Agents: Jabberwocky

by Overlord Mordax

Greer and Yami are trapped in a strange, dangerous beta-matrix and must work together (or at least avoid killing one another) to get out alive!

A/N: Occurs after 'Shades of Red', 'Lies', and Stormhawk's 'Barrier of Existence'. Action/character based: some angst. ^^ denotes earpiece talk [] denotes what Greer 'hears'. Enjoy.

Summery: Greer and Yami must work together (or at least avoid killing one another) in order to escape from a dangerous beta-version of the matrix with their lives.

Disclaimer: Warner Bros. and the Wachowskis own the Matrix. The Agent's series was created by Stormhawk. Yami was created by Rogue McAllister and is used with permission. Greer is mine. Pop-culture references are just that.

Agents: Jabberwocky

By Overlord Mordax

Jones didn't look bored, but he was, dreadfully. Agent Clarke about as interesting to listen to as radio static, albeit rather more informative. Even so, the Jones hoped he'd be done soon and he could get back to his office, where Greer would be, after the recruit had finished his workout.

But the Jones focused in on the mouth of the mainframe when his speech transgressed onto the sandy-haired agent's field of expertise.

"Tokyo location has been offline for 53 hours and 27 minutes due to causes unknown. Agent Jones, you will report to Yokohama agency in thirty minutes to aid the other most efficient technical agents in identification and rectification of the problem. You will bring a recruit for field assistance."

Jones blinked. He had been aware of the recent difficulties in the Tokyo sector. It had always been one of the areas of the Matrix that experienced the most frequent and noticeable glitches, as well as a large population of Rebels and Exiles. For an area of the Matrix to go down entirely was not unheard of, but it was rare. And for the problem to persist unchecked for this long, he was unsure as to whether such a thing had occurred since the earliest days of the Matrix.

It would be a challenge, that was certain, and Japan perhaps a pleasant change from his usual locale.

"Do you have any questions?" Clarke asked.

"No," Jones replied. "I will comply."

***

"We're going to Japan? All right!" Greer grinned, leaning casually on Jones' desk. He was genuinely excited, not only because Japan was high on the list of places he wanted to see, but also because aside from his brief trip to Ohio, he hadn't left the state in months.

"Yes, but you must take care with your actions. It is hardly a vacation, there will be foreign agents attending, and they will not likely be tolerant of aberrant behavior," Jones looked gravely up at him, still typing quickly.

"Aw, I promise I'll be good Jonesy."

The agent quirked a disapproving eyebrow and the recruit immediately put on a straight face and stood up.

"My apologies Agent Jones, I assure you my actions will reflect not negatively on you or on this agency."

Jones nodded with a slight smile. "Good. The last thing I desire is for you to be terminated due to an ill thought action."

"Same here," he replied, kissing Jones lightly on the cheek, and looking over his shoulder at the screen. "What are you doing?"

"I am making sure I possess copies of the files on all previous localized system crashes and any other relevant data. It is possible that the Yokohama agency unintentionally neglected something." The screen's scrolling green code reflected in Jones' eyes of the same shade.

"One can't be too careful," the raven haired man said.

"No, one cannot," Jones agreed, and after a pause, said, "Greer, I may seem cold to you while we are in Japan. Please do not take offence."

"I understand," Greer told him. "I don't want you to get deleted."

Jones stood, picking up his sunglasses and putting them on. "Then we should depart."

A moment later the two were standing in what Greer assumed was the main entry-hall of the Yokohama agency; it was an assumption only because in fact it looked exactly like their own agency, as far as he could tell. It was then Greer realized something.

"Uh, Agent Jones, I may have given you a false impression at some point, but I do not know enough Japanese to get by."

The agent looked at him with a barely perceptible smile. "There is no cause for concern; your earpiece will translate for you."

Greer raised his eyebrows. Well, he thought, that was convenient.

The door in front of them then opened and a young Japanese man with his short dark hair bleached at the tips appeared. He was of course wearing what Greer affectionately called The Suit. The man's hair and youth gave Greer cause to mark him as a recruit rather than an Agent.

The Japanese recruit gave them a quick, respectful bow and said, "I am recruit Chiba, please, follow me." Greer couldn't help but smirk, because, though he heard the command in perfect English, the man's lips definitely didn't match up. Just like in Godzilla, or a badly dubbed anime.

On that note Greer followed Jones and Chiba through the door and down a long corridor that was eerily the same. It had the same white walls; it even had the same recycled-air smell. The only thing that was noticeably different was that the numbers on the doors were in Kanji.

The door they stopped at didn't look any different than the others, but Chiba opened it and led them inside. It was a large room, mostly taken up by a white, round table with five chairs, five laptops and a large amount of other equipment. The back wall was dominated by a display of the Matrix scrolling code. There were five other people in the room when they entered, and, after standing in an uncomfortable silence for a long moment, two more people appeared without warning in the room.

"You are late," the man Greer assumed was the Japanese tech agent said.

"We were delayed by rebels," the taller of the entering pair said. Greer noticed that his and the accompanying young man's Suits were markedly different. Instead of a businesslike jacket, each wore a long, heavy black coat that reminded Greer strongly of the KGB.

"Very well," the Japanese agent acknowledged, and then addressed the assembled group. "You are all aware that the Tokyo location has somehow been knocked out and it is our purpose to discover the cause and repair the damage. Recruits," he paused, waiting as five of the ten occupants snapped to attention, Greer included. "You will patrol the perimeter of the blackout zone. Your duties will be to report anything suspicious you may find, and, more importantly to keep rebels away from the sight. You will also perform any other functions that may be requested of you. Is that understood?"

They nodded.

"Then you are dismissed. I will now require you to a position several meters from the site."

They nodded, and all at once they were standing in the empty entryway of an expensive hotel. It didn't look at all dilapidated, so Greer assumed that all the buildings near Tokyo had been evacuated during the crisis.

"Okay, now before we go out," Chiba said, "I would say it is time for us to get to know each other. I am Chiba Ryuji, recruit of four months and you may call me Ryu. I am from Yokohama, obviously, and will be assisting Agent Takeuchi. I am a fan of international films and collector of cell phones."

Greer chuckled at this introduction, as did a female recruit he hadn't noticed before, and the Russian recruit smirked. It was the girl who spoke up next though. She was sharp faced and tanned, with dark hair longer than Greer's. "My name is Rosa Zona, from Mexico City, recruit of three and a half months, here with agent Vasquez. I used to be webmistress for the largest Spanish Lord of the Rings site on the net, and Elijah Wood bothers me deeply."

Greer smirked and decided now was the time to step in. "I'm Vincent Greer, recruit of six and a half months, here from New York with Agent Jones. I'm a gamer who makes a practice of taking apart games and redesigning them, and I'm currently working on Ocarina of Time."

Rosa smiled at him, and the next recruit to introduce himself was a, buff, buzz cut blonde. "I am Erik Hoffman, from Berlin, recruit of five months, and brought here by Agent Wagner. I am a painter." He glared at them all, daring them to laugh, and Greer had to smother a chuckle.

Everyone was now looking at the pale recruit in the long coat. He frowned. "Urich, Six months, Agent Godinov. St Petersburg." And that was all he said.

Ryu shrugged. "Alright then," he rubbed his hands together excitedly. "We should break into two groups and patrol from both directions."

The Russian seemed to have a problem with this. "I work alone," he said gruffly.

Rosa rolled her eyes. "It is a circle, stupid, only two directions you can go."

"Now now, Rosa-chan, if he feels so strongly perhaps he could stay at a single point and run more extensive tests on the barrier."

"Barrier?" Erik asked.

The Japanese recruit sighed. "Follow me." He led them out the ornate hotel doors, and the sight that met them outside was very strange indeed. It was a field of black-violet energy, crackling and swirling, only a few feet in front of them.

Rosa reached out to touch it but Ryu forcefully pulled her hand back. "We lost Minako that way, let us not lose you as well."

Shocked the girl nodded and inspected her hand carefully. "Got it."

Ryu looked at them as well, "Let it serve as a warning to the rest of you as well. There was nothing left of her to bury." Greer saw the pain in his eyes and gave him a compassionate nod. "Alright," he inspected them, "Rosa, you and Erik will go around the perimeter left, while Vincent and I-"

"Greer," he corrected.

"Vincent," Ryu insisted, "Will go right. Now, Tokyo is a big city, and even though it is only the main city that is blocked and not the suburbs, it is still much too far to walk. So I suggest you 'require' some transportation, and make it run silent," he advised. "We've cut all the hardlines within ten miles, so any rebels who want to get here will be driving, so keep an eye and an ear out for unfamiliar vehicles, especially you Urich. You'll stay here and run as many tests on the barrier as you can think of."

Urich nodded.

"This is the spot where we think it may have originated, so it's the best place for testing, here." He handed the Russian a palm-sized device.

"It has no buttons," Urich commented.

"It is just a view screen, simply 'require' it to make the test you desire and that is where you will see the results"

The tacit recruit nodded, and Ryu turned back to the others. "Let us get going. There are enough roads close to the barrier that you should never be more than fifty meters from it."

Greer noticed that Rosa had required a sleek, top-down sports car that she and Erik promptly hopped into, and drove off with what the American recruit felt was an eerie, unnatural silence.

"Amazing, what technology can do these days, ne?" Ryu commented wryly.

Greer chuckled. "You can say that again," he replied as he required his usual blue and silver motorcycle, but modified to run silently for today.

"Nice machine," Ryu said enviously, "Perhaps I can do better?" The motorcycle he required was red and black with dragon decals, but Greer still liked his own better. Ryu then put on a matching helmet as Greer mounted his own bike.

The Japanese recruit gave him a skeptical look, and required a second helmet which he tossed to Greer. "We are not immortal, my friend. It is best to take precautions."

Greer shrugged, slipped the helmet over his long black hair, and started engine, wincing at the lack of noise.

^"It seems unnatural to you?"^ Ryu's voice came over his earpiece.

^"A bit,"^ he acknowledged and was glad that unlike normal bikers, they'd be able to talk easily while they rode. ^"So,"^ he said as they started off, ^"You like movies?"^

*** Ryuji wasn't bad company, as company went. Granted he was a bit loud, and a bit obnoxious, but so far he hadn't managed to offend Greer too badly, of course that might have been because the American recruit hadn't allowed him to stray onto any personal topics. So far it seemed the two of them shared common interests in the areas of anime, as well as movies. They were just in fact, wrapping up a discussion on the finer points of the Biohunter movie, having run out of any subject matter on those lines.

^"So,"^ Ryu said thoughtfully, ^"got a girlfriend?"^

Greer winced under his helmet. ^"No,"^ he answered. ^"Not really."^

^"You are lying, I think,"^ Ryu said slyly. ^"I can hear it in your voice."^

^"Drop it,"^ he growled. ^"It's none of your business."^ It was none of anybody's damn business, especially concerning it could get him killed and Jones deleted if anyone found out.

Ryu clicked his tongue. ^"Ni, touchy, aren't you?"^

^"Yes,"^ he snapped.

^"Well you should not be. We have much in common."^

"Oh, really? How do you know that? All you know is we like some of the same movies."^

^"Yes, and you give away more than you know when you speak about them."^

Greer didn't answer. He leaned further down on his bike and gave it an extra kick of speed, even though it wouldn't bring him out of speaking distance with Ryu. Even with the eeriness of their silenced motorcycles the dark haired young man could still feel the hum of the machine beneath him, it should feel sweet and reassuring as it usually did, but at the moment he felt as though a single word might throw him into a frenzy. What did this kid think he knew? What could he know? Nobody knew him; nobody knew Vincent Greer and what went on in his mind. Sometimes he felt like nobody could ever know. The emptiness was creeping inside him now, the angry void that threatened to swallow him sometimes, in his dreams. Dark things haunted that passage of his mind.

[You're a liar] he hissed.

The recruit's head snapped up. ^"What did you say?"^

Ryuji's voice was confused. ^"I said nothing, my friend."^

"Liar," he growled to himself. He was so full of tension. What had put him so on edge? This was supposed to be his big chance to see Japan, not that he was seeing much of it. Jones was right this was not a vacation, this was work. They were a quarter of the way around the barrier's perimeter and no rebels had been sited, nor any clues to what might have happened. If such a thing was possible, Greer's reflexes 'itched'. He burned to be in combat.

He glared out from behind the lens of his helmet. The stupid thing. He had never needed it before, why should he now?

Taking a breath, he opened the back of his mind and set it on 'scan' for lack of a better analogy. He heard snippets of conversation, starting across the evacuated area, but all of it was in Japanese, and since it didn't filter through his translator he could understand almost none of it. He was just about to give up when he heard something interesting, just of the edge of the barrier.

[We're there] It was a voice Greer recognized, it was Yami.

[Okay, I want you to scan the perimeter, and watch out; there are Agents not to far off.]

[Got it, Tank, we'll be careful] Yami said chipperly.

They hung up.

Greer's grimace turned into an almost sadistic smile. Yami, the rebel who'd got him shot. He'd been hoping to meet her again. His motorcycle skidded dramatically as he turned around and started heading back the way they'd come

^"What are you doing?"^ Ryu demanded.

^"Rebels,"^ Greer sent over his earpiece. All four recruits would hear it, as would the agents. ^"Near the barrier at sector G95r7d."^

Jones' voice came alive over the earpiece. ^"Recruits, proceed with caution, Anderson is with them."^

Caution, Greer thought with a smirk, here I come.

He sped forward on an intercept course, Ryu behind him.

***

Yami stood with Neo, 'Lete and Azreal in front of a very wonky looking dome- thing.

"What the hell it this?" she muttered, reaching out to touch it. But 'Lete put his hand on top of hers and stopped her.

"It might be dangerous," he said in his serious young voice.

The girl pouted. "Right, so, what is it?"

Neo shrugged. "We don't know yet. Some sort of glitch. Morpheus wants to see if we can duplicate it, or somehow use it to free more minds."

Yami studied it. "How? It looks pretty useless to me."

"Let me take care of it, Yami," 'Lete smiled, taking out some kind of sensor device he'd gotten from the construct and sweeping it over a patch of the field.

"So I guess we just w-" she was cut off by the ring of her cell phone. "Tank?"

"Agents, coming fast, run!"

"Fast? Like how fast?" Yami looked up and could see on the horizon a small dot, getting larger and larger. She reflected on how they had had to hike all the way here through a ten mile 'dead' zone of cut hardlines. How the hell were they going to get away in time?

"Like get-the-hell-out-of-there fast!!!!"

All four rebels turned and ran.

"Who the hell planned this mission?!" Yami demanded to no one in particular. "There's no way we can out run them!!!"

The motorcycles were gaining on them, and it was obvious that there was no way they were going to be able to escape.

"Keep running, I'll stall them!" Neo shouted.

Yami, who was beginning to warm up to the better part of valor, nodded, and kept running, even as she heard the 'crunch' of Neo jumping on top of one of the motorcycles. It was followed closely by the sound of an explosion. Then she saw something out of the corner of her eye, a motorcycle, seemingly flying through the air, and a man in a suit jumping off towards her.

***

They were about to catch up! he grinned, his ponytail coming loose from his helmet and trailing like a whip behind him. They were almost there... Greer tingled with anticipation.

But he saw the most severe of the rebels, Anderson, stop, and turn and Greer lessened his speed, letting Ryu get ahead. Let the Japanese boy take on the 'One'; Greer had a score to settle.

He was so concentrated on taking down Yami, in fact, that though he saw Ryu's motorcycle explode; he took no notice of whether or not he had survived. Let his helmet save him, he thought scornfully, chasing his target. It was Yami's fault he'd been shot, her fault he'd nearly died. He wanted her to feel like he had felt then, only, he would make it the last thing she ever felt. Greer reached up and touched his helmet where his ear was, thinking of the earring he wore beneath. The earring won from Yami, who'd cheated at their first encounter.

As he approached, with a moment of dramatic flair he required a ramp in the road and sped up it, then soaring high into the air. At the peak of the bike's arc he leapt, throwing off his helmet, and as he rushed toward the ground and to Yami he thought, this is what it means to be alive.

Yami must have seen him, because she paused mid-stride, and he fell upon her, arms outstretched, smashing her into the pavement and cushioning his own fall. They rolled several feet backwards, until they were just at the threshold of the black barrier. Greer had her pinned. He heard a 'crack', her skull hitting the pavement almost as an afterthought.

But she was rebel, and so she wasn't dead.

He leered down at Yami, who was unfocused with concussion. "Miss me?"

Yami's eyes went wide and she struggled to get free, but Greer held her pinned. Her companions had abandoned her to reach their own safety, and Anderson was presumably busy with Ryu. Greer could take his time.

"You're supposed to be dead! Neo killed you!"

"Dead? I think not," he purred softly, pulling his gun from inside his jacket.

"That's not fair!!!" she shrieked. "You CHEATED!!"

"Then I suppose that makes us even," he tapped the dragon pendant that dangled from his ear. With a smirk put his gun in his jacket and required his katana. "Good bye."

Yami lashed out with a kick born of fear and adrenaline, which flipped them over, and there was a satisfied crackle as they passed the threshold of the barrier.

***

Greer thought it felt like he'd been doused with water and smacked in the face with a lightning bolt. Yami thought it felt more like being lit on fire and stretched every direction at once. Either way it was painful; and it left the opponents sprawled on the ground each trying to be the first to recover. Both got to their feet with relative ease and comparative speed, and each stood staring menacingly at the other. Greer sheathed his katana, and drew his gun instead.

The imminent bloodshed was forestalled, however as the rivals noticed their surroundings.

It had once been the heart of a great city, but that city, whatever it had been, now lay rotting as if a corpse unfound in the grime and shadow of any convenient alley. Twisted, rusting street signs lurched zombie-like in fractured, wrecked pavement; vines spread like clawed fingers across the landscape choking anything unlucky enough to meet their grasp. Bleak towers of cracked and broken metal, the ghosts of skyscrapers, rose into a sky that was deep, bloody red. At this sight, the rebel gasped and the recruit held his breath, standing in a single moment of death's unbroken silence.

"What the hell did you do?!" Yami screeched, her voice shattering the stillness sending its fragmented shards to cut the unwary. "Where in god's name are we?!"

"The Tokyo blackout zone," Greer said flatly. "You pushed over the threshold, somehow. Great."

"ME?! You were trying to KILL me!!" Yami shrieked accusingly. "What the hell was I supposed to do was I supposed to do?!" she stamped her foot, her scarlet curls flaring around her shoulders.

This assertion put Greer back in his stride, and with a cruel gleam in his sapphire eyes, he leveled his gun with his target. "You were supposed to die."

"You son of a-"

Something groaned and snarled; it was a sound crossing nails on a chalkboard with a lion's growl, through something hollow and metallic.

Yami and Greer both looked over at the sudden noise. Pacing towards them was a ...thing. It looked like a cross between a lizard and a jungle cat with the worst qualities of both. It was huge, easily half again as big as Greer was, with glistening black scales, a whipping tail, and feline ears flattened back against its heard, red eyes glowing feral. The front half of it was supple and slender, with long, graceful legs, ending with splayed claws the length of daggers. Its back legs were higher, muscular and powerful and made the beast look perpetually crouched and ready to pounce.

It lowered itself further and sprung at the two, claws outstretched.

Greer dived out of its way, knocking Yami down with him and once again, they both rolled in the dust. This time however they wasted neither breath nor time on one another and scrambled to their feet once more, taking off running down the blasted street with super-human speed. The creature pursued them, its leaping, back-paws-first gait like that of a cheetah. The recruit paused just long enough to empty the clip of his dessert eagle at the thing, but impossibly, as if it worked by the same rulebook as they, the beast dodged them, seeming to flicker out from one moment and back in again only inches away. The recruit tossed the empty gun away as he ran again, almost panicked by the monster's speed, and insanely, infuriated at the fact that Yami was now ahead of him. A new speed invigorated him at this, and he was nearly upon the rebel again, but so too was the beast nearly upon them.

He looked for an escape and saw they were coming to a building mostly intact, he hurled himself at the door, and it flew upon at his force. He rushed back to shut it, but before he could, Yami burst through as well and it was she who threw the heavy steel door shut just as the beast leapt upon it. From inside they could hear it snarling and rasping, clawing savagely to get in.

"The hell are you waiting for?! Help me lock it!!!" Yami insisted, holding her meager weight and considerable strength against the door to abide against the creature.

The scratch of claws on steel kept the recruit form hesitating, and he flattened himself against Yami as he fastened the locks and hoped they were strong. The two then turned and pressed their backs up against the door, panting less with exertion than with fear.

"How long will that hold it?" Yami asked.

"Hard to say. Depends on how bad he wants us." Greer closed his eyes, listening to the howls, and outraged scratching, and prayed desperately they would subside.

They held the door in silence now, and the shrieks became less desperate and more annoyed, and the clawings became more infrequent. For a moment it was completely silent and then the thing uttered one last piercing scream that hung in the air like the final note of a dying song, and then there was silence again. The two stood there holding the door in for a full ten minutes after this until finally Yami spoke.

"Do you think it's gone?"

"Probably. Almost definitely."

"Oh good," Yami relaxed, slumping on the door.

Greer took a breath. "Unless it's a particularly smart monster and wants us to think that it's gone."

The rebel straightened up and glared at him. "Great," she bit her lip. "Do you think that's likely?"

"I have no idea."

"What is that, anyway?"

"I have no idea."

"I thought agents were supposed to know everything," she sniped.

"And I thought rebels were supposed to be enlightened," he sneered back. His fingers itched to find the hilt of his katana, he could kill her now, almost certainly, before she could react, spill her blood and watch it pool on the floor of this gruesome place. But cold logic held him back. He hadn't killed the beast and where there was one there might be more. He might need her, if only to distract the thing. He held his temper in check. For the moment. "Look," he said, trying to sound reasonable. "You got us in here, do you have any idea, any idea at all, on how we might get out."

She held her hands up defensively and snarled. "Hey, it isn't my whacked out energy barrier-thingy."

Greer rolled his eyes. "Energy barrier-thingy? Look. Look, just hold on a minute."

She opened her mouth to protest, but he held up a finger to silence her, and pressed his earpiece. ^"Recruit Greer to Agent Jones."^ he waited...nothing. ^"Agent Jones, are you there?"^ Still silence. ^"Is anyone there?"^ But no one was. Greer then opened his mind to his power and 'listened' as hard as he could, extending his sense to its farthest limits, but there was nothing, for the first time since he was ten years old that corner of his mind was filled with nothing but an eerie silence. It was unnerving.

"Damn it!" he hissed. "I'm cut off!" He doubted it would work any better, but he turned to Yami anyway. "You've got a cell phone, try your people"

She looked very skeptical. "Oh yeah right." She crossed her arms. "This is all some elaborate Agent trick to... get the Zion codes or something, isn't it?"

Greer closed his eyes and rubbed his temples. He couldn't let her get to him. "Look, just, just forget for a minute that I hate you and you hate me, and think logically. How exactly would this get the codes?"

Yami didn't answer.

"Exactly. It wouldn't. Your rebel friends would unplug you and let you die before they gave up their precious codes. I've seen it before, many times. And if I just wanted you dead, I could have had you so many times before this moment, and I'm certainly not one for elaborate death traps. So, excluding all of those things, tell me, what is the point?"

She hesitated. "Okay Agent, say this isn't a trap. Why should I help you?"

He fought off the urge to say 'Because if you don't, I'll kill you. "Because, unless we work together, I very much doubt that either of us will find our way out alive, understand? If we combine our efforts, however, we just might manage."

"Yeah, and as soon as we're out, or as soon as you think you can get away without me you'll kill me."

"How do I know you won't do the same?" he raised a dark eyebrow.

Yami snorted. "As if it would matter. You'll just pop up somewhere else, all creepy and stuff."

Greer set his jaw and growled. "I am not an agent, I am a recruit. If you can cut me I will bleed, if you can shoot me I will die."

"Oh yeah? Then how are you here now?"

"Because," he hissed, "I had intensive surgery, expert medical care and spent over a month in bed."

This seemed to genuinely surprise the girl. "But, they didn't just leave you to die?"

"No," he said firmly. "Unlike the rebellion, the agency takes care of its own."

Yami opened her mouth to argue, but Greer cut her off.

"A truce," he said. "We work together until we get out of this place; each of us will do our best to make sure that both of us survive this. And, when we get out, we go our separate ways in peace and tell our superiors whatever story will make them happy." He held out his hand.

"How can I trust you?" she demanded suspiciously. "You're with Them."

He almost smirked. "And you're with Them. So if you can't accept my honor as a recruit, accept then the truce on my honor as a gamer, and I will accept the same from you." He held his tongue as the back of his mind told him that the first time he had accepted her gamer's honor she had betrayed it; it was the part of him that still screamed mercilessly for her blood to be spilled. He kept his hand outstretched.

***

Yami stared at the hand held out to her. The rebel part of her was demanding that she run, or fight, anything but take his hand. But the other part of her, deeper and longer in the making, the part that evening in the arcade that had so admired the raven haired gamer spoke differently. That part of Yami saw the sense in what he was saying, that part of her too, admonished her for distrusting him. After all, it had not been he who cheated that day. And the earring that he possessed was a mocking reminder before her, and seeing it dangling from his lobe made her burn with shame and rage. Oh how she longed to steal it back, to take what was rightfully hers! To deny that loss that he had dealt her. But she had lost, hadn't she? Could she really claim that he was the treacherous one? But that was ridiculous! He was with the Agents, he was a traitor to humanity, he was, well, evil! Then why was he offering to help her escape? The angry part of her mind could not rationalize that piece of the puzzle.

But on one thing, Yami's mind was unified. She wanted to survive, she wanted to keep on living. And she knew that in these closed quarters, with no place to run to, and her gun lying somewhere on the other side of the barrier that to deny the man his truce was suicide. And she might not have any friends on this ghastly side of the looking glass, but she was being offered an ally.

Hesitantly, jerkily, she reached up and clasped his hand. "I accept the terms of the truce."

He nodded. "As do I." They let go.

"Do you want me to try my phone now?" she asked, reaching into her trench coat.

But he shook his head. "Don't bother, it's pointless. Even I can't get a signal in here."

"What you mean your ear-thingy? It probably way different than a phone." She pulled hers out.

He shook his head again. "Yes they do work differently. But I don't mean that. I mean my Power."

Yami wrinkled her nose in confusion. "Huh? What power?"

"I can Hear any telephonic communications within a certain radius. Right now, up to about eighty miles. But there's nothing in this place for me to Hear."

She stared at him. "Agents can hear telephone calls? Is that how you track us?"

He shook his head. "No, only me. I'm only the third person in history to be able to do it." He didn't seem very cheerful about it, either. Yami wondered what, beyond the obvious, was bothering him.

"Oh, well, that's neat."

"No," he replied flatly. "It's really not."

His aura of strain and melancholy as he said this was such that Yami didn't reply. "So... what do we do now?"

Greer paused. "We find the top of this building. It might be safer if we travel by rooftop."

Yami snorted.

The raven-haired man raised an eyebrow. "Something funny?"

"Roof jumping always makes me think of Batman," she relied.

"Me too," he said with a smirk, starting toward the back of the large room where there was a staircase. "I am vengeance, I am the night."

Following, Yami stared at the back of his ponytail. "You know Batman?"

"Oh yeah, we're on a first name basis," he quipped. "But I like the cartoon better than the comic. Make mine marvel," he repeated dutifully.

She stared yet more skeptically and hurried to catch up so that she could see his face. "You read comics?"

He looked her in the face, his cloudy eyes piecing. "Obviously."

"But I thought agents-"

"I keep telling you, I'm a recruit. I'm just like every other pimply faced geek who chose to fight this war, I just happen to be on the other side of it. Besides, even Agents have personalities."

"No they don't," Yami scoffed; after all, she had to draw the line somewhere.

"Suit yourself," he shrugged, mounting the stairs.

"Okay, well, prove it," she challenged.

"I know an agent who's a major pain in the ass, an agent who likes video games as much as you or I, I know an agent with a daughter."

"Stevie!" she gasped.

"I see you know her."

"Knew her," Yami growled angrily. "She's dead." And Yami was still angry with Neo for being the one to drive the girl from the ship.

"Suit yourself," he said again.

"Stop saying that and explain what you mean if you're going to say anything at all," she demanded huffily.

"Very well. She got plugged back in. She's safe enough, and happy."

Yami gasped. "Plugged back in?" They could do that? But, she thought that was impossible.

"Yes," he paused. "How many flights do you think this is?"

"To many," she pouted, and told herself she was determined not to ask any more questions about that subject. They climbed in silence for a moment, before curiosity got the better of her. "How did it happen?"

"Her crew struck a bargain with us; I'm not at liberty to discuss the details."

"The Exodus?" Yami gasped. She had heard about them last time the Neb had docked in Zion, had heard that they were traitors to humanity.

Greer said nothing for a moment. "I think we're coming to the top. You should draw your weapon."

Yami stopped in her tracks. "Er, I don't have one."

He turned to face her and raised an eyebrow.

"I lost it back before the barrier.

***

Greer sighed. They weren't even out of the building yet and already she was more of a nuisance than a help. "Fine. I'll 'require' you one, alright?"

"Huh?" her soft face showed her confusion.

"Rebels program their equipment in a construct, yes?"

She nodded.

"Agents and recruits are tied to the mainframe, and it will supply us anything we need. Watch," he held out his hand and said, "Require: gun."

Nothing happened.

"Um, nothing happened," Yami said.

"Damn!!" Greer swore, "This place, it must be completely cut off from the mainframe!"

"So that means no 'poof here's your gun'?"

Greer took a deep, hopefully cleansing, breath. "It means a lot of things." It was why he couldn't use his earpiece, and it meant that they wouldn't be showing up on anybody's radar. It meant no rescue party from either side of the war, and it meant that Jones would have no idea where he was or what had happened to him. He'd be worried sick. "Jonesy," he muttered under his breath.

"What was that?" Yami asked.

"Nothing," Greer snapped. "Just frustrated. Great, so that means that between us we've got one weapon, my katana," he drew the sword from its sheath. "Well," he said, "at least this baby can't run out of bullets."

Yami smirked. "Does 'this baby' have a name?"

"Yeah," he smirked back, "Glamdring, the foe-hammer. Now let's get going."

***

This is ridiculous; Jones thought to himself, none of this is getting us anywhere. No diagnostic of the dome (or rather sphere, since it seemed to extend beneath the ground as well) showed up anything wrong.

"Agent Jones?" Takeuchi asked for the thirty-seventh time since they had begun.

"Negative," Jones replied again, concluding his scan of the area's beta frequencies. They were missing something here, but what was it?

Takeuchi asked the rest of the agents in turn, but none of them had found anything either. The five went back to searching, and the sound of computer keys was the only sound in the room. Jones privately wondered if any of them was as interested, or as disgusted with this problem as he was. He was not sure whether or not he doubted it. If they could not solve this problem, they would have to delete this entire area and reprogram it from scratch. Every battery in Tokyo would be lost and Jones was pessimistically sure that he would somehow be blamed for it. He shifted almost imperceptibly in his chair.

No, he would solve this. What was it if not the challenge he had wanted? Humans had a saying, be careful what you wish for, you might get it. Jones held his sigh behind his teeth. What hadn't they checked yet?

Then he remembered the data he had saved before they had left. He had brought them, not because he could not access them as easily from here as his office, but because he knew that in this environment, he would forget them completely. He called up on his screen the historical files on all previous location system crashes and scanned them in descending order. The most recent was very localized. A city block in the in Massachusetts had disappeared completely. It had taken the agent assigned less that an hour to fix; he scanned the code of the block and found that a single character of the code had eroded. He simply replaced that character.

But Jones had scanned Tokyo's code six times and found nothing. It was all still there and running properly and it showed no sign of the dome. There had been a single glitch running, but Jones had repaired it and nothing had happened.

The next most recent crash-

His earpiece crackled to life. ^"Rebels. Headed for the barrier at sector G95r7d."^ It was Greer.

Damn! The five of them had been so wrapped up in repairing the crash that no one had thought to scan for rebels. Lucky Greer had caught it. But Jones throat still tightened apprehensively. Greer could take care of himself, he knew, but what if he was not? He quickly scanned the sector Greer had indicated, and his apprehension grew.

^"Recruits, proceed with caution, Anderson is with them."^

Greer did not reply.

The agent again bit back a sigh. Greer was ill at ease lately, and sometimes reckless. Jones opened a second window of code, locked onto his dear recruit, and went back to scanning his historical files. He passed several incidences without gleaning anything useful, but then he came to a citation approximately fifty years ago. A five mile stretch of Hong Kong had become unstable and crashed and while they repaired the code, it seemed that a back-up copy of the area had activated automatically.

Jones paused and reread the information. He thought he remembered something from his early years about a contingency incases of system crash, but as the years went and the matrix was stabilized, it had become unnecessary. With more than even his usual speed Jones pulled up a cross-reference of all the information on this back up.

Every location had a backup, he discovered, and they were stored separately by city, so that one could be booted up without bring up all the others. In case of a major crash they activated, but they were not meant to be left running for extended periods of time. They were meant it seemed, only to save crops from destruction, and were, Jones thought derisively as he briefly scanned a sample of their coding, hastily and sloppily programmed. They required routine maintenance to keep them from breaking down entirely and causing problems. It was more like the beta-version of a video game than an actual backup, all glitches and haphazard work.

With the distinct feeling that he knew where this was going, Jones pulled up the maintenance records for Beta-Tokyo. Behind his sunglasses he rolled his eyes, it hadn't been repaired in approaching forty years. It was a wonder nothing had happened before this. He called up the code of the beta on his screen. Or rather tried to, as nothing happened. He frowned and tried another path. Still nothing. He stared and the screen for a moment. That was impossible wasn't it?

Jones stood up, and the eyes of all the other tech agents rose to him.

"I have discovered the source of the problem," he announced. "The back up copy of Tokyo location has eroded due to neglect. Approximately 56 hours ago something initiated it."

"Why did we not detect this earlier?" Agent Wagner demanded.

"Because it is no longer connected to the mainframe and is now operating independently," Jones explained. "That is why we are unable to scan it."

The agents all stared at him.

"That is impossible," the Mexican agent asserted.

"Obviously it is not, as that is what has occurred. In order to rectify this we will have to first reconnect it to the mainframe, and then we will deconstruct it gradually so that it does not destroy the alpha Tokyo as it collapses," Jones sat down again.

Now Takeuchi spoke up. "Locate the frame coding and connect that first; this will be simplest."

Jones looked at his monitor; one of the windows had gone blank. He frowned and pulled it to the front and checked it. Jones had to mask his horror; it was the one that had been monitoring Greer and it had shut itself down for lack of anything to focus on.

Checking furtively that all the agents were too absorbed in their task to question that he was not also, Jones opened the scrolling code on his monitor and ran it backwards to when Greer had notified them of the rebels. He watched in dismay as he leapt from the motorcycle to fight with Yami. He was out of control, he had gotten himself killed, Jones knew it. But, if that was the case the window should still have been locked on his body...He watched as Greer was about to kill the rebel, and she deftly flipped them over, and into the barrier.

Agent Jones stared. Greer was trapped inside the glitching beta, and that was if he had not been killed by the transition. And if he was alive (he had to be!) how would he get out. Would he be returned when they disassembled the place? Or would he be killed?

This was the third time that Greer's life had been in serious jeopardy. When he had been shot Jones had gotten him to the medical lab in time, and when he had been in that still unexplained coma, Greer insisted it had been Jones who brought him back. Both times the agent had stayed by him the entire time. And while Jones could not be there for him physically, he would make sure he did everything he could to keep Greer from being lost.

Jones opened a code window and checked their progress. A small pathway had been established, but they were unable to take the thing down until it was fully integrated. That gave him some time at least, to find and retrieve Greer. He began scanning for the recruit's signature.

***

Tank stared at his monitor. Yami, she had just, disappeared! She'd been fighting with an agent and then suddenly they'd both dropped right off. He was worried, very worried about her.

"Yami," he tried, "Yami are you there?"

There was no answer. But this wasn't the first time someone had dropped off his radar and lived to tell about it, so he still had hope. He walked over and looked down at her unconscious body. "Hang in there," he told her, and squeezed her hand.

***

Greer stood at the edge of the rooftop, Yami poised just behind him. They were quite high up, just over sixty stories, and the view of the city below was beautiful and terrible. Was this Tokyo? What had happened to it? He looked over his shoulder at the red-head.

"Time to go."

She pursed her lips. "Just out of curiosity, do you have any idea where we're going anyway?"

"We're in the center of the city now, or we seem to be. So we'll see if we can get to the edge."

"And if we get to the edge we can just walk through again, right?"

He shrugged fluidly. "Anything's possible." He dropped to a crouch and sprung, caught for a moment in the indeterminate state between flying and falling until he landed nearly a thousand feet away on the roof of another building. As he stood, Yami landed beside him less gracefully, and Greer ran to the other side of the roof and leapt again, the girl following close behind.

His mouth twitched into a smirk with the irony. Usually when he traveled in this manner, he was in pursuit of a rebel, rather than willingly being followed by one. But the method seemed safer and it was faster as well. They fairly ate up the terrain, and its repetitive nature gave Greer time to think.

Ryu had said that another recruit, Minako, had gone through the barrier. Was she still alive or had she been taken by that creature? Greer couldn't spare the time to search for her, but if their paths, as unlikely as it was, crossed, he would certainly try to get her out as well. And he hoped that Ryu himself was alright, but that too was unlikely, precious few recruits survived an encounter with the One.

He was like a bat out of hell, Anderson, swooping about in that severe black coat of his, reeving life and sowing destruction. Greer wondered what had happened to turn a normal maladjusted hacker into such a missionary of death. Greer had read his files, he'd been a geek, a nerd, a loner and a loser; in his early days as a rebel he'd even had a fair amount of style and humor, but now longer. Now he was merely a messenger of doom, like one of the four horsemen of the apocalypse.

But maybe life in the real world could do that to a person, drain them of their spirit and their vigor. Because from all the information that Greer had, 'Neo' was less like the individuals chosen for rebellion or recruitment, and more like agent Brown.

Agent Brown, now there was a man who could really tick him off. The way he looked down on them all, even the other agents as though they were all inferior creatures and he was some kind of god on earth. That commanding, snide, self-superior tone just made Greer want to smack the Agent's sunglasses right off his face and shake him. He clenched his fists.

"Hey! Hey!" Yami called a few meters behind him, "Can we take a break for sec?"

Greer looked back at her with disgust, but he stopped, and leaned against an outcropping in the roof of a skyscraper.

Yami sat down, breathing heavily, and the recruit watched her. He knew she'd been a rebel for only a little over two months but she should be used to this sort of thing by now. How else had she survived? Sheer luck?

"So," Yami mumbled, "I guess this would be the other side of the looking- glass."

Greer rolled his eyes; she was a rebel alright. "Is that the only book they let you people read?" he asked snidely.

"Morpheus says that you can draw a parallel between Alice and anything."

He snorted. "In case you haven't noticed, your Morpheus has a lot in common with the author of that book," he paused just long enough for Yami to give him a questioning look. "They're both on drugs."

"Morpheus is a great man," she snapped automatically.

"So then, since he's so great if he were here he'd know, a) where exactly we are, b) what the hell that thing chasing us was, and c) how to get out of here."

Yami scowled. "I told you, we're on the other side of the looking-glass, it was a jabberwocky and... yes, he would know."

Greer quirked an eyebrow. "Teeth that bite, claws that catch," he shrugged. "I suppose that at least, is a name as good as any. But, since your Morpheus isn't here at the moment, I'd suggest we get going again, before his 'jabberwocky' catches our scent."

Yami stood, and they leapt to the next rooftop.

***

A pair of keen golden eyes watched the duo steadily from a cross the gap of three rooftops.

Oh, but I have already got your scent, young hunter, he chuckled to himself. And in a few moments, I will make that fact perfectly clear to you.

Final it appeared that the chance he had been waiting millennia for had finally come knocking at his doorstep. That first human had been of no use at all, quite a disappointment, really. Though, a disappointment softened sharply by her sweet and tender flesh.

And afterward he really had not expected more humans to sashay through his door so soon, but it appeared that patience did pay off, if only one had long enough to wait. And he had been waiting for centuries.

He could wait centuries more, if indeed, that was his fate.

But it did not look as though it would be, any longer. True, one of this new pair seemed as though she would be just as useless as the girl before her, but really, who could blame her? After all, human females by all accounts were a weak and hopeless lot. He would give her as a gift to his pack; that was, as long, and only as long, as they captured the male completely unharmed.

***

It seemed like they'd been jumping roofs for a million and two years. Yami was hot, Yami was tired, she didn't much care for the company and damnit if she didn't just want to go home!! Why the hell was it her who these things happened to? You'd never catch anybody else she knew caught in a weird bubble of space/time or something, no way.

It was the sort of thing that only happened to Yami Yameshita.

After all, if you're NOT Yami Yameshita, how else do you manage to lose both parents before you're twelve, have a baby sister hovering at the brink of depression at HER age, AND find out that oh, sorry that ain't the real world after all, but hey we'll trade your old life in for a nice post- apocalyptic one, how's that a deal for ya?

Then you get to spend the rest of your days shooting and being shot at until someday there's a bullet that manages to hit you, eating runny muck, and getting snapped at by this centuries own personal Jesus Christ! Oh, and we'll throw in an all expenses paid trip for two, you and an agent, to Nowhere land! While you're there you'll spend you time being chased by big ugly things with teeth, and jump from roof-top to roof-top for HOURS on end in complete and stoic silence!

As they landed on the next rooftop (a wide one, with a door coming up from the top floor of the building) Yami put voice to a question that had been nagging at her for some time.

"Hey! How do you know we're not dead?"

Greer stopped abruptly and turned on his heel to face her, scowling.

"I mean maybe we really DID die touching that barrier thing and this is hell?"

Greer glared at her. "I don't doubt it. Now, are you finished?"

Yami pouted. "Yeah, whatever."

"Then let's go." Greer turned back around just in time to see the door in front of him creek open.

Yami's eyes went wide, and she took a step back. In the darkness of the stairs, six pairs of glowing red eyes emerged, and a seventh pair of gold.

She was frozen with fear, watching the spectacle, but Greer whipped around again and grabbed her arm.

"Run!!!" he shouted, dashing back the way they had come with her in tow. Yami stumbled awkwardly, her feet not seeming to want to move. They snarling and yowling was getting closer and she risked a look back over her shoulder just before they leapt back to the last building.

They were less than a body's length away.

Yami landed roughly and was yanked up again by the agent. She heard, more than saw, the first of the pack land on the roof beside them. Greer whirled around and attacked it with his katana.

"Run fool!!!" he screamed at her, and run she did.

But she could hear the beasts coming for her; two at least had already gotten past Greer and decided to come after her. There was no escape; she was going to become food for weird lizard cats in probably just under a minute's time.

She needed to get down to street level! If she managed, she could probably hide in the sewers. These creatures didn't have the dexterity to lift manhole covers, and they weren't small enough to get into grates.

But the only way she'd make it down fast enough was if she jumped, but she didn't have her gravity manipulation powers here, she'd tried them out earlier, to no avail. And if she couldn't slow her self, she'd die when she hit the pavement.

The creatures were practically at her heels, but she saw up ahead the next rooftop had a door leading down. She jumped over, as far as she could to get the maximum possible lead on the brutes and ran to the door, she kicked it open, and then wedged it shut behind her, dashing down the stairs so fast she was almost falling.

She heard the door burst open behind her and the beasts in pursuit. She was down three floors already; she just had to out run them. God damnit, she did NOT wanna die!

She was going so fast she that time almost seemed to stand still, and as she got to the seventh floor from the ground level, she bit back her fear and jumped the rest of the way down in the wide space between the railings.

She landed painfully but got up as soon as she touched the ground and burst through the door, slamming it shut behind her. The rash jump had evidently been a good idea, because none of the Jabberwockies had followed suit. They were still on the stairs.

She dashed through a long hall and finally out into the open. Her eyes hastily searched the street, as she heard the beast catching up again. They found their target just across from the building she was at. A sewage drain big enough for her, but too small for the beasts. She dived over onto the concrete and grabbed the sides of the drain. She wriggled in feet first and dropped down into about four feet of water. She held her arms out to steady herself, and looked back at the drain.

She could see the huge muzzles and taloned paws of the two creatures growling and scrabbling, trying to get her. But they couldn't. A big grin practically split Yami's face in half.

"Haha!! In your face! That's what you get for messing with Yami! Losers..." She turned, and looked around, tuning out the futile howls of the Jabberwockies. It wasn't as nasty as she'd thought down here, but, she supposed that was for lack of people. The sewer was mostly water, and some plant slime. Off to her left there was an edge of heavily eroded ledge of cement, but it looked to narrow and slippery to walk on, so she decided to just stick to the water. But which way to go? She looked left and she looked right.

"They both look the same," she grumbled. Well, they'd been headed left to get to the edge of the city, though they hadn't made much progress, and had gone back right when the Jabberwockies attacked. So she decided on left again. That was the direction Greer would inevitably go if he had survived the attack, and there was the slim possibility that they'd meet up again. Though Yami wasn't at all confident that he'd survived. The odds were just stacked too far against him.

***

As Greer came back to consciousness he refrained from opening his eyes. After all, last time he'd had a fatal accident he'd woken up in the locked ward. Well, it had turned out to be a coma but still, the principal held. When you cheat death, bad things happen. Well, not all the time, the first time he'd done it he'd found gotten to be friends with Jones. But, did being rescued by the man who's in love with you really count as cheating death? Probably not. And anyway, even if they did it probably wouldn't happen like that, and even if it did he was already taken thank you very much.

The recruit groaned. He must have hit his head; that was the only way he could explain why he'd be babbling that way in his own mind. And indeed, as he realized this he felt a dull ache in his skull and more pain throughout his body. He felt scratched bruised and battered.

Well, that at least probably meant he wasn't dead. By all accounts, being dead didn't hurt very much. He sighed mentally. If things like this kept happening, one day his skill would fail him, and his luck would leave him and he really would be dead.

But today, it seemed at least, wasn't that day, and he'd probably better open his eyes and figure out exactly why those creatures hadn't ripped him limb from limb and consumed his innards.

He opened one eye slowly, and then the other. The first thing he noticed was the bars, rusty iron bars all around him. He was in a cage, with jungle vegetation growing through the bars and off into what seemed to be the jungle around him. He peered through the thick trunks of the tress and the heavy underbrush and saw other cages, but he couldn't tell if they were occupied.

I've been sucked in Jumanji, he thought resignedly, recalling the cartoon more than the actual movie. And now I'm in the middle of a jungle, lying in the corner of a cage waiting for who knows what. I'm probably going to be eaten in a stew or have my head mounted as a trophy or something.

"Just great," he muttered, and shifted on the uncomfortable floor, which was concrete beneath all the vegetation.

"Well I see you're finally awake."

Greer startled and whipped around in the direction of the voice, sending thrills of pain all through his body. The cultured British accent coupled with his movie reference of the moment had him half expecting to see the safari dressed hunter, Vanpelt standing over him. But the truth was just as strange, if not more so.

There was a Jabberwocky sitting on its haunches, watching him from just outside the cage with large golden eyes and what seemed to be a feral grin.

Greer looked around more slowly now, trying to find who had spoken. But he found no one and his eyes traveled back to the creature. That was ridiculous, he thought. Surely it didn't talk? But, after all he'd been through in his short years, his skepticism, which had been thin to begin with, was now practically non existent.

He looked the Jabberwocky in the eyes. "Are you the one who's responsible for this?"

It stood up on all fours and paced forward, its nose inches from the bars. "Am I the one who is responsible for what, young hunter? If you mean the fact that you are still alive the yes, but, if you mean am I responsible for your visit to this wretched place, then I am afraid not." The beast, which Greer was fairly sure was a male, gave a casual toss of the shoulder, almost a shrug.

The recruit narrowed his eyes, disbelieving. "What do you mean you're responsible for my still being alive?"

"Why I stopped my pack from killing you, of course. I wanted to, talk," his voice though luxuriant in timbre was calculating and cynical.

"What about Yami?" he demanded.

The beast shrugged again. "You're female? I'm afraid I had no use for her."

Greer scowled. So Yami was dead, he'd failed to uphold their bargain. His fingers went up to the earring for a moment. Then he glared at the Jabberwocky. "She wasn't 'my female'."

"As you like it, young hunter."

"Why are you calling me that?" he demanded, sitting up.

"Why, because you haven't told me your name, of course," the smile the beast gave him was anything but reassuring.

Greer frowned in distrust. "You give me your name, and I'll give you mine."

He chuckled. "Well then, all right. My pack refers to me as Grrrmaaaarrsss'ssssss."

The recruit was unsure he could say the strange growling hiss.

"But," the beast added, "It's more properly pronounced Grimoires."

He raised his eyebrows. "Grimoires, as in texts of black magick?"

"I have heard that such things bare my name," he said, matter-of-factly. "Now, young hunter, your name would be?"

"Vincent Greer."

The beast's eyes seemed to light up further. "Ahhhh, I believe that, taken as a whole, would be 'the conquering watcher' or some such?"

It was Greer's turn to shrug.

"But, enough of this banter, to business."

The recruit raised an eyebrow. "Business?"

"Oh yes my boy," the creature's eyes narrowed, "business. We have matters, you and I, which need discussing."

Some people would have taken one look at the monster and refused to discuss anything. Greer, however, was much more prudent. His life was in this creature, Grimoires', hands; he wasn't about to endanger any chance he had of keeping it. And though he was fairly sure that it was going to be rather more of an interrogation than a discussion, he went along with it.

"What, exactly, are we going to be discussing?" he asked as pleasantly as he could manage. If this beast was going to play the gentleman, he certainly wasn't going to be outclassed.

"I believe I would like to discuss where it was that you came from and how it is, that you will be returning to that place," Grimoires flicked his tail gently.

"Hmmm, I think," he replied carefully, "that before I can answer that properly I am going to have to know exactly where here is."

The Jabberwocky smiled, showing an altogether unpleasant number of teeth. "Smart boy," he purred, sitting down on his haunches again. "Very well. Your companion was not far off when she called this 'The other side of the looking-glass', though I perhaps would have called it 'Hell'. This world was once full of humans, and then one day, they all disappeared. They did not die, they did not leave; they simply all disappeared into thin air at the very same instant, and it took me a very long time to discover why." Grimoires flexed his claws idly. "Tell me, Vincent Greer, though I expect your attire speaks its own answer, are you aware of the Matrix?"

Greer nodded slowly, reevaluating the creature with the fact that it knew of the matrix. So this had to be part of the matrix, didn't it?

"And you would be allied with the Agents?" the beast continued.

"How'd you guess?" he smirked, straightening his tie.

"Oh, the suit is a dead give away, my boy," Grimoires grinned sarcastically. "But, returning to the matter at hand. I discovered that this place was a copy of the Matrix or a piece of it, for backup purposes," he hissed bitterly. "Put in storage and forgotten, with some of its programs still running."

"That's what you are then, a program?"

"In a manner of speaking," Grimoires said lightly, standing and pacing a bit. "I was a house cat, in my original existence, belonging to a little girl. However, when I was copied and doubled over into this world something remarkable occurred. I was still online, but the program that told me when to grow old and die, was not." He smiled an unwholesome smile. "And so, in this strange humanless world with some programs here, and some asleep, offline, unaware of the change, I became what my previous existence had never been, a predator. Small things I hunted at first, mice squirrels, birds, but something strange was happening, eating was not working the way that it had before. Somehow when I devoured these creatures their programming was augmenting mine. I became both physically larger and more intelligent; with each kill I became more complex, more aware. I moved on to larger and larger prey, until one night I met a man, a program rather, in a grey coat smoking in an alleyway. And he was mine, that clock-master, for that is what he was, though time has little meaning here. And there were more of them after that, I took. my hunger for complexity is insatiable."

Grimoires paused for a moment in a reflective mood. Greer was listening with rapt attention. The creature then continued. "I encountered others, who had become predators the same as myself, but none of them were as great as I, none of them had ever taken so complex a program, and so I am their king, and they are my servants, the witless creatures, terrible conversation." He shook his head sadly, but his golden eyes gleamed a he looked up Greer. "But now sits before me a predator nearly my equal."

Greer made a face. "I'm no predator."

He snorted. "Don't be ridiculous, boy; I smell the blood that you've spilled. You even killed two of my servants before they took you."

"That's different; I'm a soldier, not a murderer. And I have never eaten anyone," Greer growled. Grimoires had touched a nerve.

"Oh you haven't? You can't tell me you have never felt the intoxication of the hunt, that heady rush that comes with the chase, and the sure certainty, have never felt one with your prey, drinking in their soul as you reeve from them their life's blood. You can not tell me that you do not, in that single moment, truly posses your victims."

The recruit felt his face growing warm; he knew what the beast was describing, and he had felt it. It made him angry, and he wanted to deny it. He bit down the fury.

"If you know the hunt, whether you have actually eaten your prey or not, you have still consumed them. Still devoured them. Still possess them."

"No," he snarled back. But his hand reached up to the earring.

Grimoires stalked forward until the tip of his long muzzle was almost pressed against the bars of Greer's cage. "Oh yes, there is a beast in you, my boy. I can smell it, feel it in your every movement. Ferocity hides behind your eyes even now, waiting to escape you. Something in you longs for the hunt, cherishes it, will not be denied." He paused, with a wicked grin. "It troubles you in the night, this predator's soul. I know it does. You cannot reconcile this beast with your supposed humanity, more than that, you fear to do so. And so it is you he stalks, as you sleep he paces back and forth in you mind, hunting for weakness, growling at the bars of its cage and every so often, screaming for release." He paused again. "There's no denying it, I know my kin when I see him."

Greer flashed the feline a smoky glare.

"But we've digressed so very far, perhaps we should return to our original subject?"

In a low voice Greer said, "You killed her too, didn't you, the girl who came in here before Yami and me."

Grimoires frowned. "The Asian in the suit? Yes, I took her. But that is of no consequence. Tell me, young hunter, how is it you expect to return home?"

The beast had brought up his very worry that plagued him. "Why? Do you mean to stop me?"

"Oh no, no, no. This wretched place never appealed to me and it has served it purpose. It is nearly empty now, but for its predators. I need a new hunting ground. So you see, I mean to accompany you."

"Never! There's no way I'll bring a monster like you back to the Matrix."

Grimoires sighed. "We could be such companions, you and I. It's a shame so much of you hates me. So much of you hates yourself."

Greer didn't give him the satisfaction of an answer.

"Very well. Give me one three drops of your blood and you may go, to pursue any exit you will. Neither I nor my servants will harass you further in this place."

The recruit snorted, and ran and hand through his mussed ponytail. "You're kidding me."

"Oh no, my boy. I caught you, I held you. I hold you still. You will give me this small token of yourself freely, or I will kill you and take all of you by force."

Greer stared at the thing. This was mad, almost perverted. "How do I know you'll keep your word?"

"Why, you have my predator's honor, my boy. Other than that? You'll just have to trust me of course."

On the one hand this was sick, this was twisted. On the other hand, what choice did he have?

Greer took a breath. "Alright, it's a deal."

Grimoires smiled. He turned around, paced a few feet away and came back with Greer's katana in his mouth. He dropped it just outside the bars. "You may take your blade."

The recruit reached warily out the bars, keeping his eyes of the beast standing beside, and grabbed the hilt of his sword. He pulled it in, reassured by its familiar weight.

"Now, if you would..." he trailed off, but Greer knew what he meant.

Grimoires meant for him to cut himself. Greer took a deep breath; he raised his left hand and slid it in across the blade of his katana. He winced as the blade bit deeper into his hand than he'd intended, and dark blood began to trickle down to his wrist.

Grimoires approached the bars. "Hold out you hand," he purred.

Greer grimaced and shoved his bloody palm out between the bars. The beast's jaws parted slightly and his tongue protruded. He licked up Greer's hand starting at the wrist, and moving up. He lapped the blood from the wound. The recruit winced and shivered at the same time, the rough tongue caressing his fingers, and he felt his eyelids growing heavy. "Stop," he whispered hoarsely as Grimoires began to explore the depth of the cut, "that's enough."

The creature drew back. "Of course." There was a hungry shimmer in his golden eyes, which chilled Greer's heart. This beast was in no way sated of him.

Grimoires paced around to the other side of the cage, as the recruit tore a strip from the bottom of his jacket and bound his hand. The beast reached up and extended a claw into the lock of the cage, twisting it. The door swung open with a sickening, grinding creak. Grimoires stepped away from the door.

"You may leave now, my young hunter," he purred. "None of my number will seek to stop you or bring you harm."

Greer stood shakily, steadying himself on the bars until his footing was firm. He stepped deliberately out of the cage and looked down at the giant beast, whose shoulder came up to his waist. Greer nodded curtly to him.

"Farewell Vincent Greer, perhaps we will meet again."

"Doubtful," Greer snorted, sheathing his katana. He walked determinedly through the thick vegetation past several more empty cages until he was out of Grimoires' sight, and then he broke into a run. He had put up a confident façade for the beast, but he was much less certain as to the method of his own escape. He didn't even have any idea where he was now, or any semblance of a plan except that he would try to get to a road if one was to be found.

He wasn't sure whether he was more or less hopeful about getting out after Grimoires explanation of what this place was. As to the other things he had been told...

So Yami was dead, Greer knew he should be pleased, but instead he felt cheated. It had been his duty as well as his right to kill her, and that had been taken from him. A hot anger gripped his heart, and he fingered the earring as he ran.

***

In the Yokohama agency Jones' anxiety had been slowly growing. As they brought down the beta-location piece by piece the Agent had caught traces of strange programs, varying between the crude and the complex and they were unlike any programs he'd studied before. The closest match would be that of an Exile. Jones was worried for Greer's safety.

But the chaos was being tamed and Jones was certain that in only a few moments he would find the recruit's signature and be able to pull him out.

He looked up momentarily at the other agents in the room; all dedicated to the task at hand, none of them preoccupied with troubled thoughts for the man they loved. Jones lowered his head as he blushed of himself. How did he always get himself into these messes? Why had he fallen in love? And with a human! So many troubles...

Jones hunted avidly through the source code for his love.

***

In the Neb Tank was glued to his screens. The sphere around Tokyo had been slowly decompiling for the last three hours, no doubt it was the work of Agents, but for the first time he was mildly grateful for them. Another minute and he was sure he'd be able to isolate Yami's signature from the mess.

He looked nervously over at her body on the chair. It had taken Tank all of his persuasive skills to convince Morpheus it wasn't a danger to leave her plugged it.

He looked back at the screen. There it was!

***

Yami had been walking through the sewers for absolutely ages! She was wet and cold and she was sure that her legs and feet were all pruney. She sighed, looking round at the cavernous underground. More like a cave and river than a sewer. But she had been noticing something; corners of the place kept flickering in and out of existence on the corners of her vision. She wondered what was happening.

She was tired, and she needed to stop. She'd needed to rest an hour ago and had been looking for an exit back to street-level ever since, but none could be found. Well, at leas there weren't any of those awful monster things down here. There weren't even any rats.

The rebel yanked her hand back as the ledge she'd been running her hand along flicked and was covered suddenly in a green slime. She grimaced. What the hell was going on?

Then suddenly everything gave a jolt and Yami felt like she was spinning. She flailed and tried to find something to hang on to. The water she was standing in was now warmer, sickly and viscous, almost chunky. She felt a wave of nausea assaulted by a foul stench and she opened her eyes to find herself now in a real sewer. She heard squeaking rats, and the ledge she'd been hanging onto was a jut of pavement, almost a sidewalk covered in a film of slime, but infinitely better than the muck she was standing in. With a wide-eyed squeal she pulled herself up onto in. She shifted from foot to foot as muck dripped off her pants.

Her cell phone rang, startling the beejeezus out of her. She gave a shriek that echoed down the long dark corridor, and the phone rang twice more before she regained the presence of mind to answer it.

"H-hello?"

"Yami? Damn its good to hear you!!"

"Tank?! What the hell happened?" she was delighted.

"We're not sure, but just keep walking; you're almost out of the dead zone. There's an exit not three miles from you."

"YES!!" she shouted joyously into the phone.

"Ow..." Tank mummbeled.

***

Grimoires followed after Greer undetected, determined to get out of this place, especially now that it seemed to be disappearing in chunks around them. One moment a tree would be there, and then it hiss and flicker and there would be pavement in its place. Something was happening, the place was collapsing in on itself and Grimoires would not be there to see it fall.

He had too many plans to die now, not after he had lived this long. And he had lived a very long time here, practically forever, over a thousand years, as time passed much more slowly in this place, than it did outside. He'd gotten the girl to tell him that much before he'd ripped her throat out, the only use she'd been at all.

But there was this man, this Vincent Greer, whose blood he had taken. This fellow hunter, Grimoires would break him of his self-hatred and release the predator inside. It would give him such satisfaction to do so.

***

Jones' heart gave a leap as through the disorder of the collapsing code he found Greer. He didn't even stop to notice the strange flicker near him, an echo of the same signature. He just pulled him out, glad to see proof that he was alive.

***

Greer ran, tensely watching the forest as it glitched and flickered. What would happen if it shut down completely while he was inside? He didn't want to find out.

Jones, what if he never saw the agent again? His heart gave a wrench. He couldn't he just couldn't die here like this, or worse, be trapped here for the rest of his life. That would be hell. To be stuck here with that creature Grimoires, the thing he was sure would like better than to tear his flesh and devour him.

The recruit shivered, thinking of the beast lapping the blood from his palm. It had been sensuous, almost pleasurable, and it made him feel guilty, ashamed. His face burned. That damned beast, that damned killer.

The world suddenly gave a sickening lurch, and Greer fell face first, sprawled Tokyo pavement.

***

Grimoires animal senses went haywire, thrown from the smell of jungle and desiccated city into an actual living city, filled with humans, filled with conflicting scents. It almost overpowered his sensed. He shook his head and tried to reconcile himself with what had happened. He saw the young hunter lying on the pavement ahead, alive. Somehow they'd been pulled out of the matrix. Grimoires was certain that the human's blood had allowed him to be pulled out along with whatever had pulled the recruit.

But there were other humans in this place, and he had to get out of sight. He saw a darkened alleyway and darted into the shadows.

***

Greer's head was reeling as he picked himself up off the ground and found himself in the heart of Tokyo in the evening. He stared around in amazement. He was out, he was out! He clenched his fists in exaltation, but winced as his fingers pressed into his cut palm.

The Tokyo streets were alive with people returning home from work, teeming with them even. It was hard to keep track of himself in the mess, and he pressed himself up against the wall of a building to keep from getting jostled along with the crowd.

His earpiece crackled to life. ^"Recruit Greer?"^

It was agent Jones! I grin split the recruit's weary face. ^"Right here sir! Were we successful?"^

^"Yes recruit, quite successful. The glitch has been repaired."^ Greer could hear the carefully masked edge of joy in his voice. ^"You will report back to Yokohama agency immediately."^

^"Ah, I'm afraid I don't know quite where that is from here, agent Jones."^

There was a pause. ^"Very well, recruit. I will come and retrieve you."^

Greer watched as Agent Jones shifted into a young Japanese businessman who had been passing by. Greer threw his arms around him, feeling his initial surprise before he returned the embrace.

"So," he whispered into the agent's ear. "I take it you're to blame for my rescue."

Jones laughed his soft little laugh. "Of course."

"You gonna save my ass every time I get into trouble?"

"Always." Greer felt Jones' lips and breath ticking his ear and felt warm, He loved holding the smaller, more delicate man to his body, feeling the way their bodies met. But Jones stepped back all too soon. "We must return to the Yokohama agency for a few moments."

Greer nodded dutifully. When did the two of them ever have time to be close? "Then we'll be going back home."

"Yes." Jones reached for his left hand, but saw the makeshift bandage. "What happened?" he asked, concern filling his deep green eyes.

The recruit shook his head. "I'll tell you when we get back, okay?"

For a moment it looked like Jones was going to demand an immediate answer, but then he nodded and took Greer's other hand. he shifted them back to Yokohama agency.

Greer made sure to let go of his hand as soon as they were there. The room was crowded again, though not quite as before. All the agents were there but...

"Where are Ryuji and Urich?" he asked the remaining two, Rosa and Erik.

It was the Mexican girl who answered. "Ryuji's in the infirmary, Urich's dead. We thought you were too."

Greer nodded. "How is Ryuji?"

"He's awake. Bruises, lacerations, a little trauma. It's a good thing he had his helmet on though, or he'd be dead."

Greer smirked ruefully.

Jones was finishing a short conversation with agent Takeuchi." So there is no further need for my assistance?"

"None. You may report back to your own agency," the Japanese agent gave a respectful bow.

Jones nodded towards Greer, but he thought of something. "Ah, Agent Jones, sir, may I speak with Recruit Chiba in the infirmary for a moment?"

The agent gave a slightly puzzled look, but agreed. "I will wait for you here."

"Thank you, sir," Greer closed the door behind him and jogged down the white corridor, thankful this time, for the cookie-cutter layout of the agencies. He was stopped by a medic as he entered the infirmary.

"May I speak with Chiba Ryuji?"

"Come with me," the doctor said, leading him across the room to a cot where the recruit lay.

Ryuji's eyes widened as he saw Greer. "Vincent! You're alive, then...is Minako?"

Sadly Greer shook his head.

The wounded recruit's face fell.

"I'm sorry," he apologized. "She was your girlfriend, right?"

To Greer's surprise, he shook his head. "My little sister."

Somehow that made Greer feel even worse. He didn't know what to tell Ryu. He took a breath. "I have to report back, but I'll keep in touch, right?" he offered Ryuji his right hand. The Japanese boy took it and they shook hands briefly.

"Right."

With a parting nod, Greer turned and walked out of the infirmary, to his surprise finding Jones standing just outside waiting.

Greer raised his eyebrows. "Couldn't wait to see me, hmm?" he said in a very low voice.

He could have sworn Jones smirked as he took Greer's hand and shifted them back into the relative comfort and privacy of his office.

Jones sat down and required the customary chair for Greer. He was in there so often the recruit sometimes wondered why Jones didn't just keep the chair in there. But he supposed that would be more suspicious, wouldn't it? Damn all this secrecy and hiding!

But he sat down, leaning back and finally able to relax a little bit.

After a moment or two of silence, Jones spoke in his soft, light voice. "Will you tell me now, what happened?"

Greer sighed. "Alright. It happened like this."

He launched into an account everything that had happened after Yami had pushed them across the barrier; the beast's attack, their flight, the truce even. But he hesitated when he came to his conversation with Grimoires; he shifted uncomfortably as he related what the monster had said about him, and the blood, and so on. But he told all of it, determined not to leave anything out.

"And then you pulled me out," he shrugged in finishing.

Jones leveled a steady, concerned gaze at him. "Listen to me, Greer. This creature, this program does not know you. I know you. Yes, you kill rebels, but you are not a murderer. You are a kind, loving, humorous young man. I would not love you if it were otherwise."

Greer smiled, feeling warm from the praise and reassurance. Hr felt a resurgence of desire for the agent. Jones seemed to feel the same because he stood, walked the few steps to Greer's chair and surprisingly, sat down in his lap. He leaned close to Greer's face a mischievous smile playing on his lips.

"Now, am I from you story, to understand that you derive pleasure from 'licking'?"

Greer felt himself turn scarlet as Jones gently grabbed his uninjured hand and began to caress his fingers with his tongue. Greer put one arm around the agent who moved from fingers to face with his tender caresses. He stifled a small moan, running his hand through Jones hair and caught Jones with his mouth and pulled him into a passionate kiss.

There was a knock at the door and the disentangled themselves faster than ever before, Jones shooting up and practically flying into his own chair, while simultaneously trying to un-muss his hair. Greer had required a cloth and was hastily wiping the spit from his face.

"Come in," Jones said, his voice breaking with panic.

The door opened. Greer didn't think he'd had reason to hate Stef, but he did now as she walked in the room. He had to smoother the supremely irritated glare he wanted to give her. This was the second times she'd interrupted them! If he didn't know better he'd say she was doing it on purpose!

"Hey guys," she said. She almost seemed to take Greer's presence in the office for granted these days, almost. "What're you two doing in here?"

"We were just, discussing the occurrences in Tokyo," Jones lied. "Greer had a rather singular experience; he was trapped in a backup location."

"Oh really?" she required a chair for herself, and sat down. "I was just coming to see how that had gone. Tokyo back up and running?"

"Indeed."

Stef looked over at Greer. "So what happened hmm?"

He sighed, exchanged a small, exasperated glance with Jones, and launched into the story again.

***

In the neon darkness of Tokyo a singular predator stalked.

A young Japanese woman wearing a suit walked much more confidently in the slum than she should considering she carried no weapons.

A figure appeared from the shadows of an alleyway, a man, tattooed and rough looking with a club-like weapon in hand.

"Hey there pretty," he said to her, eyes gleaming, and caught her wrist. "How bout you and I have a go." He grinned evilly.

To his surprise the woman grinned back. "Yes, why don't we," she purred, and leapt upon the man, her figure morphing seamlessly as she did so into that of a great beast like a cross between a cat and lizard.

The man didn't have a chance; the creature tore his throat out as he screamed his last. A few moments later the creature looked down at its prey. Pitiful; he licked his lips.

The monster stood up, morphing again as he did so, and a man, tattooed and rough looking, walked out of the alleyway, sated.

The end...

for now....