Author's Note: Sorry about the wait I've had midterms and finals.

Warning: Smith. Just Smith.

Disclaimer: I do not own the Matrix or any of the characters associated with it such as Smith, Trinity, The Architect or The Oracle. I only have rights to my Ocs.

Hollow

Wyvern ran up a fire escape, the Agents behind him fired their guns, the only thing keeping him from getting killed was the fact that he kept moving. The gunfire ceased as they started climbing after him, Wyvern risked looking down and his heart skipped a beat when he realized that there were only two Agents following him when they were always seen in groups of three. Where was the third?

With the two behind him catching up, Wyvern had to forget about the missing Agent and keep running. He was so close to an exit, he just needed to get there before the Agents caught him...He reached for his cellphone to call the Operators on The Nebuchadnezzar. The moment one of the brothers picked up Wyvern spat out, "I need an exit open hurry! Agents following! Hurry!"

He didn't hear a response when gunfire opened on him again. Wyvern rushed across the top of the building and jumped across the street. To his dismay his cellphone slipped out of his hand as he flew through the air. Once Wyvern landed he went toward a door on the roof, ran through it shut and locked it behind him. It made no difference to the Agents, but maybe, just maybe it would slow them down a bit.

Wyvern continued to race down the stairs to the third level, he had no idea what this building had used to be but these days it was used by the humans to get in and out of the Matrix. Several rooms away Wyvern could already hear the ringing phone that signaled that the Neb was prepared to take his mind out of this dream world and back into the real one. The only problem now was that Wyvern had found the third Agent.

He came from the empty room with the phone, tackling Wyvern to the ground, choosing to use physical force rather than bullets like his partners to bring down the human rebel. If he could just get to that phone he'd make a narrow escape! Wyvern tried to shove the Agent off him but managed to do little more than let the Agent get to his feet while he stayed stuck on the floor. Wyvern kicked at him, but the Agent picked him up and slammed his head painfully against the wall.

"Where is she?" The Agent hissed suddenly.

"Wha...?" His head was slammed against the wall again, Wyvern cried out in pain, "What a-are you talking, 'bout- Who...?"

"I know you were involved with unplugging the adolescent female Christine Edwards, also known as Trinity." The Agent yanked him back by the hair to growl this in his ear. "Now what have you done with her? Where is she?"

The phone was still ringing when. Wyvern shoved his elbow in the Agent's stomach getting nothing accomplished but to make the Agent grunt. Trinity? That girl that Glitch had requested they rescue from the Matrix? He knew that the girl had been under watch by the Agents and probably convinced that they were her friends but...this Agent acted as if he cared what had become of her. No. It had to be a lie, Glitch had told him that the Agents were just using young hackers to get to Morpheus.

"I don't know who you're talking about Fed!" Wyvern hissed, which resulted in him being picked up and thrown across the room into the opposite wall.

The Agent crossed over to him, instead of the normal icy calmness this Agent wore an expression that so closely resembled rage that a new terror started to build in Wyvern's chest. "Do not lie to me." The Agent snarled clasping Wyvern's head and squeezing tightly, "This is your last chance. Tell me where Trinity is and I will let you walk out of here with your life. Pathetic as it may be."

The Agent was actually bargaining for the girl. Wyvern couldn't comprehend what that meant, but he knew that an Agent's only objective was to crush the human rebellion. If he wanted Trinity back so bad then he could only assume that the Agents thought Trinity had the information they'd hired her to infiltrate the rebellion for. Wyvern's vision started to blur and turn red, blood pounded in his ears and he could taste it in his mouth. A flash of a young woman with brown hair and the sweetest smile he'd ever seen went through Wyvern's mind and a deep sorrow swallowed him.

I'm sorry Glitch...

"I'll never tell you!" Wyvern spat.

The Agent growled and smashed his head against the wall for the last time, at the same time he twisted snapping his neck. The human's skull cracked, but with the severing of his spinal cord he was dead almost instantly. Smith rose from the bloody mess the phone still ringing as he. Humans used the phones as gateways between this world and the other one. Curiously Smith picked up the phone and put it to his ear. He'd seen humans disappear the moment they answered, but nothing happened. He didn't hear anything either, just static, and even that faded to nothingness as the line went dead. Smith set the phone down just as Jones and Brown appeared at the doorway haven finally caught up.

They looked between the dead rebel and their partner, "Our orders were to take him alive if possible." Jones stated, it wasn't an accusation, just a reminder.

Smith took off his sunglasses and wiped dust off them, "It was not possible." He replied nonchalantly, "He almost escaped."

Brown checked the body, "You snapped his neck," he said analytically, "He's suffered several blows to the head, you could have knocked him out and brought."

"By the time he would have regained consciousness the humans may have decided to terminate him." Smith justified, "There is nothing we could have done."

Jones and Brown shared a skeptical stare, but chose not to argue, clearly they were sensing that Smith was not in the mood to explain his choice of action. They left the body of the rebel known as Wyvern where it was, sooner or later it would be discovered by someone, a human investigation would be conducted but it would remain an unsolved murder, no concern of theirs.

They returned to their car, Jones took the driver's seat and Brown sat in the passenger's side. Smith remained standing where he was, Jones rolled down his window with a questioning look to Smith. "One of us should stay." He suggested, "There may be more terrorists that will seek out this exit."

Jones seemed to see right through this suggestion to Smith's true reason for not getting in the car. "You are not going to find her, Smith." He said plainly, "It is unlikely that Trinity will be back in the Matrix anytime soon and statistically the odds of her betraying the rebellion for the Agency after we refused to share information with her are not in our favor."

"I understand." Smith replied, "I still request to keep on the look out."

Jones remained silent but gave a single nod to Smith before rolling up his window and driving away. Once the car and his partners were out of sight, Smith pulled his earpiece free and walked around the block taking note of every human he encountered, searching their bodies behind his sunglasses for any sign that they could be part of the human rebellion, like a hidden weapon, dark clothes or their own sunglasses. In particular he looked for a face, the one that belonged to the girl who had once said she loved him.

Smith, I'm meeting someone I'll be home soon.- Trin

That note was the last thing he had seen of her. Smith had tried not to be concerned when Trinity had disappeared. Tried and failed. His first reaction was to search for her, like he had the night she had run away from her foster home, calling all of her friends and checking out her favorite places to hang out when she wasn't on the computer. When that had failed to produce any sign of her, Smith had taken the car to do a full search for her. Still nothing. He was forced to accept the truth he had been denying:

Trinity had been unplugged.

The surge Smith felt when he realized that could only be called anger. If there was an emotion Smith was familiar enough with to recognize and understand it when he felt it, anger was that emotion, but this was different. Smith's anger was never directed to anyone or inflicted specifically at anything, he just withdrew from his fellow Agents and refused to speak. Most often the action he took with his anger was to leave Jones and Brown on their own when dealing with exiles or any other work the Agents normally did, in fact the only reason he'd shown up for this assignment was because a human rebel had been involved.

And clearly he had not handled the situation appropriately.

But mostly, Smith's anger was directed at himself or Trinity. While Smith continued to wander around town looking for more rebels he played in his head every encounter he'd ever had with the young woman, trying to figure out when exactly she had started to fall for him, why, and what he had done to make her feel that way for him. He shouldn't have been so kind to her. He shouldn't have humored her as often as he had. He shouldn't have pretended to be human for her.

Perhaps if he hadn't she wouldn't have been unplugged.

And perhaps if she hadn't been unplugged he wouldn't be feeling this way.

Smith wandered his way into a park where he found a bench to sit on and be miserable and conflicted. If this whole situation had proved anything to Smith it was two things: First that he cared enough about Trinity to notice she was gone and be upset about, the second more astonishing thing was that he cared enough to actually want her back.

Smith's hands balled into fists and his fingernails dug painfully into his palms but he didn't care.

It hurt more to think that his relationship with Trinity would never come to fruition more than it hurt to break the skin on his hands. It was like something had reached inside his body and ripped out something vital leaving him cold and hollow.

Is that pain what love was?

The more Smith thought about it the more it hurt and the angrier got. The hole inside him throbbed as it missed something he rarely even noticed was there in the first place. A woman sat down beside him and started to throw bread crumbs to birds that gathered and fluttered around them. Smith didn't take any particular notice of her until she suddenly spoke up.

"You know what they say about having a heart?" She asked. Smith turned to her, she was a program he could tell that much, but didn't recognize her from any previous encounters and most programs feared Agents too much to speak causally with them. She was black skinned and slightly obese but had a kind look about her that made Smith interested in what she had to say.

"What?" Smith demanded not kindly, though he wasn't sure himself if he meant he wanted to know the saying or if he was asking her to repeat herself.

The woman pulled a packet of cigarettes out of her pocket and Smith refrained from rolling his eyes. Smoking was a disgusting human habit that he didn't appreciate even when it was used to blend it. She smiled at him. "They say a heart's a heavy burden." She answered as she lit her cigarette and took her first smoke of it.

Smith didn't understand what she was saying or why she was saying it. Like she was somehow already aware of what was occupying his thoughts, Smith opened his mouth to question her but once she exhaled a cloud of nicotine she silenced him by speaking further.

"Of course what they forget to say is that having a soul is perhaps even heavier than a heart." She looked away from him and tossed more bread crumbs to the birds.

Smith raised an eyebrow, confident that the Matrix was not occupied by random good programs who wandered about giving free advice to people he was immediately suspicious of this one's intentions. "What do you want?" He asked.

The woman laughed, the desire to shoot her sparked slightly but Smith ignored it when she answered, "I thought the question was about what you wanted." Smith growled but she continued, "What I want Smith, is for the best of endings to be the one we get." She said.

Puzzled by this answer and the fact that this program actually knew his name Smith was compelled to ask "Who are you, how do you know me?"

The woman laughed again, "Oh, now's not the time to be asking who I am, there will be plenty time for you to figure that out later." She said, "Now is the time to be tasking who you are."

"I beg your pardon?"

She looked at him again, "You know what I mean Smith. You've known for a while. You're not like the other Agents, are you?"

It was true this thought had crossed Smith's mind a few times then and again, but he was still suspicious of the program before him, "How so?"

"Now you're asking the right questions." She answered, "How are you different Smith?"

He didn't have an answer. Every time that thought had occurred to him, Smith had failed to come up with a satisfying answer as to why he was not like the other Agents so he had always ended up pushing the thought aside without coming to a conclusion.

However this time, Trinity came to mind when Smith wondered about why he was different.

"You need to think about this carefully Smith. No one else can help you with it and I've done more than I should have already," She said standing up and putting her cigarette out, "All I can say now is that you make a better friend then you do an enemy Smith." She finished and walked away leaving Smith to wonder what had just happened.

He turned his attention to the birds trying to figure out what the stranger meant, who she was and how she could possibly have any idea what he was going through that would make her say the things she had. Failing to do anything accept make himself feel even more confused and conflicted Smith slipped his earpiece back in to see if there was anything to take his mind of his situation. There was none. And Smith was left once again knowing only two things:
Trinity was gone and he wanted her back.

Author's end note: Next chapter is the last official chapter but there will be a short epilogue as well so...yay. In case I don't post again before the holiday (Which its unlikely I will so don't get excited) Merry Christmas!