Author's blah blah de blah: Yes, I know I totally screwed up the other fic and that I should be writing that one now but heck, didn't feel like it. This wacko idea came to me when I was dicing onions today. Don't ask why. I get scads and scads of weird ideas when I chop onions. This is gonna be a LOT of reminisces put together, almost all of which I am basically making up for entertainment purposes – The Wachowskis own The Matrix (they rule!)

I plan to do the characters one by one, it chapters. One chapter, one character. They're all from Trinity's viewpoint. Can't help it. I love Trinity. (non slash, duh)

Contains some swearing I would never have used in real life. Do not use thy Lord's name in vain.

~*~

Not like this

Zion's not all it's cracked up to be, you know. It's got real food, real drugs, real flushing toilets, real buildings and all. Yet you can walk through the whole damned city and realize one thing: It hasn't got real people.

Those plugless sods just strut around their little city which is mammoth-sized compared to their narrow little minds. They don't give a shit to the fact that there's an actual war going on all around them now, do they? Oh no. I couldn't possibly care about you filthy soldiers. And please, wipe your feet before you make contact with our sidewalks.

The fact that we get meals every time we arrive – about the same stuff as the snot on board, only solid - is only due to the other fact we actually pay for them. Zionists get free meals three times a day at soup kitchens that put ours to shame. The nicest thing they've ever done for us is put aside a little plot of land on the edge of the city for us – for our burial. Ironic. Even then we have to share. Phooey. Still, it's not a bad place – we get a small pond, with actual fish in it, a couple of trees and some benches. The crowning glory is the weeping willow over the pond – grieving with more grace than the best of us. It's a good place for reflection.

This is where I am right now – on the only bench underneath that old, crying tree. I can feel Neo's arm someplace around me, comforting. My head is resting on his shoulder. We've been silent for the past ten minutes or so since we sat down. He's managed to get himself some new clothes, somewhat thicker than his old ones. He looks the part, now.

Morpheus is nowhere to be found – we know better than to go look for him. Tank's supposed to be here, but his family must be holding him up.

So it's just Neo and me, then, waiting for Morpheus to come back for the sake of going to see the rest of our crew as… well, a crew.

"Makes you think, doesn't it?"

"What?" I stir from my hazy recollections.

"This whole place. Zion."

"What about it?"

"Doesn't it kind of remind you? I mean, not everyone here's the greatest - they still stare through the shutters at night – but take Tank's family for example," said Neo gently, running his fingers lightly through my hair. I snuggled closer to him, smiling to myself, remembering all of Tank's two younger twin brothers and teething sister – who couldn't possibly still be teething. Biting seemed more likely. They clung on to him as if magnetically attracted. "They're all so… together. Makes you kind of wonder what happens back in the matrix, y'know, after they fished us out."

I shrug. "We left that behind."

"True." To tell the truth, Zion didn't remind me of life back in the matrix at all. Under all its realness, it actually felt even more artificial than the computer reality had ever been.

We were quiet another few minutes before he started again. "What about you?"

I raised an eyebrow. Ever since he became the one, Neo has had this annoying belief that everyone knows what he's talking about. Like the day he burst back and he was like, I'm flying! I'm flying! And we were like, huh?!??

He made amends. "You must have been someone, in the matrix…"

"Well, I'm just not that someone anymore."

"Humor me, Trin. Any hobbies?"

"Hacking."

"We all knew that one. Come on. You already know all about me."

"Motorbikes." I paused a bit. "Ever wonder why nobody else throws knives?"

"Well, now that you mention it, yeah. Tank doesn't seem to have anything for knives."

"I used to like cooking. Are you happy now?"

"Cooking?"

I bit my lip to keep from laughing. He looked damn cute when he was confused. "Someone makes that goop we eat every morning."

Neo's nose wrinkled. "Someone has horrible taste."

"I'd like to see you try. The last time someone said that, the Neb starved for two whole days until Morpheus threatened to lock me up in the kitchen for the rest of the year."

"Did he really?" The corners of his mouth twitched – something I hadn't seen in days.

"Hell yeah."

"Anyone back home? Friends, family, exes you didn't tell me about?" A white swan glides dreamily across the pond.

"My dad died when I was twelve or so. No siblings. My mum… well, she'll be a ripe old sixty by now. I used to cook with her."

Neo shook his head. "I still can't imagine it. Trinity, in her bad-ass leather and a Susie Homemaker red apron on, cooking."

"Imagine it, because you're never gonna see it."

"How old are you, anyway?"

"Twenty-eight or so, I guess." I focus my attention on the swan, which disappears into a bush, promptly abandoning me.

"Christ." He shook his head again, looking somewhat like a rumpled horse. "You don't look it."

"Morpheus found me late. I'd finished college already. I've been on board nearly six years already, though." I grimaced. "After Morpheus' ten, that's a record on the Neb."

"So you've seen 'em all come and go, I expect."

I choose not to reply and return to my dutiful observation of the swan as it remerged from the bush, a long line of cygnets trailing cheerfully behind. Family. Perhaps that was one of the concepts that Zion in general lacked the most.

I closed my eyes and rested my head against Neo's shoulder.

~*~

All I can do now. I KNOW I'm messing up the ending with this. Anyway, this is NOT the last you're hearing from me. Chapter two should, repeat, SHOULD arrive shortly.