imperfect

by kangeiko

This is a WIP and is subject to revision. "How can one recognise life? Is it not best seen through the understanding of pleasure? And was not this – this crude, innocent, imperfect embrace – the purest expression of unselfish pleasure?"

TITLE: (im)perfect

DISCLAIMER: I don't own Neo, Agent Smith or anyone else in this story. No money is being made from this and no copyright infringement is intended.

SPOILERS: Set after the end of "The Matrix Reloaded"; speculation for the third movie.

PAIRING: Neo/Agent Smith

RATING: R

SUMMARY: "How can one recognise life? Is it not best seen through the understanding of pleasure? And was not this – this crude, innocent, imperfect embrace – the purest expression of unselfish pleasure?"

ARCHIVE: ask first.

"Who are you, really?"

The residual mental image was what it was supposed to be, but it wasn't right. It didn't feel right. Embedded deep in the training programme, hidden from prying eyes and with the lassitude of an entire hour to devote to these questions, Neo could finally confront the man who had likely betrayed them all. Awake, he had given nothing away, acting the part of the bewildered survivor to the fullest. But once Neo had woken from his own slumber, once he had met this pseudo-survivor – oh, Neo saw him as clearly as it is possible to see one so shrouded in fog and confusion. He did not read as a human, but he did not read as an Agent either. Was he a more sophisticated Cypher? An advanced Judas, sent among them to bring about the fall of Zion from within? Or was he something even more advanced?

Could there really be a programme hidden inside this man?

"Don't you know? You disappoint me." The form wavered a fraction as the man stroked a hand along a cheek that had a moment before sloped down into a neat goatee beard. Now, it was the perfectly smooth skin of a Matrix Agent. "Who else could it be, Mr Anderson?"

Indeed. Who else could have infiltrated a human mind but a programme capable of overwriting all original programming? Like a worm, he multiplied endlessly, copying himself and spawning endless replicas with each new copy. Unlike conventional copies, the original programming remained intact. There was little to no pattern disintegration; Neo could see in this Smith all the previous Smiths he had encountered in the Matrix.

And how was it that they all remained in such perfect contact with each other, outside of the Matrix? How could such a perfect hive mind function without any sort of connection?

Neo smoothed his left sleeve down and smiled. He had known that this creature was before he entered the training programme; that is why he had requested privacy for this tête-à-tête. He intended to have some use come from Smith's presence, one way or the other. Morpheus was entirely too patient a man for this task, and, besides, Neo had a personal bone to pick with Former Agent Smith.

"I knew it was you. It is hard to forget someone who attempts to absorb you."

That particular violation had been akin to rape. Perhaps this confrontation was partly motivated by revenge; it did not matter. Perhaps the Smiths had a sophisticated new programming that enabled them to maintain contact outside the Matrix; that, too, did not matter. What mattered were the facts: the contact between the Smiths existed, as did the connection between Smith and Neo. Even now, Neo could feel it, humming between them. They had overwritten each other, attempted to change each other's programming, copied and plagiarised and deleted at will. And what was the result?

What would further tampering produce?

"Have you brought me here for revenge, Mr Anderson? I had not believed you so petty." Smith flicked imaginary lint off his sleeves and checked his cufflinks were still in place. "I am your prisoner. It would be useless for me to resist whatever revenge you see fit to employ." He smiled, then, a smile that failed to reach up into the rest of his face. Smith carefully removed his glasses, folded them and pocketed them away. "Well, do your worst, Mr Anderson. But do not delay, for I believe you still have a battle to fight. And if you do not win..." The smile was still firmly in place, "well, I believe you have already made your choice in that respect."

"I am already fighting that battle. And I know better than to trust a programme, now."

"No? And I thought you had such faith in the Oracle..."

Neo removed his sunglasses and slipped them into an unseen pocket. "No Oracle now. No Architect. Just me. Zion. Sentinels. Hundreds of Smiths. And the X factor."

"The X factor? Luck?"

Neo was slowly moving forward in the pristine white room. There was just one table in the standard dressing of the training programme, and it was more than enough. No weapons here – with Smith imprisoned in the training programme and Neo firmly in control, of what possible use could weapons be?

No, there were better ways of working. Of waging wars. And if they won the battle for Zion, they would not have done it through firepower or manpower or through clever tactics.

There were better ways of working.

Smith had not moved away. Neo stopped two feet from him and waited until the mocking smile faded. "The learned man does not need to depend on luck."

A pause, then the slow rise of that perfect eyebrow. Smith's face was infuriatingly blank. "And you count yourself among learned men?"

Neo reached out his hand and laid it against Smith's cheek, barely touching the warm skin of the former Agent. "How can you study us for so long, imprison us for your entire existence, and yet still have no understanding of what we are?" Smith's skin was smooth and soft and even under his touch. Such perfect skin he had, moulded over perfect sloping cheekbones, taut over a perfect Adam's apple, soft over dark blank eyes. Every aspect of Smith was an approximation of human perfection, a gross crime against the beauty inherent in the errors of the human form. There was no harsh five o'clock shadow, no blotchiness from an upset or dryness from the harsh rays of the sun. He was as perfect as Neo's own visage: the residual mental image from a form that had never existed.

"And what are you, Mr Anderson? I understand you more fully than before, I admit this. When you overwrote me, your imperfections and flaws were imprinted upon me. I understand the errors in your make-up. What are you, but a sum of imperfections and errors?" Smith's voice was as smooth and perfect as his face.

The training programme shuddered slightly in response to that. Neo felt a liquid, scalding rage pool in his stomach and embraced it. An hour, a mere hour, would give him neither hope nor revenge. What was he to do? How could he force cooperation from a creature that did not understand threats or identity or humanity? That dared to lecture him on perfection, to pass such scathing comments on the existence Zion had been forced to scratch out below the surface of the planet that should rightfully belong to them – it was unthinkable.

And how was he to show him otherwise? When this being did not understand the beauty of imperfection, did not understand noble or dark emotions, viewing both as aberrations. How was he to show him the power of such errors? How was Neo to break him?

It came to him, then, his answer, in Smith's almost-human form. Here, in the training programme, he was vulnerable to Neo's strength, much as Neo had been vulnerable to the Agents in the Matrix. Here, Smith was at his mercy. And how was he to show him the power of emotion? By the simplest methods possible. By the last recourse of parents when attempting to discipline a recalcitrant child. By the angry blow of an owner to an animal that refused to obey. By lording his strength over the helpless, and by forcing fear out of a vessel that had never felt emotion before.

He knew what he would do as soon as he begun to do it. This was an act of rage, a demonstration of power, and it could not bear over-intellectualisation. The cerebral is capable of death on a grander scale than the physical, but there is something to be said for the pure terror carnal physicality can invoke.

It wasn't a measured act, after all. Spur of the moment. Angry. No semblance of pleasure here, no pleasure taken from the suffering of another. But the suffering would have a purpose, and he could take pleasure from that purpose, could he not? He could intellectualise it until it wasn't real. It wasn't.

He didn't even bother to undress, simply forcing his clothing open, bending the still form over the pristine table and pinning those slim, elegant wrists to the white surface. And it wasn't real, was it? It wasn't real, not any more real than Smith's attempted absorption of him had been. And if this was real, then that must have been real too – that almost-rape that happened purely in his mind but had terrified him beyond anything he had felt thus far. Either way you looked at it, he was not breaking any rules of morality. If this did not exist, then he had broken no rules. If it did, his earlier almost-violation – and that of Morpheus – made this an act of vengeance. An eye for an eye; it made this allowable. Who better than him to teach the agents to fear?

He took no pleasure from the act, although his form reacted to the lean body beneath him in a most predictable manner. He took no pleasure from the bruises he inflicted on the slim wrists he kept pinned against the white surface of the table; he took no pleasure from the clean, soft hair, dark and stark against the pristine purity of the table; above all, he took no pleasure from the act of violation itself. It was a means to an end.

A heartbeat away from completion, he caught his breath and let go of the elegant wrists. The form of Agent Smith remained supine and stretched beneath him, neither resisting nor reacting. He was beyond reach.

Neo's hips stilled, the brief flare of pleasure ebbing almost immediately. He withdrew, not touching Smith, simply buttoning up his flies, willing his breathing to even out.

Smith straightened from the table, set his clothes to rights and turned around. He raised an eyebrow. "And what did that accomplish?"

Nothing.

For Neo, the violation was comparable to Smith's actions earlier. For Smith, those actions had been necessary and did not require an emotional response. And what response did this violation invoke from him?

Nothing.

He was as blank as before. His hair fell back into place. His face slowly relaxed back into its blank mask, emotionless and cold. In a moment, he was beyond reach, perhaps even to the pain Neo had intended to inflict.

Blank. Blank. Nothing in this world – from the pure white of the table, to the Matrix itself, to these infernal agents – had any personality whatsoever. Nothing but blank looks, cold stares and the mechanical tasks of the agents, sentient though they might be. How could creatures that pretended to sentience achieve it without any emotion whatsoever? Was the Architect right? Was emotion simply the result of the imperfection of the human mind? How could something imperfect create perfection?

And how could someone attempting to teach emotion resort to teaching the cruellest, most despicable emotion? How could any self-respecting teacher attempt to teach fear? How could anyone with any humanity in them force the first emotion of a being to be that of hatred?

Suddenly, Neo was certain that he himself did not wish to understand the rage that still pooled hotly in his belly. He did not want to embody *this* aspect of humanity. He did not wish to be reduced to this.

This was not what he had wanted to teach. This was not what he had wanted to show Smith. This was not what he had wanted to show the world.

"I want to show you something else." He held out his right hand, palm up. "There is an ancient tradition among men. We show our hands before conversing, to show them empty of weapons."

"You do not need weapons here, Mr Anderson. As I understand it, I am your prisoner." Smith's voice was pitched just a little too low. Just a little too quiet.

Neo smiled.

"I want to show you something."

Smith raised an eyebrow. "Perhaps a new torture technique? Or will you 'show me more of this Earth thing you call kissing'?"

Well. A sense of humour? Or simply a random firing of those electronic synapses, a rogue line or two of code underneath the perfection of the surface?

What had Persephone wanted? Why was love so important to a programme? What did they know of emotion? How could they understand this most complex of human feelings?

How could they live without it? How could any one?

The rage still roiled in Neo's belly, making his cock ache and his pupils dilate. The most ancient of human responses to power: arousal. How simple it would be to resort back to the violence he had employed before. How pointless it would be.

And what was he to teach Smith? What was he to teach a being that did not understand or feel pain?

Why would anyone wish to learn such a thing?

Smith was still regarding his bare hand with blank acceptance. That the empty palm could inflict pain all by itself was something he understood. That it could elicit other responses had obviously never occurred to him.

Once more, Neo raised his hand to Smith's cheek, stroking along the perfect skin of a cheekbone. He traced the shell of an ear; the hollow of the cheek; the bridge of the nose; down, he traced, around the purse of lips. His thumb pushed against the fullness of the lower lip, nudging this most intimate of entrances to the body. No other part of the body could touch the brain through speech or emission; no other part of the body could experience more pleasure.

But what did Smith know of pleasure?

"You watched me die, Agent Smith." Neo's voice was low, quiet. He did not need to speak at all, for in this, the training programme, he merely had to wish for something to bring it about. Yet this – the movement of lips, the strum of vocal chords – was what they were fighting for. The contraction of his throat, the rise and fall of his chest – to have this in reality was their goal. In the meantime, a simulacrum of life had best imitate it to its fullest extent. "You watched me die, and you say you experienced pleasure at my death." Neo's thumb had breached the defence of Smith's lips and nudged the firmness of teeth. "What do you know of pleasure?" The thumb withdrew, dragging wetness across the bottom lip. "How can you speak of pleasure, when you know nothing of it? And how can your kind claim to understand us, to control us, when you have no comprehension of pleasure – of love – in all its forms?" Neo pulled his hand away, his thumb slick from Smith's mouth, and brought it to his lips. He licked the thumb clean, sucking it into his mouth.

Smith's eyes followed him, darkening in confusion. He did not move.

No, he did not understand.

"We know of love. We know of sex –"

It was too much. They were barely a foot apart. Neo's cock still strained against his trousers, sensitive from their earlier tryst. And here, Smith was attempting to explain the machine understanding of love. Of sex. Of the purely physical joining of the bodies they kept in separate vats. Of the reflex reactions, of the small sighs, of the knocked elbows, of the awkwardness the following morning, of the rare instances of lifelong love. How could they be so perfect and so wrong?

"What do you know of sex?" He reached out his hand again, thumb still wet, still slick. He pressed at the fullness of Smith's lower lip once more, fascinated at the perfection of the illusion. So perfect. So wrong in its perfection. There was no scrape of stubble, no sharp inhalation, no too-long canines biting down on dry lips. No: Smith's lips, like the rest of him, were soft, sculpted, and entirely perfect.

Neo pressed softly, indenting the lip and spoiling the perfect line of its bow.

Who wants perfection anyway?

"What do you know of sex, when you do not do the simplest of physical things? What can you know of love when you do not know pleasure?" He trailed his fingers down, until his hand fit snugly around Smith's throat. There was the quiet, nervous jump of the Adam's apple, obviously written into the programme, but no pulse beat beneath Neo's fingers. The Architect had evidently not deemed it necessary.

Neo took that extra step forwards, bringing his body to within an inch of Smith's. The agent still had that same placid look of quiet confidence. He thought he knew.

How could someone so perfect be so wrong?

Neo took his hand away, letting it drop to his side. He regarded Smith evenly for a long moment and then leaned in slightly, encroaching on Smith's personal space. His lips followed the movement of his hand moments earlier, skimming over the sculpted cheekbone, the shell of the ear, the hollow of the cheek, the bridge of the nose. Down, down, to trace the curve of those lips, to let his curious tongue touch them softly.

The lips of a human have more nerve endings in them than almost any part of the body. They, along with the eyes, convey more emotion than a thousand books or films could hope to express. They can cause more pleasure than anything else; they can suffer some of the worst abuse.

And when Neo leaned back from that tentative lick, he saw something new. Something he had not expected. In the too-perfect face of Smith, Neo saw a glimmer of genuine scare, the kind that comes when there is a genuine lack of comprehension. Smith simply did not understand what Neo was attempting to accomplish, nor the methods Neo would employ.

And there, in that perfect, pristine room, in the aftermath of an imperfect, aborted act of rage, Neo leaned in once more to see if he could force pleasure out of a creature that had never felt before.

This time, his lips pressed just to the right of the Adam's apple. It jumped slightly as Smith swallowed; once more as he attempted to stop himself from swallowing and instead hiccupped. No, there was quite a bit to learn to learn about the body's ever-increasing demands for pleasure. From soft fabrics, to good food, to sex, to the platonic embrace of siblings or close friends, the body *needed*.

And, here, in the perfection of the training programme, a body would also need. It would demand. When a clean-shaved cheek pressed against the jaw line, the spine straightened imperceptibly. When lips mouthed the shape of the Adam's apple, the entire body shuddered. Whether out of pleasure or revulsion was not important; all that mattered was that the body *needed*. It would dictate Smith's reaction.

When in pain, mind over matter can prevail. Doubtless the subroutine that governed pain-management was still in place. But what mind can withstand pleasure? The body betrays you too quickly. It yearns to feel the touch again. It needs those lips back at the pulse point. It needs the quick, silent, sweet licks of the tongue, almost feline in its delicacy, soft against the jaw line and the lobe of the ear. It demands the return of the presence that threatens to withdraw at any moment.

It was the body that forced Smith to lean in that imperceptible fraction; that caught his breath in the back of his throat with an incomprehensible emotion.

Fear could well be the only emotion that can successfully be reconciled with pleasure. What is hate but fear of the unknown? And what is pleasure but the total surrender to what the unknown may bring?

It took Neo long moments of stillness to finally tilt his face for the kiss. He wasn't sure if was reluctance that stayed his hand, or if it was the prolonging of the pleasurable anticipation. Smith's eyes were impossibly wide and dark in their incomprehension and curiosity. His mouth was partly open, whether from anticipation or simple happenstance, Neo could not tell. It did not matter. Smith's eyes were still open when Neo's tongue swiped once more across his lower lip. They were still open when Neo's mouth closed over that lip, sucking gently. They were still open when Neo's tongue breached the defences of his mouth.

Those incredulous, disbelieving eyes at last closed when his lips parted and his teeth unclenched. He exhaled, gulping back air in almost the same breath. Neo was almost too close for him to inhale anything but him: his scent, his taste, the slow swipe of that tongue across lip and teeth and into his mouth. *This* was what it was to be like, all teeth and wetness and heat, drowning in each other.

Neo's left hand touched Smith's right one; Neo enfolded the Agent's hand with tremulous slowness. He rubbed his thumb into the open palm as his tongue at last found Smith's for that first tentative touch. Neo's right hand snaked up to stroke that perfect cheekbone once more; to reach back and curl into the soft dark hair; to anchor himself in place. It was all trappings, of course: all a simulation of what the real thing would be like. But Smith did not exist in any other form. Was this the real thing for him? Was this the real press of open mouths? Was this the real closing grasp of open hands?

It mimicked the Matrix perfectly: it felt real. Oh, it felt real. Smith's mouth was hot, yes, wet, yes, but had initially been strangely tasteless. Here was a creature that did not eat, that did not drink, that left no memory nor imprint behind. And here was a creature that now, a mere few moments later, tasted of the sharp tang of liquor. A thing foreign to Smith; a thing Neo had reluctantly accepted as a gift from his hosts aboard this battered ship. A good programme, then. A smart programme. An adaptive programme. In this clash of teeth and tongues and hiccupping, convulsive, delicate licks, Smith was absorbing new aspects for his programming. In this strange coupling Smith would gain something, even if, for him, it was a worthless gain.

It wasn't anything more than this: nothing more nor less intimate than their mouths open in this most intimate of embraces. How could there be something tenderer than this? What other example of pleasure could Neo have used? What other action excited such innocent, arduous pleasure?

No wonder Trinity burned with jealous fury at Persephone's untoward demand. That one – she was a threat to what they shared. Smith was not, of course, could never be. There was no guilt here, for it was not secret, this embrace, nor dirty, nor something to hide. It was completely innocent, and the only gift Neo had to give.

He had attempted to show Smith fear. And here, as Smith's left hand slowly raised to rest against Neo's chest and feel the simulation of a heart beat its steady pulse, Neo felt the increasing speed of the rewriting of the simulacrum against him and wondered why he had wanted such a strange thing. It was here, in the perfection of the training programme, that Smith's pretence at sentience became a reality.

Neo did not begrudge Smith this. They would remain enemies. But it was no small thing that they would understand each other better.

Neo's hand was against Smith's throat, keeping him in place. He felt the first strum of an answering beat underneath his fingers.

It was more than enough.

*

fin