Little Angel of Mine Chapter 1: A Call in the Night, a code lyoko fanfic

A/N: Some of you may be familiar with this genre, but if not, I suggest looking it up on deviantART.

Little Angel of Mine

Chapter 1 – A Call in the Night

The moon hung high and the stars twinkled bright in the night sky of Paris as Aelita Schaeffer slept soundly in her dorm room at Kadic Academy, completely undisturbed. Her normally vivid nightmares about her past life and her present friends would have kept her awake all night long. But tonight, she was in a blissful slumber that she hoped would never end.

Sadly, she had hoped in vain.

A methodic beeping noise came from her computer on her desk, and she wearily opened her eyes and started to move. She slowly pulled back the covers, crawled out of her bed, and sleepily walked over to the desk chair. She plopped down in it and noticed an e-mail message pop up on her screen. The message read, "To Aelita, Sender Unknown."

"Huh?" she raised her eyebrow. "Who could this be?"

She opened the message, and it read, "Dear Aelita, I know of your struggles with trying to free your classmate William from the control of XANA. I have a program that could help you bring him back. Come to the factory at once and go to Sector 5. See you there, honey.

F.H."

"F.H.?" she gasped, knowing those initials all too well. "Daddy?"

Quickly, she threw off her night shirt and got into a fresh set of her day clothes, and sneaked out of the window of the girls' dormitory. She then dashed through the park to the secret entrance to the factory. When she got to the spot, she removed the manhole cover and climbed down the staircase that led to the sewer system. She grabbed her scooter and rode down the alleyway to the factory. Once she got to the stairs, she locked her scooter next to the railing and climbed up the ladder.

Aelita raced over to the opening to the building, jumped onto one of the ropes and slid down it to the factory floor. She then dashed to the elevator and pressed the large red button. Once the door shut, the elevator descended to the supercomputer mainframe room, where she sat down in the chair, put on the headset, and looked at the screen.

"Daddy?" she said into the microphone. "Are you there?"

"I'm here, Aelita," came the voice of Franz Hopper, Aelita's father and the creator of Lyoko and XANA. "I'm in Sector 5, and I'm ready to give you the code once you get here."

"But couldn't you just input the code from there without me?" she asked.

"Unfortunately, I can't," Franz replied. "There's some kind of interference that is keeping me from accessing the mainframe without someone being in a tower here on Lyoko."

"Really?"She raised her eyebrow. "I've never heard of that before."

"I'm dying to see you again," he added, with a tone of weariness. "You've no idea of how long I've wanted and waited to see you."

"Oh, daddy…" she said, her eyes now watering. "I'll be there right away." She started the three minute auto-virtualization sequence and climbed down the ladder to the scanner room. She stepped into one, the door closed, and light engulfed her as she was virtualized into Lyoko.

When she dropped into Sector 5 of Lyoko, she noticed that things were eerily calm. None of XANA's monsters were visible anywhere around her. She even virtualized right in front of a tower. She stared up at the tall white structure before furrowing her brow.

"Something's wrong," she said. "This is way too easy."

As if on cue, a swath of monsters composed of two dozen Kankerlats, five Bloks, three Krabes, two Tarantulas, and two Megatanks appeared out of nowhere. A shriek came out from above, and a Manta flew down from the ceiling. What was so special about this Manta was that it was darker in color than other Mantas, and there was a very familiar figure riding atop it.

"William!" she gasped as the possessed boy leapt from his mount and onto the floor. "What did you do to Dad?"

"Your father was never here," William replied in his warped voice. "I lured you here to extract your data!"

"What do you mean?" she asked.

William closed his eyes for a second, and said, "I've been dying to see you Aelita. Come to the factory at once." Aelita gasped when she heard her father's voice come from William's mouth.

"How did you do that?" she gasped.

"I took precautions in case I would need my creator's appearance," William said in a deeper voice.

"XANA," Aelita said, knowing that this was the demonic AI speaking through William. "What do you mean by what you said about 'extracting my data'?"

"I will extract your data so that I may enter the real world with this boy as my eternal slave and with a body of my own!" he shouted, thrusting his sword into the air. "Schyphozoa! Come forth!"

Suddenly, Aelita's heart skipped a beat as the terrifying jellyfish like monster came down from above and thrust its tentacles at the helpless Lyoko Warrior. She tried to run away, but a blast from several monsters prevented her escape. She could only look as the floating monster wrapped most of its translucent tentacles around Aelita and placed three of them near her head. When the monster started extracting data, the tentacles all began glowing red, and Aelita began to shiver. No one had even noticed that the tower she was facing began to glow the same shade of red.

===CODE LYOKO===

Meanwhile, a kilometer away, I, Jeremy Belpois, had just finished another program that would help my friends on Lyoko. I wiped the sweat off my brow before my entered the last string of data into the code and saved my progress. I checked my watch and noticed the time was around twelve minutes until midnight.

"Aelita's going to kill me for staying up this late," I said silently. "But I have to do this, or else XANA will gain the power to doom us all."

As soon as I said this, a loud beeping noise came from my computer. I gasped, as I knew it was the Lyoko Tower Scan at work. It picked up the trace of an activated tower in Sector 5.

"Oh no!" I gasped. "I've got to get Aelita!"

I quickly picked up my cell phone and dialed Aelita's number. It started to ring and I nervously tapped my fingers on my desk. After seconds of ringing on her side, her answering message kicked in, and I hung up.

"Why isn't she answering?" I asked myself. I glanced back to the screen and noticed something new on it. This was something that almost made my heart stop.

"Oh dear God," I gasped. "She's on Lyoko! What does she think she's doing?" Another look at the screen elicited another yelp. "The Schyphozoa has got Aelita! I need to get there right now!"

Without changing, I quickly put on one of my night jackets and a pair of shoes, and quietly opened the window to my dorm room. I climbed out the window and scaled down the dorm building, and made a mad dash to the manhole entrance to the factory. I noticed Aelita's scooter was missing, and I hissed as I unhooked my own scooter and rode through the sewer pipes to the factory. Once I got there, I saw Aelita's scooter parked next to the ladder. I locked my scooter next to hers, and climbed the ladder to the bridge to the factory's island.

I slid down the rope and instead of going to the elevator, climbed down the stairs next to the elevator into the supercomputer mainframe room. I raced to the chair and jumped into it, quickly putting on the headset.

"Aelita!" I shouted, looking at the screen. "Can you hear me?!"

After hearing nothing, I began to panic. "Wait," I said, starting to calm down. "The Schyphozoa's got Aelita, so she can't reply. I have to pull the materialization code before it's too late!"

I rapidly pressed several keys and hit the large 'enter' key. I looked at the screen as Aelita's data card disappeared from the screen, showing that she was materializing. I then ripped the headset out of my ear, jumped out of the chair, and dashed down the stairs to the scanner room.

==CODE LYOKO==

On Lyoko, William looked on as Aelita's body faded away. He cursed under his breath, but then a dark shadow appeared behind him. "Your mission was not a complete failure, William Dunbar. We have enough of what we need. In a few moments, you and I will enter the real world. You will retain your powers and you will have a new human body to rule the humans along with me!"

==CODE LYOKO==

"Aelita?" I called out. "Are you alright?"

I hit the floor of the scanner room and ran to the humming scanner as the door to it opened and it hissed out a cloud of steam. When I looked inside, I gasped because she was nowhere to be seen. I instinctively thrust my hands into the scanner and waved them around, wondering if she had turned invisible, which was something that XANA had done to her once before. I stuck my head into the scanner and looked up, finding nothing, and then looked down. It was when I looked down that I nearly fainted.

I saw Aelita passed out on the floor of the scanner, in her day clothes, but she was still not the same as when I last saw her. She would look perfectly normal to the casual observer if they didn't know that they were looking through a magnifying glass. To me, she had somehow shrunk to nine centimeters tall. My breathing now became extremely rapid as my gaze darted over my girlfriend's miniature form.

"No way," I stuttered, shaken. "How…how did…what…why is…how do I…what's going on here?"

I nervously moved my head down to her now-small body and hovered my ear over her chest. I heard her heartbeat, and sighed, relieved. Taking a deep breath, I reached down into the scanner and scooped up Aelita in my hand, standing up once I did so. I began hyperventilating to keep myself from going crazy.

"I'm holding Aelita in my hand," I said to myself. "I'm holding Aelita in my hand. I'm holding Aelita in my hand!" No matter how many times I ran it through my head, it made no sense at all! I took the elevator up to the mainframe room, and sat in the chair, placing Aelita down on an empty panel on the keyboard while I started typing. I would need both of my hands for this.

"Come on, XANA," I said. "What did you do?" I looked at the current data on the computer, and gasped. Somehow, the Schyphozoa had drained a part of her digital genetic code from her that had affected her materialization. "Okay," I said to myself, "how do I get her back to normal?" I glanced at my watch and then slapped my forehead. "Oh man! It's almost midnight! Jim will be patrolling the dorms, and he'll notice the open window from my room! I've got to get back there quick!"

I removed the earpiece, picked up Aelita again, and rode the elevator up to the main floor. Rather than take the rope, I placed Aelita in my jacket's breast pocket and climbed the ladder to the bridge. Checking to make sure that Aelita was secure in my pocket, I ran to the manhole and climbed down into the sewers, folding Aelita's scooter and slinging it over my back while unlocking my scooter and riding back to the school. I slipped past Jim, who was patrolling the grounds, and climbed into my window, shutting it behind me. I gasped for breath before reaching back into my pocket and gently taking Aelita out.

I stared at her tiny body, now in both of my hands, for a long time, still unsure if I wanted to or could believe that this was happening. I instinctively thought I should try to wake her up, but the thought of seeing her face full of fear at my form, which no doubt would be enormous to her, kept me from doing what my mind knew could not be avoided. So I gently placed her on my bed pillow and sat on my bed, too exhausted to try to work this out.

"Maybe Aelita has a point about me not staying up to late," I said to myself. "I don't feel too good and I can't fall asleep." I leaned back onto my bed, and I pulled the covers off, slid inside, and covered myself up. Once tucked in, I took off my glasses, placing them on my nightstand behind me, and turned my head to face Aelita.

I reached out to her, my hand hovering over her body, larger than she was. It took a lot to keep my breathing stable as I touched her cheek with my index finger. As I did this, I realized my other fingers were brushing her hair and back. I immediately drew my hand back, as I had no idea why I was just petted my girlfriend. While I pondered this, I noticed Aelita's body begin to move. I drew in a sharp breath as she began to move even more, rubbing her eyes and starting to sit up. She stretched her arms and yawned, which I thought was kind of cute for some unknown reason, and got to her feet, stumbling slightly.

"Huh?" she said, in a soft, silent tone that reflected her diminished size. "This isn't the scanner…" She then looked around her, confused at her new surroundings. "What? Where am I?" After looking down at the pillow, she finally, slowly, turned around and up to face me. I kept as straight a face as I could, but Aelita looked like she was going to scream.

"Aelita, it's me!" I quietly shouted, not daring to raise my voice for fear of it hurting her. I had read enough books to know that much. At the mention of my name, she gasped again and covered her mouth with her hands.

"J-Jeremy?" she gasped. "Is it…is it really you?"

"Yes," I nodded, sitting up slowly so not to scare her.

"But…but…" she stammered, trembling as I sat up, "how is this possible? You…you're…gigantic!"

"Maybe to you," I said, "but I'm not the one who's grown, you're the one who shrunk."

"How?"

"When XANA attacked you," I replied, "he stole some of your data that made up a part of your body. I don't know how or why he did it, but he did do it. He's the reason you shrunk when I rematerialized you. The tower is still activated, but XANA's not doing anything, so I believe it's safe for now."

"There's an activated tower?" she said. "Shouldn't you call Ulrich or Odd or Yumi?"

"To reiterate," I retorted, "XANA is not doing any noticeable activity, so we're okay."

"How can you be so calm?" she asked. "What about me? What am I going to do?"

I leaned in a little closer. "Aelita, I promise you that I will do whatever it takes to get you back to normal, but it's going to take a while. First, I need to find out how XANA did what he did to you and then we'll take the right course of action." I crawled back into bed, faced Aelita again, and smiled. "But right now, we should get some sleep."

"Okay," she said, still shaking. "Tomorrow we'll work on this."

I frowned sadly at her reactions. "Aelita, are you alright?"

Her back was turned to me and she didn't answer.

"Are you okay, Aelita?" I asked again.

"Hm?" she turned to me. "Oh, yeah. I'm okay."

"I'm…" I gulped. "I'm not scaring you, am I?"

"Is that it?" she asked. "You think I'm scared of you because you're a giant to me, don't you, Jeremy?" I gulped again, wondering if I had upset her. Before I could say anything in response, she walked over to me and placed her hand on my cheek, looking into my eyes.

"I'm not scared of you, Jeremy," she said, without shaking. "I admit that you did scare me to start with, but that was only because I had never experienced anything like that before and it caught me off guard. Obviously, you care a lot about me. Otherwise, you'd never have risked your own safety, followed me to the factory, saved me, and got me back to the school." She hugged my cheek and smiled. "That's not scary in the least."

I blushed rather profusely at this action, and then I smiled and brought my hand around, which wrapped around her in a sort of hug. She didn't even flinch as I did so, and I smiled again.

"Thanks a lot, Aelita," I said. "I needed that."

"Lucky thing we're on Spring break this week, huh?" she asked.

"Oh yeah," I said, releasing her. "That makes all of this less strenuous class-wise."

"So," she began, "where do I sleep?"

"Well, I don't roll around in my sleep," I replied, "so you could sleep next to me." I then blushed again as I said this. "Only if you wanted, though! I won't make you if you don't want to."

"It's alright," she laughed. "That would actually be nice. That way I'd be safe and we'd be near to each other."

I blushed again, but I did my best to hide it. "Well, alright then." I moved aside slightly, making space on my pillow for her to sleep on. "Good night, Aelita."

"Good night, Jeremy," she said, smiling and laying down on the pillow.

I took some of the thin sheets and laid them over Aelita. I then pulled the thick blanket over the both of us, and I closed my eyes. I may have been anxious at first, but Aelita cleared my doubts and calmed my mind yet again. Relieved at this, I drifted off into an easy and peaceful slumber, unaware that before I fell asleep, I had pulled back the sheets from Aelita's sleeping form, draped my hand over her, and pulled the sheets back.

A/N: Fluffy ending! What will happen next? You'll find out soon enough because I'm writing the next chapter now!

UPDATE: 3/11/2013 - I noticed several mistakes in Jeremy's intro. I originally meant for this to be all in third-person, but I changed to first-person with Jeremy. There were still a bunch of 'his' in the text, ann I changed them all. Next chapter's today!

-JeremyX signing off!