The Day I Tried to Live

Chapter 2

By: DuJour

Disclaimer: I lay no claim to any characters other than Tess – the rest belong to the Wachowski brothers, god bless 'em.

A/N: Rating changed for very brief, mild f/f slash. 

I could hear voices.  I couldn't open my eyes or speak, but I could distinctly hear both a male and a female voice speaking to each other somewhere close by.  I appeared to be lying on my back on some sort of table, but I wasn't sure because I couldn't really feel anything. I couldn't move. I couldn't speak. All I could do was listen.

"I hope you know what you're doing, Trinity.  It makes me uncomfortable to unplug them at her age."

"I know.  I told you I would take full responsibility if anything goes wrong."

"Why her?  I still don't understand.  I realize that you felt sorry for her, but you know we can't save them all, simply out of pity."

"It wasn't just pity, Morpheus.  When I first saw her hiding in that phone booth, I saw the fear in her eyes.  I could feel her terror, and I remembered what it was like the first time I came up against an agent.  And I remembered how I felt when I first realized that what I was seeing couldn't possibly be real."

"So you saw something of yourself in her?"

"You could say that."

"I see."

"Plus, once I found out about her medical background, I thought that she could be an asset to us.  You can't find that kind of training in a teenager."

"That may be true Trinity, but anyone can be trained rather easily.  We have plenty of programs…"

"There was something else, Morpheus.  I can't explain it, but when I saw her - I knew she was meant to be here.  I don't know why, but I just knew we had to get her out.  You can understand that, can't you?"

"Yes. Yes I can."

With that, I drifted back into unconsciousness.

I had no idea how long I slept, but I woke up to a strong smell that I couldn't quite put my finger on. It was like a combination of engine grease and a burning electrical smell covering up an underlying musty dampness.  And I was cold. I had a brief recollection of being in an old garage, but I couldn't remember why I was there or even when that was.  Maybe I was still there.

I tried to listen for the voices again, but all I could hear at first was a low, steady humming that seemed to emanate from no where in particular.  Then I recognized another sound - footsteps.  They were muffled, but I could hear what sounded like heavy heels treading on metal ground.  I thought I could make out three distinct sets, but maybe there were more. 

I tried as hard as I could to concentrate and hear above the humming and beyond footsteps.  Finally, I heard the voices again.  They were low and stifled, but they were there.  Most of what I heard seemed to be men's voices, but one was distinct - female and familiar, but still too muffled for me to make out any of what she was saying. 

I had to figure out where I was.  I hesitantly tried to open my eyes, but my lids were so heavy I had a difficult time.  When I was finally able to open them enough to let some light in, I instantly knew why I hesitated.  A sharp pain shot right into the back of my skull and my eyes felt like they were being scalded.   Even the smallest sliver of light caused a great deal of pain.

What the hell was going on?

I slammed my eyelids shut tight. 

OK, I thought, let's try something different.  I attempted to move my hands.  I was weak, but I was able to open and close my fingers.  I stretched my fingers out to try to get a sense of where I was lying.  I felt a rough blanket covering some type of bedding - maybe a cot.  I was able to move my hands to the edge of where I lie and I could feel the edges of a mattress.  Definitely a cot. 

Since my arms seemed to work, I thought I'd try my legs.  I wiggled my toes and rotated my feet at the ankles.  I noticed that they just hung over the edge of the cot.  Again, I felt weak - and wouldn't have trusted trying to put weight on my legs - but I seemed to have all my limbs intact.  That was something at least. 

I got ambitious and tried to move my head from side to side, which proved to be a big mistake.  I was able to rotate my head slightly, but only with a great deal of discomfort that was immediately followed by a horrible dizziness and a sickening wave of nausea.  My body heaved involuntarily at the onset of the nausea and I felt certain that I would vomit, but nothing came up. I did, however, seem to capture the attention of whoever in the room with me. 

"Trinity, she's awake."  I heard an unfamiliar voice say.  He sounded vaguely British.

Trinity? I pondered the name.  I know that name.

"Tess, can you hear me?" asked a familiar voice.

I was able to nod yes.

"It's okay.  You're okay now."

I felt a warm, soft hand on my forehead.  I tried to open my eyes again, despite the pain that I felt with my first attempt.  I couldn't help it.  I had to see who this familiar voice belonged to.

"No, don't open your eyes, yet.  They're still too sensitive.  You'll be able to open them a little later, once the lights are down."

I heard what she said, but I didn't want to obey.  I was even more curious now to see who was speaking to me.  Whose hand was holding mine so softly.  Whose breath I could feel tickle my ear as she leaned in to whisper to me. 

 "Tess, you've got to trust me.  Just listen to me and I'll get you through this, okay?"

I nodded.  I obeyed.  Whoever it was, how could I not trust that voice?  It was almost hypnotic.

"Stryker, get some bandages.  Tess, I'm going to have Stryker bandage your eyes, so you won't be tempted to open them.  It's just for a little while, I promise."

"Who's Stryker?"  I said.

These were the first words I'd spoken since I regained consciousness and they burned like fire spewing from my throat.

I heard the man's voice chuckle.

"I'm Stryker.  I've been helping Trinity here take care of you."

Trinity.  That's who the voice belonged to.  It was all starting to come back to me.  The agents.  The pill.  Morpheus.  Then something else.  Something else I couldn't quite remember.

"I've got to say I'm quite honored that my name was your very first word."

"Stryker, the bandages," I heard Trinity warn.

I felt strong hands gently lift my head up to allow a bandage roll to be wound around my head and over my eyes.  It hurt my neck muscles just to have my head lifted even slightly like this.  Everything was still so sore, but despite the pain I knew it would cause, I continued to speak.  I had so many questions.

"Where am I?" I asked, trying to limit my speech to a whisper, hoping that would hurt less. 

I felt Trinity's hand take mine again as Stryker finished up with the bandages. Her touch was both gentle and firm, not unlike her voice.

"You're on Morpheus's hovership, Tess.  The Nebuchadnezzar.  We brought you here after you took the pill.  Do you remember?"

"I remember the pill.  And then something else, but I'm not sure…"

"Don't worry about the rest right now.  I just want you to know that you're safe.  Stryker is one of our crew members.  He's been helping me take care of you."

"What happened to me?" I croaked.

"We rescued you, love," Stryker quipped rather jovially.

"Oh. Thanks."  Despite the millions of questions that his statement presented me with, that was all I could manage to get out.  I still didn't know what had happened to me, had no idea where I was, and not a clue as to who or what I had been rescued from. 

All these questions swirled about my head, and I desperately wanted answers to them all, but fatigue prevented me from demanding the answers I needed right then.  I began to get dizzy again and couldn't talk any longer.  Trinity must have noticed how quickly I was wearing down.  She gently squeezed my hand and released it.

"They'll be plenty of time for questions later.  You should try to go back to sleep." 

This time I was happy to obey her order.

When I woke, I could feel someone sitting on the cot next to me.  Even without the benefit of sight, I could tell it was Trinity.  I smiled, both to acknowledge her presence and because I felt so much better than I did earlier.  Much of the soreness was gone and my throat no longer felt like it was on fire.

     "How'd you sleep?"  She was caressing my forehead, which felt lovely, but odd.  Something didn't feel quite right.  Then it hit me.  I had no hair.  I reached up to feel for myself and sure enough, I was bald but for a bit of soft stubble. 

     "Don't worry. It'll grow back," Trinity chided, noticing my concern.

I continued to run my hand over my newly shorn locks.  I could feel the shape of my skull, which I'd never been able to do before.  I noticed I had a slight dip right in the center and a hollow between two tiny ridges down the back.  I followed this hollow with my fingertips until they caught on something round and metallic that seemed to be pressed into the back of my skull.

"What the fuck?!" I yelled as I instinctively tried to pull this thing off my head.  I didn't know what it was, but I knew it wasn't supposed to be there.

"Trinity, help get this thing off me!"

"Tess, don't…" she cautioned calmly. 

I wasn't in the mood for calm.

"Now Trinity! Get it off me now!"  I yelled as I tried even more furiously to dig this thing out of my skull, but since I didn't appear to have much in the way fingernails, my efforts were rather futile. 

"Stop it, Tess!  Just stop it!"  Trinity commanded as she grabbed my arms, pulled them away from my head, and held them down to my sides. 

Damn, she was strong.

"Calm down, its okay.  It's just a plug.  It's not going to hurt you.  I have one too. See."

She guided my hand to the back of her head, where I felt an identical plug buried in her hair. 

Why hadn't I noticed this before? I thought.

"Trinity, what are they?"

"I'll tell you but you've got to promise to calm down."

I promised.  Again, her voice was lulling me into submission.    

     "Good. I think we can take these off now," she said as she began unwinding the bandages from my head.  Even with the bandages off, it was hard to see and it took a while for my eyes to adjust to my new surroundings, but at least they didn't hurt this time. 

It was dark in the tiny room except for one dim lantern on the wall beside my cot.  The room was small and spartan.  Besides my cot on one wall and a table on the other, the room was bare.  Bare and industrial.  In fact, it wasn't so much a room as it was a cell.    

I recognized Trinity sitting on the edge of the cot immediately, even without the black leather.  I actually thought she looked even more beautiful now, in a tattered grey sweater and work pants.  And her eyes.  I'd not seen her eyes before – they'd always been shaded.  But now, I could see that they were the most beautiful pools of crystal blue.  They stood out brightly in the room, where everything else seemed to be tinted a dull grey. 

     "Is that better?" she asked.

     "Yes," I answered with a hesitant voice.

"I'm going to show you something now.  Don't be afraid."

     Trinity gently rolled back the sleeve of my shirt to reveal two small plugs in my forearm.  She sat back and let me ponder my new ornamentation for a moment.  I fingered the plug on my left arm, halfway down the underside of the forearm.  It was black and round, about the size of a quarter.

     "We used that one as an IV port to feed you while you were recovering."

     "Oh."  That's all I could say as I continued to study the plug with my finger and my eyes.  "Oh." 

In an attempt at sympathetic solidarity, Trinity rolled up her own sleeve to show me that she had the same plugs in her arms as well. 

     "Are there... more?" I asked.

     She turned away from me and for a moment I thought that I had somehow offended her, but instead of turning to leave, she began to lift up her sweater.  As she pulled it up over her arms, I noticed the plugs on her back.  Six in a row, straight up her spine.  She lifted the garment up completely over her head, dropped it on the cot beside us and turned to face me.  I could see that she had two plugs in her chest, one just above each breast.  I looked up into her eyes and posed my silent question while hesitantly extending my hand.  She granted her permission with a nod and a soft smile.

     My fingertips touched the plug just above her right breast.  It was a very strange feeling.  Something so odd and foreign, yet very much a part of her human body.  She stayed very still and allowed me to explore, all the while keeping her eyes fixed on mine.

     As I continued to run my fingertips over the plug, I noticed how it was slightly cooler than her warm skin.  And how the black metal contrasted harshly with her milky complexion.  With the very tip of my index finger, I began to make small circles, extending them radially from the center of the plug outwards.  When I reached the border where the metal met skin, I traced a circle around the outside of the plug, further attempting to comprehend this symbiosis between flesh and steel.

     Goosebumps began to appear on Trinity's chest and shoulders as she let out a long, deep sigh.  Suddenly, and unexpectedly, I realized that it wasn't just the plug that I wanted to explore.  I slowly let my finger wander down to where the skin of her breast began to darken and traced a circle around the areola, just as I had done with the plug.  Her goosebumps seemed to multiply with my touch and she sucked in a deep breath and closed her eyes.  I noticed her nipple had hardened and I couldn't resist softly rolling it between my thumb and index finger, reveling in its warmth in my gentle grasp.

     Trinity let out the breath that she had been holding in, and with it came a small, contented moan.  She opened her eyes to look at me and I immediately felt ashamed and worried that I'd done something wrong and I quickly removed my fingers from her breast.  Then, she softly smiled and I knew that she was okay with what I had done.

     "I'm sorry," I tried to explain.  "I just wanted to..."

     "It's okay, Tess.  You just wanted to feel something real."

     With that, she surprised me by reaching her hand up under my shirt.  She trailed her fingers up my chest, then up and over my left breast, pausing momentarily as she lightly brushed my own hardened bud with her thumb.

     The sensation of her touch was amazing.  Like nothing I'd ever felt before.  This certainly wasn't the first time I'd been touched this way, so why did it feel so different now?  Was is because she was a woman?  Because I'd never been touched by someone quite so beautiful?  I suspected that both of these reasons contributed to why I was feeling the way I was, but I knew that those weren't the only reasons.  There was something else causing the overwhelming sensation, but I didn't yet understand what it was.

     Trinity laid her palm over the plug on the left side of my chest, just over my heart.  She then took my hand and returned it to the same spot on her chest.  She leaned in close and I could again feel her breath tickling my ear.

     "See, you're just like me now," she whispered.  Her voice was seductive, but reassuring.

     As much as I wanted this information to comfort me, I still had too many questions.  I reluctantly removed my hand from her chest and she inched hers from beneath my shirt.

     "Trinity, why do we have them?  What are they for?"

     Seeing that I still had so many unanswered questions, Trinity settled back in her seated position on the cot, picked up her sweater and held it in front of her exposed chest.

     "Well, they're not used for much of anything now.  But they used to keep you alive when you were plugged into the machine world.  Some were used to feed you, some were for excretion.  Others were used for neuro-muscular stimulation."

     "Wait a minute, what are you talking about – the machine world?  Is that where you brought me after I took the pill?"

     Trinity appeared to stifle a giggle at my question as she pulled her sweater back on.  "No Tess, by taking that pill, we saved you."

     "From what, those agent guys?"

     "Not exactly.  Tess, do you remember when I told you we'd have lots to talk about?"

     ~~~~~~~

     My mind was reeling as I listened to what Trinity was telling me.  It was just… unbelievable.  My whole life was a lie?  All this time when I thought I was just going about my everyday business, I was being used as energy to feed machines who had taken over the world – nearly 200 years ago?  It was insane!

My head was throbbing.  I couldn't take much more, but I'd come this far and now I needed to know everything, so I continued asking questions.

"So, all my life, I've been… asleep?"

"Sort of.  You've basically been in suspended animation.  Sensory depravation.  That's why it's taken you so long to recover. We gave you acupuncture to stimulate your muscles and to improve your circulation. Your eyes just need a little time to adjust.  It will take a while getting used to things again, Tess, but we'll help you."

"We?"

"Myself, Stryker, and the rest of the crew.  You'll meet them later.  In fact, do you think you're up for a tour of the ship?"

"Sure," I said.

Why not? I thought.  Taking a tour of a hovership was about the least strange idea I'd heard all day.