IceBlade28: Well, my first Matrix fic. I'm branching out from my usual FE stories, trying to find what else works. And my muse for this fic will be Kid.
Kid: I'm here why?
IceBlade28: Because I am the author. I am the all-knowing God of your Universe. And if you cross me I will erase you from existence.
Kid: Oh, okay. Start the fic!
Blip
I don't know what I did to deserve this. I've been good, haven't I? Granted I've never believed in this Neo fellow or this whole 'Matrix' deal, even though the wacko's that visited me did. But come on- I didn't deserve this! It was dark, cold, rainy, and little flying messengers of death were trying to find a home in my back.
I turned a corner and briefly heard the sound of a bullet crashing into the brickwork by my ear. The sound was deafening, and I managed to gasp out a swear word as I ran harder down the alleyway. After the deal with the black chick and the Asian guy, things had just gone from bad to worse.
Wait. Lemme back up a bit. They, that is the crew of the Logos, decided to visit me at my house. In the dead of night.
-----
When they showed up at my door, I thought I'd swallow a lung; it wasn't difficult to see the angular bulge of semi-automatic's tucked under their clothes. At first I thought they were a pair of vigilantes or something: find the hacker, kill the hacker, trash his place and torch it to make it look like a gang attack. When they introduced themselves as 'Niobe' and 'Ghost', I changed my mind: they were government-paid mobsters who were going to kill me, trash my place, yada yada yada. Hence the codenames.
My hacking crimes to do with the Traffic Ops. board were still flashing in my eyes when they invited themselves in. So I hacked into the power grid and fiddled around with the lights- I just wanted to see a cool bunch of cars screeching and dodging each other. No-one was meant to die. They sat themselves down and told me some bullcrap about a computer program controlling our minds. This 'Matrix' or whatever it was. I'd hacked plenty of matrixes before; heck I had to get through one to gain access to the power grid in Traffic Ops. I not-too-kindly tried to escort them from my house. With a pistol I keep in the jar by the door.
In retrospect, threatening a pair of serious-looking, semi-automatic-armed people with a smidgey little pistol was a dumber idea than hacking into Traffic Ops. I guess I thought if I got the drop on them, they wouldn't be able to load their weapons.
The Asian guy, 'Ghost', rose slowly from his seat. I told him to drop the weapon; he decided to drop me instead. So, lying on the ground and unable to feel my legs, 'Niobe' tells me this deal with these red and blue pills, which she stuffs into my shirt pocket. Right then, this trio of greasy haired, lawyer-looking people literally kick the door off it's hinges. And then everyone pretty much lost it.
"Agents!" Niobe shouted, pulling out her weapon. Ghost didn't, however- he gave Niobe a shove towards the kitchen. I heard a crash and I knew I'd be paying for a broken window along with my door.
"About time!" I shouted at the laywer-looking people. "And are you going to pay for my door-" I shut myself up as soon as I saw the massive pistol spring into one of their hands.
"He has the pills," one of them droned.
"But he has not used them. Perhaps he can still be relocated, or his mind erased. Perhaps we could even bug him," the other asked, in the same monotone. The first one, the one with a massive pistol pointed at me, shook his head; I noticed a white earpiece danging from his ear. Unlike the other two, this guy had taken his earpiece out. I've worked in Traffic Ops, and I know one thing for certain: bad things happen when you take your earpiece out. Very bad things.
"It is too late. This man has been contacted by the rebels. He can no longer remain in the Matrix; he must be eliminated," the first droned. My eyes widened; I'd played enough online RPG's to know what 'eliminated' meant. And he'd mentioned that word: Matrix. If I'd been thinking straight enough to focus on something other than the pistol barrel pointed way too close to my face I might've believed Niobe and Ghost.
While this silent conversation was going on between me, the 'Agent' and the gun, the third 'Agent' had run into the kitchen. Even though I was still going cross-eyed at the pistol barrel in my face, I heard karate yells from the kitchen and the sound of more of my stuff being smashed. I felt the cold weight of my own pistol; could I use it? Would I even get a chance?
Without warning, Ghost came through the wall and landed on the other two dark-suited men. Heck, I'll just call them Agents. And for now, I felt like believing Ghost and Niobe. I didn't have much time to react, because one of the Agents kicked Ghost in the back. The poor Asian guy was getting pummelled, and he just disappeared somewhere in the ceiling. Probably came out through the roof.
I aimed at a black-haired Agent and squeezed the trigger of my pistol. A round blew neatly towards his head; he jerked his neck. The bullet just missed his ear and embedded itself in the floor. Now at the point of wetting my pants, I held the pistol in shaking hands as the Agent rose to his feet. I unloaded the rest of my bullets at his chest; in a display of Agent-coloured swirling air, every bullet whizzed past him and into my kitchen wall. It was like one of my favourite RPG's had exploded violently into my life. And I was stuck in my house with an empty pistol, no martial art skills and a pair of people who could dodge bullets.
"Oh, crap," I moaned as the Agent aimed his massive pistol at me. I managed to duck the first round and smash a nearby window by throwing my empty pistol at it, a window which I promptly dived through.
-----
And now back to the present. I'm running through a dark and wet alleyway with an Agent on my butt. The third one ran off after Niobe, and the second one is still ripping my house to pieces trying to find where Ghost landed.
A dumpster ahead of me sparked, signalling a missed bullet. The red and blue pills were starting to stain my shirt pocket from the rainwater; I pulled the red pill out and clutched it in my fist. Niobe had explained the whole deal with the pills to me, and there was no way was I going to use that screwy little blue pill. Something was going on here, and I'd be danged if I was going to sit back and ignore it.
I placed it in my mouth and began to swallow when a hideous buzzing filled my ears. It punched through my head and sent me to my knees in pain, my mouth open in a silent scream. The little red pill fell from my mouth and landed in a puddle of rainwater below. I looked at my hand; it was growing slightly, and the white cuffs of a shirt began to etch itself onto my skin. Maybe it was an Agent trying to take over my body! It didn't seem so wacked-out now that I'd seen them punch through a dry wall and dodge bullets.
I grabbed that little red pill and stuffed it in my mouth, trying to force it down my convulsing throat. The buzzing was making my vision wonky, and I felt my whole body going numb. I scooped a little rainwater into my hands and splashed it into my mouth, trying to swallow that dang pill. It was a life or death thing, and I didn't want to die. In the name of this Neo guy, I didn't want to die.
Finally the little red pill slipped down my throat. Almost immediately, the buzzing stopped, and I was able to stand. Strangely enough, the last thing I heard was an echoey scream, before it faded to the sound of rain. Maybe I'd killed the Agent when he tried to jump onto my body and I took the pill. Or maybe it was the product of a rattled brain. I straightened up, breathed some life into my shrinking lungs, and started climbing a rusty fire escape. Maybe I could see something from the roof. Maybe Ghost had landed on one of them after he went through my ceiling. But I had to find Ghost or Niobe- they were the only ones who could make some sense of the crap that had happened to me.
In a way, those who were once people to be feared were now my only chances of salvation.
I paused halfway up the ladder; a thought had just popped into my head, telling me to go back to my house. I shut it off; there was still an Agent at my house. Although, as far as I knew, Ghost was still there: so maybe there was a chance.
I looked through a window next to me. I was hanging on a ladder, and who should be within the room but a broken and very-injured-looking Ghost and a Niobe with bullet holes through her jacket. They were standing by a phone on a desk; a phone which quickly rang. Niobe said a few words to Ghost, words that I didn't catch. But Ghost placed the receiver to his ear, and then something very strange happened. It was almost nice to find I could still be weirded out. Ghost's form seemed to vanish into a series of white lines, almost like a template. A template which faded into a ripple-like haze, before disappearing altogether; like dropping a coin into a hole. A hole in reality.
Niobe hung up the phone, and it rang again. I'm assuming the person on the other end was the person hacking the Matrix. He must've been a master computer hacker, even better than the 'Trinity' I'd taken on before. At least, her screenname was 'Trinity'; she had come so close to successfully hacking the IRS database. I thought she- or maybe he, you could never tell with hackers- was pretty good, so I tried to hack her own computer. Trinity shut me down so badly I had to throw every piece of hardware out and start from scratch. Maybe it was her calling. Maybe it was her hacking the Matrix. Maybe. Maybe.
Niobe placed the receiver to her ear and followed the same pattern as Ghost. The phone fell from mid-air and dangled on it's cord.
I wrenched open the lock on the window and fell inside; my only thought was to reach that phone. Sure, I was a civilian, but I was a civilian that had met two of the 'rebels', a civilian that had escaped Agents and seen their powers, and a civilian that had eaten one of those funny red pills. I wanted answers.
I dumped the phone back onto it's base and quicky hit Redial. Holding the phone near my face, I was breathing hard. I guess an hour every morning at the gym wasn't quite enough of a workout for me.
Finally, a voice sounded on the other end of the line. A sweet, angelic voice. Except that the voice was male. I guess Trinity was a guy.
"Operator," it said. For a moment I thought I had the regional operator, but then I corrected myself. I worked in the phone business; it's how I was able to hack the power grid so easily. I knew the operator by person, and the Trinity (I'm assuming) on the other line wasn't Bill.
"Is this the . . ." I had to pause and tried to remember the name of Niobe's ship.
"Is this the, um . . Logos?" I tried. Trinity seemed to pause.
"Maybe," he quipped. "But who the heck is this?" I looked around frantically, wary for the slightest sound of Agents. I knew how easy it was to tap a phone line. I heard a little static on the other end, before a slightly familiar voice. I say slightly because I hadn't known her that long.
"This is Captain Niobe of the Logos. Who is this?" she demanded. I almost wept with relief. Maybe I'd get some answers now.
"This is the man who's life you threw in the blender," I said angrily. "I took your dang red pill, just in time to stop one of those freaky Agent things taking over my body. Some serious crap has been happening to me and I want some answers!" I yelled, getting angrier. I didn't ask for this, I didn't deserve this!
"How'd you get past the Agents?" asked Trinity.
"Sparks, shut up," Niobe said. I frowned at the phone.
"Sparks? I thought the only person good enough to hack into this Matrix thing was Trinity- that's who I thought was on the other end," I said, confused. Sparks snorted.
"Please. Trinity's with that bunch of high-hopes over in the Neb. I'm the designated Operator for the Logos," he laughed. I placed a hand to my temple; my life was going nowhere, fast.
"Look, Sparks- I saw how you got Niobe and Ghost out of there. Can you do the same for me?" I asked, hoping. There was silence on the other line, and a clang outside the door of the room.
"Please do it quick," I whispered. "I think there's-" The door of the room was promptly kicked off it's hinges in a repeat of what had happened to my own apartment. My worst fears were confirmed.
"-an Agent," I finished lamely, staring with wide eyes at the sunglasses-wearing Agent standing in the doorway.
"Alright, here's what's going to happen: Oh, sh-" Sparks' voice was cut off as a bullet shot past my temple and neatly destroyed the phone, and my hopes of escaping. I glared daggers at this Agent.
"You know, I didn't have any incentive for trying to kill you," I said belatedly. "But then you interrupted a private meeting. You hurt my guests, you trashed my house, you tried to shoot me. And now you're going to pay," I finished furiously, holding a lead pipe in my hands. It had been lying on the table with the phone; it now had a temprary home in my hands. I planned to relocate said pipe to a more permanent premises: the Agent's head.
"Mr. Hallomar," the Agent droned. I half expected it to come out with some Terminator 'You have been issued to be terminated' line.
"You are only human," it quipped. Funny. I'd barely known these guys for five straight minutes, and I already thought it impossible for them to 'quip'.
I brandished the pipe and moved forward. The Agent smiled; I paused. A smiling Agent was bad. Almost as bad as taking out your earpiece. It took me a little longer to notice the loaded pistol he still had, cocked and ready. I smiled back weakly.
"Oops," I stammered, trying to think.
"Goodbye, Mr. Hallomar," the Agent said. I dropped my pipe and ran, zig-zagging across the concrete floor. I was running for the window at the end of the room; the fact I was three stories up didn't occur to me. Bullets whizzed around my head, missing me by inches and less. By some miracle, I didn't get shot. The Agents must've had really bad accuracy, or my karma sure liked me today. One of those bullets shot past my neck and broke the window for me.
I had tunnel vision- the only thing in the world to me was that rainy window just ahead. I wanted to get out that window almost as much as I wanted to find out the deal with this dang Matrix business. It was then that I remembered I was three stories up; incredibly, I didn't care. Until I looked down and verified just how far it was to the ground. Then I started caring.
Behind me, the bullets had stopped. I guess the Agent was out of ammo. As if to confirm this statement, the Agent looked disgustedly at his pistol and tossed it aside. I couldn't jump out the window, no way. Which meant that this crummy, greasy-haired Agent was between me and my way out. I told him so. He didn't care.
"I'm going to enjoy killing you, Mr. Hallomar," the Agent said, cracking his neck. I walked slowly towards the pipe, picking it back up from the concrete floor. The Agent also advanced, grinning. I wanted so badly to wipe that grin off his face with my pipe, but in all honesty there was little chance of that. What hope did I have against a guy who could dodge bullets? I guess I'm trying to plead temporary insanity.
I ran forward and delivered a massive swing to the Agent's head; before I could blink, he'd ducked under my swing, knocked my legs from under me and punched me in the ribs, sending me skidding back across the concrete floor.
I painfully picked myself up, using the window ledge for support. Tears came to my eyes, and I had trouble breathing. I think he broke one of my ribs. Something in me cracked, and I let out a whimper. Okay, so more than one rib was broken. The Agent smiled and advanced, cocking his fist. Somehow I knew that if he hit me, I would go through the wall and end up falling three stories anyway. I held up my fists in a pathetic imitation of the Agent's style. Who knows, maybe I'd get a lucky punch in.
The Agent swung his fist at my face; I ducked, went for the most sensitive point on a male's body and connected. With barely a moment to lose, I grabbed him by the seat of his pants and threw him as far as I could. In retrospect, not very far, but it was far enough.
He fell out the window; I felt like laughing. I had just killed an Agent! Me! I think I'd exhausted my good karma supply for the next decade or so.
The matter was no longer funny when I saw his fingertips poking over the window ledge. Without hanging around for any clever 'Take that, villain!' lines, I ran for it. The Agent was more than capable of catching me.
Tail tucked firmly between my legs, I ran down the hall and up the stairs. By the time it occured to run down the stairs, the Agent was halfway down the hallway. I had no choice but to continue upwards. And upwards I continued, begging to whoever was up there- whether it was God, Neo, some other three-letter Deity, or Spongebob for all I care- not to let this Agent kill me.
At the top of the staircase, I heard the most wonderful sound in the world- the sound of a phone ringing. I knew it was for me. That little ringing phone was my ticket out of here. I spat out some phlegm and blood hat had worked it's way up from my lungs and hauled my butt up the rest of those stairs, the Agent dogging me every step of the way.
Finally I beat those stairs and staggered down the hall. After all the crap I'd been through it would take an army of Agents to stop me getting to this phone.
I ripped the receiver off and jammed it to my ear, turning around. The Agent was only a few metres away. I could see the anger in his eyes as he spear-tackled-
Nothing. I was gone, and for a moment I felt like . . . I dunno. I felt like I was a program in the Matrix or something; I could 'feel' everything. And almost everything was in it's right place, except for this little blip in the code. It was moving fast, and soon it would exit the Matrix.
The blip was me. And I had no idea where the heck I was going.
IceBlade28: Well, that was my first Matrix fic. I'll update when I get inspiration again- probably a month or so. Reviews would be great!