Disclaimer: Fan Fiction Inspired by the film The Matrix by Larry and Andy Wachowski © Warner Bros. Entertainment (1999). The Ghost in the Machine and The Hecate Cycle © oqidaun / M.L. Nicholson (2002)
Credits: Opening lyrics from Black No. 1(Type O Negative) Closing lyrics from Severance (Dead Can Dance, A Passage in Time)
Ratings:
± Complete work: R for Language and Violence.
± Chapter Eight: PG13 for Mild Violent Imagery and Language.
Chapter Eight OmniscienceLoving you was like loving the dead…
The man drinking cappuccino absorbed the clamor of empty voices, jazz music and the rattling of demitasses and coffee mugs. Rain splashed against the dark windows and the door opened sloshing another soul into the crowded coffee house. Fluidly, the newcomer slid out of his Burberry and slipped a delicate hand through his damp auburn hair. As an afterthought, he peeled his dark glasses away from his face and snaked through the crowd.
The smirking couple argued over trivialities and the distinguished looking man lowered his newspaper long enough to steal a secretive glance at their antics. Their conversation thrived in all that was not said, their unmet eyes, and flippant revelations. The music paused and their heated words enjoyed a preeminence on the surface of the sea of voices. A slow setting sun, he sank back into his newsprint. Two chairs, an ashtray and an ottoman away, a sallow skinned girl feigned interest in a copy of Paradise Lost. Her smoky eyes looked past the yellowed pages and settled on the man behind the newspaper. She blinked slowly like the cartoon cat clock in her sister's shop.
* * *
"Une autre, Monsieur?"
He looked up from the outdated science article. "Excuse me?"
"Oh, I am apologizing, I thought you speak French." The barrista ignored the ruthless, yet trendy crowd descending upon his understudy. "You read the Paris Match, I thought—"
"I see now. You caught me off guard. I did not respond immediately as I am too much of an academic to speak it well. I used to teach Latin at St. Vitus, so my understanding of French is bookish rather than experiential. However, it is not unschooled. Je voudrais une autre, s'il vous plait."
The barrista busied himself with the preparations for another cappuccino. "I not know St. Vitus had school. You like being teacher?"
A hint of dangerous irritation crept into his frown. "It was many years ago when I was working my way through medical school." He closed the magazine and watched intently as the barrista steamed the milk. He did not turn around. "Who is that woman you keep watching?"
The boy faced Moroccan blushed as he pushed the coffee across the bar. "She is Kai. She come here everyday."
"Kai? Who are her friends? Are they regulars as well?"
"The man with newspaper is regular. He complain about my espresso, but order it everyday. He speak French and sometime help me with English. Just like you, he is a doctor."
"Really? I guessed as much. What about the other—the man in the suit?"
"He come to talk to Kai. I no know him. One time another looking like him come when she is not here and speak with the newspaper man." He frowned. "I no watch them when Kai is gone."
"And the girl with the long hair and beautiful eyes?"
A broad knowing smile grew across the younger man's face. He raised a dark eyebrow. "She a friend of Kai. They talk every week. She come in only when Kai here."
"By which door does she take her leave?"
"Always the back, the alarm no work there so you can leave that way."
He laughed. "The back door on a dark and stormy night…Merci beaucoup, Monsieur. Tomorrow when you see Kathleen—I mean Kai—you will give her this." A fine linen envelope passed over the marble counter. "And tonight you will go home and work on your English, particularly verbs conjugated in the third person singular tense and articles."
Camus accepted the envelope and dropped it into the pocket of his starched apron. "Tonight I will work on my English and tomorrow I will give the envelope to Kathleen—I mean Kai." He wandered away, suddenly interested in the customers he was neglecting.
* * *
"I am not making any concessions. I am only agreeing that there may be more room for investigation than I originally anticipated."
"Two murders down and not a damn clue. It's comforting that you think there might be room for an investigation. Where are your lackeys tonight?"
"Brown and Jones are indisposed. I have something you may want to see and—" He stopped. The noise of the room floated away and the rattling of a hastily abandoned barstool peeled like a rusty wind chime. His intense blue eyes looked past Kai to the narrow hallway leading to the telephones and fire exit. The reverie faded and the din of voices and jazz returned. Smith's attention drifted back to Kai. He lowered his voice. "We should speak privately about these matters."
* * *
Vintage alligator ankle boots clicked along the wet concrete avoiding puddles, yet staying close to the wall. The aluminum crucifix tinkled innocently against the old glass buttons. Infrequent over sized raindrops smeared the chalky makeup. As the drops increased and the ghostly rice power washed away, she dissolved into a mere mortal. At the end of the narrow alley an ambivalent streetlight bathed the sidewalk in blue. He was waiting and she knew it.
"Beautiful evening for a stroll?"
She tightened her grasp on the ivory handle of her umbrella and tried to brush past him. "Yeah, whatever."
The shadow fell into step beside her. "The world's a miserable place, isn't it?"
"It sucks," she mumbled.
"You do not seem distressed by the weight of your comment."
"You live, you feed, you get a nice buzz and you fucking die. You know how it works."
"Then you are not surprised to see me?"
"I knew you were coming. I have been waiting."
"Really? Now I am surprised. The sister of Cassandra heeds her warnings?"
She walked faster as her courage waned. "People are talking." A bony hand seized her arm and spun her around to an angry face. In another world, a pair of virgin eyes snapped open and atrophied arms and legs flailed against the confinement. In her mind and in the other world she chanted: This world, this world, the red room, it's not real, it's not real, the red room,, the red room, the red room, the red room…A hand reached out of the amniotic fluid and struggled to tear the membrane. A frantic plea to a Sentinel with its hundred eyes directed elsewhere.
"It won't work." Shaking her, he laughed and drew her close enough to smell the coffee on his breath. "Let's have a bit of talk. I saw you reading Paradise Lost. I like that story. I wanted to tell you about the Fall, especially since you think you know so very much about it. It was pride that brought them down according to Milton. I, however, think that there is something more."
"Let me go."
"No. As I was saying, I think it was more than pride. I think it was something more powerful. Pride goeth before a fall, but who gives the coup de grace. Who pushes the prideful into the chasm?" He shook her again.
"I don't know." She tried to take a stumbling step backwards. His free hand snapped out and wrapped around her throat. A plum colored hematoma radiated outward from his thumb and forefinger.
"I don't expect you to know. I will try an easier question"
Her red lacquered nails dug impotently into his gray flesh. A defiant cry hung in her throat as her trachea began to give under the pressure of his grip. "I'll do anything."
"Yes, I know that."
"Please…"
"Tell me, do you believe in genetic evil?"
* * *
Two pairs of identical footsteps shuffled up three flights of stairs and an uncomfortable silence descended in front of the frosted glass. She shoved the brass key into the lock and pushed the door open. An unkempt ivy in a faux Chinese urn tumbled off its plant stand and crashed to the floor on the landing below. The quiet returned. Apathetic feet shuffled through the potting soil and shattered ceramic. Kai abandoned the closed door and moved to the edge of the stairs. She grew weary of unannounced visitors wandering up and down her staircase. The building needed an elevator. Uneven steps assaulted the worn marble steps. Smith kept his hands in the pockets of his raincoat as the steps drew near. Kai searched the darkness and her shoulders relaxed.
"What are you doing around at this hour, Nina?"
The steps continued and the girl materialized out of the shadows. Smith's right hand flew to his shoulder holster and settled on the butt of the IMI Desert Eagle. He took a step forward.
Kai did not move. "Nina?"
A frothy gurgle escaped its purpled lips. The lifeless marionette crumpled to the floor. The force of the fall freed one of the glass orbs from its bloody socket. The pewter colored marble swiveled unevenly across the floor and bumped against Smith's loafer.
Downstairs, a fourth pair of footsteps sprinted across the lobby and out the front door. Smith wrenched his gun from its holster and leapt over the prostrate body. His leather-soled shoes smeared the crimson blood into the light gray marble. Without hesitating, Kai yanked her sidearm out of its holster and charged down the stairs behind him. The lobby was empty and only a disinterested street lamp greeted them on the sidewalk.
A chill languished in the night air and carried with it the first hints of the fall to come.
When all the leaves
Have fallen and turned to dust,
We will remain
Entrenched within our ways.
Indifference,
The plague that moves throughout this land
Omen signs
In shapes of things to come.
