/////////////////////////////////////////////////////// Hey guys, I'm back again. Hope this next chapter will spark your interest in my story. Don't worry about the starting, I know its boring. I'll try to get to the exciting parts soon. Without further ado, here is the next chapter. Love ya'! ;) ///////////////////////////////////////////////////////

Chapter 3 Welcome Aboard.

"Welcome aboard the Nebuchunezzar, Gareth." Morpheus had never addressed Gareth so casually before, he guessed that calling him 'Mister Williams' was no longer valid on board his very on ship together with his crew. The surroundings were dark and gloomy, the walls lighted up with a dim glow of light coming from who knows where? Gareth sat up in his armchair, instantly he felt a searing pain on the back of his neck. His hand flew to the spot where the pain came from and felt around. His fingers found something metallic and round with many holes around the perimeter. At least, that was what Gareth thought it might look like.

"Hey, that's him. That's the guy!" a male voice shouted from somewhere in the ship.

"Really? Its Gareth, the Gareth the one who survived the blast?!" another voice answered, somewhat unbelieving the other voice.

Gareth heard the clink clanking of boots or shoes on the metal grating of the hovercraft. The sounds grew louder with each footstep, soon the footsteps stopped and two people appeared just behind where Morpheus and Trinity stood. One of them looked young, had blonde hair, a medium build and was donning a pair of denim pants together with a long sleeved shirt with the words 'FcuK' in bold on the chest section. His attire made him look like a computer hacker in New York, no matter how you look at him. The other man looked slightly older than the computer hacker, he had graying hair, was wearing a white shirt and long blue pants. His shirt was stained a bit by oil here and there; it was also torn in certain parts. "Obviously an engineer of something." Gareth thought. Morpheus stepped aside and pushed the two men to the front of him. "This little fella," he messed up the computer hacker's hair a bit with his hand, "is Switch, our on-board human supercomputer." He smiled and patted Switch on the shoulder. "While this guy," he gestured with his hand to the man on his left, "is our mechanic and weapons engineer." The man nodded at Gareth and said, "Name's Cypher buddy." All of a sudden, sirens were blaring and emergency lights were flashing red. Morpheus started giving out orders, pointing out this and that, only now he had remembered about Gareth, so he said to him,

"Gareth, I want you to stay here, do NOT touch anything, we have a situation."

"What situation? I want to help!" he asked a question, followed by a request, which he knew Morpheus would object to.

"This is not the time for explanations Gareth. And no, you cannot help at this time, you are too weak. I'll explain everything to you later. Now, stay here." With this, he turned his back on Gareth and ran off.

"Sentinels, their tailing us! They caught our broadcast signal captain!" a man in a black shirt shouted from the bridge of the Nebuchunezzar.

"Lose em'!" Morpheus ordered. "Trinity, Cypher, get to the weapons and hold them off till we can get to a safe zone." He sounded tense but his faced showed no signs of fear or tension.

Trinity and Cypher rushed off to the back of the hovercraft one behind the other. "God damnit, I knew it was a bad idea to broadcast so near to 01." Trinity gasped as she and Cypher made their journey to the weapons stations. "Yeah, whatever you say." Cypher replied behind her. "Crangggggg! Screeeee!!" a lurch and sliding of metal on each other was heard and the entire hovercraft tilted sideways. Another sudden movement of the ship and it threw everyone off their feet, except for Gareth who was still sitting comfortably in his nice big armchair.

"What in the hell.?" Cypher stopped, looking upwards, seeing a hole in the ship's metallic ceiling. He also saw a set of red glowing 'eyes', which grew bigger, and smaller, zooming in and out as it tried to get a clear image of Cypher.

To be continued.