Title: Downloaded
Author: Stormhawk
Rating: PG
Disclaimer:
Matrix universe and associated characters: Wachowski brothers.
Agents universe: co-owned by me and Mordax.
Stef, Stevie, Jonas, Carol, Grady, Nevin, Tavis: Me
Greer: Overlord Mordax
Word Count: 6009
Summary: In his world, Jonas has decided to turn the world of the Matrix into a movie.
Notes: The idea for this hit me over the heard (and it hurt) the other day. The three new characters in it are loosely based on everyone on FFN. Hopeless Matrix-addicted fan boys who read and write fanfic and live on the Internet.
Ok, to my regulars: You guys mean so much that I have chosen to immortalize you within the words of this series. Ok, your names have been tweaked but I'm sure you will recognize them. Hope you don't mind and take it as a compliment. If you can't figure out who you are or figure that you should be on the list and aren't, email me or talk to me on the board.
Please read and Review.
"Damn I love The Matrix," Nevin said as they walked away from the holo-theatre.
"And what, we hate it?" Tavis replied, as he brushed some popcorn off his black fan-shirt that quoted Morpheus' line, 'welcome to the real world.' "We've seen it as many times as you have."
"Duh, we live together, of course we've seen it as many times as you have," Grady said
"I wonder if the FFW server is back up, I want to read the rest of that fic."
"No, I want to watch the Animatrix again. Second renaissance, damn the humans."
"You have a problem Grady," Nevin said rolling his brown eyes and shaking his sharp-featured face.
"Shut up Mr. Anderson."
"Morpheus help me," Nevin said, playfully cringing behind Tavis.
"Leave him alone Agent Grady," Tavis said adopting a Morpheus-like pose, though the oldest of the three looked nothing like the rebel, Tavis was short and stocky, his deep gray eyes were large and complemented his black hair. "He is the One."
"You're both viruses. And it's Recruit Grady." The tall boy said rolling his own eyes, which were green.
"Great, so you're an expendable coppertop." Nevin said, having stopped cringing.
"No, watch it again when we get back. Recruits aren't expendable, the agents value them."
"No way. They're just humans." Tavis argued.
"You never get it, there is a philosophy about choice and balance. You just don't like the bad guys."
"Yeah Grady, they're bad," Nevin said chewing on a piece of popcorn that had gotten wedged in his sleeve.
"Who's the one with the Agent Mimosa wallpaper?" Grady teased as he pulled at his brown hair that had a natural, abnormal but natural, streak of white running though it. Nevin poked his tongue out as they rounded the corner.
"Guys, this way," Tavis said as he pointed to the corner shop. "We're out of food."
"We've got space food."
"Nevin, no one but you eats that."
"We got money?" Grady asked.
"I got paid yesterday," Tavis said as he pulled out his card. Notes and coins hadn't been used since 2030 and all transactions were electronic. His card had a photo of him (he was cross-eyed in the picture) and was made of an extremely strong plastic so that it couldn't be easily damaged.
Walking into the store they split up, each knowing exactly what they had to get – it was a routine they had grown into after they had moved in together after they had finished high school. Fifteen minutes later they met up at the checkout and the holographic check out chick smiled at them as she scanned their purchases in.
Holograms were exceedingly common in their city, though not as so in other cities. The reason was quite simple; they had two of the largest holographic research and development institutes right there. Until recently HoloTech had been the only one but in the last six months JonasLabs had developed a huge range of new technologies and innovations.
There was only one ethical rule. The holograms were not allowed to be truly intelligent, that would cause too many problems so they were instead just very well programmed. It allowed humans to take on better jobs. With the huge increase in job opportunities since the globe officially declared itself digital in 2015 joblessness hadn't been a huge problem.
After paying for their purchases they left and walked the few blocks to their home. They adored their home. It was a basement (though they referred to it as subterranean, something they thought it sounded better) that was as big as the entire underside of the building. It had originally been storage space but when the refurbishing had taken place there was no longer a need for it so it was redone and rented.
It had been on the market for six months before the boys had found it. Desperate to rent it, the manager had given it to them at half price so long as they were locked into a five-year contract. That was fine, as they had no plans on moving for a couple of decades.
Nevin flicked on the lights and the computers, Tavis hauled the food through to the kitchen and Grady checked the mail slot.
"Junk, junk, another bill? Nevin we told you to stop ordering junk from that place," he said as he tossed a package at the shorter teen.
"Junk? It's not junk."
"It's Empire comics. They suck."
"We can't all be Marvel boys Grade," Nevin said as he tore open his package of six comics.
"I'm DC, don't forget that," Tavis called from the kitchen.
"It's here! Yay!" Grady said as he jumped the couch and slipped the thin card into the player.
"I didn't think it was due out so soon," Nevin said as he flicked off the light. Though they were on the other side of the war, it was nonetheless something exciting.
"It wasn't supposed to be," Grady confirmed as Tavis came through from the kitchen and sat in the recliner. He continued as the holo-player warmed up, "Jonas is going on holiday so he put this ep out early."
"How do you know?"
"Web. Duh."
"What's it about?" Tavis asked as the JonasLabs logo appeared. The holo-projector was the next natural step in evolution from the two-dimensional television. Though they had no form, the action and characters would play out in three-dimensions rather than two.
"I'm not going to tell you. You'll have to watch it. All I know is that there's some new characters introduced."
"Shut up, it's starting."
"Want to see it from the other side?" Mimosa's voice invited from the sound system as the credits sequence started.
Agents: The Series, flashed in green before it was drowned out by code. There was a rush of clips from earlier episodes then a freeze frame of major characters. Though it in no way had as large a fan base as the movie that were pro-resistance this series had a strong fan base.
The pictures stopped and the title appeared 'Frames of Reference.'
"Hey that's the name of my fic," Tavis complained. "Damn that Jonas, he stole it."
"Shut up, that fic wasn't that great anyway."
"I thought it was."
Grady paused the projector. "You stole that idea straight out of 'The Traitor' so it wasn't original to begin with."
"That's what fan fiction is, playing with ideas that were never developed by the creators."
"No incarnation of Stef would ever betray Smith like that."
"But…"
"That was a glitch. Anyway it didn't make any sense, why wouldn't he have known she was a program, they can see that."
"Jones programmed her to look human."
"If they were suspicious of him, anymore suspicious than they are in canon, they would simply tell the mainframe to initiate a backup copy of his code rather than go to the trouble of creating a deception agent."
"I liked that idea."
"So do I, I read every chapter didn't I? Right until the end, which sucked."
"I was planning a sequel but it only got forty-five reviews."
"That's not bad for a six chapter fic."
"Are we going to watch this or not?" Nevin asked. "Cause if we aren't I'm going to go read my comics."
"Ok Anderson," Grady said as he pushed the play button.
"You think Whitman will be in this one?"
Grady paused it again. "Not unless it's a Crete story, remember she's in the real world with him."
"Jonas must have been on LSD when he came up with that? But do you notice that it's only in this and not in the movie?"
"It's a spin-off series, it doesn't have to be the same. Now be quiet or I'll pull that unable-to-speak trick on you."
"Yeah right, recruit."
He pressed play again; this time there were no interruptions.
*****
Jonas hadn't been worried about leaving his facility. It had the top security in the city and probably the state. He and Carol were just going to have a holiday and enjoy the success of the multimedia franchise that was The Matrix. He had been considering the idea for a while and one day had simply gone ahead with it.
He had created the first holo-movie by simply piecing together files of Neo's journey into the real world and becoming the one, possibly the most interesting thing that had happened in a while in their world. The audience had loved it, that's why six months later it was still in the theatres.
Next had been a series of shorts, named the Animatrix because they were animated, he had always loved ancient techniques and animation was one of them.
Then had come the Agents series, he had to profit from those annoyances somehow. Splitting off from the first movie (for he had a sequel planned) it revolved around the 'bad guys' and her. Carol had objected to that but had quieted down once he had created a whole string of episodes centric on her.
He simply recorded their reality, he even included the factor of his world, though he had renamed the character based on him 'Crete'. And it had made him rich. That's why they were taking a holiday.
*****
"I give it three out of five," Tavis said. "Not one of the better ones."
"Come on," Grady argued. "That was a five star ep."
"Good rebels, give me a break."
"Cypher was a traitor. He would have gotten plugged back in."
"I thought it was better than FoS," Nevin said as they walked over to their computers. The other two agreed.
"Hummer is cool."
"You just like him cause he's as absentminded as you are."
"Shut up."
"I will not shut up Nevin."
Hanging above the three computers was a Spyder; it was how the computers accessed the web nowadays. Years ago, they had either used a modem or broadband access. Now everything was done by a Spyder (named for the pun with 'web') it was simply the best of all worlds. It was tied into the hard-line like the old cable Internet was but it was also a satellite receiver, as satellites could access most servers.
The Spyder would automatically select with function would load the pages faster and do it that way. Though, the difference was only a matter of seconds. Though it did make quite a difference when you were downloading.
Or hacking.
But the trio only hacked sometimes and certain sites at that. Mainly it was official Matrix site. Followthewhiterabbit.web .web had replaced .com years ago, it was simple. http:// was a thing was a thing of the past as were country codes, except in certain cases.
The governments were a great example. Gov.au, gov.us etc, each were the main government where subdirectories and sites could be accessed from. It had been a major shake up in 2018, when the net had been completely overhauled and made simpler and more streamlined. Spyders though were a relatively new invention, having come into common use in 2050.
For now, the three fan boys were going to do the thing that they did best. The thing that consumed most of their time. The thing that they were unable to live without, that defined their lives.
Fan fiction.
Their only hope was that the FFW server was working, though it was an ultra-rare occurrence they all shuddered at them memory from three years ago when it had been down for five days straight.
After checking their w-mail (web mail) Grady and Nevin clicked over to the fanfiction.web site. Tavis however, pressed a small blue device on the side of his slim monitor. A voice recognition system. These were quite common so that disabled people could use computers with relatively no trouble.
Tavis, even though he could have used normal software had chosen to instead write his own, he wasn't disabled, he was just lazy. But the software had a habit of breaking down and back chatting. It didn't back chat in a human way, it would just spit error messages at him. Nevin and Grady didn't know why he bothered; it wasn't so different from the ones already on the market.
"Wait a second," Tavis said as the FFW page opened up on his screen, having resorted to typing on the keyboard like the others. "Is anyone else on the board?"
"Didn't check," Nevin said as he opened up the message board/chat site that was devoted to both ATS and the Animatrix. "Nah, no one."
"Not anyone?" Grady asked as he clicked the movies category.
"Members not online," he read from the screen. "Karen Luffer, Underlord D Fonce, Ara, Die Dowji, L-Tory, Ollie is furry, three skitz jade angels, Star-slayer, Rocki, Jeni, Thunder Eagle, Muse, Blue quadruped, Outgral, Alloy sin, The very disturbed fairy. No one we know is on there."
"Ok," Tavis said. "We fic."
"You guys uploading anything?"
"No, I'm still waiting for reviews for my last one."
"You uploaded it five hours ago, and it was only 600 words long."
"I wrote it on a sugar high."
"That would probably explain why Brown was apologizing to his sandbag."
"Give it a couple more hours Nevin, you'll have some reviews. Two at least," Tavis said with a look at Grady.
"Great, pity reviews."
"Better than nothing Smurf."
"Great, Stef says 'Smurf' so you have to say it."
"Sue me rebel."
"If you two would kindly be quiet, I'm reading and fic." Tavis complained.
"That Stef/Greer one you started last night?" Nevin asked as he clicked up the Matrix category.
"Uh-huh. I'm up to chapter five."
"That's never going to happen."
"Yeah, Jones I know."
"Nah, Darth. Stef and Darth."
"Eh, maybe." Nevin said distractedly as he started on a parody fic.
A few hours later, not by any means bored of their fic but rather hungry they let their Spyder rest while they cooked dinner. It was a simple thing; throw the food bag in the Nuke1500 and wait. One minute later the food would be ready.
Insta-meals ruled. All the essential vitamins and minerals in an easy to prepare package, they didn't taste half-bad either. Tonight, the trio dined upon Lasagna and fries.
Tavis was so engrossed in the fic that he was reading that he barely noticed the conversation taking place between Grady and Nevin.
"You could never do it, the system is too well guarded."
"No Nevin, that's what everyone thinks, no one has ever tried to hack the system. I'm going to get in."
"You're going to hack your way into the JonasLabs main server? They use an original OS in there, he has the top security in the state around there, I've heard that it's better than some of the smaller gov sites."
"So they say, it could be a rumor," Grady argued as he shut down his open web pages and opened up the hacking software that he'd written himself.
"How much are you willing to bet that you'll get in?" Tavis asked out of curiosity.
"If I don't get in tonight I'll eat Nevin's space food for three days."
"Damn you're serious aren't you?"
"Considering I'd rather kill myself than eat that junk."
"I. Am. Sitting. Right. Here," Nevin reminded them.
They shrugged, Tavis went back to his fic, the story was seventeen chapters long and very interesting. Nevin shook his head and opened a packet of space-food, it wasn't really called that, it was merely dehydrated food that could be eaten straight from the packet and was supposedly able to last one hundred years without going rotten.
It was more or less like eating dry noodles.
He chewed on the chicken-flavored food stick and posted aimlessly on the message board.
After an hour of trying Grady grew furious and walked around the room with his head in his hands.
"Giving up?" Nevin taunted.
"I never give up the hack. Do you have any idea what is sitting on his server? What we can get our hands on if we get in?"
"It's impossible."
"Nothing is impossible Nevin," Tavis said having finally finished the fifty thousand plus word story and writing a review. "If Grade says he can get in then I believe him."
"You want to know what I believe? I believe he's the best hacker out of the three of us but that he will have to learn to like this stuff cause he will never get onto Jonas' server."
"I will too," Grady insisted and went back to his computer.
"What kind of security is it?" Nevin asked.
"There's two different routes in, one is impossible even for me, you'd have to be Neo to get into through there. The one I'm trying is a series of codes."
"What are you trying?"
"Everything from Elite to Underground," he said. "And everything in between."
"Maybe that's what he wants you to think."
"What are you thinking Nevin?"
"About the mines of Moria actually. They were thinking that it was complicated so therefore they were missing out on the fact that the answer was in fact simple."
"LOTR is ancient but you might be onto something. What do you suggest?"
"If you were Jonas and you knew that fan boys were going to try and hack your system you'd work against their mentality right?"
"But JonasLabs also does all the AI research so it wouldn't only be Matrix fans would it?"
"No, but the research has taken a back seat to the franchise. Judging by us cause we're pretty good stereotypes for the type of person who would hack the system what would be the last thing you would do?"
"Something to do with the movie or the Animatrix or ATS."
"Exactly."
"Nevin you are actually being intelligent." Tavis commented.
The boy smiled, "I know – scary isn't it?"
"Yes, yes it is."
Grady spent the next half hour building a new d-base of password combinations, he did this by using his program called Sneaky_Key which spit the passwords at the firewall for him. All he had to do was sit back and wait for the results. It hadn't worked with the previous d-base of words but this new one might work if Nevin's line of thinking was right.
He compiled the new d-base by copying and pasting in the transcripts of the Matrix, all the animated episodes and every episode from ATS. In addition he included some important dates or numbers that had been mentioned.
Sitting back, he waited. And waited. And waited some more.
After ten minutes, however there was a breakthrough. Sneaky_Key had broken through the first firewall. He looked at the log to see the password.
[Password = '555-0690']
He stared at Nevin, "holy shit you were right."
"Hey, though I look it, I am not stupid."
"Remind me never to underestimate you again."
"I will but you will anyway."
Five minutes later the second firewall broke.
[Password = 'B166ER']
After that, the next five were easy.
[Password = 'Dream world']
[Password = 'Carol Whitman']
[Password = 'Project 002']
[Password = 'Carlson']
[Password = 'Simulation']
Grady's eyes grew bright as he watched the screen in awe. "We're in."
*****
"This one?" the dusky-haired girl asked holding up another shirt.
"Stevie I wouldn't even like to image what your dad would do if he sees you in something like that."
"Come on, you probably dressed like this."
Stef took the shirt off the younger girl and stuffed it back on rack, "tight fluro green shirts weren't really my thing."
Stevie laughed, "I was joking. I like these better," she said indicating to the pile sitting beside the register. The pair were in Meteorite, a shop that carried everything from cowboy boots and plaid shirts to Goth gear and jewelry. It was the essence of eclectic.
"We'll take these," Stevie said to the purple-haired teen behind the counter. Her nametag read Ri.
"All right," she said with a smile as she scanned the barcodes. Stevie reached into her purse and pulled out her bankcard that was attached to the bottomless bank account that she and the crewmembers of the Exodus shared. The card read Brooke S Tarker it was the name on the faked file that had allowed her to get plugged back in without suspicion.
After paying for her purchases they walked out of the store but lingered looking at the display of jewelry. Most of it was silver in color, though some pieces were clearly pewter, and had interesting or intricate designs.
"Having a good day?" Stef asked her.
"Yes. Everyday I wake up is great, knowing that I'm home and away from that crappy ship."
"Where next?"
"I picked Meteorite, you choose next."
"I don't care, this is your day."
Stevie grinned to herself. "Can we go to Amy's?"
Stef shook her head. "No way Steves, you're not tricking me into that. Your dad made me promise that you would not get your ears pierced."
"It doesn't have to be my ears. I can get my tongue done or get a belly bar."
"Are you trying to get me deleted? He said 'no', many times actually."
"Ok, ok."
"CD store, your room could do with some posters." Stevie nodded as they walked there.
"Ooh," Stef said as they walked in. "I didn't know this was out," she said picking up a CD.
"Who is it?"
"Shadows, you wouldn't have heard of them, they haven't been out long." She looked at new album; it was almost a pun or a joke or something. The cover art had a picture of a computer screen with a hand beckoning the listener in with the background consisting of binary code in different colors.
The title was 'System Debris.' She picked up two copies.
"Who's the other for?" Stevie asked as she headed over to pop.
"Greer, he's one of the recruits."
Stevie looked at Stef and giggled, "Is he your boyfriend?"
"NO!" Stef replied sharply.
"Oooh, I think you like him."
"Shut up Stevie."
"I'm gonna tell my dad," she threatened in a singsong voice. "Stef's got a boyfriend, Stef's got a boyfriend."
Stef buried her head in her hands, "would you shut up? Everyone can hear you."
"You're just embarrassed."
"He. Is. NOT. My boyfriend. Ok? He's just a friend ok? Do I have to translate it to teenager for you?"
"I can hear you just fine."
"You are as annoying as a little sister. You make me glad I never had one."
The grin disappeared from Stevie's face and she busied herself with the selection of CD's in front of her. Stef got the feeling that she had said something wrong. "Hey what's wrong?" she asked softly.
"It's just…I always kinda thought of you as my sister. I don't mean to be annoying."
"Oh shit Stevie, I was joking. I can be your sister if you want me to. I was lying, I always wanted a little sister – just not one who says that Greer is my boyfriend."
"You mean that?"
"Yeah sis, let's get these CD's and go somewhere else."
"I haven't picked anything yet," Stevie argued.
"These will do," Stef said picking up a random handful of CD's. "You're bound to like something on one of them."
*****
"So what are we looking at Grady?" Tavis said, finally regaining the ability to speak after five minutes of solid staring at the screen. Part of it was the fact that his friend had actually been able to get into the best-guarded system in the state. The other was the system itself; they had never seen anything like it before.
"The most well designed OS that I have ever seen."
"You can say that again," Nevin breathed. "But don't cause I know you will."
Grady pulled up random filed and typed keys at random until he began to get a handle on the way the system worked. It was fairly simplistic, it had been designed by someone who loved computer and liked an easy OS to work with. All the basic commands were the same and the rest weren't hard to extrapolate.
"Well guys, what do we want?"
"Whatever we can get," Nevin said voicing exactly what they wanted.
"Will do." But after pulling up folder after of Matrix-related stuff he couldn't find anything of interest that they didn't already have.
"Well this bites," Tavis said. "I thought it would be a lot cooler. Get out of there before you get caught for nothing."
"You guys go back to whatever it was you were doing. I want a little more time on here, I know I can find something."
"Well," Nevin said opening another packet of space-food, "you can waste time if you want. I'm going to back to the board. I'm going to annoy L,Tory and Blue quadruped."
"Go ahead and be random Nevin," Grady said, "you're very good at it." While his two friends busied themselves at their separate computers he pulled up deeper system folders until he came upon a whole new level of the system that had been hidden from him before.
He knew he had been going to find something; he had a feeling that this was it.
Running through lists of files he realized that he was looking at the source codes for the holo-actors and holographic locations. He was in the heart of the system.
He was looking at his own version of the Holy Grail.
"Holy system codes. Guys!" he had to shout before he exploded. "Come here, come here, come here!"
"What is it?" Tavis asked.
"Look!" he said as he was on the verge of hyperventilating and was unable to form many words at a time. Knowing their friend wouldn't go crazy unless it was truly cool they pulled their chairs up besides.
"Please tell me I'm looking at what I'm thinking at," Tavis said as he reached out and touched the flat surface of the monitor.
"You are," Nevin said holding his pointed chin. "He found it. He's…"
"The one," Tavis said. "We bow down to you."
"Let's explore," Grady said having regained control of his voice. The others just nodded dumbly.
"We have to download some of these," Nevin said with a smile on his face.
"Hook the holo-player in and we'll have a look at them." Tavis ran over with a uni-cable and plugged it into the projector. The uni-cable system allowed any peripheral to be plugged into the same port, that way they were much easier to replace and hook up systems.
The thin cord was plugged into the back of the player as Grady scrolled down the list of 'characters'.
"It's in alphabetical order," Tavis said, "Can you skim the list down a bit?"
Fairly confident that he could work out how to control it, Grady nodded. Pulling up Sneaky_key's 'little brother' All_access, he copied all the character file locations and used the simple interface to sort them according to their properties.
"Rebels, civilians, programs…what do we want?"
"All of it Grady, we want it all," Nevin said ogling the screen. "Whatever we can find."
"Can I pick first?" Tavis asked.
"No, we use a fair way of deciding."
"And that would be…?" Nevin asked Grady.
"What it always is: paper, scissors, rock." The other two nodded their head in agreement.
Winning the best three of five Grady threw up his hands in triumph, "I go first."
"Well, it's fair," Tavis said begrudgingly, "you did get into the system."
"Got that right Morph. I know who I'm getting first."
There would be only one program who he would choose to get a copy of first, "in that case we don't mind," Nevin said as Grady ran through a list of the agents.
*****
"Did he tell you?" Stevie after she swallowed some potato bake, "did he tell you I have to go back to school?" She groaned as it seemed like the worst thing that could ever happen (besides getting unplugged)
Stef nodded, "it's only fair – you're only fifteen. You have your whole life ahead of you."
"But I just got home, I want time to have fun."
"You can have all the fun you want, it doesn't mean you can't go to school at the same time."
"School…fun, does not compute," she said in a robotic voice.
"School can be fun," the agent argued.
"Right…"
"Now Stevie listen to me…" She went to explain the value of an education but the world disappeared from sight as she felt herself being pulled backwards into a void.
Jonas! She swore silently. It could only be him.
*****
"It's working," Nevin all but yelled as the holo-player grew brighter and a form started to take shape.
"Yes!"
***
Why? Hadn't he had enough fun for a while? Program a few commands, send her life to hell and back and then delete the history.
Damn you Jonas.
She snapped together as the process ended, slowly opening her eyes she was not where she had expected to be. Three guys a couple of years younger than her stood up and away from a small line of computers.
"Grady, you're a genius."
"I know."
"Oh god. It's the Buffy geeks." Stef exclaimed.
All three went 'eek' and stumbled back a few paces.
This wasn't Jonas' lab, this was nothing like what she had seen before, turning and looking around it wasn't even a lab, it was just a home to some messy teenage guys.
"It's got to be a programmed response," the one with the creepy white streak in his hair was saying. "Jonas is one damn good programmer."
"Programmed response my digital ass!" she snapped at them.
Huddling in close to each other they slowly walked forward. "It's just a hologram," Tavis said, "just a very well programmed hologram."
"I'm not a hologram."
"How can it be interactive?" The short one with the pixie features asked. "It's just a hologram."
"What's your name?" Tavis asked.
"Agent Mimosa."
"See, basic answers, it's only interactive to a certain point, like the waitress at Marshes that you keep trying to date Nev," Tavis said. "The real Stef would have said 'Stef Mimosa' not 'Agent Mimosa.'"
"Hello? I am right here."
"Who else do we want to pull through?" Tavis asked looking back at the computer.
"Wait a minute Tav," Grady said, seeing something besides dead holographic eyes. "Are you aware?"
"No, not at all," she said sarcastically. "You hacked Jonas' system didn't you?"
"How do you know about Jonas?"
"How would I not?"
"She must interact with him…I wonder what kind of interactions?" Tavis pondered.
Less than a second later a Desert Eagle was pointed at his head. "Say that again and I will find a way to kill you, I don't care if I'm only a hologram in this world."
"This world?" Grady asked.
"Listen, I know exactly where I am. I'm in the real, real world."
"Crete's world?"
"Who the hell is Crete?"
"Who created the Matrix?"
"The mainframe. But in reality it's just sitting on Jonas' file server."
"Reality? In Reality?" Nevin said with a giggle. Stef fired but the bullet disappeared once it left the range of the holo-player.
"What's so funny about reality?"
"Reality is the episode where you found out about Crete and the Matrix being only a simulation within a simulation."
"I ask again, who is Crete?"
"Oh shit…oh shit…" Grady said catching on. "Oh my god, oh wow."
Really wishing she could kill someone, "are you able to speak real words?"
"Yeah, what's your gig Grady?"
"It's all real, Jonas is doing AI research right? Jonas is Crete, he…the Matrix is real, it's all real. He's based the movie and series on his research."
"No way." Nevin said.
"That's impossible." Tavis argued.
"What movie?"
"That can't be right, the insta-food must be off."
"That sounds exactly like something Jonas would do."
"Well, if behind all the PR he's anything like Crete then it's all possible."
"You're basing this all on the fact that this hologram, admittedly of the hottest agent ever…"
"What about Carol?" Nevin interjected.
"Has a really good interactive sub-routine." Tavis finished, he wasn't ready to accept that it all could be real, even if it was a fan-boy dream come true.
"Hot? The only hot thing about me is the lead slugs that come out of the end of my gun. Put me back in before Jonas finds out and leaves me out here forever."
"He's on holiday." Grady said.
"Ok, I will believe all this if you can prove that you are who you look like and are conscious."
"What do I have to do?"
"Be random, programmed holograms are unable to be random."
"Purple monkey puke face," she deadpanned. "Is that random enough?"
"You're not lying. The Matrix is real. The Matrix is real!" Tavis screamed.
"Give him a shot of something before I find a way to and put me back in."
"You don't have to leave so soon, you only just got here."
"Forgive me but I hate this world."
"We're not all Jonas."
"I know but…"
"Then what harm can it do? I'm Grady," he said holding out his hand.
"Holograms can't shake hands, unless you've got one of those disc things."
"Somewhere, it would probably be a good idea to get you out of the buffer."
Meanwhile, Tavis was still bouncing around the room chanting 'the Matrix is real,' with Nevin closely following to make sure he didn't hurt himself.
Five minutes later she was out of the buffer and her programmed was tied to the disc, she was solid. "I'm Grady," he said holding out his hand again.
"And I don't have a short-term memory problem," she said. "I'm Stef."
"We know, trust us we know," Tavis said as he grabbed her hand and shook it so much her arm threatened to fall off.
"How exactly do you know? You're not like his interns or something?"
"Us? Right. He's the best single programmer in this part of the world and we're nerds just out of high school."
"That I can see for myself, how do you know who I am?"
All three looked at each other, "um…it's easier if we show you," Tavis finally said and beckoned her over to the tower beside the holo-player that held all the video cards. He pulled out a selection and laid them out in front of her on the cabinet.
"This came out about six months ago," Nevin said holding up the Matrix card. "It's still in the theatre but this is a pirate copy."
"The Matrix is a movie to you?"
"Basically."
"But it didn't stop there, next came the Animatrix which were shorts then you came along."
"Me?"
"Well ATS anyway," Grady said. "Agents: The Series, it's about the agents and the recruits."
"I see," she said as she shook her head slowly, this wasn't a move she would have expected Jonas to make.
"It's very popular if that makes you feel any better."
"Not really, there are enough layers of fiction without this happening."
"Do you have any idea how cool this is?" Nevin almost shouted, "We are your biggest fans." The other nodded in agreement.
"I thought you guys were on the rebels side," Grady said smugly.
"The rebels?" she asked.
"Well the movie is on their side," Tavis admitted.
"You want to watch it?" Nevin asked.
"Nevin!" Grady said sharply. "Won't that wreck the universe or something?"
"No cause it's already happened."
"Ok, well?"
"Ok." She said, a little confused but these guys seemed ok, better than Jonas anyway and she was interested to see what a rebel-centric movie would be like considering she knew the people it was about. Sure, what the hell? What could possibly go wrong?
Tavis detached the holo-player from the computer, stowing the uni-cable in the nearest drawer and then he put the card in.
Grady dimmed the lights and they all sat down. "Can you require us some popcorn?" Nevin asked.
"No, I can't require out here."
"Damn." He commented as the movie started.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Ok, I'm cutting it here before the file size gets too big. Onto chapter 2.