#kadic academy

~

This is set after "Final Round", after William is captured by X.A.N.A.

I've also made a reference to the episode titled "Attack of the Zombies" but it's very mild.

Reader and Ulrich are friends, no confessions as of yet. I hope you enjoy this, and I hope to get better at writing these things.

TW: Anxiety, panic attacks.

~

"So William's just... gone?" Yumi asked, eyes widened in disbelief.

"... Yes." Jeremy replied, pushing his glasses up the bridge of his nose. "Lyoko is completely gone, and I don't see him on my monitors."

"Jeremy and I are going to reconstruct Lyoko," Aelita spoke up, looking at the rest of the group as Jeremy turned away and back to the monitor. "William might show up after a while."

Silence followed.

"What... what if he doesn't?" (Y/N) asked slowly.

"Aww, relax, (Y/N)!" Odd exclaimed, setting his hands behind his head. "He will. He'll be fine. X.A.N.A. doesn't like throwing away new toys."

"Odd's reasoning is somewhat logical, for once." Jeremy's voice agreed. "I'll look for him."

"What about William's absence? Jim's going to kill us." Ulrich pointed out, hands folded.

"A simple morphed call as William's father should do the trick."

"I knew something like this would happen." Yumi grumbled, clenching her shaking fists. "He was too careless, and now he's just stuck..." she swallowed and exhaled, and her voice came out shaky when she spoke after, "We shouldn't have asked him to join."

"Agreed." Ulrich sided with her.

"Th-that's not important right now!" (Y/N) piped up hotly, making the others -- even Jeremy -- turn to look at her. A breath. Though they were all friends, it still made her nervous to have so many people looking at her, especially Ulrich, whose eyes were the ones staring directly into hers. "We have to find him and set this right. He's a person for god's sake and he's missing!"

"(Y/N), you're right." Aelita was the first person to approach her, gently squeezing her hand. "I promise you we'll find him. Okay?"

~

Jeremy and Aelita stayed back at the Factory while the others climbed down the sewers.

Usually, Odd Aelita, Jeremy and Ulrich, being boarding students, would part from Yumi and (Y/N), the day students, to get to Kadic's boiler room. The girls would then travel to the neighborhoods and get home. Tonight, just the walk through the sewers was agonizingly slow.

Too silent. Too silent.

It's because of you, a voice in (Y/N)'s head whispered. It's because of you. Apologize.

(Y/N) clenched and unclenched her fist. It wasn't a noticeable action, but it did help her calm herself a little bit.

"I'm sorry for raising my voice back there." (Y/N) said after about ten clenches. "I'm just worried."

"That's alright, (Y/N)." Odd smiled. "We understand. Besides, Ulrich and I might have been insensitive too."

"Yeah, sorry about that, (Y/N)." Ulrich supplied.

Yumi, who was the one walking ahead of all of them, suddenly came to a stop.

"I should send William's Dad's contact number." she said, her voice thick. "You guys go on ahead."

She went to lean against the walls of the sewer tunnels.

"I have his number." (Y/N) piped up, opening her phone's contact list. "I can send it to-"

"Just go, please." Yumi said forcefully. "Please."

Gahh, what was wrong with her today?

An unsettling pit of acid bubbled in (Y/N)'s stomach. It's you. You're the problem.

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to upset you." (Y/N) said. "I-"

A hand squeezed her shoulder, and she squeaked in surprise, seeing Ulrich behind her.

"Let's go, (Y/N), I'll walk you."

"But I didn-"

Yumi sank to the ground, sliding down the wall till she could put her head on her knees and cry. It was no secret that she liked William, even after Ulrich had been particularly sour about it, so a part of (Y/N) could understand why she was so upset.

Before she could say anything, Ulrich was guiding her towards the entrance that led to the city. (Y/N) turned her head around, her (H/C) hair nearly whipping Ulrich, to glimpse Odd hugging Yumi to comfort her before they took another turn.

"I didn-didn't mean to start anything off." (Y/N) said when Ulrich let go of her slightly. "I just..."

"I know." Ulrich said gently. "It's just that Yumi doesn't exactly like expressing her feelings in front of people she's not very close to."

Yumi, Y/N and William were in the same class. Y/N and William had joined Kadic together from the same previous school, and William had taken to Yumi immediately.

(Y/N) had tried too, but..

"I'm not very good at understanding social cues, I'm sorry." Same reason why she hadn't been able to make any other friends except William in her previous school too.

And now, she had lost that friend.

"Yumi didn't like me knowing about the scanners and Lyoko too... did she?"

"What?" Ulrich gaped. "No, no. It's not about-- okay, well, yes." he changed his answer after (Y/N) gave him a look. "But you can understand why... Lyoko is a dangerous thing and the more people knowing, the more dangerous it is."

They walked together in silence.

(Y/N) knew how she had heard Ulrich, but she couldn't help the queasiness in her stomach, couldn't help but listen to the voice in her head telling her it's all your fault, you should have tried better, you should be more normal and understand Yumi, you should have gone in and scanned yourself and let it be you instead of William.

She clenched and unclenched her fists again.

When (Y/N) had been younger, the panic attacks came without warning, where even the slightest misstep caused her to spiral down into what she could only describe as absolute, agonizing hell. She wouldn't be able to breathe, wouldn't be able to think straight, let alone stand. She would feel queasy and vomit.

Going to school when she was younger had also been a herculean task. Loud noises, and people, so many people she had to look at and talk to -- and so many people who made fun of the way she spoke, the way she was slower than others, and how she was weird and different -- and no matter how much she tried, she would end up getting hated anyway.

William was the only person who understood -- the only real friend she'd had.

(Y/N) stopped walking. It was all too much.

"(Y/N)?" Ulrich whispered, meeting her eyes. The night made his eyes look black.

Black void. Black despair. William. It was all too much.

"I have to go.." was all she could manage before she got to an open corridor where sewer water was collecting. She knelt down and hurled the contents of her stomach into the stream, hurled and hurled and cried and cried, panting, out of breath.

"(Y/N)-- Oh shit, what happened?"

"I'm-- I'm sorry." (Y/N) sobbed.

"Are you alright?" he asked, sitting down beside her. She avoided his eyes. "Hey, hey, look at me."

She sobbed some more at her own inability to be able to look at a person and hold their gaze. Eye contact scared her, and it was hard when it was like this, when she felt like she couldn't quite do anything worthwhile.

"(Y/N), please, please don't cry.." Ulrich sounded helpless. She was looking at his crossed legs, wiping her eyes. "Is there something I can do?"

No, nobody could do anything. William was in the digital sea, Yumi hated her, she couldn't even look at people -- there was nothing that could be done.

Hands touched her face. Rough, calloused hands. Ulrich's -- penchaksilat's doing, no doubt -- and they were familiar. She had definitely felt them before. Hands that slowly tilted her face upward. She closed her eyes.

"D-don't do that." she told him and his hands dropped at once. Everything put her on edge when she couldn't breathe. But, Ulrich.... Ulrich was trying to help. "I'm having a p-panic attack. Tha-that doesn't help."

"What does help, then? I want to help."

What helps?

She wiped her eyes, lowering her head till it about touched her own cross-legged feet. Covering her mouth with her hands, she breathed in and out. The sewers were suffocating, but she needed this. The exhales came out as sobs, and no matter what she tried, they didn't stop coming out as sobs.

"G-go." (Y/N) choked out to Ulrich, still not looking at him. "It's l-late. Go."

"I won't leave you like this."

She had only known Ulrich a short time -- shorter compared to William -- but she knew that he was stubborn. And kind.

Come on, get up, (Y/N).

Slowly, (Y/N) lifted her head up and opened her eyes. She saw Ulrich's face. He sighed, looking very clearly relieved now that she was looking at him.

"Trying to calm down is difficult. I've always taken a long time after a panic attack. It's hard." she explained, trying to keep her voice as leveled as she could, but a sob and a stream of tears escaped her after the 'hard'. "Sorry that you had to see me like this."

Ulrich looked sympathetic. Kind.

"You don't have to apologize for anything, (Y/N)." he said. He looked contemplatively at her for a moment, maybe two. Then he sighed. "I can't imagine how hard this entire situation has to be for you. You're new to the whole Lyoko thing and William's a close friend of yours...."

William had noticed a long time ago that Yumi and her friends were always disappearing, always off into a world that seemed different than the ones they lived in. He told her of dreams he had, of defusing bombs to save the whole Lyoko gang, how it all felt too real to be a figment of his imagination.

(Y/N) hadn't understood then, but with dreams of zombie students and a heartfelt moment between her and Ulrich out in the snow, she had started to realize that his theories had some substance to it.

He had been right -- the Lyoko warriors were in a world of their own. And by proving his resourcefulness, he had been inducted as one of them, and -- with one thing leading to another -- so had she.

"Best friend," she corrected. How many times had he stood up for her since they had been kids? "You said that the Return to the Past won't bring him back?"

He shook his head. "No, it doesn't work that way." Then, he added, "Odd was right back there, though. William was great with that sword, and X.A.N.A will not let a good fighter go."

"But he will be under this X.A.N.A's control?"

"Not for long, you can bet on that." He set his hands on his knees. "Jeremy's good at what he does, and Aelita's his better half. We'll keep trying to bring him back."

(Y/N)'s mind thought of Mr. and Mrs. Dunbar. They were back home, going on about their night, not knowing that their son was trapped in a virtual world. An involuntary sob choked her, and as she recovered, coughing, she prayed that this truly wouldn't be for long.

"How long have all of you fought X.A.N.A?"

"Nearly two years." He scratched the back of his head with one hand, and she met his eyes again. Brown, not black, she noted to herself. "It feels like forever."

"You're... really brave." (Y/N) said quietly. Ulrich's eyes widened and she averted her gaze to the tunnels on the side. "I've only known about this for two weeks, and here you are, fighting this monster for two years with nobody knowing."

"It becomes a part of your day. I don't see heroism in it." he shrugged.

"I think it shows that... all of you really care about this world." she countered. "And everyone in it."

"I don't know what to say." Ulrich admitted. "That's nice of you."

"Thank you."

Silence followed again, but this silence was warm. Surrounded by sewage made things less ambient, but it was fine nonetheless.

"How long have you know William?"

"Four years. We... went to the same school together. He came here after his expulsion, and so did I." It was only logical.

"He's a boarder, though?"

"His parents work at our hometown since that's where their business runs. My parents shifted here so that I could travel to Kadic easily."

A thought occured to her.

"Oh no, it's too late." she whined. "I've got to go home."

She got up and dusted her clothes with her hands. Ulrich stood up too. "I'll come with you."

"No, that's alright-"

"Just until the gate. Then, I'll go back."

(Y/N) smiled, albeit a little unsure. "Are you sure?"

"Of course."

~

They walked till they got to the cityside entrance of the sewer base.

"Thank you, Ulrich." (Y/N) told him sincerely.

"Not a problem, (Y/N)." he replied. "Get home safe." A pause. "I know this wasn't really the greatest introduction to Lyoko, or to our lives, but this won't be for long." He met her eyes fiercely, with determination. "I know I haven't been the best to William, but I'll do everything I can to find him. We all will."

"I believe you." (Y/N) assured him. She looked at his hands. Calloused hands, she would always remember them for the kindness they showed her. A flicker of a dream appeared in front of her -- of him holding her hand as they ran from zombified students. It hadn't been a dream. She gently touched his hands and smiled, "Good night."

She let go, and he waved, and she walked out into the night, a smile lingering on her lips.

Ulrich watched (Y/N) go -- her (H/C) hair dancing slightly in the night wind, and watched her till she turned to the next street, where her house was.

His phone rang, and he picked the call, going back into the sewers.

"Where are you?" rang Odd's voice. "I'm back inside our room. Jim's on rounds!"

"Coming. It took a while to drop (Y/N)." He got back to the sewer tunnels. "How's Yumi?"

"She's okay. Better. Really missing that Cassanova. I still think that if (Y/N) and William hadn't shown up, you and Yumi would've fallen in love with each other instead of them."

"Odd." Ulrich hissed warningly.

"I'm not saying it's a bad thing! It's cute. Love is something you can't control."

"I'm hanging up on you." Ulrich stated before doing just so.

(Y/N) was different than most people, in that she was kinder than most people were, more empathetic. He still remembered how she had believed him when he told her that they knew how to help everyone else from the zombie attacks, and how she had accompanied him to the factory without hesitation. A Return to thhe Past had erased her memories of everything they talked about that day -- about her autism, about his vertigo, about how long they had been figting X.A.N.A. for. It was that kindness that made him fight the others to tell her about Lyoko in the first place.

He wanted that kindness -- needed it.

I believe you, she had said when he told her about X.A.N.A the first time.

I believe you, she had said when he assured her they would bring William back.

Now, all he had to do was keep his end up, and -- one day -- believe in himself enough to tell her how he felt.

~

And that's all I've got for now!

Maybe later down the line, I'll write something to elaborate on the "Attack of the Zombies" episode moments.