Title: Cursum Perficio
Rating: Strong PG-13, maybe R. Basically blood, guts, and gore. You know.
Summary: (ETM based AU) What did Vlad want with Niobe in the Chateau?
Spoilers: Enter the Matrix and the Matrix Reloaded. If you haven't played or seen them and don't want to be spoiled, don't read. If you want to know about ETM, go to my site for a transcript.
Category: Alternate Universe and Angst.
A/N: Constructive criticism is very much craved, as I'm not too sure about whether what I'm trying to do makes any sense. Please help me by telling me what you think and how I can improve!
Disclaimer: The Matrix and all its appendages are the brainchildren of Larry and Andy Wachowski and are carefully guarded by Warner Brothers. Enter the Matrix was developed by Shiny Entertainment and produced by Infogames. This is purely a piece of nonprofit entertainment. Cursum Perficio is the title of a song on Enya's Watermark CD.
A special thank you to Blake, who generously betaed the fic for me. *bows reverently*
Chapter One: Warehouse
Niobe knew from the moment she walked in that something was very wrong with the Chateau. It was so...foreboding.
She knew she couldn't deny that it was beautiful. Warm sunlight poured in from the story-high stained glass windows, accentuated by flowing curtains. Fabulous paintings, one of whom Niobe believed was Poussin's Et in Arcadia, Ego... adorned the walls along with friezes and decorative coats of arms. And along the floor, a plush ruby-red carpet ran through the halls, contrasting with the white marble and softening the sounds of Niobe's footfalls. It was truly a beautiful place, as dazzling as a diamond.
But for all its beauty, this gem gave off no warmth. The window's stained glass warped the outside world and made Niobe feel like a caged animal. The formality of the Chateau's Baroque architecture coupled with its immensity was oppressing. She felt more on guard in here than she had felt back in the sewers a few short minutes ago.
And, most disturbing of all, there was no sign of anything alive in the place aside from her, not even a pet cat. Niobe was damn well sure of that. It was so quiet that she could have heard a pin drop.
Okay, let's find a spot where there's reception, get directions from Sparks, find the key the jackasses stole, and get the hell out of here, she told herself, rounding a corner from the Great Hall. She paused three steps later, glanced behind her, trying to see which direction Ghost, her first mate, had gone, and did a double take.
The door she had passed through no longer showed the Great Hall on the other side. Now it was...a bedroom?
"What the hell...?" Niobe muttered. She walked into to the room and checked the door to see if it had been a trick or if she was seeing things, but it looked like the bedroom had always been there.
Maybe the entry point location changed, like in the maintenance passage, she rationalized, trying to make sense of what was going on. She shook her head, rejecting the possibility. No, that makes no sense. The door has to be closed first, and I didn't close it-
SLAM!
Back in the hallway Niobe had sought to venture into, the sound of a slamming door echoed, amplified by the marble. She wheeled around to investigate and spotted a man at the opposite end of the hall, several hundred meters away from her.
He was dressed all in black, reminiscent of how she and other rebels tended to dress inside the Matrix. He also had straight, limp, shoulder-length black hair and skin so pale that it was practically white. All he needed was a black cape, and he would have been an instant winner in a 'Severus Snape lookalike' contest.
Niobe stared at him, silently demanding that he explain himself. He smiled, clearly entertained by her presence. He was daring her with his eyes, challenging her prowess. And behind her sunglasses, anger flared in her brown eyes.
She burst into a sprint towards him, confident that she would catch him. She was a free mind; no one could run faster than a freed mind save for Neo and Agents. She would kick this guy's ass and get the information she needed. No sweat.
Her actions apparently amused him even more. With equally quick steps, he turned down the hall to the left and disappeared around a corner, laughing heartily. All it did was infuriate Niobe. He was taunting her!
She focused, and the world around her slowed down, although her pace did not. She ran down a flight of stairs and around the corner after the man, following the sound of his laughter. Eventually, she did have to stop. Her breath was nearly spent, and she had not been able to catch up to him. The laughter quickly faded away, leaving her no indication as to where he had gone.
By now, the ship captain was through playing around. She reached for her cell phone and dialed the Logos' number, forgetting that it wouldn't work inside the Chateau. Only static greeted her at the other end of the line. Unfortunately, her error gave Vlad, the man she had been chasing all along, enough time to drop down from his perch on the ceiling and take her out from behind. She slumped to the ground before she could even react.
The laughter reminded her of Richard. That was why she hated it even more than what would have been considered normal.
Every Wednesday was order day, the day that the warehouse would receive its latest shipment of surplus items from other warehouses. What they would receive depended on what there was too much of. Usually, they got sent lots of damaged canned goods and plastic kid toys. But sometimes they would receive books, a record or three, or even some chocolate. She used to find it interesting.
After working three months in the warehouse, she had stopped caring what they were being sent. All it meant were different words on the invoice in any case. Eventually, she just stuck to her job: check the contents, make sure everything in her palettes had been received, label the cardboard boxes, and put the boxes on shelves so that someone else could come and get it when they needed it.
It was also (in theory) what Richard was supposed to be doing. Not that he ever did. Most of the time he would sit on his boxes and watch the others work while sipping a coffee or smoking a cigarette. When he did decide to work, he would casually toss the boxes to the nearest shelf, just to get it out of the way. The only reason he got away with it was because he had been with the company so many years. Or so she had been told by the others.
Today, he had decided that she was a source of entertainment, and watched her work from his perch atop a pile of boxes of baby bottles. She found it disconcerting initially, but refused to let him see that it bothered her. She kept her eyes and mind on her job, and tried to ignore him. It was easy, at first. At least until he started talking.
"Ooh, nice throw hun!" he remarked sarcastically as she tossed a lighter box onto a high shelf. She allowed herself enough pause to glare questioningly at him before returning to her job.
"Aw, c'mon. I'm just trying to be nice," he continued, hopping down from his makeshift seat and walking towards her.
"I'm sure you are," she answered flatly, ending the conversation she didn't want to have.
He cracked a smile and laughed, as if she had just made the funniest joke ever. "That's my girl," he said, pinching her ass, "always playing hard to get." He sauntered away, probably to the bathroom, without giving her a chance to react. She stared in the direction that he had left, fury growing in her expression.
Don't fucking touch me.
Thunk. Thunk. Thunk. Thunk.
It was the constant slamming of her unresponsive body against the wooden staircase that brought Niobe back to consciousness. She groaned and tried to move on her own, quickly assessing the situation. She had been caught, and was being dragged up a very long staircase by the collar of her snakeskin jacket.
Her captor, Vlad, stopped pulling her up the stairs, noting that she was awake again. He slinked around her so he could see her face to face. Again, he smiled a Cheshire grin. He looked like he had just won the lottery.
"I know I should take you to the Merovingian," he said in a mocking tone, "but the thing is, he might just kill you."
He backhanded her across the face, and the world faded to black again.
Speed had always been her outlet. For as long as she could remember, she had always wanted to go faster and farther than before. It had always set her apart from everyone else. No one her age could run faster than she could. She had never questioned this desire, although she had pondered about 'why speed?' for a long time. Eventually, she settled on a one-word answer: escape.
And it made sense. She never ran in competitions, or to win. She never ran seriously against someone else. She ran for herself, to get away. It was only when the world faded away to a blurry mass did she feel clarity. She ran when she needed to think.
When she was seven, she learned to bike, and the possibilities expanded exponentially. She was thrilled at the ability to go faster than before. For hours on end, she would take her bike and whiz through the city streets, exploring new areas and contemplating in known ones. When she was on her bike, she was untouchable, the master of her world. When she could feel the wind against her face, she felt in control.
Imagine her glee when she learned how to drive a car.
Niobe wasn't sure how much time had passed. Minutes? Hours? Days? She felt like she had just been unplugged and was lost in a myriad image and senses that she couldn't handle because her mind was confused. Wooden ceiling. Hard floors. Dust. Musk. Smoke. Candles were burning on tall candlesticks all around her; daylight was trying to creep in from a tiny window. Time held no meaning.
A clammy hand caressed her cheek, cold to the touch. Instinctively she jerked away.
Vlad smiled and stepped away from her. The candles started to fall, one after the other. The world began to spin again, spiraling away from her perception.
Niobe distinctly felt something prick her neck.
She was approached in one of her favorite haunts, a park next to the lake. She had stopped to sit at a bench in front of a fountain to take a breather, when he walked up behind her.
"You're almost as fast as you are when you're racing your car," he said, catching her off guard. She watched as he joined her on the bench, smiling knowingly. He was definitely well off, based on his expensive leather jacket and pale skin. His eyes were hidden behind a pair of brown-tinted sunglasses.
"I think you've got the wrong person," she replied evasively, getting up to leave. This man had invaded her solitary world without invitation, and she didn't feel like talking. That was why she was running.
"No, I don't. You're Niobe. You won that cash prize at the races outside of town. You're pretty good, especially for your age."
"Was. My car's impounded," she corrected, crossing her arms, "now what's the point of all this?"
He stood up and faced her, nodding slightly. "Of course. Where are my manners? My name is Tiresias. Your friend Joseph told me about you."
"I haven't seen him in months. Last I heard from him was that he was going off to find the answers to some...personal questions."
Still running. Still refusing to trust.
"He did. He told me to tell you, 'I ran fast enough to escape.'"
That got her attention. She had been close with Joseph; he was her best friend. He knew her racing name. And, more importantly, he knew something nobody else but her knew. He knew why she ran. To escape.
Tiresias appeared to be content with the tidbits of knowledge that he had offered to her in a few short sentences, and took out a piece of neatly folded paper, handing it to her in a quick and smooth gesture.
"He wants you to find your way out too. Think about it," he quipped. Then, when she looked up from the paper he had handed her, he was gone, as if he had never been beside her.
She stared at the slip of paper in her small hands, and unfolded it, revealing a telephone number and an address for a place downtown.
It was only later, when she and Ghost had escaped the twisting labyrinth of the Chateau, had outrun the Twins in a stolen car, and had made it back to the exit that she even noticed the wound.
"Captain..." Ghost began, offering her the hardline phone first. She shook her head. He had been just as beat up as her, and yet her first mate still felt a need to ensure her protection first and his second.
"After you," she ordered, cracking a small smile. Ghost didn't argue the point with her any further and jacked out, his form disappearing into thin air as the Matrix enveloped the space he had been occupying.
Niobe replaced the phone and waited for it to ring, glancing around the empty building and outside to ensure that they had not been followed. Her hands ran up her own neck, supporting it and kneading the tense muscles. She felt something warm and sticky on her left hand, slowly seeping under her gloves from the openings for her fingers, and frowned. It was drying blood.
Niobe opened her leather jacket to the point where she could expose her neck, and walked over to a window, examining her wound in the opaque reflection.
There was no doubt about it. It was a bitemark.
The bastard fucking bit me! What the hell did he think he was? A vampire? She thought, mentally cursing Vlad.
The telephone on the wooden table at the centre of the warehouse began to ring again, snapping Niobe out of her reverie. She zipped her jacket back up and answered the phone.
What Niobe wasn't sure of was whether or not he really had been a vampire. As the Oracle would later tell Neo, she was right.
Last edited: November 2, 2003.