worried with all the blood I have in this chapter, do you guys think I have to change my rating to PG-13 because of it, or do you think it's just fine. Thanks again now I'm going to be writing another fan favorite episode "Image Problem". I'm gonna do some a little different with it. Don't worry, everything will be the same, I'm just gonna make a little G-Force inspired tweak. Hehe, how's THAT for a cliffhanger.
Ok now to Jin's last "modification". I decided to give Jin a second weapon since the pistols didn't offer much combat wise. I planed this out a LONG time ago and I made sure that this weapon wasn't overpowered also. I felt that Jin needed a good "Killing Weapon" so I gave him the sniper rifle so he could actually take out the monsters easily but I also made sure to give it a lot of draw backs. Well thanks for reading and don't forget to leave a review.
Finally, I hope all the Odd fans out there are happy seeing now that I revealed that Odd too knows martial arts and he did Jin a run for his money. Now the ENTIRE L-Team is capable of kicking butt both in and out of Lyoko.
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