There's an instinct when sleeping, to wake up.
After dreams, there is a space and one become aware of light, somewhere, warmth, beyond reach, and the darkness behind closed eyes. And there is an urge to reach, to surface, to break free of dreaming and know the real world.
Even if a consciousness is scattered through a world's code.
And as he wakes, slowly, painfully, he feels himself take a shape, a form. He becomes aware of cloth against skin, and the rustle of wind through leaves.
Starshine and streetlights. He opens his eyes, turns his head, and blinks at the scatter of windows, the dark sprawl of City. It begins to rain, quietly, softly.
A reforming of the world. A little girl's dream and he watches the clouds above him move without wind. Carefully, he sits up, running fingers through his hair. Water slicks and runs down his neck, his old t-shirt clinging to shoulders. Faded black cotton and denim, scuffed brown boots propped at the end of the park bench.
He stands, stretches, and begins to walk. Each step is a memory, and as he moves code slips and slides into order, making sense. He watches the play of tendons under skin, feels the pulse of blood, the rhythm of his breath, even as it hitches in his throat.
Neo leans on the rail at the harbour's edge, letting his head fall. The rain lessens, mists, and gives him no excuse for the water that catches in his hands. He shuts his eyes against the coming dawn, muffled words dripping into the ocean through his fingers.
Gone. And he, left behind, somehow trapped here, apart from his body, apart from the real. There is nothing he could do now, after waking, to dissolve back into dream. He knows he can not die. Nothing here is true, for him, and never will be.
"Hello Neo."
He does not turn at the smoker's voice, only hunches smaller when he feels her hand on his shoulder. She knows better, perhaps, than to offer her usual sweetness. He has lost faith in anything so innocent.
"Open your eyes, kid."
The word makes him choke, and he has to try again, "Why?"
"Haven't you seen the sunrise?"
There is warmth, faint as fading breath, but he looks up. Beside him, the Oracle smiles, and light on the water gleams brighter. Beyond the city, beyond the rain clouds, the sun is glowing soft.
He laughs, hollow.
"What's funny?"
"I never saw it. I know she must have, but when we flew above the storm I was already blind, and I couldn't see what she did."
"What was that?"
"The sky." He turns, then, and feels his mouth twist. "Trinity saw the sky, the real sky, and I've never heard a silence like that before." His hands grip the railing, paint crumbles. He wonders if he'll leave prints. "This isn't real."
"Kid," but that name isn't his, anymore. "Neo. Why are you still here?"
"Because I can't leave. My body's dead, and this is all that's left," he kicks a foot against the ground, another white mark on dark leather. A reminder of Thomas Anderson, and that's not who he is anymore, either.
"Just a mind?"
"Yes." Just a collection of memory and the aching knowledge that she's gone.
"Your mind makes it real."
His first lesson. Jumping with the hope of reaching safety and losing faith and falling. Losing all he believed in and crashing into the ground.
Her hand squeezes his shoulder again, and he flinches at the kindness of it.
"What were you doing before you woke up?"
"Dreaming of not being here."
"And it's just that easy," it occurs to him that she makes a little more sense than usual. "Your path is over Neo. You've got nowhere else to go but home."
And he pauses, looks beyond her, and up at the sunrise. There's too much colour, too much light; he half expects a rainbow to appear, and a dove to settle on his outstretched hand. It's all too perfect, and he knows that's wrong.
"Home?"
That smile creases at the corner of her eyes, and he mirrors it, briefly. He knows how much younger he looks, and the memory hurts in a good way now.
He lets go of the rail, and shakes the imprint of metal out of his hands. A change ripples along his skin, a familiar coat and black suit, the weight of shades in his pocket. He settles his shoulders and takes a step away from the Oracle.
"You understand me now, Neo."
He nods, a short formal goodbye. "I think, just one last phone call."
And she laughs at his smile, husky with smoke and age, and he hears the gold of sunlight as he leaves.
*
There's a knowledge, when falling asleep.
There's a point where one forgets the feel of reality, and slowly lets go of the world. Awareness fades, and memories that do not matter grow faint.
Yet, those that do glow stronger, brighter, and he falls into them like thought dissolving in a sunrise, like the crest of flight into a blue sky.
Until truth means what it never has and always will. Until there's just the comfort of a hand in his, and the welcome of one who has waited as long as she had to. And truth is nothing more important than knowing what/who to believe in, and how to return to her side.
And maybe it's forever, or maybe it's not. Maybe the next dawn will be real, or maybe sleep will last.
At least, this length of eternity is enough.