A/N: reviewed a few times, but not Beta'd by anyone else. I just really
wanted to get this done and out there. I've changed a lot from its original
post on the Hardline and I am continuing it. A sort of 'What if' that I
started almost after walking out of the theater on Nov 5th. I realize what
happened in Revs happened, but perhaps it could have happened another way
;)
Thanks to Beat for the kick-ass title (which is also an excellent movie you
should all go watch) Jah Love! HUGE thanks to Danascully for the ideas and
encouragement.
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"For certain is death for the born
And certain is birth for the dead;
Therefore over the inevitable
Thou shouldst not grieve."- Bhagavad Gita, Ch2
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Equilibrium ~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Everything that has a beginning has an end .
And every end is a new beginning.
Night falls at the end of day, spring blooms as winter fades - one follows the other, balancing.
For every beginning there is and end, and for each end, a new beginning.
This cycle had ended. soon another would begin. Her protector understood this, accepted it, and fought against it even as she did.
"So, they are going to restart it?"
"I believe so," she answered heavily then took a long drag at her cigarette. It wouldn't be soon, but it would happen: the cycle of life and death would continue.
"Neo's coming back, isn't he? I liked him. He was nice."
The oracle and her protector turned to regard the young exile program. She didn't yet understand, but she would...eventually. Her shell was swinging her small feet in the air as she sat on the park bench, long braid bobbing as she moved. Bring Neo back? The Oracle wondered and accessed the system. Continuity was rewriting the program to issue a De-ja Vu. A car crash . Interesting. What in the world were the outside machines doing?
The barge carrying the One moved away from the tower. The human male was barely alive after bringing about the defeat of the Smith program. The human would be taken and placed into a pod for transport to Zion. The machines would keep their word - there would be peace between them. Smaller nurse bots flowed down onto the platform to secure the human and monitor his condition.
"Trinity," he suddenly spoke. This information was relayed in an instant across the Machine network.
"The human female, apparently dead, level 101," a maintenance bot reported, spying the other human as it made its rounds. The system paused, waiting for the primary decision making AIs to consult their subprograms. Silently, the barge changed course, circling back around the crash site. Sentinels were already cutting through the twisted metal, exposing the innards of the tower to the blackened sky. A small, spider-like machine launched itself across the distance and landed with a metallic clunk on the inside of the breach. The machine skittered over the human female and sent an assessment back: Impaled by metal support rods, extensive blood loss, severe trauma and subsequent shock. Neural activity: higher functions down, lower barely operational.
The sub-machine awaited orders for exactly .04 seconds. Then it leapt on the human female's chest, snipped away the fabric, stuck two of its manipulators to her skin and administered an electric shock to her system. The machine was joined by a second and then a third similar to itself. The female did not respond to the first pulse so a second was given by two of the sub-machines. This time her heart started beating, circulating what little blood was left in her body. Neural activity still read low so the third machine administered a low level charge through her primary neural interface. The female gasped weakly.
A sentinel squeezed into the space and clipped the metal poles then lifted the body. Blood rained down from her, covering the smaller machines. Quick bursts of electricity cauterized the wounds. The female was placed on the barge and it quickly sped away, towards the smaller, on-site power plant.
The mood in Zion was mixed. The war was over, but at a terrible cost. An estimated third of the population had been lost in the fighting. For those on the last ships of the Zion fleet, the victory was bittersweet. No word came from the Logos. That they, or at least Neo had survived to make it to the machine city, was evident by the very survival of Zion. As the hours passed, the remainders of the Logos', Nebuchadnezzar's and Hammer's crews kept a sort of vigil over the communications channels.
"I take back anything I ever said about Neo being crazy," Roland admitted. His voice was gruff to anyone who didn't know him, but those that did could see he was trying to keep his emotions in check. Even Zen Ghost was having a hard time.
"Hey." Niobe found Ghost on Squiddie cleanup crew in the remains of the docks. The smelters were running full blast, turning the destructive squids into useable materials for the rebuild.
"Hey," Ghost replied as he used a cutting torch to crack the outer casing of a Sentinel. He turned off the flame and pushed back the protective helmet.
"No, word," Niobe told him in answer to his hopeful glance. The pain in his eyes intensified for a moment before he nodded and continued to cut. Niobe accepted this and went to find Morpheus.
He was working on the Hammer with Roland, the Hammer's crew and some Zion dockworkers. They were trying to get the hover pads up and running. If the Hammer could fly, they could use it to possibly lift some of the heavier debris away. He looked up with such hope in his eyes, she wanted to run over and hug him. Extreme self control stopped her from doing just that when she saw the shattered look in his eyes as she shook her head 'no'. She placed a hand on his upper arm and gave it a quick squeeze before diving into the repair work.
Nearly a day after the machines had left, there was still no word from the Logos. But there had been no hope they would survive the machines when Neo had saved them at the last moment. She had to keep hope, she owed them that much and more.
The human male would recover, but his eyes were damaged permanently. The machines fed antibiotics into the red conductive fluid he was suspended in and let his body regenerate. Soon he would be able to travel back to the human city. The female was in a much more serious state. Her injuries had been extensive and the medical machines had had to restart her heart twice on the flight to the power plant. A nurse bot dipped manipulators into her pod, repairing damage done to flesh and bone. The machines had learned much about keeping humans alive in extreme conditions at the beginning of the war but had not practiced this knowledge in years.
In the meantime, the machines would enjoy the extra energy two more humans provided via their pods. The reserve power plant contained animals that had once roamed the planet. They were a much less efficient energy source for reasons which still eluded the best programs. But they were far more docile and required little maintenance.
The nurse bot finished repairing a rupture in the female's intestine and quickly closed the incision with efficient staples. The female could be moved if she lived though the next day.
Neo woke slowly. The first thing he noticed was the bright light hitting his eyes. The second was the steady beep of some sort of machine.
"Am I dead?" he wondered. He was reminded of when he'd woken on the Neb. Only now, Morpheus wasn't there - though Tank and Dozer might be. But they were secondary. All that mattered was her.
"Trinity," he managed to say after three tries. A cheerful voice greeted him, but not the one he was expecting.
"Neo!" He turned his head and a fuzzy shape bounded towards him. Sati? But.hadn't he won? "Hi Neo! I'm glad you're back. I made you a sunrise, would you like to see it?"
"Easy honey, he just woke up," Neo's vision cleared enough that he could see he was in a hospital room of some sort. The Oracle was smoking a cigarette and sitting on a chair near the foot of his bed. Sati was bouncing on her heels next to him. He had a massive headache and the light from outside was hurting his eyes. Sati smiled brightly then skipped off back to where she'd been before: Neo could see a number of rag-dolls strewn across the floor. One wore an approximation of a black suit and red tie. Another wore a black and red dress. Neo watched as Sati picked up another doll, this one wearing a long, shiny coat and sunglasses. Neo's chest constricted as he watched the 'Trinity' doll beat the stuffing out of the 'Merovingian' and 'Persephone' dolls. He couldn't watch anymore and rolled onto his back, to stare at the ceiling. The tile pattern was far too regular.
"I'm in the Matrix," Neo said.
"Bingo," the Oracle replied and took another drag.
"Don't be sad Neo," Sati was again at his side. She pressed something soft to his chest and left to resume playing. Neo turned and saw that 'Seraph' was now beating on the 'Merovingian' doll. Neo looked at what she'd placed in his hands. It was the Trinity doll she'd been playing with. He felt like shattering into a million pieces. It was like losing her all over again. He'd done it twice, he was sure feeling this way a third time would kill him.
"I gave her the you-doll. She started to cry when she saw me playing with you and Smith, so I gave it to her," Sati said conversationally as Seraph executed an amazing flying kick which sent the Merovingian sliding across the floor and under the other bed in the room. Sati scurried after it and resumed her play, but Neo took no notice.
Trinity was there, chest rising and falling softly, a compliment to the doll he had tucked under one arm.
"My God. I am dead."
"Still not too bright I see," the Oracle chided softly.
"I'm not dead."
"That's what I told you before."
"How?" Neo asked, voice cracking. The Oracle stamped out the end of her cigarette and shrugged.
"Not sure really." Neo was going to ask more when the door opened and a doctor bustled in.
"Ah, Mr. Anderson. You're awake." Neo winced, hearing his former name. "You're a very lucky man. You were in quite a car accident." Neo arched an eyebrow and looked at the Oracle. She said nothing and watched as the man bustled around to Neo's bedside and began poking and prodding. "You're wife is even luckier. She's had a very rough time of it. She very nearly didn't make it. She-"
"I think that's enough," Seraph said calmly as he stepped into the room. The doctor looked frightened for a moment before he completed his exam of Neo, took a quick look at Trinity's still form and left. Seraph nodded to Neo and turned to leave. A severe looking women carrying a clip-board blocked his path. She glared at the exiled program for a long moment. Neo squinted, looking at the code instead of the false vision the Matrix presented, and saw that she was a program herself.
"Don't do that," the program ordered before she pushed her designer glasses further up her nose, 'Humph'-ed, turned on her heel and exited. Seraph looked back at the Oracle, who shrugged, and resumed to his post outside the door.
"Continuity," the Oracle gestured at the unknown program. "She is in charge of fixing things in the Matrix, initiating De-ja Vu. She's very busy right now, but don't worry about her. You have other things to worry over I think." The program's eyes slid back over to the bed Trinity occupied.
"Oracle, is she."
"She's alive. As alive as you are, apparently. We thought we might have lost you for good, kiddo. Glad to see you're both made of sterner stuff." She watched as Neo struggled out of bed and across the distance to Trinity's side. He seized her hand and brought it to his lips, kissing it and repeating her name over and over, like a mantra.
"Trinity. God, Trinity, please wake up. Please," he pleaded, switching hands so he could stroke her cheek. Her eyes fluttered and her arm drew around the plush toy in the crook of her arm. She turned her head and finally, opened her eyes. Neo cried and kissed her soundly before drawing back so he could properly see her eyes again. She gasped softly and reached out to touch his face.
"Are you real?" she asked as she drew tentative fingers across his cheek. He turned and kissed the inside of her palm.
"Yeah." He grabbed her hands in his. "Yeah. I can't let go." Trinity half laughed, half sobbed as she reached out to hug him. He held her tightly, unsure if this was a dream before dying and unwilling to let it go to waste if it was. She winced and he drew back. She put a hand to her side and grimaced.
"Hurts," she managed. She looked over Neo's shoulder to the Oracle.
"How badly?" she asked. If she was hurt in the real world, she'd feel the pain here. The oracle's face was grim.
"Badly from what I could gather. You're both in pods in the machine city being repaired before you are being sent back to Zion."
"Why?" Trinity asked. She hadn't been expecting to wake up. Or at least she expected to wake up dead. Why would the machines do this? Why heal them? Why not dump them into the sewers like so much refuse.
"Because he is the One. Believe it or not kiddo, the machines owe you big- time and you made a deal." The old woman withdrew another cigarette and lit it while Trinity and Neo thought.
"Peace." Neo said, the pieces sliding into place. Peace meant no more death.
"Bingo," the Oracle confirmed with a smile and gesture of her smoldering cigarette.
"God, I left you," Neo held Trinity to him. He'd been so overjoyed to see her, he hadn't thought of what her being alive actually meant. It was his worst fear: he'd left her and she hadn't been dead.
"No, Neo, no. You had to go," Trinity protested. "You had to, for any of us to have a chance," she whispered in his ear. "You had to. And because you did, we're alive."
"I'm sorry," he repeated again and again. "God what a day," Neo said into her shoulder. Trinity ran a hand through his hair and chuckled, even though it hurt.
"Yes."
The phone rang, startling them both.
"I'll get it!" Sati said cheerfully. She hopped up and grabbed the phone, placing it against her ear. The little girl smiled and nodded then replaced the handset. "That was the big machine. He says you're going home now," she told the two humans. "He says you're being unplugged from here and being taken home." She frowned "He also said Trinity was still very sick, but she was going home anyway." Sati sat next to the Oracle and whispered in the loud voice that children use. "I don't think I like that big machine too much."
"How do we leave?" Neo asked. They had no ship, no operator. Thankfully they had bodies.
"The next call is for you," Sati said cheerfully, swinging her legs. The phone rang and Neo and Trinity exchanged a look.
"You first," Neo said, handing Trinity the handset.
Niobe surveyed the gathering. Neo and Trinity had been declared lost after two days. She'd been torn between wanting to keep watch, and the cold knowledge that they were most likely already dead or they'd been home before now. Their room had become a shrine of sorts. A hundred or more candles were lit in front of their door next to small offerings of painted and carved rocks and handmade fabrics. The stones would have weighed down their death shrouds - had there been bodies - before they were interred in the gardens or cremated.
It was awful. She was happy on the one hand - the war was over. But on the other, they had lost so many good people, not the least of which were the two probably most instrumental players. Link and Zee stood to one side, mourning on their own. She and Sparks stood behind Ghost as he watched people walk by and place candles by the darkened door. Morpheus sat on a fallen piece of rubble beside them, chin in hand. So far he'd refused to give up on his crew. Niobe wondered how long he could keep up hope. She had tried, she really had. But the odds that they were alive had become slimmer and slimmer as the minutes had turned into hours had turned into days. Even now, as her mind tried to wrestle with grief, she held a flame of hope in the deepest part of her soul.
Niobe watched Kid march forward and set a candle by the others. He then turned on his heel and walked towards them - towards Morpheus actually.
"It's not a candle because they've died. It's a guiding light home," he stated. Niobe could have lost it there, but years of self-control stopped her. Morpheus slowly turned to look at Kid. The boy wasn't nearly as young as he'd been mere days before. War did that to a person, Morpheus reflected. He looked at the candle and then back at Kid then nodded solemnly. Kid nodded back and marched off to his duties. Morpheus watched him disappear into the crowd before he stood.
"I should get back to work," he said as he passed. Ghost, who'd watched the exchange in silence nodded and followed, Niobe and Sparks following him in turn.
On the third day after the war ended, they were working on the Hammer when the call came.
"Machines! Machines! Machines at the gate!"
"Shit." Niobe spat as she raced for the controls to the ship, Roland and Morpheus on her heels
"Hold on, they have something," Roland said. The machines were not the usual squiddies they fought. These were much larger machines which looked more like the ones that tended the pod towers, and they seemed to indeed be carrying something. The Machines stopped just shirt of entering the ruined gate, their red optic sensors glowing in the shadowed sewers. The newly repaired radio crackled across the Hammer and in the control room. The whine and clicks of the machine's binary language sounded in the cabin of the Hammer.
"What do they want?" Roland asked irritably.
"I think they want in," Morpheus said, wondering. The machines tentatively floated forward into the docks. They settled down on a clear area close by the Hammer, then rose again, leaving two Matrix-pods behind. A voice like a nightmare, as loud as a thunderclap, resonated in the ruined dock.
"The promise is kept."
Then the machines turned and quickly sped away. Niobe looked at Roland and Morpheus for a fraction of a second before all three tried to scramble out of the small passage into the rest of the ship. Being the lightest and quickest, Niobe was out the door first. She sprinted down the corridor, passing a confused Sparks and Ghost. After seeing three captains run by, Sparks and Ghost followed.
Outside, people were making their way towards the two pods - and the people inside. Niobe grimaced as she picked her way around and across the heavy masonry still on the landing pad. The liquid in the one was not the right color. It was far too dark red and obscured the body inside. The other was more normally colored. The body inside was still wearing most of his clothing. God, it was Neo. Which meant that the other.
Niobe forced the thought away as she sprinted the last meter or so. She touched the pod and then realized she didn't know what to do next. Neo was plugged in and she didn't want to harm him. Looking the pod over she saw a glowing button near where it would have been connected to the tower. She hit it and the plugs disengaged from Neo and coiled like snakes. The hatch opened and the liquid inside rushed out the back, spreading across the ground.
Neo gasped and thrashed instinctively, calling for Trinity.
"My god, Neo." Morpheus exhaled.
"Morpheus. Trinity is badly hurt. They.They brought her back. She-" he fell into a coughing fit.
"Easy Neo," Morpheus cautioned.
"What happened to your eyes?" Roland asked. He could see the telltale marks of a bad burn around the sodden bandage.
"Smith."
"Smith? This happened in the Matrix?" Morpheus questioned.
"No. On the Logos. He was going to kill her. God, is she ok?" He turned around looking for something though how was beyond Niobe. He seemed to find her however and relaxed.
"Help her," he asked, pain coloring his voice. "I can't lose her again. I can't live through it. Not again."
"We'll help her, Neo," Morpheus assured him. The younger man nodded and struggled to get out of the pod. Ghost and Roland stepped forwards to help steady him while he climbed out of the slippery pod. Niobe thanked the powers that be that someone had had the presence of mind to call a medical team onto the scene. She could see them racing across the dock to them. Niobe turned and gaped. Neo unerringly made his way to Trinity's pod and pressed the release tab. Little hisses inside the pod disturbed the heavy red cloud hanging in the pink. The liquid rushed away and Trinity was deposited on the pod's floor. She was mostly naked and a number of angry bruises with nasty looking wounds in their centers stood out on her too pale skin. Fresh, red blood began oozing out from between the staples in her shoulder and abdomen. They could all now see the IV filled with bright red blood connected to her right wrist and the clear IV connected to her left.
"Trinity," Neo called, reaching for her. The woman stirred, and turned towards the sound of his voice.
"Hurts.like.bitch."
"I know Trin. I know. We're home now. Hang on."
"'Kay," she responded sluggishly. What the hell had the machines put her on Morpheus wondered as he Neo and Ghost gently lifted her from the pod and onto the stretcher. The medics ran off, Neo hot on their heels - which Morpheus realized was astounding a full five minutes later when the shock was wearing off. How could he see though that bandage? He shook his head and followed.
"Jesus," Roland said when he found his voice. Niobe shook her head as well and dragged a stunned Ghost behind her.
Tense hours later, the medics finally allowed them to see Neo and Trinity. She was asleep on a small bed, looking healthier then when she'd come in, but still very pale. Neo was sitting by her side holding her hand. It was almost the opposite of before, Morpheus mused. Someone had convinced Neo to shower and had gotten him clean clothing. He wore a clean bandage around his eyes. The medics had said that his eyes had been burned: a live cable had been dragged across his face and they could do nothing. Still, he looked up and seemed to look at each of them in turn before turning back to Trinity.
"The doctors say she's doing well considering what she went through. I've lost my eyes, but that doesn't seem to be a problem," Neo reflected. He kissed her hand. "I can see her now. It was hard, but we're part machine, aren't we?" He sighed heavily. "Anything connected to the mainframe glows like a star. It's beautiful and terrifying. Mechanical things glow, but not as much. I think I can see their electricity, their energy. Matrix-borns have more; I can barely see other people. I don't know how it happened, but it did. It's like seeing everything in code." Neo's voice dropped off as he became lost in thought.
"Neo, what happened?" Morpheus prompted. Neo looked at Morpheus and then back down at his hands holding Trinity's.
"When the One reaches the Source, the war is over. I met it, we made a deal." Neo ran his thumb over the back of Trinity's hand.
"It?" Morpheus asked. He met the source? Hadn't he done that already? Neo shrugged.
"Deus Ex Machina. Hey." Neo leaned in to kiss Trinity's cheek as she stirred.
"Where-?"
"Home. Zion. We're ok."
"Good. Stay?"
"Never letting go," He whispered in her ear. She smiled, he could barely read changes in expression now, but felt more than saw her smile. He waited until her breathing evened out again before he turned back to look at Morpheus.
"Can we talk about this tomorrow?" he asked. The older man nodded. Neo watched them leave then carefully curled next to Trinity on the cot. She shifted slightly with a content sigh as he carefully wound an arm around her waist. "Love you." He kissed her cheek and soon joined her in a deep, untroubled sleep.
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"For certain is death for the born
And certain is birth for the dead;
Therefore over the inevitable
Thou shouldst not grieve."- Bhagavad Gita, Ch2
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Equilibrium ~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Everything that has a beginning has an end .
And every end is a new beginning.
Night falls at the end of day, spring blooms as winter fades - one follows the other, balancing.
For every beginning there is and end, and for each end, a new beginning.
This cycle had ended. soon another would begin. Her protector understood this, accepted it, and fought against it even as she did.
"So, they are going to restart it?"
"I believe so," she answered heavily then took a long drag at her cigarette. It wouldn't be soon, but it would happen: the cycle of life and death would continue.
"Neo's coming back, isn't he? I liked him. He was nice."
The oracle and her protector turned to regard the young exile program. She didn't yet understand, but she would...eventually. Her shell was swinging her small feet in the air as she sat on the park bench, long braid bobbing as she moved. Bring Neo back? The Oracle wondered and accessed the system. Continuity was rewriting the program to issue a De-ja Vu. A car crash . Interesting. What in the world were the outside machines doing?
The barge carrying the One moved away from the tower. The human male was barely alive after bringing about the defeat of the Smith program. The human would be taken and placed into a pod for transport to Zion. The machines would keep their word - there would be peace between them. Smaller nurse bots flowed down onto the platform to secure the human and monitor his condition.
"Trinity," he suddenly spoke. This information was relayed in an instant across the Machine network.
"The human female, apparently dead, level 101," a maintenance bot reported, spying the other human as it made its rounds. The system paused, waiting for the primary decision making AIs to consult their subprograms. Silently, the barge changed course, circling back around the crash site. Sentinels were already cutting through the twisted metal, exposing the innards of the tower to the blackened sky. A small, spider-like machine launched itself across the distance and landed with a metallic clunk on the inside of the breach. The machine skittered over the human female and sent an assessment back: Impaled by metal support rods, extensive blood loss, severe trauma and subsequent shock. Neural activity: higher functions down, lower barely operational.
The sub-machine awaited orders for exactly .04 seconds. Then it leapt on the human female's chest, snipped away the fabric, stuck two of its manipulators to her skin and administered an electric shock to her system. The machine was joined by a second and then a third similar to itself. The female did not respond to the first pulse so a second was given by two of the sub-machines. This time her heart started beating, circulating what little blood was left in her body. Neural activity still read low so the third machine administered a low level charge through her primary neural interface. The female gasped weakly.
A sentinel squeezed into the space and clipped the metal poles then lifted the body. Blood rained down from her, covering the smaller machines. Quick bursts of electricity cauterized the wounds. The female was placed on the barge and it quickly sped away, towards the smaller, on-site power plant.
The mood in Zion was mixed. The war was over, but at a terrible cost. An estimated third of the population had been lost in the fighting. For those on the last ships of the Zion fleet, the victory was bittersweet. No word came from the Logos. That they, or at least Neo had survived to make it to the machine city, was evident by the very survival of Zion. As the hours passed, the remainders of the Logos', Nebuchadnezzar's and Hammer's crews kept a sort of vigil over the communications channels.
"I take back anything I ever said about Neo being crazy," Roland admitted. His voice was gruff to anyone who didn't know him, but those that did could see he was trying to keep his emotions in check. Even Zen Ghost was having a hard time.
"Hey." Niobe found Ghost on Squiddie cleanup crew in the remains of the docks. The smelters were running full blast, turning the destructive squids into useable materials for the rebuild.
"Hey," Ghost replied as he used a cutting torch to crack the outer casing of a Sentinel. He turned off the flame and pushed back the protective helmet.
"No, word," Niobe told him in answer to his hopeful glance. The pain in his eyes intensified for a moment before he nodded and continued to cut. Niobe accepted this and went to find Morpheus.
He was working on the Hammer with Roland, the Hammer's crew and some Zion dockworkers. They were trying to get the hover pads up and running. If the Hammer could fly, they could use it to possibly lift some of the heavier debris away. He looked up with such hope in his eyes, she wanted to run over and hug him. Extreme self control stopped her from doing just that when she saw the shattered look in his eyes as she shook her head 'no'. She placed a hand on his upper arm and gave it a quick squeeze before diving into the repair work.
Nearly a day after the machines had left, there was still no word from the Logos. But there had been no hope they would survive the machines when Neo had saved them at the last moment. She had to keep hope, she owed them that much and more.
The human male would recover, but his eyes were damaged permanently. The machines fed antibiotics into the red conductive fluid he was suspended in and let his body regenerate. Soon he would be able to travel back to the human city. The female was in a much more serious state. Her injuries had been extensive and the medical machines had had to restart her heart twice on the flight to the power plant. A nurse bot dipped manipulators into her pod, repairing damage done to flesh and bone. The machines had learned much about keeping humans alive in extreme conditions at the beginning of the war but had not practiced this knowledge in years.
In the meantime, the machines would enjoy the extra energy two more humans provided via their pods. The reserve power plant contained animals that had once roamed the planet. They were a much less efficient energy source for reasons which still eluded the best programs. But they were far more docile and required little maintenance.
The nurse bot finished repairing a rupture in the female's intestine and quickly closed the incision with efficient staples. The female could be moved if she lived though the next day.
Neo woke slowly. The first thing he noticed was the bright light hitting his eyes. The second was the steady beep of some sort of machine.
"Am I dead?" he wondered. He was reminded of when he'd woken on the Neb. Only now, Morpheus wasn't there - though Tank and Dozer might be. But they were secondary. All that mattered was her.
"Trinity," he managed to say after three tries. A cheerful voice greeted him, but not the one he was expecting.
"Neo!" He turned his head and a fuzzy shape bounded towards him. Sati? But.hadn't he won? "Hi Neo! I'm glad you're back. I made you a sunrise, would you like to see it?"
"Easy honey, he just woke up," Neo's vision cleared enough that he could see he was in a hospital room of some sort. The Oracle was smoking a cigarette and sitting on a chair near the foot of his bed. Sati was bouncing on her heels next to him. He had a massive headache and the light from outside was hurting his eyes. Sati smiled brightly then skipped off back to where she'd been before: Neo could see a number of rag-dolls strewn across the floor. One wore an approximation of a black suit and red tie. Another wore a black and red dress. Neo watched as Sati picked up another doll, this one wearing a long, shiny coat and sunglasses. Neo's chest constricted as he watched the 'Trinity' doll beat the stuffing out of the 'Merovingian' and 'Persephone' dolls. He couldn't watch anymore and rolled onto his back, to stare at the ceiling. The tile pattern was far too regular.
"I'm in the Matrix," Neo said.
"Bingo," the Oracle replied and took another drag.
"Don't be sad Neo," Sati was again at his side. She pressed something soft to his chest and left to resume playing. Neo turned and saw that 'Seraph' was now beating on the 'Merovingian' doll. Neo looked at what she'd placed in his hands. It was the Trinity doll she'd been playing with. He felt like shattering into a million pieces. It was like losing her all over again. He'd done it twice, he was sure feeling this way a third time would kill him.
"I gave her the you-doll. She started to cry when she saw me playing with you and Smith, so I gave it to her," Sati said conversationally as Seraph executed an amazing flying kick which sent the Merovingian sliding across the floor and under the other bed in the room. Sati scurried after it and resumed her play, but Neo took no notice.
Trinity was there, chest rising and falling softly, a compliment to the doll he had tucked under one arm.
"My God. I am dead."
"Still not too bright I see," the Oracle chided softly.
"I'm not dead."
"That's what I told you before."
"How?" Neo asked, voice cracking. The Oracle stamped out the end of her cigarette and shrugged.
"Not sure really." Neo was going to ask more when the door opened and a doctor bustled in.
"Ah, Mr. Anderson. You're awake." Neo winced, hearing his former name. "You're a very lucky man. You were in quite a car accident." Neo arched an eyebrow and looked at the Oracle. She said nothing and watched as the man bustled around to Neo's bedside and began poking and prodding. "You're wife is even luckier. She's had a very rough time of it. She very nearly didn't make it. She-"
"I think that's enough," Seraph said calmly as he stepped into the room. The doctor looked frightened for a moment before he completed his exam of Neo, took a quick look at Trinity's still form and left. Seraph nodded to Neo and turned to leave. A severe looking women carrying a clip-board blocked his path. She glared at the exiled program for a long moment. Neo squinted, looking at the code instead of the false vision the Matrix presented, and saw that she was a program herself.
"Don't do that," the program ordered before she pushed her designer glasses further up her nose, 'Humph'-ed, turned on her heel and exited. Seraph looked back at the Oracle, who shrugged, and resumed to his post outside the door.
"Continuity," the Oracle gestured at the unknown program. "She is in charge of fixing things in the Matrix, initiating De-ja Vu. She's very busy right now, but don't worry about her. You have other things to worry over I think." The program's eyes slid back over to the bed Trinity occupied.
"Oracle, is she."
"She's alive. As alive as you are, apparently. We thought we might have lost you for good, kiddo. Glad to see you're both made of sterner stuff." She watched as Neo struggled out of bed and across the distance to Trinity's side. He seized her hand and brought it to his lips, kissing it and repeating her name over and over, like a mantra.
"Trinity. God, Trinity, please wake up. Please," he pleaded, switching hands so he could stroke her cheek. Her eyes fluttered and her arm drew around the plush toy in the crook of her arm. She turned her head and finally, opened her eyes. Neo cried and kissed her soundly before drawing back so he could properly see her eyes again. She gasped softly and reached out to touch his face.
"Are you real?" she asked as she drew tentative fingers across his cheek. He turned and kissed the inside of her palm.
"Yeah." He grabbed her hands in his. "Yeah. I can't let go." Trinity half laughed, half sobbed as she reached out to hug him. He held her tightly, unsure if this was a dream before dying and unwilling to let it go to waste if it was. She winced and he drew back. She put a hand to her side and grimaced.
"Hurts," she managed. She looked over Neo's shoulder to the Oracle.
"How badly?" she asked. If she was hurt in the real world, she'd feel the pain here. The oracle's face was grim.
"Badly from what I could gather. You're both in pods in the machine city being repaired before you are being sent back to Zion."
"Why?" Trinity asked. She hadn't been expecting to wake up. Or at least she expected to wake up dead. Why would the machines do this? Why heal them? Why not dump them into the sewers like so much refuse.
"Because he is the One. Believe it or not kiddo, the machines owe you big- time and you made a deal." The old woman withdrew another cigarette and lit it while Trinity and Neo thought.
"Peace." Neo said, the pieces sliding into place. Peace meant no more death.
"Bingo," the Oracle confirmed with a smile and gesture of her smoldering cigarette.
"God, I left you," Neo held Trinity to him. He'd been so overjoyed to see her, he hadn't thought of what her being alive actually meant. It was his worst fear: he'd left her and she hadn't been dead.
"No, Neo, no. You had to go," Trinity protested. "You had to, for any of us to have a chance," she whispered in his ear. "You had to. And because you did, we're alive."
"I'm sorry," he repeated again and again. "God what a day," Neo said into her shoulder. Trinity ran a hand through his hair and chuckled, even though it hurt.
"Yes."
The phone rang, startling them both.
"I'll get it!" Sati said cheerfully. She hopped up and grabbed the phone, placing it against her ear. The little girl smiled and nodded then replaced the handset. "That was the big machine. He says you're going home now," she told the two humans. "He says you're being unplugged from here and being taken home." She frowned "He also said Trinity was still very sick, but she was going home anyway." Sati sat next to the Oracle and whispered in the loud voice that children use. "I don't think I like that big machine too much."
"How do we leave?" Neo asked. They had no ship, no operator. Thankfully they had bodies.
"The next call is for you," Sati said cheerfully, swinging her legs. The phone rang and Neo and Trinity exchanged a look.
"You first," Neo said, handing Trinity the handset.
Niobe surveyed the gathering. Neo and Trinity had been declared lost after two days. She'd been torn between wanting to keep watch, and the cold knowledge that they were most likely already dead or they'd been home before now. Their room had become a shrine of sorts. A hundred or more candles were lit in front of their door next to small offerings of painted and carved rocks and handmade fabrics. The stones would have weighed down their death shrouds - had there been bodies - before they were interred in the gardens or cremated.
It was awful. She was happy on the one hand - the war was over. But on the other, they had lost so many good people, not the least of which were the two probably most instrumental players. Link and Zee stood to one side, mourning on their own. She and Sparks stood behind Ghost as he watched people walk by and place candles by the darkened door. Morpheus sat on a fallen piece of rubble beside them, chin in hand. So far he'd refused to give up on his crew. Niobe wondered how long he could keep up hope. She had tried, she really had. But the odds that they were alive had become slimmer and slimmer as the minutes had turned into hours had turned into days. Even now, as her mind tried to wrestle with grief, she held a flame of hope in the deepest part of her soul.
Niobe watched Kid march forward and set a candle by the others. He then turned on his heel and walked towards them - towards Morpheus actually.
"It's not a candle because they've died. It's a guiding light home," he stated. Niobe could have lost it there, but years of self-control stopped her. Morpheus slowly turned to look at Kid. The boy wasn't nearly as young as he'd been mere days before. War did that to a person, Morpheus reflected. He looked at the candle and then back at Kid then nodded solemnly. Kid nodded back and marched off to his duties. Morpheus watched him disappear into the crowd before he stood.
"I should get back to work," he said as he passed. Ghost, who'd watched the exchange in silence nodded and followed, Niobe and Sparks following him in turn.
On the third day after the war ended, they were working on the Hammer when the call came.
"Machines! Machines! Machines at the gate!"
"Shit." Niobe spat as she raced for the controls to the ship, Roland and Morpheus on her heels
"Hold on, they have something," Roland said. The machines were not the usual squiddies they fought. These were much larger machines which looked more like the ones that tended the pod towers, and they seemed to indeed be carrying something. The Machines stopped just shirt of entering the ruined gate, their red optic sensors glowing in the shadowed sewers. The newly repaired radio crackled across the Hammer and in the control room. The whine and clicks of the machine's binary language sounded in the cabin of the Hammer.
"What do they want?" Roland asked irritably.
"I think they want in," Morpheus said, wondering. The machines tentatively floated forward into the docks. They settled down on a clear area close by the Hammer, then rose again, leaving two Matrix-pods behind. A voice like a nightmare, as loud as a thunderclap, resonated in the ruined dock.
"The promise is kept."
Then the machines turned and quickly sped away. Niobe looked at Roland and Morpheus for a fraction of a second before all three tried to scramble out of the small passage into the rest of the ship. Being the lightest and quickest, Niobe was out the door first. She sprinted down the corridor, passing a confused Sparks and Ghost. After seeing three captains run by, Sparks and Ghost followed.
Outside, people were making their way towards the two pods - and the people inside. Niobe grimaced as she picked her way around and across the heavy masonry still on the landing pad. The liquid in the one was not the right color. It was far too dark red and obscured the body inside. The other was more normally colored. The body inside was still wearing most of his clothing. God, it was Neo. Which meant that the other.
Niobe forced the thought away as she sprinted the last meter or so. She touched the pod and then realized she didn't know what to do next. Neo was plugged in and she didn't want to harm him. Looking the pod over she saw a glowing button near where it would have been connected to the tower. She hit it and the plugs disengaged from Neo and coiled like snakes. The hatch opened and the liquid inside rushed out the back, spreading across the ground.
Neo gasped and thrashed instinctively, calling for Trinity.
"My god, Neo." Morpheus exhaled.
"Morpheus. Trinity is badly hurt. They.They brought her back. She-" he fell into a coughing fit.
"Easy Neo," Morpheus cautioned.
"What happened to your eyes?" Roland asked. He could see the telltale marks of a bad burn around the sodden bandage.
"Smith."
"Smith? This happened in the Matrix?" Morpheus questioned.
"No. On the Logos. He was going to kill her. God, is she ok?" He turned around looking for something though how was beyond Niobe. He seemed to find her however and relaxed.
"Help her," he asked, pain coloring his voice. "I can't lose her again. I can't live through it. Not again."
"We'll help her, Neo," Morpheus assured him. The younger man nodded and struggled to get out of the pod. Ghost and Roland stepped forwards to help steady him while he climbed out of the slippery pod. Niobe thanked the powers that be that someone had had the presence of mind to call a medical team onto the scene. She could see them racing across the dock to them. Niobe turned and gaped. Neo unerringly made his way to Trinity's pod and pressed the release tab. Little hisses inside the pod disturbed the heavy red cloud hanging in the pink. The liquid rushed away and Trinity was deposited on the pod's floor. She was mostly naked and a number of angry bruises with nasty looking wounds in their centers stood out on her too pale skin. Fresh, red blood began oozing out from between the staples in her shoulder and abdomen. They could all now see the IV filled with bright red blood connected to her right wrist and the clear IV connected to her left.
"Trinity," Neo called, reaching for her. The woman stirred, and turned towards the sound of his voice.
"Hurts.like.bitch."
"I know Trin. I know. We're home now. Hang on."
"'Kay," she responded sluggishly. What the hell had the machines put her on Morpheus wondered as he Neo and Ghost gently lifted her from the pod and onto the stretcher. The medics ran off, Neo hot on their heels - which Morpheus realized was astounding a full five minutes later when the shock was wearing off. How could he see though that bandage? He shook his head and followed.
"Jesus," Roland said when he found his voice. Niobe shook her head as well and dragged a stunned Ghost behind her.
Tense hours later, the medics finally allowed them to see Neo and Trinity. She was asleep on a small bed, looking healthier then when she'd come in, but still very pale. Neo was sitting by her side holding her hand. It was almost the opposite of before, Morpheus mused. Someone had convinced Neo to shower and had gotten him clean clothing. He wore a clean bandage around his eyes. The medics had said that his eyes had been burned: a live cable had been dragged across his face and they could do nothing. Still, he looked up and seemed to look at each of them in turn before turning back to Trinity.
"The doctors say she's doing well considering what she went through. I've lost my eyes, but that doesn't seem to be a problem," Neo reflected. He kissed her hand. "I can see her now. It was hard, but we're part machine, aren't we?" He sighed heavily. "Anything connected to the mainframe glows like a star. It's beautiful and terrifying. Mechanical things glow, but not as much. I think I can see their electricity, their energy. Matrix-borns have more; I can barely see other people. I don't know how it happened, but it did. It's like seeing everything in code." Neo's voice dropped off as he became lost in thought.
"Neo, what happened?" Morpheus prompted. Neo looked at Morpheus and then back down at his hands holding Trinity's.
"When the One reaches the Source, the war is over. I met it, we made a deal." Neo ran his thumb over the back of Trinity's hand.
"It?" Morpheus asked. He met the source? Hadn't he done that already? Neo shrugged.
"Deus Ex Machina. Hey." Neo leaned in to kiss Trinity's cheek as she stirred.
"Where-?"
"Home. Zion. We're ok."
"Good. Stay?"
"Never letting go," He whispered in her ear. She smiled, he could barely read changes in expression now, but felt more than saw her smile. He waited until her breathing evened out again before he turned back to look at Morpheus.
"Can we talk about this tomorrow?" he asked. The older man nodded. Neo watched them leave then carefully curled next to Trinity on the cot. She shifted slightly with a content sigh as he carefully wound an arm around her waist. "Love you." He kissed her cheek and soon joined her in a deep, untroubled sleep.