Chapter 6 - Part 6-Happiness

Natalie set her palms down on the desk surrounding the keyboard. Yumi and Jeremy watched as she let out a sigh and clicked to her profile of personal information. She then clicked on Aelita’s profile and brought the two next to one another. There were shadows covering her eyes, and her pale lips moved mysteriously.
“It all started back before you guys came to Kadic Junior High,” she explained. At that moment, the elevator opened to reveal Odd, Ulrich, and Aelita.
“What gives, Natalie?” Odd asked. “You were about to head back to school, and then you go and walk back to the Factory! Are you just asking for a detention?”
“Quiet!” Yumi ordered. “She’s telling us something.”
“All of a sudden,” Natalie continued, “my eyes just opened. I had no idea where I was or who I was. I was alone in a strange world. That is, until I voice started ringing in my head. It told me to stand; I did. My legs were surprisingly strong, and I could walk on my own. Then it told me to walk to the center of the platform. As soon as I did, a screen came up with a long list. The voice told me to pick a name from the list. That name would be my name. I scrolled down and chose one. That is who you know me as today.”
“So you named yourself?” Ulrich tried to understand. Natalie didn’t reply. She continued to speak:
“And then the voice told me to call it something. It wanted me to call it XANA. I was eager to please, and I called him by his request. XANA later told me that he was a he. He then told me that I was a she. He taught me so much. He taught me to speak. He taught me everything he knew about Lyoko, computers, virtualization, materialization, and everything else within the computer worlds. My knowledge and memory was infinite. I could remember so many things, and I was able to understand everything quickly. I learned at an alarming rate, and I soon became smarter than XANA himself.”
“Your knowledge surpasses XANA??” Jeremy exploded. “That’s impossible! Aelita, does your knowledge surpass his?”
“No,” Aelita replied, holding fists at her heart, “my knowledge is actually less than XANA. Natalie knows far more than I do.”
“So you knew about her all along?” Yumi asked through gasps. “Why didn’t you say anything?? We could have known about Natalie all along and stopped all these crazy XANA attacks!”
“Natalie didn’t want me to say anything,” Aelita mumbled. “She made me promise that she’d never be known again.”
A silence became over everyone. The frustration and betrayal that the fighters felt was overwhelming to the point of tears. The Lyoko natives felt guilt rising in their now-Human souls. Aelita turned away and mumbled something inaudible. Natalie kept a straight face and continued:
“When XANA realized that my knowledge surpassed his own, he started to panic. He also knew that I was created a fighter. I could defend myself against his monsters. I had those two guns and my Bullet Happy attack. So desperate to remain the ruler of Lyoko, he called me to a tower in the Forest Region. It was the Materialization Tower. I entered it and floated up to the next level. When I got there, I got the biggest surprise. There was another girl sitting on the other side of the platform. XANA told me that this was my sister, and he told me to name her. I thought for a moment and said, ‘Aelita’. She then opened her eyes, smiled at me, and called me ‘Sister’.”
“From then on out, we were together all the time,” Aelita picked up. “Natalie taught me everything. I learned quickly. But more, XANA’s plan was working. XANA was trying to distract Natalie with a sister so she would not be able to gain any more knowledge. He figured that he would forever remain the most intelligent A.I. in the universe as long as my sister was busy with me. One day, we found that out.”
“XANA must have not liked that move,” Odd commented, placing a hand on his hip. “He must have been really ticked off.”
“He was,” Aelita confirmed. “That was when he told us to come back to the Materialization Tower. We obeyed and found ourselves struck with an offer. XANA would materialize one of us if we both promised to never tell anyone about Lyoko and if we refused to gain more knowledge of computers. Well, it was quite an offer to us! However, we didn’t have much of a choice. I turned to Natalie and told her that she should be the one. She had been the Protector of Lyoko for too long. I also whispered to her that I had felt something new that day.”
“Pulsations, right?” Jeremy questioned. Aelita nodded and said:
“That’s when I knew our ‘father’ had become infected with that evil virus. Natalie turned away and softly nodded her head. She walked to the middle of the platform and turned back to me. Before XANA could do anything, I ran up to her and pressed my fingers against her forehead. I told her, ‘When you become materialized, wait until midnight in the Real World. When that happens, wake up and walk off these school grounds. The super computer and scanners are located in a place called Kadic Junior High. Sneak off the grounds and walk down six blocks. There’s an orphanage at the corner. Fall asleep on the stoop. When you awake, you will be taken care of.’ With those final words, XANA snatched Natalie away from me and sent her to your world.”
Yumi bit her lip and said, “Then Natalie is connected to XANA as well. You still have the virus inside you, but does Natalie have that same virus?”
“I’m afraid so,” Aelita confirmed. “You guys saw when Natalie was acting strange in Lyoko. That was the day she deactivated the tower. Well, when time was reversed, it was the same predicament. XANA’s virus dwells within both of us.”
Ulrich shook his head. He turned to the computer screen, where Natalie’s gaze had not left. He looked at the stats if the Lyoko inhabitants. “If the two of them have the same virus, why not transfer the virus to just one of them?” he suggested. “That way, one can stay in the Real World, and we can work on the anti-virus for the other.”
“I’ll send you all to Lyoko now!” Jeremy agreed. “Natalie, Aelita, the two of you will have to share a scanner.”
“Let’s go,” Yumi said, determined to fix the mess. “We don’t have much time!”
Odd pulled Natalie away from the computer screen, and the five of them ran inside the elevator. Ulrich press the button, and they traveled down to the scanners. Natalie and Aelita squeezed together in one while the other three each stepped inside his or her own.
“I’ll send you to the Forest Region,” Jeremy told them. “Get to the Materialization Tower as soon as you can, but you should watch out. There might be a few monsters. XANA might have gotten the message, okay? Get ready. Transfer: Ulrich. Transfer: Natalie and Aelita. Transfer: Odd. Transfer: Yumi.” The five of them spun together and let the wind consume them. “Scanner: Ulrich. Scanner: Natalie and Aelita. Scanner: Odd. Scanner: Yumi.” They took the final spin. “Virtualization!”
The five fighters landed in Lyoko all safe and sound. They started running together at top speed towards the tower. Out of the corner of her eye, Yumi spotted a Mega-tank.
“Go ahead,” she told the team. “I’ll handle him.”
“You’ll need backup,” Ulrich insisted. He turned to Odd. “Take these two to the tower, all right?”
Odd nodded and began running with the girls straight ahead. Seeing that there were no other Mega-tanks, Yumi pulled out a fan.
“I’ve got an idea,” she told her fellow fighter. “Follow my lead and make sure he doesn’t go after Odd and the other girls.” Ulrich nodded and started to run towards the monster. Yumi then ran behind a tree to take cover and pressed her fingers to her temples. Her body started to develop a red aura. “Telekinesis,” she murmured. She grabbed a boulder near her and slowly brought it up to the sky. The Mega-tank tried to aim and hit Ulrich, and Yumi knew it could not see above it as long as its shield was covering it. At the last second, the monster opened to hit Ulrich; but Yumi’s boulder made it all the way to him and smashed the monster with a single hit. Yumi fell, exhausted and weak. Ulrich ran over to her and let her lean on his shoulder.
“That was a great plan,” he whispered. “Hang on, okay? I’m going to bring you to the tower.”
“Just leave me here.”
“No way! What if another Mega-tank comes?”
“We only need to protect Natalie and Aelita.”
“I’m bringing you anyway.”
Ulrich started to walk ahead as fast as he could while still keeping Yumi standing. She moaned something and caused a smiled to form on Ulrich’s face. There was no denying it: he was in love.

Odd, Natalie, and Aelita finally made their way to the Materialization Tower. Aelita smiled up at it and turned to her sister.
“This is it!” she cried. “Now all we need to do is decide who will stay in Lyoko.”
“Make your choice quickly,” Odd told them. “There’s another Mega-tank coming. I can hear the rolling all the way here.”
“Can you take it on your own?”
“No problem! Go on in.”
Odd smiled his world famous smile and charged towards the enemy. While he was running, he gasped as the visions came. He saw a quick flash of Aelita and Natalie hugging, then Aelita floating up the tower, and then Natalie closing her eyes. He snapped back to reality in an instant and looked behind himself to see that the two of them had melted into the tower.
“I really hope we can materialize them both,” he mumbled to himself. “Aelita’s our best friend, and Natalie is the girl I think I love.”
He shook his head and continued running with his arrows ready.

Natalie and Aelita stood together in the tower and faced each other. Both wanted to be materialized, but both also wanted to bring the other one with her. Natalie crossed her arms and gave a sour face.
“You go,” she ordered. “I’m paying you back for letting me be materialized before.”
“Thank you, Sister,” Aelita replied. She and Natalie held hands and floated up to the top level. Aelita then looked up to talk to Jeremy. “We decided that I’ll be the one,” she announced. “What should we do?”
“You two have to hug each other in order for me to transfer the whole virus to Natalie,” Jeremy replied. “After that, I’ll materialize you.”
Aelita nodded and turned to her sister. Natalie held onto her hands and suddenly embraced Aelita with a soft squeeze. Aelita returned the hug, and Jeremy went to work. He started typing in a few calculations and pressed the enter button.
“You should be feeling slight pain,” he told them. The girls moaned in reply, signaling that this was occurring. Jeremy hated the fact that they were hurt, but he continued until there was shock between the girls. They broke away with a sudden jolt and were sent crashing to the floor. “Hurry, Aelita!” Jeremy called. “I’ve got to materialize you before XANA can do anything!”
Aelita nodded and ran to the center of the platform. Natalie watched in awe as her sister floated gently to the top of the tower. With tears in his eyes, Jeremy pressed the enter button once again and said, “Code: Earth.”
Aelita disappeared in a split-second and reappeared in a scanner. Once she was conscious, she stood up and ran for the elevator. She pressed the button and went up to the top level. There, she didn’t only fins Jeremy, but the rest of the fighters, too.
“We all defeated the Mega-tanks but lost our life points in the process,” Yumi told her. “Don’t worry though. They’re all gone.”
“Thank you,” Aelita mumbled. “I’m sure my sister is happy.”
“Maybe she can tell you herself,” Jeremy announced, smirking. “Natalie got past an impossible firewall with her use of extreme knowledge. Her Lyoko file was there. Maybe the key to getting rid of the virus is there, too!”
“XANA created that firewall to keep the existence of Natalie unknown!” Aelita cried. “That section contains all of the answers. I don’t have as much knowledge as my sister, but I will try my best!”
She ran over to the computer and access the section past the firewall. Looking at all the information, her eyes widened when she came upon one section. She smiled big and let tiny tears of joy fall.
“That’s it, isn’t it?” Jeremy asked, smiling along with her. Aelita nodded and clicked on the picture of Natalie.
“Do the same thing as you did to me,” she said, “but press this button instead.” She pointed to the Home button in the section with the six keys together in a rectangle. Covering her mouth to keep from screaming in joy, she back away from the computer and let Jeremy go to work.
“So, you figured it out, huh?”
The team perked up from their celebration party as Jeremy brought the communication screen up. There was Natalie talking in XANA’s voice. “I see you figured out how to heal any of my viruses. Lot of work that will do. I infected Natalie because I wanted my daughter back. I wanted her to remember who she was and hopefully to join with me again. It looks like that failed. You got my virus out of my second daughter. You’re going to get my first daughter. I can’t change that, but I can reboot myself to another super computer. I guess all that’s left to say is good job, Jeremy. You defeated me this time, but let’s see if anyone else can.”
“There will always be someone that can defeat you, XANA!” Jeremy shouted.
“Sounds like a challenge,” XANA replied. “Oh well. Once again, good job, and please take care of my daughters.”
The screen disappeared and Jeremy went straight to work. He pressed all the buttons and finished up with the Home button.
“I hope this works,” he said. “Code: Earth. Virtual Revival!”

Dear Journal,

We learned something today. Along with the return of our two Lyoko friends came a lesson in friendship. Who would have thought it took an A.I., a XANA creation, and an evil virus to make us realize this? I guess all that matters out of all this is that we have two new friends here with us. These two, we met because of XANA. He created both of them. Aelita is sleeping at Yumi’s right now, and Natalie is across the hall from Odd and me. Jeremy and Odd are the happiest people alive right now. Their girlfriends from Lyoko are on Earth. Yes, I said girlfriends! The look in Odd’s eyes was so sweet; it almost brought me to tears. Jeremy was overflowed with joy when it came to Aelita being virus-free. Those sisters are now complete Humans. I just hope that no agents come and inspect them, because they still have the exact same DNA! (laughs) Well, enough of that. We shut down Lyoko today, and I don’t think XANA was fast enough to make it to another computer. Hopefully, he was destroyed along with Lyoko. However, that’s only a hope. But that hope has something much more important than XANA’s destruction. Hope today taught us about love. We now know more than ever that it doesn’t matter whether someone was born on Earth, born in Lyoko, or born from XANA. That person can still be happy. In this case, I’m happy with my Earth girl. That’s right. Yumi is my girl now. I’d like to see Sissy bother me anymore! (laughs again) Well, all is right with us now. The boys and I are happy. The girls are happy. XANA is most likely gone. We look forward to a happy future.

-Ulrich

THE END

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