A/N: A few months ago, I posted up a poll on my Tumblr, asking the people who saw Evolution what they were expecting but disappointed that we didn't get, as well as asking the people who didn't see Evolution what they would expect out of a theoretical Season 5. I asked these questions because I may or may not have had an Evolution rewrite in mind. This story is that rewrite.

To be honest, I don't hate Evolution. It had some really good concepts and ideas that were just poorly executed at worst and had unexplored potential at best, which I'll be pointing out chapter by chapter.

Hopefully, you all enjoy it. I did my best to follow the canon and continuity of the original series.

Disclaimer: I do not own Code Lyoko or CL: Evolution in any way, shape, or form. If I did, we'd have seen Jérémie's official Lyoko form by now.

Note: On my DeviantArt page (same penname as here), go to my gallery and type in "A World Without Danger" in the search bar. The search will bring up all of the concept art I've done of the main characters in this story.

EDIT: Beta read by FP7ETDP43

!~~~C~O~D~E~~L~Y~O~K~O~~E~V~O~L~U~T~I~O~N~~~!

"When Jérémie gets an alert from an old program that's been silent for one year, he faces a dilemma that will change everything he knows about Project Carthage."

A World Without Danger

Code Lyoko: Evolution Rewrite

Season 5, Episode 1: Recrudescence

Flashing red lights were all that lit her path, but she knew exactly where she was going. It was his fault that he constantly gave her 'special tours' of the facility, treating her more like a guest rather than the prisoner she actually was.

It wouldn't be long before he got the security system back online, before he undid all of her hard work. Once he did, he'd be able to find and easily detain her once more. So she had to hurry. This was her only chance.

She ran down the vast corridors, ignoring the sweat on the back of her neck, before using a crowbar to pry open the double doors that led to the room she needed to be in. They were automatic sliding doors, but that feature was unfortunately shut off when she hacked the security system, and it had to remain shut off, or else he would find her soon after.

It took her about two minutes to get inside, mostly due to lack of muscle use over the years, but she was finally where she needed to be, with a locked door between her and him.

It was a very large room, with five human-sized metal cylinders on one side and a large computer monitor on the other side, and both sides connected by many thick wires attached to the ceiling.

She quickly went up to the computer monitor and turned it on, before typing in the necessary commands. Having helped build this computer (sort of), it was very easy for her to gain control of the administrative features.

As she did her hacking, the building's comm system crackled to life. "I know you're still here. You have nowhere to go." It was him, though his voice was backed by a fair amount of static, indicating that he still had a long way to go before he undid her hacking. "Acting against me is a very bad idea. You belong to me, and always will."

She ignored the involuntary shudder she made and continued her hacking.

He continued, "How did you get out of your cell? How did you manage to disable all of my cameras, movement sensors, and door-opening codes? How are you preventing me from tracking you down?"

She smirked, "Don't underestimate me, you cretin. We met in a coding class, remember?" He couldn't hear her, she knew that, but it came out anyways.

As she typed away, he continued, unaware of her insult, "I don't know what you overheard, but no matter what you believe now, your husband and daughter are gone. They disappeared twelve years ago, and there's no way they're still alive today."

"That's complete bull," she muttered. The guards had revealed that they were required to tell him about it. Why would they need to do that if he wasn't interested in it?

"Whatever you heard to provoke this behavior from you is a lie," he finished.

Fortunately, she was also done. She typed in one last command, and a window popped up showing a thirty second timer, joining the already open window showing a cloaking program. She turned around in time to see one of the five cylinders open up.

She pressed the 'enter' key on the keyboard in front of her, and the timer began counting down. Seeing this, she immediately sprinted towards the open cylinder.

Taking a deep breath, she whispered, "Waldo, Aelita...I'll see you soon," before the scanner doors closed on her. A sudden gust of wind emerged from the bottom, and she felt her body depixelize.

Finally, Anthea Schaeffer was free...

Elsewhere in the facility, in the main security office, the man got an alert of the program that she had activated and just used. And he cursed, "Dammit!"

"Did she...?" one of his assistants asked, also seeing the alert on the monitor in front of them.

"She virtualized herself!" he confirmed, before typing on the keyboard in front of him. "And I can't do anything! By the time we bring the security system back online, it'll be too late!"

"If she escapes, that bad news for us!" the assistant reminded him. "Can you track her down?"

"No, I can't! She disabled the radar!" he relayed, translating the codes on the screen into a language the security officers surrounding him could understand. "She virtualized herself directly onto the worldwide network, so I can't materialize her back either!"

He angrily punched the wall in front of him, before storming out of the security office. The assistant quickly followed him.

After quickly catching up to his boss, weaving throughout the small crowd of interns in the hallways, the assistant asked, "Sir, where you going?"

"I'm going to turn on the supercomputer," he replied. "It will give me full control over the system. Only then, will I have a chance at finding her."

The assistant and surrounding interns immediately reacted in horror, and the assistant immediately replied, "But, sir, what about the virus?! To our knowledge, it's still there!"

"That's true," one of the interns agreed. "It's what forced us to turn off the supercomputer in the first place! Who knows what will happen if we turn it back on?!"

Their boss immediately snapped back, "We have no choice! Anthea Hopper is our only link to both Waldo Schaeffer and his weapon against Project Carthage! If we're able to track her down, she'll lead us to both. Then, we win."

By this time, the man had reached the supercomputer room. With the assistant and interns' help, they were able to pry the door open. He swiftly entered and watched as a tall rectangular supercomputer emerged from the ground. Once it was fully revealed, he walked over to the main interface and pulled the main lever up.

On the monitor of the main interface, a question was immediately posed, 'Are you sure you wish to turn this supercomputer on?'

The man typed in 'yes', and the facility's lights all flickered back on. Main power was restored, overriding all of Anthea's hacking.

With one simple pull of a lever, Deckard Enterprises in Switzerland came to life.

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

In Boulogne-Billancourt, France, Jérémie Belpois was startled awake by an alarm going off.

Thinking it was and used to it being his alarm clock lately, his hand immediately reached over to turn it off. But the alarm didn't stop.

Confused, he opened his eyes to see that it was still dark outside. His clock was reading 1:06 in the morning. He then checked his phone, which was charging on the desk next to his clock, but it hadn't made any sound either.

So if it wasn't his alarm clock or his cellphone, then what was it?

A very familiar blue glow was emitting from his computer, which he had put to sleep when he went to bed last night. Sitting down at his chair, he saw that the alarm he was hearing was actually from the superscan, of all things.

What the hell? The supercomputer was off, and the superscan had been quiet for the past year. XANA was gone, so the program had no purpose going off in the middle of the night anymore.

But there it was, clear as day. The wireframe of a tower on Lyoko, colored red, indicating that it had been activated by XANA.

But as soon as he glanced over to see where the tower was located, the alarm stopped, and his screen showed the tower deactivating by itself. His computer's connection to Lyoko cut out, signaling that the supercomputer was still turned off.

Exactly how he and the others left it one year ago.

An uncomfortable feeling was pooling deep in his gut. He knew what this meant, but he didn't want to believe it. It wasn't possible. XANA was not back.

He was still half-asleep. He hadn't even put on his glasses in the panic he felt in his quick journey to his computer.

"It's just a nightmare," he muttered. "It's just my imagination playing a mean trick on me."

And a good part of him believed it. For now, at least.

Seeing no need to tell the others about this, Jérémie climbed back into bed and let sleep take over him once more.

His exhaustion made him fall back into slumber quickly, but the feeling in his gut remained, making his sleep unrestful.

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

Jérémie ended up awakening about fifteen minutes before 7AM. During the past year, he'd been getting back into a normal sleep cycle, but that alert last night (if it was real) had shaken him up and was on the verge of making him relapse into his normal routine prior to XANA's defeat.

After laying in his bed for a few minutes, fully awake and his head full of intrusive thoughts, he got up and turned off his alarm before it could go off.

Hoping a shower would help calm him down, he went to the boys' shower room and stood under the hot water for a good five minutes, before his brain warned him to wrap it up before he took all of the hot water.

Once he was dressed in his day clothes, with his damp towel resting around his neck, he left the shower area and entered the sink area, only to find William Dunbar there, splashing some water on his face.

"Hey, William," Jérémie greeted him.

William looked in the mirror he was facing to see the blonde's reflection staring back at him, standing a couple meters away from him. The elder smiled, "Hey, Jer. You're up early. You have another nightmare?"

During the past year, the two boys had developed a friendship, forged through their shared experiences of their trauma being directly caused by XANA. Their resulting nightmares had become their most commonly discussed topic, mostly because it was nice to have someone to talk to, and they were both afraid that the others wouldn't really understand. In recent months, Aelita had also joined these chats, because she too was directly targeted by the rogue AI. Really, they made quite the intriguing trio.

"Uh, yeah," the blonde replied. To be honest, though, he wasn't sure. If last night's alert was indeed just a dream, then it was very realistic. The fear and dread he felt as he realized what it meant were way too authentic to ignore or shrug off as just his imagination.

"You feel like talking about it?" This was the most commonly asked question between them.

"Not right now," the blonde replied, part of him relaxing because he knew William wouldn't push him. "Maybe later...when I can remember it." It was just an excuse, because he honestly wasn't certain that last night's alert was just a nightmare.

Fortunately, William shrugged, "That's fair. I'm here whenever you're ready."

"Thank you," Jérémie almost whispered. Despite his lie, his gratefulness was genuine, but he quickly remembered that William was also here before 7AM. "Did you have another nightmare too?"

William sighed, "Yeah."

"You feel like talking about it?" He had to ask, because as he himself just demonstrated, sometimes they didn't want to talk about their nightmares.

The elder was very quiet, not giving Jérémie an answer, at least not right away.

When William finally spoke, it was just barely above a whisper, "Not–...not really. But I don't know how long I can keep it secret without losing my sanity..."

This concerned Jérémie greatly, "What's wrong?" He was alarmed by what the elder boy was insinuating.

"I think...I think I'm starting to remember," William quietly confessed, and Jérémie's blood went cold, immediately understanding what that meant. "Recently, my nightmares consist of me fighting the others when under you-know-what's control. It's only bits and pieces, not everything, but...it still leaves me shaken up every time."

Jérémie was quiet as he listened to this. When he could finally speak, he whispered, "I'm sorry."

William's response was automatic, "Don't be. It's not your fault. You and the others went through hell and back to free me, and I'll always be eternally grateful for that. But maybe..." he paused, before smiling ironically, "maybe the others were right to blow me off back then."

Ulrich, Yumi, and Odd only did so out of trauma, Jérémie recalled. Recently, however, the relationship they shared with William was improving, as they accepted how unfair they were being with him. William, for his part, wasn't really opening up to them completely, not fully trusting them while also letting them adjust to the new normal concerning him.

So, knowing this, William saying that he thought the others were in the right here, something Aelita always vehemently objected to, told Jérémie that the elder thought the isolation was a fitting and necessary punishment for all the harm he'd brought the group.

And Jérémie immediately understood why Aelita always argued against William's forced isolation, because he agreed with her. He did not like what William was suggesting, not one bit.

"No, they weren't," the blonde sternly replied. "Don't ever let me hear you say that again. Whatever you did under XANA's control was not your fault. While I do wish you had listened to me and run away from the Scyphozoa and not towards it, I think being XANA's prisoner is more than enough punishment." He really did.

"'We can't change the past'," William recited, "'but we can learn from it'." It was something Jérémie usually told him, as well as himself, like a mantra. "I really am sorry I didn't listen to you back then. I should have." He gently sighed, sounding a lot less stressed out. "Thanks for listening, Belpois." Jérémie smiled in response. "Why don't we have some hot chocolate while we wait for the cafeteria to open for breakfast?"

Having mostly forgotten last night's occurrence at this point, the blonde genius softly smiled, "I'd like that."

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

Jérémie stood and conversed with William by the vending machines as 7AM rolled around, both of their school bags slung over their shoulders, and the rest of Kadic woke up.

Last night was just a bad dream, the blonde told himself as he took a sip of his hot chocolate (which thankfully didn't taste like dirty socks today). Just a nightmare. He didn't have to worry.

Their friendly chat was interrupted by a familiar pink-ette approaching them, with a skip in her step. "Hello, Jérémie. Hello, William," Aelita Stones (actually Schaeffer) cheerfully greeted them. "Good morning."

Jérémie returned her smile with one of his own, while William verbally responded, "Good morning, Aelita. How did you sleep last night?"

"Very well, thank you," Aelita replied, as she slipped her arms around her blonde boyfriend, giving him a good morning hug like she always did. Jérémie returned her embrace, not realizing how shaken up he still was from last night, like actually trembling.

So he quickly let go, not wanting to alert his girlfriend of his growing anxiety. It was just a nightmare. Just a dream. It's over. Stop worrying about it.

Fortunately, Aelita didn't seem to notice (if she did, she didn't say anything), and continued her conversation with William, who responded, "That's good. The Subdigitals' new album released yesterday. You still planning on heading to the music store after classes today?"

"You're asking because you want to come with me," Aelita guessed. William playfully shrugged, slightly embarrassed that she was so spot on. The pink-ette smiled, "Yes, I'm still planning on it, and yes, you can come with me. Odd's coming with me, though."

"That's okay. I don't mind."

Out of the aforementioned trio, Odd was the least egregious about ignoring William; the two were actually fairly chill with each other. Really, Ulrich and Yumi were the problem.

As the two chatted away, Jérémie felt his laptop begin sounding a soft alarm. His anxiety immediately doubled as he pulled the device out of his bag and opened it. On the screen, to his horror, the window for the superscan was open, showing the wireframe of a tower on Lyoko outlined in red.

XANA had activated a tower.

But just like last night, the tower regained its neutral white glow, and the superscan window went away by itself.

This only made his anxiety worse, being added to a growing pool of a confusion.

"Jer," William's voice made him nearly jump out of his skin. "You okay?"

"You look like you've seen a ghost," Aelita added. Both she and William were looking at him with concern.

She wasn't too far from the truth, actually. It was a ghost. XANA's ghost. And apparently, it was coming back to haunt him.

But he couldn't just tell them that. He needed to do more research.

So, instead, he shrugged it off, "I'm fine. I'm just hungry. When is the cafeteria going to open?"

"It's past seven, so it should already be open now," Aelita replied. He could see part of her shrugging off her worry, but the other part of her mind was still concerned for her boyfriend. "Ulrich and Odd should be waiting for us."

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

Today was a good day, Yumi Ishiyama thought to herself as she entered the front gates of Kadic. The sun was out, barely any clouds in the sky.

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Hiroki leave her side to join Johnny, Milly, and Tamiya by the vending machines. During the past year, her brother had joined the school news team to get closer to Milly. Johnny had followed him to be supportive and in the process had formed quite the friendship with Tamiya.

In real time, Yumi smiled and made her way to the cafeteria, where her friends were. William was with them, all five of them sitting at a table by one of the windows.

Ignoring William will only make things worse, she reminded herself as she walked towards the table.

"Hey, Yumi!" Sissi cheerfully greeted her as the Japanese girl passed by the table the principal's daughter was occupying with Caroline Savorani and Maitena Lecuyer (two other girls who were considered 'popular').

Elizabeth 'Sissi' Delmas hadn't changed during the past year, not really. She still had a mean streak, was still the same spoiled principal's daughter they all knew and loved (now, at least), but she had chosen to bury it deep down in favor of being nice to others. Really, the biggest change concerning Sissi was the fact that she had dyed the left side of her bangs blonde. Sissi hadn't told anyone the reason why, but no one really cared. That was her own business, and it suited her.

Ironically, the thing that used to piss people off—the fact that she had her father's ear—was everyone's greatest weapon now that Sissi was nice and likeable.

(A side note: She no longer minded being called 'Elizabeth', though she preferred 'Eli' or 'Liz', but most called her 'Sissi' out of sheer habit.)

Yumi waved at her in return, not stopping her path, before sitting in the open seat next to Ulrich Stern, her boyfriend. He held out a croissant, which she took (one of their daily traditions), and she asked, "So what's on for today?"

"Odd wants to see Wheelchair Zombie 5 after classes today," Aelita relayed.

"Really?" Yumi sighed. "But the fourth one last year was so bad. You said so yourself, Odd."

"That's why I think they're fun," Odd Della Robbia explained. "I'm one of the few people who can truthfully comment on how unrealistic they are."

Of course. XANA's zombie attack. No one remembered turning into a zombie, because they ran a Return to the Past to erase the damage. William didn't remember, because it happened before he became a Lyokowarrior, but the original five remembered. It was scary at the time, but fun to look back on now that XANA was gone.

"Trust me," Odd continued, "I'm inwardly groaning at them. But to me, they're so bad, they're good."

"The best kinds of movies," William quipped. "I'll come with you, Odd."

"Yes!" the purple-clad boy cheered, before turning to the others. "What about you guys?"

"Well, when you put it like that," Ulrich muttered. "Yumi and I don't have anything planned today, so I guess I'll come with you."

"I'll probably have homework to do," Yumi replied. "But if it's not too much, I'll join you."

Odd's smile lit up the room, "Great!" He then turned to the last two, "What about you two? Mr. and Mrs. Einstein? Come on, it's not like XANA can take inspiration from it. It's dead and gone!"

Aelita excitedly beamed, "Of course, I'll come. It's an outing with my friends; I'll always say 'yes' to that!"

Last month, the six Lyokowarriors were at the mall and Aelita's eye found a heart locket. It was gold and plain, but for some reason, she really liked it. Unfortunately, she didn't have the money to buy it, so during the next five days, the other five all pooled their money together to buy it for her.

Grateful for the gift, Aelita placed two photos within the locket, one of her biological family (four-year-old her with her parents), and the other of her adopted family (present day her with the other five).

"What about you, Jer?" Odd and Aelita both turned to Jérémie with expectant excitement, only for them all to be caught off-guard by how anxious Jérémie seemed.

"S-Sorry," the blonde genius replied, snatching up his cup of hot chocolate to take everyone's mind off of how his hands seemed to be shaking, only to make it worse. "I'll try to make it, but I-I have quite a bit of work to do."

Weird. Jérémie hadn't given them an indirect answer for a year. XANA being gone meant he could relax, and him being able to relax meant he no longer had to dodge the question whenever the group asked him to tag along with them somewhere.

So for him to suddenly get back into the habit now worried them. It seemed like a sign for something. What, they didn't know. Yet, at least.

"Jérémie," Aelita softly asked, a very worried expression on her face, "are you sure you're okay?"

"Of course I am!" No, he wasn't. His smile was fake. "Why wouldn't I be?"

"I don't know," Aelita gently replied. "But your hands are shaking." She had placed a hand over one of his own.

"Don't worry, I'm fine," Jérémie attempted.

But the group knew that he wasn't fine. Normal and relaxed Jérémie would stutter (even now) if he knew he and Aelita were holding hands. This Jérémie, stressed and anxious (for some reason), barely reacted at all.

Fortunately, Aelita wasn't buying into his constant dodging, "Let's go to the infirmary."

It was a wonder that Jérémie didn't fight his girlfriend as she led him out of his seat and towards the cafeteria's exit. Before leaving, she asked Odd, "Sorry. Raincheck?"

"Sure," Odd nodded, he and the others watching the two leave with concern.

William, especially, couldn't take his eyes off of Jérémie. Jérémie knew something, he had realized. Something bad was going on.

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

Jérémie hadn't meant to let his anxiety overtake him like that. Odd talking about bad movies wasn't anything new, nor was the group comparing those movies to a XANA attack. He shouldn't have overreacted like that.

But the repeated false alarms from the superscan today were what set him off.

Because there was a decent chance that they weren't false alarms at all. Maybe XANA was back and just messing with him, taunting him with the fact that his and Franz Hopper's Anti-XANA program had failed...

Jérémie took a deep breath, sitting on one of the two beds in the infirmary, to try and clear his head from those thoughts. It worked. XANA's gone. (So is Hopper, but that's beside the point.)

Nurse Yolanda Perraudin released his arm from the blood pressure gauge and addressed his concerned girlfriend, who had brought him here, "His vitals are all normal, but his breathing is still off and his muscles are very tense. My best guess, Miss Stones, is that he's being hit with an anxiety attack."

"Anxiety attack?" Aelita asked. "So it's in his mind?"

"Yes," Yolanda replied. "Something he saw or heard triggered in him a response that it's something worth stressing out over, maybe even telling him that he's in danger."

He saw Aelita's green eyes widen at the word 'danger'. But she, impressively, kept up a brave front, "Is there anything we can do to help him?"

"Yes," Yolanda told her. "Find what's stressing him out and nip it in the bud. Make him relax. Mr. Belpois," he lifted his gaze to face the woman, "I strongly recommend you take the day off for your mental health."

"I agree," Aelita quickly cut in. "I'll take notes for you." He believed her. In fact, she was the only one he trusted to take good notes for the classes he missed.

He was about to insist that he was fine, but seeing that he was outmatched here, he sighed and relented, "Okay."

Aelita sighed in relief, as Yolanda smiled, "Wise choice. I'll go write you a note excusing your absence."

After the nurse disappeared inside her office, Aelita sat down on the bed next to him. He prepared himself for her inevitable questions, but it only served to stress him out more.

"Calm down, Jer," she whispered. "It's just me. You're safe now."

He closed his eyes and took another deep breath, before whispering back, "I know." Her being here, and them being the only ones in the room, was actually helping. But the thought about XANA possibly being back from the dead was still lingering.

She spoke a little louder, but still softly, "So what are you so stressed out over?"

Said stress returned tenfold. There's no way he could tell her the truth with a straight face. So he chose to lie, "I-I don't know. It could've been the nightmare I had last night." It was how he phrased it to William, so it wasn't completely a lie. Right...?

"You too?"

That caught his attention. While his was a lie, hers was the truth. He immediately turned to face her, a look of visible concern on his face. He always hated the fact that she still had nightmares, even if it made sense concerning who she really was. "What was yours about?"

"My mother," her voice was meek, almost in a whisper, as she lowered her gaze to her lap. "She was escaping from a facility. But the scary part is that it felt just like the one I got before my father died..."

"You think she's in danger?" Jérémie finished, and she nodded.

Aelita rarely talked about her mother. He knew Anthea Schaeffer was taken by the men in black one Christmas day, and that Aelita didn't understand what had happened, but that was it. And up until now, that was all he needed to know. The experience was clearly traumatic for her, and he wasn't going to be a jerk and bring it up unnecessarily.

But now, she had just had a premonition of her mother escaping a facility, the same type of nightmares she had before her father sacrificed himself to destroy XANA, nightmares that came true.

Anthea Schaeffer was Aelita's only biological family left. Jérémie never said the words aloud, but he made sure she knew that he was willing to start looking for the woman, and that all Aelita had to do was ask.

That was why Jérémie wasn't surprised when Aelita quietly asked him, "Could we...start the search for her?"

And why his answer was immediate, "Of course." And he meant it.

He was glad when Aelita smiled in response, "Thank you. I'll begin my own search. Yours can wait until tomorrow. Don't think I forgot, Mister," her voice was playfully stern, and it made smile. "You focus on your mental health today, and only that."

"Okay." Boy, he had it bad for this girl. If she wanted him to lasso the moon for her, all she had to do was ask and he'd do it in a heartbeat.

He felt calmer now. Standard banter with Aelita always made things better.

Yolanda emerged from her office at the perfect time. She approached the two with two copies of her 'nurse's note'. She gave one to Jérémie, the one she was excusing from classes, and the other to Aelita, the one who had agreed to take notes for him.

Once Aelita received the note, she gave Jérémie a quick kiss on the cheek, "I'll see you later," before leaving the room.

Jérémie watched her leave until Yolanda addressed him next, "Alright, Mr. Belpois, I'm releasing you on the basis of you being confined to your room. Relax."

"Yes, ma'am."

And he had every intention of obeying.

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

Aelita met up with the other four beside the vending machines. There was still a few minutes until class, and Aelita pocketed the permission slip from Yolanda as she approached them.

Like she expected, their first question was obvious, as Yumi asked, "How's Jérémie?"

"He's fine," she told them, "and he told me so. But I know he's not. He's hiding something from us, from me, and it's something that's stressing him out to the point of an anxiety attack."

"He's panicking?" Odd asked.

"Not a panic attack," Aelita corrected, "an anxiety attack."

"What's the difference?" Ulrich asked. Aelita understood his confusion, but she had to make sure the others knew the situation.

So Aelita was calm as she explained, "While they have similar symptoms, according to Yolanda, they differ in severity and cause. Panic attacks are often more intense and can occur with or without a trigger, while anxiety attacks are a response to a perceived threat."

"So Jérémie thinks he's in danger?" Yumi asked, visibly concerned as well as alarmed.

"I don't actually know," the pink-ette confessed, shrugging. "He wouldn't tell me. He excused it as him not knowing, perhaps a nightmare he had last night." But again, she knew he was lying.

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw William be hit with a mild form of sudden realization. But before she could ask him about it, Odd cut in, "What else did the nurse say?"

So Aelita focused on the question she was just asked, "The nurse excused him from classes today, so I hope he'll actually take the time to relax."

"Us too," Ulrich admitted.

Fortunately, in that moment, the warning bell rang, leaving the group little time to stew in their concern for their friend.

But Aelita's still lingered on.

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

Jérémie's clock rolled into 12:30 PM. The genius himself was lounging on his bed, reading the book on Norse mythology that Aelita got him for last year's holidays. The possibility of you-know-what returning still lingered in the back of his mind, but right now, he was mostly calm.

It was lunch time now, which he was allowed to attend because it wasn't a class (it was also necessary sustenance), but he didn't move. He instead chose to let the others inevitably come to him to fetch him for lunch. Part of him hoped it would be Aelita.

The peace and quiet was interrupted by annoying familiar sound of the superscan alerting him to an activated tower. Jérémie frowned and lowered his book, watching as the tower inevitably deactivated by itself.

The blonde genius just sighed and went back to his reading. Someone was clearly messing with him, but that was okay. XANA was gone, and had been for a year now. It wasn't getting to him (yes, he had to be excused from classes today because of it, but shut up, that wasn't important). He wasn't bothered by this. Inhale, hold for three seconds, exhale, hold for three seconds, repeat. Everything was fine.

Except it wasn't.

Despite his best efforts, Jérémie could not regain his focus. During the past year, he had settled deep into his new routine, a normal one without XANA. Not quickly, mind you, but he was used to it now, and the superscan's constant illogical interruptions today had severely screwed it up.

"Alright, that's it," he groaned in immense displeasure before setting his book down on his bed. He got out of bed and stood in front of his computer, which was sleeping away as if nothing was happening.

Stupid computer. Stupid superscan. Stupid prank.

"If this is a prank, it's a bad one!" he angrily ranted, pacing in front of his monitor. "This is not funny, and it never was!"

He paused when a knock came to his door. Breathing deeply, he turned to face the person who had knocked as he said, "Come in."

The door opened to reveal William. The elder had a worried expression on his face, "Hey, Jérémie. I just wanted to check up on you, and ask if you're coming to lunch." As the genius expected. "But judging by how worked up you are," he glanced Jérémie over from head to toe, "I can tell that you don't feel like coming to lunch."

Not really. Not anymore, at least.

Jérémie didn't respond, only moving back to his bed and sitting on it. Though his face definitely told William how the younger really felt; it's not like he was keeping it a secret.

But William didn't leave, "You mind me asking why you're so worked up? And at your computer at that?"

The blonde was quiet. His anxiety over this situation, whether it was a prank or not, was only getting worse, and it would continue to get worse unless he addressed and subsequently confronted it. And as the one Aelita's father entrusted the supercomputer and the new Lyoko to, it was his job to make sure XANA was surely gone.

And he had made a promise to William to keep him updated on this exact topic:

"Just promise me that if XANA ever comes back, you keep me in the loop."

"I swear."

Making his choice, Jérémie got up from his bed (again) and walked over to his doorframe. He ushered William inside his room, before closing his door, giving them privacy, "Can you keep a secret?"

"Is this about your nightmare last night?" He knew, Jérémie realized. William knew something was up.

The blonde took a deep breath before solemnly replying, "Yes. I'm really sorry, William," he turned to face the elder, staring deep into his navy blue eyes, "but I need a huge favor from you."

William raised an eyebrow to convey his confusion and interest.

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

Lunch was in its last fifteen minutes when Yumi's cellphone buzzed. It vibrated twice, indicating that it was a text message. She checked it and saw that it was from William.

"William finally got back to us," Yumi relayed to the other three.

"Forty-five minutes later?" Ulrich asked, sarcasm dripping from his voice. "Sure, that's normal." Odd just shrugged before digging back into his last meatball from his plate of thirds.

"What's up?" Aelita asked, being the most invested in what William had to say. It made sense, given how William had been sent by her to check on Jérémie.

Yumi paraphrased the text for the other three, "Jérémie doesn't feel up to lunch right now, because apparently, he's still feeling anxious." Aelita frowned, her entire being filled with concern for her boyfriend. "And William," Yumi continued, "ate something that doesn't agree with him, so he's sitting out his afternoon classes. He asked me if I could take notes for him." Yumi shrugged, before texting out her reply, "Sure." Before she could send it, though, she noted her boyfriend's expression turn into one of disdain. "I'm just taking notes for him, Ulrich. It's not like he asked me out on a date."

"No, no, I know that!" Ulrich hastily replied. "I'm just thinking how weird it is that William is now MIA right after visiting Jérémie, who has permission to be MIA. Tell William I hope he gets better soon."

Yumi smiled as she added on Ulrich's message to her response, before sending the text.

"I'm sure they're both fine," Odd attempted to reassure his friends. "You know that Jérémie's the worst of us at taking care of himself. And people getting sick after eating something is not unheard of, nor is it the end of the world."

They weren't happy about it, but none of them could deny the truth in Odd's statement. He was, in all likelihood, right; everything was fine. In reality, Jérémie was probably suffering through a PTSD-like episode, and William was likely helping him through it. The two had been known to do that—helping each other through their trauma—during the past year. Why the need to feel like lying to the others, who would one-hundred percent understand the truth, they didn't know. But for now, they wouldn't question it.

After a few seconds, Yumi received a response from William, which she read aloud, "He says, 'Thanks, I owe you one'."

As Yumi put her phone away, Aelita stood up, taking her empty tray with her, "Time to head back to class, everyone."

Odd groaned, as he, Ulrich, and Yumi followed suit.

Even if something else was going on, they couldn't do anything about it unless Jérémie told them what was wrong...

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

Meanwhile, William, not sick at all, raced through the sewers, following Jérémie as the blonde led the way. The skateboards and scooters were no longer waiting for them, so they had to go on foot, but at least the two had the privacy to do this without any interruptions.

Jérémie had told William everything, about how the superscan had been constantly going off all day, only for each tower to deactivate itself. In fact, Jérémie's nightmare last night was no nightmare at all; it was the actually first instance of this phenomenon. He thought it was just a bad dream at first, until it kept happening throughout the day. It even occurred while they were talking in the blonde's dorm, thus securing William's belief.

Whether it was for real or just a prank (definitely a mean one), Jérémie had to check it out. Grateful that the younger had kept his promise, and genuinely concerned about XANA's return, William agreed to go with him. He also agreed to keep this a secret from the others; Jérémie didn't want to tell them anything unless he absolutely had to. They were happy with things being normal; they had moved on from XANA and Lyoko, and Jérémie wanted it to remain that way.

The factory was just as rundown and dusty as when they last left it. Still cold and unexplainably creepy, and it still freaked William out (mostly due to all the bad memories). Amazingly, the elevator still worked pretty well, despite the year's worth of dust and rust the thing had accumulated.

Jérémie had brought his laptop along, hidden in his bag. He probably didn't need to, but it was a habit that he still hadn't managed to kick.

Pretty soon, the two were entering the supercomputer room, which was completely dark and freezing. The lights turned on as the massive cylindrical machine rose from the hatch in the floor. But the temperature had not changed.

"Why is it so cold in here?" William couldn't help but ask, rubbing his arms through his black denim jacket.

"When on, the supercomputer gets hot enough to heat up the entire room," Jérémie softly explained. "Now that it's shut down...well, you get it." He looked down at the lever. "It's still turned off."

"Exactly how you left it one year ago," William noted. "How can a tower be activated if Lyoko is offline?"

"That's what bothers me," Jérémie admitted. He sighed, before pressing his two index fingers to his right temple, "When we defeated XANA, it had access to the network. It didn't need Lyoko anymore. That's why it tried to destroy it." And succeeded once.

"To stop us."

"Exactly," the blonde continued. "The supercomputer is turned off, which means, like you said, that Lyoko is offline. If XANA is still alive and has been the entire time, then why would it attack through Lyoko instead of just resuming its plans to destroy humanity while taking advantage of the unique opportunity of us not being in the way?"

"And if it did want to take us out first, just in case," William asked, "why would it wait one year to do so instead of, y'know, attacking right away?"

"All good questions," Jérémie muttered, "that we, sadly, don't have the answers to. But there is a way to find out."

His hand hovered over the lever, as he turned back to face William. His expression said just one thing: Did William want to take the risk and turn the supercomputer back on?

"You can back out now," the blonde quietly warned, almost in a whisper, "but I have to find out."

"We're only turning it on to make sure it's nothing," the elder slowly replied, "and you will turn it off if it is nothing, right?"

"I promise." And William knew that Jérémie meant it.

Both boys wanted this to be over and done with. Neither of them wanted to go back to XANA now that they had escaped. But as Lyokowarriors, they had a duty to find out, and if it was XANA, then it was their job to stop it at all costs.

"Okay," William took a deep breath. "Go ahead. Turn it on."

Jérémie turned back to the machine and pulled the lever. The supercomputer immediately whirred to life, and both felt a jolt of a familiar energy enter them.

The energy to fight.

The two went to the lab, where William watched as Jérémie turned on the monitor and started going through programs, typing in rapid-fire commands to open and then exit out of windows. William wasn't sure what they were looking at, but he trusted Jérémie to know. Meanwhile, Jérémie's bag sat next to holomap projector, the laptop within it remaining silent.

"Well?" he asked.

Jérémie shrugged, still typing away, "Sector Five is online. Desert Sector, online. Mountain Sector, online. Desert Sector, online. Ice Sector, online. Ironically, the superscan is now completely quiet."

William rolled his eyes, "Of course it is."

Jérémie continued, "The event log is empty. It didn't record any of the alerts today, which is understandable because the supercomputer was off at the time. Unfortunate, but understandable." He typed in some more commands, before shaking his head, "There's nothing. Nothing in the network's data flow, nothing on the holomap, the core is intact, all tunnels in Sector Five are closed, the airlock hasn't been used since the Skid last left Lyoko, no signs of any new replicas, no activated towers...nothing related to XANA whatsoever. Everything is as it should be."

"You sure?"

"The scan shows that all the towers have been inactive for over a year," Jérémie replied.

"Well, if XANA is back," William reminded him, "it's not like it would broadcast that fact to the world. We have to check manually."

"Are you sure?" was the blonde's immediate reaction.

William gently sighed, "I get that you're worried about me, Jer, really, but I'll be fine. I'm just searching all five sectors for any signs of XANA. That's it." Jérémie had been placed in a really tough position last year, during the final mission. He understood both sides of the 'should William go back to Lyoko' argument, so it made sense that he'd still be concerned now.

Jérémie was quiet for a moment as the two connected eyes. The blonde then sighed and placed the earpiece over his ear, where its home practically was. "Alright. Get down to the scanner room. I'll start up the process."

William turned back to the elevator, but before he could close the doors, a thought came to mind, "Hey, Jérémie...are you sure we shouldn't tell the others?"

The blonde took another deep breath; he'd understandably been doing that a lot today, "William, the others are happy. XANA being gone means we're finally able to live normal lives. I can't...I can't just destroy that." Jérémie refused to look at anything except down at his lap. "I mostly certainly won't be able to stand the look on Aelita's face if I ever told her that her father's sacrifice was for nothing..." He paused, regaining his composure. "If it is nothing, then it's best they don't know. I'll tell them only if I have to."

William understood that, he really did. He didn't agree with that, believing the others should be here too, but for now, he'd respect Jérémie's wishes.

So, "Alright," was all he said, before he pressed the down button. The elevator doors closed and the lift lowered him one level, to the scanner room.

It was William's turn to take a deep breath to calm himself, before he stepped inside one of the scanners.

"I'm ready, Jérémie."

"Alright," Jérémie replied, his voice being heard over the comm system. "I'm sending you to the Forest Sector first. Transfer William!" The scanner doors closed, and the wind began to blow from the bottom. "Scanner William!" The white circular bar rotated around him while simultaneously moving upward, scanning him as the wind continued blowing his hair and clothes up. "Virtualization!"

A large gust of wind hit him as he felt his body depixelize, before feeling it reform in mid-air. He then dropped to the ground, somehow landing perfectly on his feet despite only remembering virtualizing to Lyoko once.

He was back in his original, white avatar, the one he had before his possession. Honestly, if he had been allowed to join the final mission, he would've been glad to see the white instead of the black, but after a year of self-searching and re-evaluating his place in the world and with the other Lyokowarriors, William was actually starting to prefer the black a little more. He felt like it suited him better.

Standing up, he surveyed his surroundings, seeing tall green trees and grassy ground against a yellow sky. He was at the north edge of the sector, and a tower surrounded in a white halo stood in front of him, several hundred meters away to his left.

"I can see a tower where I'm at, and it's not lined with red," William relayed to Jérémie, who was still in the lab.

"Alright," Jérémie replied. "That's one tower down, eighty-four to go. I'm sending you the Overbike to get around faster."

In front of him, the wireframe of a one-wheeled motorcycle appeared, and then the color came in. William mounted the vehicle. "Thanks." He then asked, "When I reach the other edge of the sector, you'll tell me where the nearest way tower is, right?"

"Of course." Jérémie sounded a tad offended at the lack of trust.

William shrugged it off, "Just making sure."

He cranked the handle before speeding off on the Overbike. It was almost a shame that he couldn't rub in Ulrich's face the fact that he was using the German boy's bike. Almost.

"While you're checking the sectors manually," Jérémie said, "in the meantime, I'll run a more in-depth search with the superscan."

Regardless of the reason they were here and doing this, William couldn't deny that he finally felt like a proper Lyokowarrior, finally felt like he was back in the group and contributing to the cause.

After all, it's why he joined them in the first place.

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

At last. Classes were done for the day, and Aelita could finally focus all of her attention on her boyfriend and whatever his problem was.

While Yumi went to William's room, to give him the notes she took for him, Ulrich and Odd followed Aelita to Jérémie's room. The binder full of notes for him in hand, she knocked on his door.

Only to get no response.

She knocked again, worriedly calling out his name, before opening the door, inwardly hoping he was decent (she didn't want a repeat of the gym incident).

But his room was completely empty. The only thing out of place was the Norse mythology book she gave him last year for the holidays on his bed, when it would normally have been placed back on his bookshelf when he was done with it.

"Einstein is missing?" Odd asked. "Where could he be?"

Ulrich and Odd remained by the door as Aelita placed the binder of notes on his bed next to the Norse mythology book, before pulling out her phone and pressing number one, the first person on her speed dial (Jérémie himself; he had insisted when she first got the phone).

It rang about three times, before he picked up, "Hello?"

She breathed an inward sigh of relief. At least he was still alive. "Hey, Jérémie. Where are you?"

"H-Huh?" What was with the sudden stutter? "W-What do you mean?"

Her confusion turning into suspicion, she pretended to keep up the act she'd been playing so far, "Classes are over. I went to your room to check up on you and give you today's notes, but you're not here."

"Oh, I'm in the park," he explained. "I needed some fresh air."

"Yolanda confined you to your room," she warned, genuinely exasperated that Jérémie, of course, would disobey a direct order from the school's nurse. "I know she did."

Jérémie let out a small chuckle, "So did you, for that matter. I'm sorry for worrying you. I'll be back in time for dinner, I promise."

"You better," Aelita shot back. "I'm saving you a croissant."

Jérémie chuckled again, and this time, it felt more real, "I look forward to it. See you later."

"See you later," she replied, right before Jérémie hung up.

As she put her cellphone back into her pocket, Ulrich asked, "So, what'd he say?"

"He said he was in the park, getting some fresh air."

"Do you buy that?" Odd asked, one of his eyebrows raised and himself leaning casually against the doorframe indicating that he already knew her answer.

"No," the pink-ette quietly confessed, troubled. "No, I don't."

A pair of footsteps was suddenly heard running towards them, and Yumi appeared in the doorway, almost out of breath and a worried expression on her face, "William's gone!"

"What?" Ulrich asked, honestly sharing her concern.

"I went to William's room to give him the notes I took for him, but he wasn't there," Yumi explained. "I asked his neighbor Tristan Brossard when William had left, but apparently, William hasn't gone back to his room since he left it this morning for breakfast."

"He could be in the infirmary," Odd reminded her. "Again, being physically sick practically forces you to spend some quality time with Yolanda."

"You didn't let me finish," Yumi replied. "I tried calling him, but I haven't gotten a single response yet. All my calls so far have gone straight to voicemail."

"You think something happened to him?" Ulrich asked.

Yumi shrugged, "I don't know, but apparently, he doesn't want to be disturbed." She then took a glance around the current room, as if recalling where she was now, "Jérémie's gone, too?"

"Yes," Aelita replied. "I called him, and he said he was in the park for some 'fresh air'." She put air quotes around those two words. "But I don't–..." She was shaking her head, "I don't believe him, and I'm not sure why."

"Those are your instincts," Ulrich explained. "Listen to them, because you have them for a reason."

Aelita chose to follow that advice. She put her thinking cap on the back burner while she let her instincts take over for a moment, and her first thought, for some reason, was Jérémie's computer.

She didn't know why, though. Why his computer?

The pink-ette crossed the room and sat in her boyfriend's computer chair. As she turned the monitor on, she heard Odd close Jérémie's door before he, Ulrich, and Yumi joined her at her side, watching her work her magic.

When the screen first turned on, the four being greeted by that familiar cyan background, the first window that popped up was a very interesting one.

Aelita read it aloud, "'Connection to Lyoko established'?"

What? But the supercomputer was still shut off, wasn't it...?

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

Jérémie let a sigh loaded with heavy stress as he hung up from his call with Aelita. He closed his eyes, inhale, hold, exhale, hold, repeat...but it wasn't working.

Because he had the faintest instinct that Aelita was starting to suspect that something else was going on.

"Jérémie?" William asked, still on Lyoko. The holomap showed him riding the Overbike throughout the Desert Sector. "You okay?"

"Aelita just called me," the blonde explained, still stressed no matter what he did. "Today's classes are over."

"Already?"

"Yeah, I lost track of time too," Jérémie confessed, before shaking his head to clear it. "We need to hurry and finish up here." Before Aelita discovered the truth. "The superscan still isn't picking anything up. How's it going on your end?"

"Forest Sector is clear," William relayed, his green arrow on the screen showing him reaching the edge of the Desert. "Ice Sector is void of activity. Mountain Sector is quiet. Desert Sector is also lacking in any activated towers. Now, tell me why I need to search Sector Five?"

"Because the eighty-fifth and last tower is located there," Jérémie explained. "It is very unwise to leave that one unchecked."

"Well, since we are doing a complete check," William replied, "we might as well." His green arrow stopped at the Desert Sector's edge. "I'm in position."

"Alright, I'm typing in the password now."

SCIPIO_

Password accepted. Good, at least, the transporter still worked.

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

After checking out Jérémie's computer, and failing to find much else, the four went to Odd and Ulrich's room to get Kiwi, needing him to sniff out where Jérémie was. Kiwi seemed to understand what to do without Odd telling him anything. Odd didn't even need to hand him something with Jérémie's scent on it. The moment Kiwi was set down in the park, the dog took off, sniffing out the blonde genius's trail.

And the dog stopped at a familiar manhole cover.

An understanding immediately came across them. Jérémie had gotten some data, or something along those lines, that made him believe that their greatest enemy was back, so he had gone to the factory to check it out. No wonder he had that anxiety attack...

But Ulrich was shaking his head, "It can't be XANA. We destroyed it, didn't we?"

"I hate to break it to you," Aelita's voice was hard, mixed emotions filling her entire being, "but XANA being a computer program means that it having a backup system somewhere is not outlandish."

"No," Yumi was shaking her head too. "Lyoko, the supercomputer...all of that is over now. It's history."

She didn't want to go back. And judging by the expressions on Ulrich and Odd's faces, they didn't want to go back either.

Aelita understood. She felt the same way. XANA and Lyoko was a chapter in their lives that they had closed the moment they got the chance, and during the past year, they had healed from it. To suddenly go back to it now, along with all the pain and trauma that came with it...

Again, no wonder Jérémie had that anxiety attack. He didn't want to go back either, but he had a duty to check.

"Trust me, I feel the same way," Aelita reassured them, "but I really thought you guys were better than this. XANA may still be alive and we're just standing here, debating on what to do. Back then, if we had even the slightest doubt that XANA was attacking, we'd already be at the factory by now."

Aelita was right, the other three immediately thought. It was time to get back into the mindset of proper Lyokowarriors. They could sort out their feelings later. Seeing whether or not XANA was really back came first.

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

This was William's first time back to Sector Five since his possession. This sector held mixed feelings for him, being where he first got possessed after all. So on one hand, it was haunting to be back here, but on the other, it was rather nostalgic.

"Alright, I'm here," William said, as the room stopped spinning and a passage opened up in front of him. "Now where's that tower?"

"I'll guide you," Jérémie replied. "Take the corridor in front of you."

"Any timers I have to worry about?" William asked, as he stood in the middle of the arena.

"No," Jérémie explained. "When we rebuilt Lyoko, we got rid of that procedure. My screens show you're still in the clear, but I'll keep a sharp eye on it, just in case."

Trusting him, William ran toward the corridor, stopping only to wait for the next wall to open up. The passage opened up in a circular motion, creating a series of platforms rather than just another corridor like last time with Aelita. He paused for moment just to do some quick calculations, to find out where he needed to jump and how far, before he continued on, leaping perfectly from platform to platform.

The fact that he didn't have to worry about a timer really helped control the pressure he was under.

When he reached the next room, he halted in his tracks, however, when he saw two Creepers walk from the right side to the left. He chose not to attack, only stand still, which was the correct answer apparently, since the two monsters seemed to not notice him. They just continued their determined path and disappeared behind a wall on the other side.

When they were gone, William breathed a sigh of relief, "Jérémie? Did you see that?"

"Yeah," Jérémie replied. "Wise choice on not engaging them. They appeared to just be random patrols. Be careful, though. There may be more of them out there."

They weren't just 'random patrols'. They both knew that, but at the moment, neither wanted to speak out the very real possibility—that's why William didn't correct the other boy.

Instead, he went quiet as he began hearing a strange heartbeat within the ground.

"I'm also hearing something in the ground," William spoke up.

"You're feeling pulsations?!" Jérémie seemed alarmed.

"What are those?" William genuinely did not know.

"They're essentially XANA's digital footprints," Jérémie explained, "evidence of its activity. Aelita can pick them up with her Second Sight to help her detect and locate towers, which makes sense because she can deactivate towers. But I don't understand how you have that ability too. Your original avatar only had a light version of your Super Smoke." So, that was what his special power was back then.

"Must be a leftover from you-know-what," William guessed. "Should I follow them?"

"Yes, but be careful," Jérémie stressed. "You may be heading straight into a trap."

No, that was impossible, William wanted to say. XANA's gone, so it's not a trap.

But he didn't. He knew it was wiser not to.

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

It wasn't nothing, Jérémie knew. First the superscan, then the Creepers, and now the pulsations. Something was definitely trying to catch their attention. Whether it was XANA or (God forbid) something else trying to take XANA's place, this all being a prank was no longer a viable explanation.

"Take the second corridor to your right," Jérémie guided William through the following set of maze-like hallways. "Then, take the third left, and you should arrive at the room the tower is in." That is, if the next warning sign wasn't switching the pathways around to mess them up.

Without warning, the elevator doors opened, slowly revealing the appearance of Kiwi and the four people he really didn't want to face right now. Not here. Not when he was still checking things out.

Kiwi immediately ran to him and started wagging his tail, seemingly happy because he was apparently tasked with finding their missing friend, and had succeeded.

Jérémie forced himself to study the expressions on their faces, and he immediately noticed how they all looked like they knew where Jérémie was before Kiwi did. On top of that, Ulrich and Yumi looked like they were both trying their best to hide just how upset they were (and failing). Odd looked about ready to crack under pressure; there was no sign of an incoming joke on his face whatsoever, which already told Jérémie enough. And Aelita...

She was completely stoic. Most people would mistake that as her not caring, but Jérémie knew better. Aelita certainly cared. She cared a lot, maybe a little too much sometimes. Her being stoic like this was actually a sign of an impending and inevitable breakdown, which tended to happen whenever she had too many mixed feelings about something.

Odd was the only one who bothered to break the following, tense silence, "Hey, Einstein. Fancy seeing you here. You turned the supercomputer back on." 'Without us' went unsaid.

"I'm sorry," Jérémie softly apologized, "but there was something I had to check." He briefly glanced back at the screen to check on William and his progress. According to the holomap, he was still traversing the hallways.

"Check what, exactly?" Yumi asked. "To see if Lyoko was still there? If so, then, mission accomplished."

"It's more..." he avoided their eyes this time, "it's more complicated than that."

"Then explain it to us," Ulrich gently cut in. "We know you probably don't want to, but we really would like to hear it from you."

Ulrich was right; Jérémie did not want to explain it. He knew that hearing about this news, which at the moment was technically still only a possibility, would tear their spirits down. To them, life was still relatively normal, and this was likely an intervention to make Jérémie reveal what his anxiety today was really about.

But he had to, so he resigned to starting from the beginning. But before he could speak, an alarm began sounding.

On the screen, the superscan popped up, showing the wireframe of a tower turned red.

Jérémie knew he had to alert William, but at the moment, he couldn't move or speak. XANA was attacking (possibly) and the others were now here to see it for themselves. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see all four expressions turn into shock.

"Please tell me I'm dreaming," he muttered, not caring if the others heard him. "Turn off, turn off, turn off..." Please, go away, he pleaded.

But it didn't. It just kept flashing. And this time, the alert lasted longer than the previous alerts earlier in the day had. This was no dream.

"Jérémie?"

This was reality, and William's voice snapped him back into it. He asked, "William, the superscan is showing an activated tower in Sector Five. Please tell me you're near it."

"I am," William slowly and solemnly replied, "and I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but it turned red the moment I got here. The pulsations I'm feeling also lead directly to it."

Jérémie's chest immediately tightened up, and a swirl of emotions hit him all at once. He barely felt himself shake his head as he repeatedly muttered, "No, no, no, no, no, no..."

Until Ulrich interrupted, "Breathe, Jérémie!"

He hadn't realized he was panicking. The genius immediately found comfort in the strength his friend's voice held. At least one of them was holding his emotions back and keeping a level head.

But his body was trembling, and it only stopped when Kiwi jumped up into his lap in an attempt to give comfort. Despite what he always said about Kiwi's lack of brains, the dog had a very sharp intelligence when it came to emotions and sensing them, especially the bad ones. And this time, Jérémie really needed Kiwi's comfort, because he immediately wrapped the dog into a hug.

The holomap was now showing five red circles (two Mantas, two Creepers, and one Megatank) cornering William, who at the moment was currently at 70 lifepoints.

Yumi interrupted the silence in a calming voice, "If you don't mind, Jérémie, we'd like that explanation now."

"The truth, this time," Aelita quietly added. She still seemed stoic, but Jérémie could hear, in her voice, the indication that was just as shaken up about all of this as he was.

He might as well. Their sense of having normal lives had been completely shattered thanks to one simple alert from the superscan, a program that was just doing its job.

Jérémie took a deep breath before divulging the entire truth to them, "Last night, I got woken up by an alert from the superscan, but it went away so quickly that I thought I was just dreaming. That is, until the same thing kept happening throughout the day. Eventually, I got tired of wondering what was going on, so I asked William to help me check it out."

"And you kept it to yourself like an idiot because...?" Odd asked, trailing off on purpose.

"Because I didn't want you guys to panic unnecessarily," Jérémie explained. "I only wanted to tell you when I absolutely had to, because if XANA really is back, it means all of our hard work last year would be for nothing."

Never let it be said that Jérémie Belpois didn't care about his friends. If he had to keep a secret from them just to spare their feelings, then he would gladly take the risk if it meant keeping them happy.

"As upset as we are at you for lying to us," Yumi softly replied after a moment of silence, as they let that sink in, "we can't fault you for it at all. We understand your reasoning."

"But next time," Ulrich added, "don't keep it to yourself, okay? We're your friends."

Jérémie nodded. Right. As long as they stuck together, like they did before, he didn't need to worry about what could happen.

Odd motioning to the screen, "William looks like he needs some help clearing the passage." The amount of red circles had diminished down to one Creeper and one Manta, but William was down to forty lifepoints.

"Then let's go help," Yumi replied, before leading Ulrich and Odd to the elevator.

The trio paused before Odd hit the down button, realizing that Aelita hadn't followed. The pink-ette merely offered them a soft smile, "Go on. I still have something I need to do here."

The other three immediately seemed to understand, having reached the same conclusion that Jérémie did. The only reason Aelita would stay behind in this situation would be to talk to her boyfriend alone. And at the moment, they had a lot to talk about.

Odd nodded as he pressed the down button.

Jérémie started the familiar process. One by one, he brought up their ID cards, "Transfer Yumi, transfer Odd, transfer Ulrich!" Their three avatars began loading. "Scanner Yumi, scanner Odd, scanner Ulrich!" Once all three were finished loading, he pressed the Enter key. "Virtualization!"

Three green arrows appeared on the holomap in Sector Five's arena. Once Jérémie had pointed them in the right direction, then he and Aelita were free to talk.

He went first, "I'm sorry." He at least owed her that, he told himself as he continued to calm himself by softly stroking Kiwi behind his ears.

"I'm not mad at you," her voice was just as quiet, but her answer was surprising.

"You have every right to be," he countered. It was true. He had lied to her all throughout the day, including but not limited to his whereabouts.

"I know," she gently reassured him, "but I'm not. Because like Yumi said, it's hard to argue with someone's reasoning when you understand it, and especially when you agree with it." She took a deep breath. "I may not be mad, but I am upset."

And again, she had every reason to be. But Jérémie remained silent.

She continued without missing a beat, "Yes, part of it is because of the possibility that my father sacrificed himself for nothing, but in all honesty, I'm more upset that you didn't at least confide in me."

Of course, she was, and despite expecting it, Jérémie still closed his eyes to regulate his breathing, to keep himself calm.

"I know that you were trying to keep me happy for as long as possible," because she had already gone through enough, "and I appreciate that, but we are partners, Jérémie, in more ways than one. In that respect, I'd like you to trust me more, and not shoulder so much stress and anxiety by yourself. Like Odd said, that's idiotic."

Jérémie let slip a small smile.

But it faded when Aelita ended her little speech with, "And maybe another reason you kept this a secret...how could you tell us about it when you were having trouble accepting it yourself?"

It was actually rather scary how well she could read him. Then again, to him, she was just as much of an open book as he was to her.

"I'm sorry," he repeated his apology, genuinely meaning it, "for not consulting you first. And you know...it might not be XANA at all."

"It might be something or someone else posing as XANA," she easily finished his thought. "Well, there's only one way to know for sure."

The two revealed the answer simultaneously, "The Sector Five interface."

Aelita finally smiled, "I'm glad to see we're still on the same wavelength after a year, but deactivating the tower–"

He finished, "–comes first."

Still smiling, she gently gave him a pat on his shoulder before heading down to the scanner room via the ladder.

Jérémie, from the computer, brought up her ID card, "Transfer Aelita!" Her avatar began loading, "Scanner Aelita!" Once the loading had reached completion, he pressed the Enter key, "Virtualization!"

Her familiar yellow arrow appeared on the holomap, in the arena of Sector Five. Just like old times.

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

William could feel himself low on lifepoints as the monsters kept coming. He used his Zweihänder as a crutch as three more Megatanks replaced the five monsters he just destroyed. Jérémie hadn't given any warning about the monsters, though, and that kind of concerned William. Had something happened to him?

Two of them opened up and began charging up their lasers, but neither of them hit him. Instead, in a quick flash of yellow, suddenly he was standing in a different place, with Ulrich right next to him.

Odd leapt out of the corridor behind the Megatanks and landed on top of the left one. He fired about three Laser Arrows directly into its eye and jumped off before its destruction could affect him.

"You okay, William?" Odd asked.

William nodded, "Yes, thank you."

"Don't thank us yet," Yumi replied, cartwheeling to avoid a Megatank's laser and landed on William's other side.

The remaining two Megatanks were on opposite sides, with Odd in the middle. They both opened up their shells and charged up their lasers before firing at him.

Odd made a move to dodge them both through the narrow opening between the two lasers, but Ulrich was faster, using both of his sabers to block them both. As he kept them at bay, Yumi summoned both of her fans and threw them, one at each Megatank.

Both Megatanks were destroyed, leaving the four alone in front of the activated tower.

Yumi turned to William and softly told him, "We know the truth. Jérémie told us."

Suddenly feeling sheepish and guilty for lying, he replied with, "I'm sorry."

Yumi shrugged, "We're not mad. At least, I'm not. Jérémie told us you were just following his orders."

He was about to say something else, when Odd suddenly yelled, "Watch out, William! Behind you!"

He, Yumi, and Ulrich all turned around to see what Odd was warning them about, just in time to see a Manta get hit with a pink energy ball.

The Manta exploded, signaling its defeat, and the four all turned back to the corridor entrance, where Aelita stood there, a hand out, having just fired an Energy Field from it.

"Everyone okay?" she asked.

When she received four nods in return, Aelita ran to the edge of the platform and jumped off, before revealing that she had activated her wings as she used them to fly directly into the tower.

"Do we know what the attack was this time?" Odd asked.

"Not really," Jérémie finally replied. "Did anything weird happen at school?"

Yumi and Ulrich snuck a glance at each other, as Odd replied with, "No. Everything was normal when we left."

"Jérémie," Yumi asked, "we are stopping by the interface for answers after this, right?"

"Of course," was Jérémie's response. "It would be idiotic not to."

AELITA_

CODE_

LYOKO_

The four watched as the tower's halo turned from red back into the neutral white.

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

The trip to the interface had been surprisingly uneventful. XANA, or who or whatever it was that had activated that tower, had not thrown a single monster at them, almost as if it wanted them to check the interface for answers. Well, either that, or it had simply run out of energy, as Jérémie had surmised.

Now, about an hour later, the other five were intently watching Jérémie work on the data Aelita had retrieved, as he typed in rapid-fire commands and codes to decode and decrypt the information.

He paused, and Odd immediately asked, "You find something?" He and everybody else were on edge, understandably not wishing to leave this factory until they had answers.

"Yes," Jérémie replied, and the others went quiet. "I have good news and bad news. I'll start with the good, because it leads into the bad."

"Just answer the question," Ulrich interrupted, impatient, "did we destroy XANA or not?"

"We did," Jérémie softly replied, and the others all breathed heavy sighs of relief. "The XANA we've grown to know has been sincerely destroyed. Franz Hopper's sacrifice was worth something."

Aelita felt her chest bubble up with warmth. Whatever the bad news was, she could handle it as long as her father's death was not in vain.

"So then what's the bad news?" William asked.

Jérémie pursed his lips before revealing, "XANA was also the one who activated the tower today."

"What?!"

"How is that possible?!" Odd demanded.

"Because this version of XANA is just a backup," Jérémie explained. "It was copied onto another supercomputer at approximately 4:53 PM on 18 December 2005, mere minutes after I used Code: EARTH on Aelita for the first time. It doesn't have the original XANA's memory, at least not all of it, so it's a much less powerful version, but it is the same AI."

"And it woke up when this other supercomputer was turned on," Aelita finished, and Jérémie nodded.

"Do we know which supercomputer?" Ulrich asked.

The blonde genius shook his head, "Not at the moment. But since this version of XANA was copied before the original got its figurative hands on Lyoko's Keys, it's still anchored to Lyoko, so it had to return. But since the supercomputer housing Lyoko," theirs, "was offline, it couldn't. All those false alarms today were its attempts to convince someone to turn the supercomputer back on. And that's exactly what I did..." And now, he felt guilty for giving XANA a way in.

"Forgive me for asking the obvious," Yumi cut in, "but can't we just shut our supercomputer off and trap XANA forever?"

"You're forgiven," Jérémie replied, "but you didn't let me finish. Something else used this commotion to sneak onto Lyoko's network, something that shares very similar coding with Franz Hopper."

TO BE CONTINUED_

!~~~C~O~D~E~~L~Y~O~K~O~~E~V~O~L~U~T~I~O~N~~~!

Inspiration: CLE's "XANA 2.0"

Up next: Episode 2, Old Acquaintance - "The superscan picks up an alert for a new replica, but given the recent revelation concerning XANA, it doesn't make sense. What is this new world on the network?"

A/N: Title meaning: recrudescence - the recurrence of an undesirable condition / refers to XANA's return; mostly relates to diseases, but I thought it was fitting

-The groups ages in this season/story: Jérémie - 15, Aelita - 16 (actually 26), Odd - 16, Ulrich - 16, Yumi - 17, William - 17

-The opening scene will remain a mystery for now, but trust me when I say that it's very important. All I can tell you as of now is that it's a direct bleed-over from the end scene of "The Theory of Evolution". So I would at least read that scene before reading this chapter.

-The book on Norse mythology Jérémie was reading is just my headcanon on what Aelita gave him at the end of "Distant Memory".

~Evolution concepts~

First and foremost, obviously, XANA is back. However, instead of source codes, here, XANA had a back-up somewhere. As much as I liked the source codes concept, the mixture of that and Evolution being part live-action just made the XANA attacks so much milder compared to the animated series and the writers just dropped the ball in making XANA scary again because all it does is send out relatively harmless spectres to retrieve its codes, which it needs to regain its power. Plus, the back-up thing just makes more sense and definitely sounds like something XANA would do. I'll explain why the Anti-XANA program didn't wipe it out in the next episode; don't worry, I didn't forget about that. As for why Jérémie kept it to himself at first actually goes into a completely different concept that I'll explain and explore in the next few chapters.

Next, a tangent of the first point, the others are visibly upset at XANA being back. Sophie Decroissette explained in an interview that the group turning off the supercomputer in "Echoes" symbolized them moving to a new chapter in their lives, as in growing up and moving from kids to adults. XANA being back represents a mostly unwanted chapter of their lives returning, so them, borderline adults here, reacting negatively makes sense, especially since Aelita's father died to destroy XANA. Compare their reactions here (and they'll continue in the next chapter) to Evolution, where XANA being back barely brings up any angst at all, though you could argue that Aelita's change in personality is a result of XANA's return.

Moonscoop had to cut out the Ice and Forest Sectors in Evolution due to budgetary restrictions, and they did give an in-universe explanation for it (which doesn't make sense; Jérémie restarted the supercomputer in the prequel after it was shut down for ten years, and all five sectors were still there). However, this is a fanfiction, and I don't have a budget, since I am writing this on my own time and energy. Therefore, all five sectors are still here.

Furthermore, in this episode only, the Lyokowarriors have their Season 4 avatars, and William his 'Final Round' one. I didn't like how Evolution introduced the new suits in Episode 1 without any explanation whatsoever. Again, probably due to budgetary restrictions, but I don't have to worry, because again, I don't have that problem here.

Finally, Evolution barely included William in the first episode, only choosing to address him and the issue the others have with him a couple episodes later. Here, he's involved since the start, and I'll definitely expand on this next chapter.