Welcome to Gaia! ::

Alright... I know your computer was crappy, but you never mentioned only having 16 colors...

I hit a writing spree here, so the next partial episode will be online in a bit.

the plot thickens

yay!!! more!! this is getting good!! i..... what is up with my mule.....


wtf?! it was kyler or dan this time........ ether way, they are both dead!! evil

sad , now what will i do with all my spare time? okay, i'm smart... sprta... i'll kill kyler, that's fun.... why dose my leg still hurt...

long story short, i jumped off of a cament bench, and was stupid and turned as i jupmed down, and there is a pretty good and painful mark, i might get out of running on friday.....

Code SPIRAL - 07 - nonbeliever

Unfortunately, about a week later, things took a turn for the worst. Millie and Tamir had gone to the police about Ayumu. He was arrested in the morning, but Jeremey and Aelita did not learn about it that evening... when Jeremy was the receiver of Ayumu's one phone call.
"Hello?" Jeremy asked from the supercomputer's terminal.
"Jeremy... we've got a problem. The newspaper girls got the police involved."
"Oh no... I told you it was a bad idea... especially explaining to them about the murder. I'll launch a return to the past and get you out of there..." Jeremy reached for his controls.
"No. I have a plan. I may be able to get some information through the interegations. I'll be careful not to implicate you two or lyoko. I'm trying to work out how to prove myself innocent. They only have me on circumstantial evidence... so unless they get some real proof, they have to let me go eventually."
"Are you sure about this?"
"If I'm not, I'll get a message to you, and you can launch the return. But for now... I'm going to play along. Listen... I probably won't make it out in time to go with you to confront Rio. Are you sure you and Aelita can handle it on your own?"
"Yeah... we'll be fine." Jeremy replied. "This makes me nervous, but you may be onto something. Hope you figure something out." Jeremy hung up and sighed. This was just great. They were back down to 2 for now. That meant the blade children were even with them... and Ayumu was correct and Eyes was one of them, they were outnumbered. Jeremy called Aelita and informed her of this development, and they made their plans to go to the hospital to "visit" Rio for the next day.

"So... little Narumi's been detained by police?" Kosuke said as he lay casually on Eyes' couch. "Rio's not going to be happy about that... She was so excited about getting to take on Ayumu..." Eyes was standing on one of the edges of the room, staring off into the distance, lost in thought. Kosuke stared at him awkwardly. "What's wrong? I know your quiet, but this is a little werid even for you..."
"The other boy... Belpois... what do you know about him?" Eyes asked.
"Well... he's a wimpy nerd. He's better than Ayumu in some respects, but Ayumu is better in all the others." Kosuke stood up. "Their almost polar opposites."
"I think we should create a contigency plan in case Ayumu cannot fulfil his role. Let us test Jeremy Belpois for now."
"But that's a waste of time..." Kosuke whined.
"Until Ayumu returns to the playing field, we are wasting time doing nothing anyway. Plus, if we he joins us... Aelita and Ayumu will be quick to follow."
"But..."
"You said yourself that he is intelligent. If they are opposites as you say, one's weakness if the other's strength. If we have them both, their strengths will counter eachothers weaknesses. Together they may succeed where Kiyotaka failed alone."
"Are you sure? If Ayumu is like Kiyotaka... then Belpois is like Franz Hopper. You honestly want someone like HIM in our organization?"
"You need to learn to let go of the past Kosuke..." Eyes replied. "If I had a quarter for every time you brought that up... I'd be richer than I am now... and I'm a professional musician. Now, what else do you know about him?"
"Well... unlike Ayumu, he's not emo... yet." Kosuke added sarcastically. "I also know he's been hanging around Aelita Hopper since she came off Lyoko." Kosuke walked over to Eyes.
"You know, I was surprised that she was still alive after all this time. I remember she used to be a lot older than us..."
"She spent nearly ten years in suspended animation. We just caught up to her." Eyes responded.
"Still... it's hard to believer she was the first one... the model for all the blade children who came after..." Kosuke muttered. "Ten years... ten years and most of us are already dead." Kosuke gritted his teeth.
"It's true... of the original sixty blade children, only six are left, including you and me." Eyes said with his arms crossed. "It wasn't until after both the blade children and Xana projects were complete that Hopper realized he had crossed the line and begun to play god. So he tried to destroy all of his work... all evidence of his dark sciences... Xana was able to defend himself, but we were no so adept at first..."
"Yeah yeah... I remember. Those were some nightmarish times... being hunted day and night." Kosuke turned and headed for the elevator. "Eyes... you said there were six of us left, right? There's you... me... Rio... Hopper... who are the other two?"
"You know them both. Ryoko has been living under an alias in Japan. Konone is somewhere in America right now..."
"Ry...Ryoko's alive?!?!" Kosuke exclaimed. "But I thought she..."
"She faked her death and then started a new life." Eyes said with a frown. "Don't be so surprised... even if she uncoperative, I still keep my eyes on her. But we may have to call her back to us soon... we will need the full strength of the blade children very soon..."
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"We must accelerate our plans. Rio must be healed and back at full strength before winter... and we must sway Aelita to our side as well. I received a message fron Konone... in the winter... a new hunt is going to begin." Eye shut his eyes and gritted his teeth in anger. Kosuke stared back at him intensly.
"I'll tell her." Kosuke replied as he stepped into the elevator. "I know you don't really like to kill people Eyes... just remember... kill or be killed. That's every single day for us." The door shut as Kosuke descended. Eyes stared out the window for another minute.
"Kiyotaka... why did you have to die? We could use your help right now..." He said to himself.

"So... Ayumu isn't coming?" Rio asked with dissapointment as she sat up in her hospital bed. Her pigtails had been let down to give her simple, long hair, and she had a bandage attached to her right cheek, much like the one Jim used to where. Her arms were also bandaged up.
"Nope... sorry." Kosuke replied.
"AWWW!!! NO FAIR!!!" She exclaimed in a whiny tone.
"But I do have some new orders from Eyes. Until Ayumu is fair game again... you get to use what you planned for Ayumu on Jeremy Belpois."
"Wha?" Rio asked.
"Eyes seems to think he could be on Ayumu's level... he could be of some use to us, so Eyes wants you to test him a bit, like we've done with Ayumu." Kosuke said. "I know that may be a bit tough for you. If he loses, he'll be killed, and you certainly don't want that, do you Rio?" Kosuke implied with a grin. Rio blushed and threw a pillow at him.
"I told you before!" She yelled. "I don't LIKE him!"
"Then why do you get so mad every time I bring it up?" Kosuke replied with a smile. Rio continued to fume for a few seconds, before falling back onto the bed.
"You're so mean Kosuke." She muttered and began to pout.

The next day, Jeremy and Aelita walked down the hallway of the hospital. Neither of them said a thing... Aelita carried a boquet of flowers.
"You remember the plan?" Jeremy said to her grimly.
"Yeah." She replied. "But the situation could change so quickly..."
"We'll have to improvise..." Jeremy replied. "But improvising is more of Ayumu's thing. Hope I can do it well enough to keep us alive..." Jeremy knocked on the door to Rio's hospital room.
"Come in!" Rio voiced joyfully through the door.
"Oh! Visitors!" Exclaimed the nurse as they walked in. "Well... I'll just leave you all alone for now then..." The nurse said as she stepped out of the room, closing the door behind her. They talked irrelevantly for a minute or two, but Jeremy decided it was now time.
"The doctor said I'll be out in a week or two..." Rio was finishing her sentence, when Jeremey turned one her.
"It's too bad your bomb failed to throw us off your trail."
"What?" She replied innocenctly.
"Ayumu tracked down the store you bought if from. You assumed that the stuffed animal would be completely destroyed, so you were either careless or lazy and bought it at a store near the school before sewing the bomb inside. The whole thing was even caught on security camera. You failed."
"Um... what are you talking about?" Rio continued to act oblivious.
"Don't play dumb." Aelita said to her. "We know you're one of the blade children." Rio looked innocent only for an instant longer, but then her face tightened as she gained a serious look.
"I should have excpected this... but I am impressed you discovered I was one of the blade children. Or was that Ayumu's doing and you're just the messenger?" Jeremy said nothing in response.
"I thought so. Well... I had a little something set up for Ayumu... but since he's not here, you'll do just fine." She grinned. "Alright Kosuke!" She shouted. Kosuke stepped out from behind the room divider.
"You!" Aelita exclaimed as she pointed at him.
"Yo! Long time no see, cutie!" Kosuke flirted and winked at her. Jeremy silently fumed as Aelita blushed.
"This is one messed up little game you've invented, Rio..." Kosuke said as he pulled a rolling metal cart out with him and pushed it over to next to Rio's bed. The cart had two glasses of water, two small white packets with unknown contents, and two metal stirring sticks. "You sure you want to waste it on this dingbat?" Kosuke asked her.
"Why not? If I can't beat him, I'd never have stood a chance against Ayumu anyways..." Rio closed her eyes. "So, Jeremy Belpois... are you ready to play? Just to warn you... at the end of this game, one of us will most likely be dead."

Jeremy stood on the opposite side of the cart from Rio, Rio sat on her bed and picked up the two packets. "As you can see... these two packets are completely identical. I have no idea which one is which. One of them just had ordinary sugar... and the other is... stricknine." Jeremy's mouth gaped with surprise. Aelita stared at him worriedly.
"It's a poison..." Kosuke said from his seat on the opposite end of the room. "It kills you by causing respiratory paralysis and circulatory arrest." He explained as Kosuke emptied one packet into each glass, adn then began to stir them with the metal stirring sticks. "It's extremely bitter... sensitive tounges can taste it even when it's 2000 times more diluted than this."
"The amount I put in is about twich the lethal dose." Rio smiled as she removed the stirring sticks and set them aside. The two glasses were completley identical in appearence. "I don't know which is which, and neither do you. We'll both choose a glass and drink it's contents. Pick the wrong glass, and you can say your goodbyes to your little girlfriend over there. Which one of us will death drag away I wonder..." Jeremy just stared at her, paralyzed with fear. "Go ahead... I'll even let you pick first. That way it won't matter even if I did know which one had the poison."
"What kind of an idiot would play this stupid game?" Jeremy exclaimed. "Why do you insist on these elaborate games? If you really wanted to kill us, you could have done it easily a long time ago!"
"True... but we aren't really trying to kill you... it's more like a test..." Rio grinned. "What's wrong... Jeremy?"
"Don't do it Jeremy! This is some kind of trap!" Aelita grabbed his shoulder.
"I haven't done anything cowerdly like posion both glasses. What'd be the point in that?" Rio responded.
"Why should I believe any of this?" Jeremy exclaimed.
"I'll tell you what... I'll drink first. If it kills me, then you'd win the challenge. If it doesn't kill me, then you can do whatever you want. You don't even have to drink the water... you can just walk right out... but if you're the type that runs away you wouldn't have been any use to us anyway."
"But why would I drink it for any reason and posion myself on purpose? Why are you putting yourself at a 50-50 chance at dying but giving me a 100-percent chance of survival?"
"There's no guarantee I'm going to die."
"You're talking about twice the lethal dose of stricknine! There's 0% chance of survival! You'll die instantly!"
"But to run away from this challenge... your pride, courage, and all confidence will die anyway..." Rio replied. "And to live the rest of your life that miserable, isn't that just the same as death? You want to be the best... you don't want to be proven wrong... you want to prove you can save the world from Xana and all it's other threats. But you'll never do that if you run away. I won't run away... I will face my destiny and fight it head on. I will change my fate." Everyone was silent. "If you run now... how can you hope to face a REAL crisis that you can't run from?" Aelita stared a Jeremy worriedly. Jeremy was shaking.
"Don't Jeremy... it's all just another mind game..." She urged him.
"You people... are crazy..." Jeremy muttered with anger. "But you're just going to keep coming after us. I'll play... but if I win, you have to tell us everything."
"You mean I'll have to tell you." Kosuke said. "If you win, she'll die, remember?"
"You people are sick..." Aelita said with disgust. Jeremy picked up one of the glasses.
"All your tactics and logic won't be of any use now. What you do need is the ability to believe in your self. Your conviction that you will not lose will be the deciding factor in this game." Rio held her glass to her lips. "Well... let's begin..." She tipped the glass upward, but stopped abruptly.
"Wait!" Jeremy exclaimed... finally figuring out the trick to the game. "You really think this charade is going to fool me? The ability to decipher strategy will determine the winner of this game... not the ability to believe or whatever." Jeremy held his glass at waist height as he paced the room. "You're really a piece of work. You're both way smarter than you look, I'll give you that. When you explained your game... I didn't know what to think. I was trying to understand the psychology... I knew that you were willing to risk your life when you blew yourself up, so at first it seems logical that you'd risk it again with this game. But with that in mind, you devised this challenge to insure your victim would have a crushing defeat. But here's the part that doesn't make sense... you blade children have the upper hand at this point, so why would you risk your life again when you don't have to? This game is rigged so you would have a 100% chance of winning."

"I knew it!" Aelita exclaimed.
"But I gave you the first move. You chose your glass yourself! How could I have rigged the game? You saw everything I did..."
"That's right... and that's where you gave it away." He pointed at her. "You we're going to drink first. If you didn't die, by process of elimination my glass would have the poison. I wouldn't drink it and walk away. I'd live, but I'd be defeated. But here's your trick... there never was any poison. Both packets had sugar. So all you had to do was drink sugar water, not die, and then I'd be too afraid to drink what I thought was a glass of stricknine. I'm calling your bluff." Rio gritted her teeth. She'd been caught. "Besides... if one of us had actually died of stricknine poisioning, what did you plan to do with the body? What would you have told the police, especially with my father as the head detective? And with Aelita right here as a witness to all of this? You wouldn't take that chance. This glass is only sugar water... and I'm going to prove it." Jeremy placed the glass to his lips and tipped it upwards, but an instant later he slamned the glass back onto the cart as he fell to his knees, clutching his throat.
"Jeremy!" Aelita exlaimed.
"Im...impossible..." Jeremy muttered with shock. "That tounge-piercing bitterness... it was stricknine!" Rio grinned.
"That's just what I expected. You talk big, but you hardly touched the glass to your lips before you gave way to caution. Don't worry... you didn't drink nearly enough to kill you. But you did lose." Rio downed her entire glass at once, setting it down on the cart. "So... do you believe me now? I promised a fair game..."
"You... you really are crazy..." Aelita stared at Rio with horror as she tried to shake Jeremy out of his shock.
"She was right you know... his inability to believe in himself was the cause of his loss. His reasoning was correct... there wasn't any stricknine... just some really bitter couch medicine. I made sure to point out that stricknine was extremely bitter... so when the bitter cold medicine touched his tounge, he couldn't drink anymore. If he had truly believed in his own ability, he would have gone through with it and been fine. In the end he gave in to his own self doubt and lack of confidence." Kosuke smiled as he sat in his chair, casually tapping his foot against the floor. Aelita glanced back and forth menacingly between the two blade children.
"You're both monsters." She tried to lift Jeremy off the floor, but he was still to shaken to move. "You cheated. You owe him a rematch!" Aelita turned to Rio.
"It's true... I did use a bit of trickery, but he still lost. Look at him... he knows it. He down there on the floor, shaking like the cowerdly loser he is. He thought he had it all figured out... but he didn't."
"Get over youself already!" Aelita responded angrily. "Jeremy had you by the throat and you were lucky you slithered your way out! You rigged the game and depended on a cheap trick to win! You knew he was better than you, so you didn't have the guts to face him fairly! You knew you would lose to him unless the game was rigged! You ran away from the challenge before it even started, so you can take your pompus additude and shove it!!!" She yelled as she got in her face.

Rio stared at her awkwardly.
"You frighten me... really." Rio responded sarcastically. But inside, Aelita's words had struck her like a ton of bricks. Rio knew she was right. "Sorry... but todays not just your lucky day. You see... due to the restrictions set upon us by Kiyotaka, when we test someone we have to treat them with a certain degree of respect... anyone else who interferes with the blade children will suffer the consequences. If you're going to keep being a problem, we won't hesitate to eliminate you."
"So you're just going to kill me!? The same way you killed Jim and Imazato?!" Aelita argued.
"Yes... murder is just oh so easy. And honestly, life can be a lot easier once you've eliminated your enemies. Killing them was easy... and killing you will be easier." Rio responded slyly. Aelita, who had her hand in her hoody pocket, grinned.
"I was waiting for you to say that." She pulled a small black box from her hoody pocket... a tape recorder. "I've been recording everything since we walked into the room. The cops are gonna love this." Jeremy glanced up at her with surprise. She hadn't clued him in on that. She'd just given them the upper hand again. Both Rio and Kosuke gapsed with surprise. "You've admitted to murdering Imazato and Jim, plus you've threatened to kill us. Anything else you'd like to add to your statement?" She asked. "This is a pretty damning piece of evidence. I think Jeremy's dad should be able to bring a solid case against you with this..."
"Ha! You sneaky little vixen!" Kosuke exclaimed.
"You of all people should know about trump CARDS, right?" Aelita said cockily.
"What do you want from us?" Rio demanded. "I doubt you'd be telling us this if you were just going to hand the tape to police. You wan't something out of us, don't you?"
"Yes." Aelita responded. "Now tell us... what are you blade children?" She demanded. Before Rio could respond, Kosuke rushed past Jeremy and grabbed the empty water glass off the cart and hurled it at her. It knocked the tape from her hand and the glass smashed as it his the ground. The tape landed in the middle of the room, and Kosuke dived for it.
"Jeremy!" Aelita shouted as she rushed over and kicked the tape across the floor as it skidded to a stop against the wall next to Jeremy. He grabbed it by reflex, but Kosuke grabbed Aelita. There was a gust of wind as the window was opened.
"Alright..." Kosuke said seriously. "Give the tape to Rio or watch your little friend here make like the pretty birdies and fly..." He demanded as he pressed Aelita half out the window. They were on the twelth floor.
"Jeremy! Don't do it! So long as you have the tape, they can't hurt me, remember!" She shouted. "Killing me won't do them any good if the tape gets to the police! I'll be fine! Don't launch a return or we'll lose the tape! You'll fight them again and you'll win! Just get the tape out of here!" She urged him. Jeremy hestiated.
"But... but..." He stuttered.
"GO!!!" She shouted. Jeremy dashed out of the room, nearly breaking the door off it's hinges. Kosuke stared at him as he dissapeared from the room.
"Damn." He muttered as he pulled Aelita in from the window. "Well... look's like we'll just have to hold onto her for a while..." Kosuke still held her immobile, but shut the window.
"You're in for it now..." Aelita grinned. "Jeremy will go through hell and back to get me back and take you down in the process.
"Or..." Rio responded to her. "It'll give in the feeling that he failed not only himself, but you. He'll feel like he put you in danger, and that this is all his fault. This won't sit well with him... the poor boy is finished Aeltia." Rio grinned. "Kosuke... get her our of here before the hospital staff comes. With all that shouting, I'm amazed they haven't aready noticed."
"As if I'm going quietly..." Aelita gritted her teeth and got ready to start shouting for help, but Kosuke stood in front of her and shut his eyes while gripping her shoulders. When he opened them, the piercing yellow cat eyes appeared and pulsed, and Aelita fainted, much the way she had collapsed at the hermitage. Kosuke, his eyes still engaged, slung Aelita over his shoulder and opened the window, stepping out onto the ledge.
"I'll come by tomorrow and give you an update. Sorry things didn't go as planned." He said to her before lepaing nimbly onto the ledge and then down each floor onto the window ledges with Aeltia slung over his shoulder as if she weighed nothing.

Eyes sat at his desk, writing out a musical score on a piece of paper as Kosuke stood leaning up against the piano.
"so... things have become rather complicated..." Eyes said after Kosuke explained everything that had happened.
"Yep."
"And the girl?"
"I've got her locked up in a storage warehouse I rented. She's not getting away."
"So... Jeremy has tasted defeat and now aimlessly wanders the playing field..." Eyes muttered. "Kiyotaka said it best... the ability to bounce back after a defeat is far more admirable than the ability to never lose. If he can make a comeback now... he may be the one who can alter our destiny where Kiyotaka could not."
"I thought that was supposed to be Ayumu..."
"Kiyotaka could not have forseen all of this. Things have changed... it is because we have been able to adapt so quickly that we have survived where the other blade children have been killed. Like I said before... if either one will give us a chance... both will give us a far better chance."
"Yeah... but since we kidnapped Aelita, I doubt Belpois will ever help us, even if we were to just give her back. What do you think we ought to do?"
"We do nothing for now. It's Jeremy's turn. Now we simply wait for him to make his move."

Jeremy placed a small white box that was taped shut and labeled with an adress and stamp into a public mailbox downtown.
"That'll make sure the tape is safe..." Jeremy muttered. "But... I ran away..." Jeremy muttered to himself pitifully as he ambled towards the factory. "I left her back there at the mercy of the blade children..." He stopped in front of the forest and abrubtly but randomly changed direction, heading towards the hermitage. "I shouldn't have run away! I should have stayed and fought to protect her!" He entered the hermitage and looked around and the dusty surroundings. He sat down on the floor and began to cry. He was still there when morning came.

Aelita awoke and was startled when the door opened. She was in a small room... one of those storage units that people kept their extra stuff in. It had a locked door, and a small, narrow window near the ceiling. There was a sleeping bag that had been left for her, which she was laying on top of. There was also a pair of chairs and a small table, but little else. Her cellphone had been taken. Kosuke stood in the doorway with a paper bag in his hand.
"Breakfast is served." He said as he shut the door behind him. He pulled out a single breakfast sandwhich from the bag for himself and then tossed the rest of the bag towards Aelita. It landed on the sleeping bag next to her with a cushioned thud. She eyed both the bag and Kosuke warily. As Kosuke bit into his sandwhich, noticing her apprehention. "It's not poisoned or anything..." He assured her. Aelita said nothing. She wasn't sure how she was supposed to be acting towards her captor. Shd didn't want to make him angry... which she was sure would happen if she started to press him for information. But she couldn't think of anything else to do. She looked into the bag and found a sandwhich with sasuasge, egg, and cheese, as well as some hashbrowns and a carton of chocolate milk.
"so... how long are you planning on keeping me here?" She asked.
"Until Jeremy comes back with the tape. Or tries something stupid." Kosuke responded. "You were right though... we can't do jack until we get that tape back. He's got us frozen, and he has the next move."
"So you think he'll just trade the tape for me?"
"Yeah." Kosuke took another bite. "If he holds out until the police release Ayumu, they may team up and come up with something more creative. I'm kinda hoping for that. But I doubt it'll take him more than a day to show up begging for your freedom." Kosuke stood up. He handed her a phone.
"It's a one way phone. It can recieve and send calls only to my phone. You're not a prisoner, you're a hostage, so we've got to treat you alright. If you need anything, just call."

"Jeremy!" Thomas Belpois called as he wandered through the woods. He had gone to see his son that morning, but heard from the school that he had dissapeared. He had asked around, and no one had seen him anywhere. He worriedly dialed his cell phone but got no answer. He had simply started to search the forest surrounding the school, calling out for his son. He was surprised by what he found. A large, busted down house in the back of the woods. A sign on the front read "the Hermitage". The house was clearly abandoned. He decided to investigate it. He opened the door, which was surpisingly silent for it's old age. He found Jeremy asleep on the floor of a room with a large piano inside, his things strewn about. "Jeremy! Wake up!" Thomas shook his son awake.
"Huh? Dad?" Jeremy responded as he woke up. "What are you doing here?"
"I'm asking you the same thing..." Thomas said as he stared around the room. "What is this place?"
"Uh... it's just... an abandoned house." Jeremy said with a yawn. "I just come out here sometimes when I want some peace and quiet. It's tough to get on campus. I must've just fallen asleep."
"Does anyone else know about this place?" Thomas asked him.
"A few of my friends, but most of them have moved away." Jeremy stood up and started packing his things. "What are you doing out here?"
"I was looking for you. You shouldn't disappear like that." Thomas asked him. "You really shouldn't be out here. Come on." Thomas led him out of the house.

Kosuke returned again with lunch around noon. He once again sat there and ate with her. Aelita had nothing to do while she was alone but think, and her brain had gone into overdrive regarding her situation. She had first been looking for a route of escape, but found that pursuit to be hopeless. But then, she had begun to think more about the blade children. Her "dream" from the other day, as well as how their organization was set up and what their goals were.
"I've been doing some thinking..." She said to him. "You're group... you don't have that many people, do you? There's only two of you... or so it appears. But there's someone else, isn't there? Do you know Eyes Rutherford?"
"Never heard of him." Kosuke lied. "Why'd you think that?"
"Well... I had this dream where I ran into Eyes Rutherford and he told me he was one of the blade children..."
"So that's where he went..." Kosuke muttered.
"Come again?" Aelita asked.
"Never mind." Kouske cut off that thread of the conversation. "You're right... there aren't that many of us."
"And finding a closed place like this to keep must have taken some funds... so you must have resources." She continued, but Kosuke was ignoring her, staring out the window. "I don't know what you people want, but you've got a lot of innocents caught up in the crossfire. Jim... Imazato..."
"Jim wasn't really my fault. Xana got him involved, and he found out too much. Imazato was anything but innocent... he wanted to kill us all." Kosuke replied. "Oh, and I suppose there's no harm in telling you, but we have stopped working with Xana altogether. He wants to get rid of us as much as he wants to get rid of your group now."
"How did you get involved with Xana in the first place? How did you get to Lyoko the other day?" Aelita asked eagerly. Kosuke ignored her. "Just tell me... what are the blade children?"
"If you wanna keep living, than shut your trap." Kosuke snapped at her, before standing up and heading out the door, locking it behind him.

"I don't know what to do Jeremy..." Thomas told his son as they waited for their food at a small cafe. "My investigations are just going no where. Is it always crazy like this around here?"
"Not until you showed up." Jeremy said as he glumly played with his straw. He needed to figure out a plan to save Aelita... but he couldn't let onto his father that there was any trouble.
"Imzato Shiridan is found dead the day before he's supposed to start subbing for Jim Morales. Meanwhile, Jim Morales is found dead in his hospital room with massive impact trauma even though he hadn't moved. Then a bomb goes off at your school, and the intended target is that Narumi kid. Then, I get a call from two of the students saying that Narumi knew something about Imazato's death, but he's not talking..." Thomas rubbed his forehead. He was developing a headache over this. "Somehow these are all connected... you know Ayumu Narumi, right? Do you know anything that might help me?"
"No." Jeremy lied. "I... I don't know if it would be allowed, but I can try and talk to Ayumu for you."
"I can arrange that." Thomas readily agreed. "By the way... I know I haven't gotten to spend much time with out..." Thomas began to apologize. "It's just like it always was." Before Jeremy had come to Catic, his father had been MIA as a parent, so wrapped up in his job as a detective that they rarely spent time together. "Why don't you tell me more about your life here? Do you have a girlfriend or anyting yet?" He asked in a seemingly good nature, but he was in fact trying to get information about Aelita. Jeremy's throat went dry as he thought of Aelita again.
"I... I'd rather not talk about it." He stole the catch-all answer from Jim. "When can I talk to Ayumu?"
"Uh... tomorrow morning." Thomas responded. Jeremy said nothing more. Thomas knew what Jeremy was thinking. Somehow or another, Jeremy knew that he was investigating Aelita, and he didn't want to tell him anything. Something was very... very wrong here. And he was going to find out even if he had to tail his own son.

Kosuke finally returned later that night for dinner, with a styrofoam container containing a steak and mashed potatoes from a nearby steakhouse. He passed her the box and some silverware along with a bottle of water. Aelita tried to restart the conversation.
"So... what are you fighting against anyways?" Aelita asked. "Somehow I get the feeling you aren't ACTUALLY trying to kill us... it seems like you're testing Jeremy and Ayumu. It seems like your trying to toughen them up for something..."
"Oh believer me... there's one of them I DO want to kill... but I try and avoid killing if I don't have to... at least now anyways. Besides... I don't think enough of that loser to bother."
"Don't you regret the thing's you've done?" Aelita asked him.
"At first... I didn't have a choice. I was forced to commit my first murders... but after that... they were of my own free will. I don't expect I'd have killed willfully if I hadn't had the experience in the first place. And the person who put me through that..." Kosuke walked over and opened the door, stepping outside. "Was your father." He shut the door and turned the lock before Aeltia could respond.

Jeremy noticed his father was following him, but he didn't care at this point. He returned to the hermitage, hoping to find some clues. He began to pull books he had never before touched off the shelves, dust them off, and flip through them, hoping some kind of clue would just fall into his lap. It was then... inside a worn copy of Mary Shelly's "Frankenstein", that he found it. A photograph, with a piece of paper taped to the back. It was a photo of all the scientists from the carthage project. He immediately recognized Franz Hopper near the center of the photograph. As he flipped over the photo to read the names of the scientists, he found two names to be particularly disturbing. The first was... Imazato Shiridan. He flipped the photo back over and recognized the dead teacher near the edge on the left side. The other name he recognized was most startling of all. Kiyotaka Narumi. Jeremy closely scrutinized the photo... and found a man standing just behind Hopper. His hair and facial features closely matched Ayumu's. It was uncanny. Jeremy fell back into a chair as he stared at the photo. Ayumu's brother was involved with the xana project. He stepped deeper into the house, and managed to ditch his father by escaping into one of the secret tunnels. He somehow found motivation from this clue. He knew now that he had to take a risk if he was going to change anything. He exited the tunnels from the factory, and headed for the hospital as it began to storm.

Rio sat in her hospital bed, clumsily trying to break apart a pair of puzzle rings. Kosuke stood there, just hanging out. He glanced out the window as it began to rain harder.
"That's werid... it was sunny just a few minutes ago..."
"The TV said scattered storms..." Rio said as she tried to remove the puzzle rings by force. This continued for another minute. "UH! Kosuke! These stupid puzzle rings won't come apart!"
"There'd be no point if they came undone easily..." Kosuek sighed sarcastically.
"Hmph. I'll undo you, smarty-pants... AH!" She cried as there was a loud bolt of thunder and she ducked beneath the blanket on her bed.
"Jeez... you can be so childish." Kosuke pulled the blanket off her. "It's just thunder."
"GR... I CAN'T GET THESE STUPID THINGS APART!" She exclaimed as she threw them across the room at the door with anger. Another bolt of thunder caused her to duck beneath the covers again.
"Oh come on Rio! You're 14! Why are you so scared of..." Kosuke chastisted her, but froze when a foot stepped into the room. "Well well well... he's back. Told you it wouldn't take long." He said to Rio. Rio came out from beneath the covers. Jeremy stood there, dripping wet from having just been out in the storm.
"What do you want, Mr. dripping wet loser?" She asked.
"Even losers have pride." Jeremy said as he stooped over and picked up the puzzle rings she had tossed moments before. He casually undid them and threw them at Rio's feet. "Let's play a little game..."

Code SPIRAL 07 - nonbeliever...end.

it just had to end like that

hay hottie!