106Title: Return to the Future
Author: dantheman7777
Genre: Drama/Humor with a little romance
Rating: PG
Summary: X.A.N.A.'s latest attack is quite unusual. He infects himself and alters the code of the "Return to the Past" program. Unknowingly, when Aelita deactivates the tower the gang won't return to the past. Instead, they're sent 5 years into the future. What will they find? More importantly, can they get back?
A/N: Has it been a long time or what? Sorry for not putting anything up, my schedule has been quite strange this semester. If you want to know where I'm at in writing this then read my profile.
For the record, this is my 3rd CL fanfic but it's my first one done in a 3rd person with an omniscient narrator. That means that the narrator isn't "glued" to any one person and can jump around a lot. I think it will make for an interesting way to tell this story. Enjoy.
Ulrich leaned back on his seat against the cafeteria wall amazed at how stress-less his life was going to be for the next three days. He stretched his arms out then folded them behind his head. Acheerful grin crept upon his face.
"Well, don't you look happy," Yumi encouraged as she stole a glance of the brown-haired cutie. Seeing him so relaxed made her smile. She sat down next to him with a tray of food.
"Huh? You mean you're staying for dinner?" he asked, surprised.
"Yep, I have nothing to do tonight or tomorrow so my parents said it was okay if I could stay here late." She continued, "You guys have any plans?"
"Nope," Ulrich answered, still relaxing, "Three days without those nasty teachers is like heaven on Earth!"
"Can't say I don't blame him," the purple-loving kid commented between bites of food, "Those teachers are always out to get us, especially Jim."
Ulrich slipped back into his chair breaking Yumi's stare which he was unaware of, "Maybe if Jeremie didn't skip gym class so much he might give us a break," he taunted. Just then Jeremie joined the table.
Earlier today Ulrich and Odd had to cover for Jeremie, again, in gym class. However, this time Jim didn't buy their excuse of Jeremie receiving a rather large electrical shock from his laptop and had to go to the infirmary, even though it was the truth…from a certain point in time. As a result, the boys had to do push-ups during their warm-up and were forced to run while their classmates played soccer for the remainder of the period. They were quite tired afterwards.
Jeremie rarely ate dinner so for him to be there instead of working on Aelita's antivirus meant that he had some sort of news…or that they were serving Brussels sprouts which they weren't.
"Come on, you guys, you know it's for a good cause," the computer genius replied.
"Yeah, we know." Odd said unenthusiastically, "Save the world…."
"Speaking of worlds, how's Aelita doing?" asked Yumi.
Jeremie sighed, "Well, she's been asking a lot of questions to say the least."
"Questions about what?" Odd asked.
"To summarize it in one word: everything," Jeremie said bluntly, rubbing his eyes. "I don't mind answering them but she had so many that I could hardly work on her antivirus."
Yumi saw what Aelita was trying to convey a spoke on her behalf. "Jeremie, I think this is her way of telling you that she wants to be materialized for a while."
"You really think so?" The girl nodded.
"I'd imagine it would get pretty lonely in Lyoko," Ulrich stated with smirk on his face, trying to inform his best friend that he had an idea.
"...And talking to you can only do so much," the spiky-haired kid interrupted him and finished his sentence for him, thus, proving that he shared the same mischievous manner. "I say we bring her here for the weekend."
"It's not like we have anything else to do," Yumi confessed sharing the gang's (minus Jeremie) same subliminal thought with a grin on her face. "Besides, I think it'd be fun to take her shopping."
"Gee, that was fast." Jeremie was shocked by the lack of protest. If Aelita had explicitly told him or if he would have brought up the subject on his own, then the computer controller would have expected there to be at least a few complaints from his friends.
However, he ignored their silence because he too yearned to see Aelita again in flesh. It had been about a month since he last saw her in human form and he welcomed the day when he'd see her again.
"Let's go and tell her the good news then," Jeremie said. The four friends then dumped their trays in the trash and went to Jeremie's dorm, Ulrich leading the way.
Along the path, a certain love-struck girl saw her crush walking in the open field.
"Ulrich, dear," a whiny, high-pitched voice called. The target of her affection cringed upon hearing the sound of his name being said in such an awful off-tune voice.
Following Ulrich's lead, Yumi, Odd and Jeremie quickened their pace to the computer genius's dorm room in the hopes of avoiding yet another Sissy attack. If all went well, this would be the third thwarted encounter today. Even though it was only 6:00 PM, Ulrich had a feeling that she wouldn't let up this evening especially since Yumi was here.
He and his friends rushed into the room where Aelita's pop-up window was waiting for them. As they filed into the tiny dwelling place, the brown haired boy who was being chased locked the door.
"Hey, guys," Aelita greeted. She observed the gang panting exhaustively and became naturally wondered if school was really that physically demanding. From her only day of experience in the human world, the virtual entity didn't know the answer. For all she knew it could be. "Hard day at school?" the pink haired girl asked, half-sarcastically and half-confused.
"You have no idea," Ulrich, the most breathless of the four, replied.
"That's the third Sissy attack today," added Yumi who was assisting him in barricading the door with their bodies.
Before Sissy could reach them and eavesdrop on their conversation, Jeremie asked Aelita if she would like to come to Earth for the three-day weekend. She was ecstatic and immediately began to daydream about things to do with Jeremie when suddenly a knock came from the door.
"Ulrich, I know you're in there!" Sissy's highly girly voice seeped through the door, startling him.
She quickly thought up a scheme that would truly make Yumi forsake him. In a sweet and seemingly-genuine voice she lied, "I hope you haven't forgotten about our date tonight. You said you'd take me to the movies so…I'll just wait here until you come out."
Ulrich put a perplexed look on his face and shook his head, "I wouldn't go out with her even if my life depended on it."
"What are we going to do?" Jeremie asked under his voice, worried. "She can't find out what were doing."
Instantly, Odd noticed the only other exit behind Jeremie and began to formulate a plan. He ripped off the sheets on Jeremie's bed and tied them together and then to a leg on his computer desk. The others watched in silence, not wanting to give Sissy any indication as to what he was doing and also because they were completely confused.
Quietly, Odd explained his plan to escape out the window. However, since they were on the third story they would have to use Jeremie's bed sheets as a rope. Once they got down, they would head for the factory.
While the others were lowering themselves down, Odd left a little note behind for Sissy.
A misty black cloud loomed over the damp cement surface of the third basement floor of the ambiguously abandoned factory. It crawled out from the large protrusion of circuitry in the center, then it floated mysteriously back inside itself. At that time, X.A.N.A. had full access to Lyoko's source code.
By altering the lines to the "Return to the Past" program for his bidding he could once and for all get rid of those five menacing little children that caused him so much effort by simply having them deactivate his tower. They wouldn't even know they did something wrong until it was too late and once they do deactivate the tower the changes will be permanent! After that, the irrational human world would be his.
As they gathered around the command console, Lyoko's only inhabitant sighed, obviously depressed. Instead of having a fun and joyful weekend, her first weekend, X.A.N.A. apparently had plans.
Jeremie looked at her with confusion. She had been so happy a few minutes ago. Aelita apologized for the sudden change in plans and told them that, unfortunately, another tower had been activated. The four knew what to do. Yumi, Ulrich and Odd headed for the scanners.
Sissy was getting impatient with her "boyfriend's" lack of willingness to go out with her. The people she saw go into the room that she paced in front of weren't making any sounds and hadn't for some time. She stuck a hairpin into the lock and began to feel around. Seconds later, the lock retracted and she almost kicked the door down, she was so angry.
Sissy peered inside the vacant room and was dumbfounded. Ulrich was nowhere to be seen! Immediately, she began searching places that he might be hiding, calling out his name. After a few vain attempts, she noticed that a wind was blowing in and caught sight of the elaborate escape route and a folded piece of paper in the shape of a dog lifting one hind-leg in the air.
Sissy's hands became fists of fury as she read the note. It was signed unsurprisingly by Odd. She stormed out the entrance in hatred, vowing vengeance.
Jeremie stared at the virtual image of Lyoko. A white glare swept across his glasses as he turned to view the multiple screens in the display. He, along with the others, pondered what chaos X.A.N.A. had created this time.
The four virtualized avatars met in the forest region of Lyoko.
Aelita pointed to the direction that the pulsations were emanating from. "The tower is in that direction," she said with her eyes staring down at the artificial grass.
"Hey, don't feel bad, princess," Odd set his four fingered hand on her shoulder trying to comfort her. "Look at it this way: once we go back in time you'll have even more time to spend with us."
The way Odd always looked on the optimistic side of things cheered Aelita up regardless of the circumstances. A smile appeared on her face.
The four kids began to run to the flaming tower which was now in plain sight. Jeremie informed them that he hasn't spotted any of X.A.N.A.'s robots yet.
"This is too easy," Ulrich complained, suspiciously.
That statement made Odd worry, as he heard it said many times in the past. "You know, Ulrich, whenever you say that, usually an ambush of monsters attacks us."
"What do you want me to do?" Ulrich suggested, "Stop saying it?"
The friends continued to argue along the route to the red pillar. They still haven't seen any signs of monsters. Soon enough Aelita made it to the tower, unharmed.
"You've got to be kidding me!" Ulrich said in disbelief. "Lyoko trips are never this easy!"
"Well, let's not take it for granted," Yumi butted in. "The sooner we deactivate the tower the better."
"She's right," Jeremie agreed over the communication-link. "Go ahead Aelita."
Seconds later the girl entered in her code to deactivate the tower.
Jeremie watched as the walls of code descended and prompted himself to press the confirm button on his keyboard. "Return to the past now!"
Normally, a white bubble of light would engulf the entire planet and return everything to their state before the tower was active but not this time. Ten seconds passed and there was still no sign of the program's activation. Jeremie was stumped.
"Aelita," the computer technician addressed her. "Could you call the Return to the Past program manually? Something must be wrong with my interface."
"Okay," she replied calmly, bringing up a transparent computer command line in mid-air.
After a few keystrokes she mimicked Jeremie as the program then activated, "Return to the past now."
"Oh, brother," the object of mockery scoffed. The sound of Aelita laughing echoed through Lyoko.
When the light receded Jeremie found himself still in his computer chair at the factory. The only difference from a minute ago was that the screen he was gazing at now was black as night. There was no virtual image of Aelita, status cards or anything. It was as if Lyoko had shut down.
Instantly, Jeremie feared the worst as thoughts of not being able to see his friends or his beloved Aelita again flowed into his mind.
In the distance a male voice groaned, "Jeremie, if you turn the power on again I swear I'll shove this wrench down your throat!" It came from below in the scanner room.
Jeremie couldn't recognize the voice. Confused with the identity of the person, he went over to the ladder that led to the lower level to view the speaker.
"I'm telling you, it wasn't my fault!" another male voice, lower than Jeremie's yet strikingly similar, pleaded. "X.A.N.A. activated a tower and I had no choice. I tried to warn you."
"Yeah, sure, whatever," The first voice replied obviously not believing "Jeremie's" word.
Just then, the scanners lit up with life and their doors opened. The man working with the wrench was, again, electrified due to the arrival some familiar guests.
A/N: I do respond to reviews so if you have a question/comment please tell me! Also, be kind and tell me what you think of this, okay? Thanks.