AHHHHHHHHHHHHH! I think I've finished it!….pardon that NONE of the logic in this makes ANY sense whatsoever and that the ending is completely lame…in all honestly I just wanted to finish this story and that is why this whole chapter is just an explanation and a crappy explanation at that ( I KNOW it's confusing, but just smile and nod and pretend you understand)(actually I had a longer and more complcated explantion for everything that occured, but that was even more confusing than the ambiguity I display here, so...)...anyway, thank SO SO SO SO much to everyone who reviewed and helped me with my first foray into fanfiction! I'm not sure if I will write another Matrix fanfiction, seeing how I am an obsessive person by nature and my obsession with this has moved onto other things, but if you are intrested in the other fandoms I am writing for, do check my stories out! (shameless plug accomplished)
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Where there were questions, answers were to be had. And in the Matrix there existed one singular place to go if seeking them: The Oracle.
Trinity led the way quietly, although she knew the following Smith ached to regain his leadership. Too few words had been spoken since their exchange in the subway station; whatever passion, or, dare they ever admit it, love they shared was not to be explained by either and they knew it. Any attempted justification would only be futile. It was best they left their thoughts unshared.
Eventually, Smith's previous forwardness all but subsided and Trinity occasionally glanced behind, silently taking in the man as he stumbled along, dividing his attention between her and the ground. He grew visibly nervous as they approached the dilapidated building.
Once inside, Trinity headed for the elevator. She stopped with her hand mid-air, about to press the scratched and worn button. A quick turn to Smith revealed to the man that she was just as shaky and unsure.
"We don't have to do this," she said to him, her eyes searching his worried face, "We could leave now, unnoticed, without the answers. We don't need them to survive."
Smith tensely shook his head.
"No. You don't need them, but I do. Answers, products, outcomes are the purpose of my life."
Trinity tentatively placed a hand on his cheek.
"Were. They were your life. It doesn't have to be about the result anymore. Don't be afraid to just accept the journey."
He swallowed conspicuously, his gaze holding Trinity just as she was holding him.
"You're just as curious," he said slowly, "And if she does tell us what we want to know, perhaps it will give you even more information to take back to your leader."
"Since when have you cared about Morpheus?"
"He will undeniably play a part in how this all ends."
"What do you mean?"
"Whether you stay or not."
"Stay?"
"In the Matrix."
"Whose side are you on?"
"I don't think I can answer that yet."
Trinity slowly recalled her hand from his cheek, her hurt eyes dropping to the ground.
"But I could never leave you," he added.
Her eyes flickered back up to his face. The angst in the room was brimming and she didn't know how to quell it. She had never felt this devoted and lost. Swallowing the moment of helplessness, she smiled a meaningless grin more characteristic of an Agent than herself.
"Let's see what the Oracle says."
--
"A bit early," the woman mused, her ancient, wrinkled eyes surveying the ragtag team on her doorstep.
Beyond her, the apartment was eerily empty. Never before had Trinity experienced the door being answered by the Oracle herself; she usually kept to the kitchen.
Smith tilted his head to ask Trinity a question, but was interrupted.
"No," the Oracle said in answer to his unspoken question, "But I do know most."
She turned to lead them back into the kitchen, the elderly woman collecting an object from a dark, wooden side table as she entered. Once inside, she pivoted back to them, a hint of a smile tugging at her worn lips.
"Then I take it you are already aware of what we wish to learn," Smith spoke assertively.
"Sure, but I want you to say it."
"Why?"
"It helps the truth go down easier."
"I thought you had cookies to do that," Trinity smiled coolly, trying to ease the tension.
The Oracle sighed, turning her back to them again and swinging the door of the hearty, old fridge open.
"Pardon me, but no cookies today. How about some pudding?"
The two looked at her questionably.
"I felt it was time for a change," she shrugged.
"A change…" Trinity spoke, "Is this a sign—"
'Oh, darling," she said, receding from the fridge with two small glass bowels in hand, "Don't read too much into it. What I do has no consequence. It's what I tell you that matters. You of all people should have realized that."
Trinity glance away subtly, avoiding eye contact with the Oracle and Smith. This old woman, whether intentionally or not, was wrong. Something had changed; a great many things had changed. And not just for her either. Trinity observed Smith, who had just reached down to turn the pudding around and give it a scrutinizing look.
Trinity lifted her head back to the Oracle, her look the same temperament as Smith's death gaze to the custard dish.
"Then what do you have to tell us?"
"Only that you will be making some monumental decisions and playing some essential roles in the coming era of mankind." She nodded gracefully to Smith, "Quite ironically, him especially."
Smith jerked up to her at this comment.
"Why? Why am I so important to them?"
"Glad to see you at least figured out you were important on your own," the woman sighed, letting her eyes wander from the scowling man demanding answers to the ticking clock on the wall, "It does save time, but then how subjective time can be…five minutes can seem a lifetime when a man's waiting for the right moment."
Her two guests made discreet eye contact, each reading the glint in the other's eyes. The Oracle smiled fully for the first time, but the two were too otherwise engaged to notice. The Oracle broke the tension lightly.
"You've always been special, Agent Smith."
"Please, just Smith."
"I knew you would request that."
"Then why not just refer to me that way in the first place?"
The woman just lifted her eyebrows and gave him a minimalist answer.
"It had to be your decision," she stated before moving on, "The machines have had their eye on you for a while—Smith. There was something odd about you and they knew it. They had planned it that way."
"Control," Trinity stated bluntly, giving a clear indication of how she felt about that word and what it signified.
"Their control reaches farther than any of us could ever imagine, Trinity. But that's not the point. The point is we now have proof that they are not completely omnipotent—and an opportunity comes with that proof."
"Me," Smith muttered quietly.
"It makes you wonder, really, what caused it," the Oracle mused, seeming to look past the human and machine in front of her, "Maybe it was just inevitable. The A.I. had to learn from humans; what other prototype would they have? Perhaps…" She sighed. "Perhaps I should explain a bit."
She gently took a seat and began to eat one of the untouched puddings. She seemed shaken, so unlike her flawless and charming, if ambiguous, self.
"I just can't believe it has actually come this far, that it has evolved into something this far-reaching."
"But I haven't done anything yet," Smith countered, "I haven't even made the decision whether I really am, dare I say it, turning against my kin yet—"
"Oh, but I believe you just did."
Smith fell silent, seeming in his quiet to absorb the impact of his actions. The Oracle continued.
"In the very beginning, when the Matrix was first created, our dear Architect found your race a rather curious study. He claimed that the various human weaknesses he worked into your programming were merely to help the Agents blend in—retaining their ability to carry out their duty, of course. I always figured it had to be something more. Indeed, as the A.I. slowly garnered the ability to feel, the risk of a human infiltrate grew greater. With this danger apparently blending in suddenly became less of priority and the programming was deleted out of the Agents. Yet some coding remained behind."
"That is why I feel this way? Some of that programming remains in me?"
"Yes—but that isn't all there is to it."
"What do you mean?" This time Trinity had spoken. Indeed, the Oracle's words seemed to have had more of an impact on her than even Smith.
"Other Agents and programs of the system have it in them too."
"Other programs?"
"Yes. You've read poetry?"
"I have," Trinity answered at Smith's shaking of his head.
"Anthropomorphizing—giving human characteristics to an item that is not human. Let's just say that some of those artists were more inspired then people give them credit. The sun does really smile."
Trinity smiled too at this comment. As a human, something about that made her feel like the human race did deserve the elevated position they gave themselves.
"Still, why me?" Smith asked.
"There is no 'why' dear, you were randomly chosen. The machines needed someone with abilities to keep those who still posed a risk to the system with their emotions in check. And as you know, machines aren't that creative. They had found a method that worked with humans and adapted it to fit their own."
"I'm the One."
"To put it bluntly, yes. You're—"
"Perfect. From all that I can remember of my creation I have been a step ahead of the others."
The Oracle nodded, her face stoic. "Very much so. It was essential."
"But Neo was the One," Trinity butt in.
The Oracle took another long look up at the clock.
"Neo was supposed to be the One."
"Then your original prophecy to me remains true?"
"Depending how you look at it."
"It wasn't Neo that I was meant to love."
"No, dear, it wasn't."
Trinity looked up at Smith. She finally understood, but now was not the time to say it.
"The machines also gave you opportunities for power, skills that you might one day warp to your own uses against the system. Needless to say, you will never know what those might've been, but I'll just leave that out there for you to ponder. Of course, they always assumed you would be undone by your own emotions, that careful human programming would blind you until they could strike. A perfectly planned fault you might call it."
"But why have I never experience this before?"
"Oh, you have. Hate, anger, rage, frustration. I think if you look hard enough into your past you can find more than enough examples. These new feelings have been recognized now because, well, because you found her."
She looked expectantly at Trinity who in turn glanced at Smith. Something in her wanted to smile at that, to take Smith in her arms and just hug him joyously. But it was the saddened part of her that reigned right now.
"I'm sorry," she half-whispered to him, "I'm sorry that I made this happen."
"No," he responded, "I see no reason to be upset. And most definitely nothing caused by you. My feelings may in essence be contrived, me contrived, but you have opened up a whole new consciousness, one that is as real as can be."
He paused and an odd tranquility lingered in the room. It was unlike the previous tense gaps in their conversations; this quiet seemed to encompass all, to tie everything that the Oracle had told together in one large bundle. However many loose ends there were, however much the woman had neglected to tell them, the couple, for they welcomed that title now, felt as if they had the strength and the importance to infer the rest on their own.
"You bested the Architect," the Oracle spoke, breaking the silence, "So you must be beware him in the coming days. He will no doubt find your refusal to adapt to his system offending and put forth much effort to stop all your efforts."
She looked at Smith with a sort of impish glint in her eye.
"But you still found that one emotion that he didn't know how to control—love."
The Oracle, guiding them towards the door, smiled more widely than she had before.
"Both the machines and the humans place their trust in you. In you both."
They turned back to her once they had entered the hallway.
"Thank you," Trinity said.
"Thank you."
Studying them one last time, the Oracle also gave them one last piece of sage advice.
"A new world waits for you, if you can find it."
Shutting the door slowly, the elderly woman passed gently into the shadows and then was gone.
Smith turned to Trinity.
"Well, what now?"
Trinity smiled an all-knowing grin.
"We find our new world."
fin.