"Nick, why's he spazzing?" Michael was panicking as he seen Jeremy's body jolting up a bit, Nick was writing very hastily as he looked up at him then back to the body of his newer friend.

"I don't know. Should we wake him?" Nick wasn't sure if waking Jeremy up was smart, it could harm him.

"I dunno...Let's let him stay in his head, it's not like the antivirus can hurt him."

***

"G-Guys, do you know how to kill this thing!?!? Like....at ALL?" Jeremy was panicking, hiding behind Winston, who was using his own manifested blade like weapon to attack the antivirus.

"We have to find a way to override it."  Eric used his own weapon, aka his shock conductors, to send electricity towards the antiviruses. They was phased for a few seconds before attacking yet again.

"How do we do that?"

"We have no clue, even as quantum computers, we don't have that knowledge. But what we do know is that we can fight these things until we-" Winston stopped when he heard a scream and turned to see Sal laying on the floor. He was holding his stomach and his manifested shield was down. He'd been stabbed by the teal antivirus.

"Bug number 3.0 accessed. Beginning termination process."

"No! Sal, c'mon you can't be dying."  Keira was using a whip to keep the antiviruses away from Sal, who was already starting to glitch out. She picked him up and held him over her back as she continued whipping the two antiviruses. She wasn't letting him die on her.

"Keira if you keep holding him you'll die too!"  Winston warned and Keira shot him a glance of pure pain and anger.

"Winst I'm sorry, I am not losing Sal, we've already lost Shane. Sal is practically my twin, don't think I'm letting him die."  Winston nodded in understanding and went back to protecting himself from the antivirus, and he noticed Eric was wearing himself out from using so much electricity.

"Eric you need to stop. You're gonna hurt yourself." He sliced one of the antiviruses in half and it vanished.

"Winston I-I think you killed it!!" Jeremy smiled before he heard noises and seen it remanifesting. "N-Nevermind! It's not dead!!"

"QUICC Model J4S0N 7.0 Rebooting. System loaded." 

"Oh COME ON!" Jeremy was getting very annoyed when he heard Keira herself groaning. He turned to see her eyes were black instead of white, and her body was phasing in and out. He looked at the passed out Sal on her back and noticed how much pain he seemed to be going through...they weren't gonna win. The antivirus was corrupting all of them and he was gonna lose them. He was gonna lose his new friends...his new family...

"Jeremy stop thinking like that. W-We'll win...I'm not gonna let them die."  Eric grabbed the red antivirus' hands and sent electricity through her. She stopped moving a lot longer than his ranged shocks and he felt as if he'd figured something out when he heard serious glitching coming from Sal and Keira. "No....Winston can you handle them?"

"Yeah. Why?"

"I'm gonna try and save Sal and Keira's codes. Maybe we can bring them back once we kill these things." Eric pulled up a screen and tried to quickly copy what remaining fragments of codes his fellow Squips had and he managed to copy most of it. Their bodies were still there and Keira was still fighting. She turned to look at him and smiled, her eyes filling with static.

"D0n't w0rry 3r1c...You and Winst c4n s4v3 us...I kn0w it."  Eric felt his heart sink a second time as he realized her and Sal were both fading from existence. He quickly grabbed their remaining code before Winston got pushed back into him, quickly deflecting an attack. They both stood up and were back to back, fighting both the antiviruses like their lives depended on it...well they did but still.

"Can I do anything to help you guys? L-Like...at all?"

"This is your head. You should be able to manifest some kind of weapon."  Winston suggested and Eric nodded in agreement and Jeremy somehow managed to manifest a gun in his hand...the same gun from Apocalypse of the Damned. He got into the back to back formation and helped the two of them by shooting the antiviruses back and away from them. Of course that didn't work and they kept coming. Eric grabbed the hands again and shocked yet again and realized the longer he did it, the more phased they became.

"Eric, a-are you okay?"

"I have a plan. Winston, I need you to shock me."

"WHAT!?"

"Winston I NEED you to shock me and then lock my conductors. When I say go, you need to unlock them. Then get Jeremy upstairs." 

"What the hell are you planning Eric?"

"They're weak to electricity. I've shocked them and it phases them. Now hurry up and shock me."

"I don't think-"

"WINSTON!! Shock Eric please! I know I t-told you not to, but if this helps save the o-others it's worth a shot...please..." Jeremy was brimming with tears again, shaking in fear and Winston nodded, his hands becoming green as he pulled Eric away from the antivirus and began shocking him. "I-I'll hold 'em off." Jeremy began shooting and watched as Eric let himself go through the pain of being shocked. 

Eventually, Eric's conduction bands were glowing green. He smirked as he quickly began sending his own electricity inside of them. Jeremy noticed his eyes were glowing green and blue, and that Winston seemed much weaker than before.

After what felt like forever, Eric's entire body seemed to be glowing.

"Winston, go. Now."  Winston quickly unlocked the conductors and grabbed Jeremy, running upstairs and staring down at what Eric was planning.

The smaller Squip made his way towards the antiviruses, his entire body glowing.

"You took away my brother. You took away my family. And you tried to take away my emotions...but now...now you're going to pay. You're not antiviruses...you're viruses, and your reign ends NOW!"  He grabbed both of them by the neck and began sending electricity through them. Their weapons fell and they both froze.

Eric's body was glowing extremely bright, and he was screaming from both pain and acceptance that what he was doing could very much well....no...he didn't care. All he cared about was Shane, and Sal, and Keira. He sent their codes to Winston internally and focused all his emotion and concentration on killing these viruses that threatened his home.

"W-Winston...he's....he's exerting a l-lot of energy, are you s-sure this is s-safe?" Jeremy asked but Winston was dealing with unscrambling the code of the other Squips to hear him.

Back downstairs, Eric's body was slowly becoming code itself, the electricity eating him up alive. He didn't care. He never had, not until recent. It was something he was good at. He'd scrambled the viruses enough but he wanted to ensure they died and never came back. Jeremy didn't deserve to deal with them.

"Winston can you hear me? I-I think Eric's gonna kill h-himself." Jeremy muttered in fear and Winston quickly turned to see the dying Eric still shocking the viruses. His body had white cracks in it, and in those cracks, his code was visible. He was smiling still as he felt himself ripping apart.

"That was for Sal, Keira, and Jeremy....and this....this is for messing with Shane."  Eric's eyes began glowing white and he screamed as the electricity shot out of him. Jeremy stared as the entire lower floor glowed white before the light faded away.

He ran down to see the viruses had been deleted completely, but noticed how disheveled Eric was. His eyes were nothing but binary, his circuit marks were gray, and his body was covered in cracks of light from where he'd broken his code.

"ERIC!"  Winston ran over and looked at the broken Squip in front of him. "E-Eric can you hear me? Eric? C'mon you...you can hear me right?"

"W-W1nst0n...T4k3 g00d c4r3 0f J3r3my f0r m3..."  Eric smiled, and what a broken smile it was, and he fell into Winston's arms, and the taller Squip began sobbing at his unconscious body.

"E-Eric? Please...no...I-I'll save you...I-I won't let you die..." Winston got very little of Eric's code but he did get some as Eric finally faded from Jeremy's head.

"W-Winston? What are you doin?" Jeremy asked as Winston plopped on the floor and began messing with the coding he'd been given.

"I'm recreating the others' bodies. It might take some time, depends on how scrambled they are...but I am going to bring them back..."

"I...can't believe Eric killed himself to s-save us..." Jeremy sat down next to Winston, laying on his shoulder for comfort.

"I didn't think he'd ever do that. I knew he'd gotten attached to Shane as a side experience, maybe because Shane cared about him before the rest of us, but I didn't think he'd do that..."

"I...heard him say Shane was like his brother...Maybe that's w-why...why he did it. I feel b-bad...he's died twice now Winston...and once was m-my fault..." Jeremy began sobbing and Winston began rubbing his back with one hand, managing the code with the other.

"Shane's code is the lease scrambled...I'll try and bring him back first."

"It's w-what Eric w-would want..."

***

"Why is Jeremy crying? Michael!? I should wake him up." Nick was panicking, writing down what he was watching, which was now a curled up Jeremy, crying and gripping the pillows on his bed.

"I don't think it's smart to wake him up yet Nick...He's probably having an emotional breakdown with the Squips...he...he doesn't need to be disturbed, who knows what happened in there." Michael whispered and Nick nodded, laying against Dustin and sighing. They heard the door open suddenly and all turned to see Christine staring awkwardly at them.

"Cuz? Why a-are you here?" Nick asked and Christine wiped sweat off her brow and readjusted her headband.

"I was jogging and seen both Michael's and Dustin's cars in the driveway of Jeremy's place and got worried. Now, what's going on?"