Chapter 1.
[Mainframe log call: carrier line anomaly]
[Log recording: trace programme running]
[Trace executed: 0.2043241 seconds Time of trace 2138]
[011 44 208 566 9145 United Kingdom Sector, European Matrix
Construct]
[fork]
[dispatch agent (random) to location /identify]
[/identify agent (smith)]
[/fork]
[copy log of transmission]
[copy:
Boulton@d...
Boulton:
The Matrix has you.
We have found you.
Beware the Ides of March. And London Bridge.
Especially at 2200.
/copy]
[/log]
[/end]
Angela Harris stood on the platform at London Bridge train station,
turning up the collar of her ankle-length black woollen coat against
the icy Thameside breeze and the smell of cigarettes, fast food and
decay that permeated into her hair, skin and clothing. Her train was
delayed by approximately ten minutes.
`Typical,' she though to herself. `Bloody typical.'
The train platform was crowded for a Friday night, per usual.
Drunken yobs shouted to each other from across the platform,
obviously just coming off of a lads' night out. Angela, herself, had
just come from work, where she was working late, again, per usual.
Tower Bridge was lit up in all its glory, and the night had taken on
a particularly jet black, thick presence around her, the only lights
being those from the station and the bridge.
Someone behind her nudged into her, pushing her a few steps forward
of the painted yellow line on the dirty concrete station platform.
She was about to turn around and hurl abuse at the inconsiderate
commuter when she felt a hand grasp her arm, firmly, with the promise
of bruising if she resisted.
"Ms. Harris," the resonant baritone voice spoke into her ear, just
loud enough for her to hear. "I've been looking for you."
Angela didn't know what it was, but the sound of that voice sent an
icy, rigid spike up through the core of her spine and she felt like
the very contents of her stomach had turned to molten acid and
dropped into her bowels, simultaneously warming and nauseating her.
She turned her head to get a look at her assailant. The warning she
received via email right before leaving the office flashed in her
mind. Why didn't she pay attention to it? Whomever sent it, how
could they have known this was going to happen?
One glimpse of the black suit and sunglasses caused her unease to
develop into full grown panic. Her eyes grew wide and breathing
became rapid. It was as if all the other commuters on the platform
had disappeared and all she was aware of was this man, this
mysterious government agent holding her arm. She trembled from fear,
the cold making it somehow worse.
"Come with me." The man kept his grip on her arm and led her down
the station steps and through the concourse to the outside where a
black car with tinted windows was waiting for her. He was not
hurried, and he gently, yet forcefully loaded her into the car,
shutting the door behind her. Angela noticed the car doors had no
handles on the inside. He strode to the drivers' side and got in,
driving her from London Bridge to the depths of Westminster through a
maze of narrow back roads, most of which Angela had never been down
before, causing her to lose her bearings.
"What is this about?" Angela asked to the back of the man's
impeccably trimmed head, although she suspected that she knew, in the
pit of her stomach.
"All in good time, Ms. Harris."
"Where are you taking me?" she asked.
He didn't answer. The car had black leather interior and was
completely silent on the inside. To his credit, the car was warm,
which was the only welcoming thing about the whole situation. Angela
sighed and watched as the streets of London slid around her, the dark
night, and bright pinpoint lights.
They pulled into a nondescript underground NCP car park and he
escorted her, oddly, Angela thought, downstairs into a white room
with a grey table. After motioning to her where to sit, he walked
out of the room, silently shutting the door behind him, leaving her
alone to wait.
Angela's mind raced wildly. Webpages and hours spent logged on the
net both at work and at home, hacking into government files, slid by,
along with the whispers and innuendos they contained on them. She
spent her life posing as an IT Helpdesk manager to give her access to
her company's domain in which to hide behind when she performed her
covert illegal activities. Recently, she hit up against a wall
trying to hack into the NSA's security system. Trying to get access
to the largest programme she had ever encountered
called "construct.exe", had proved exceptionally difficult, but once
she had managed to bypass the system locks she came across a whole
new network, one larger than she had ever imagined, contained in a
server called "Matrix 16". She did not identify any of the file
extension names and doing an internet search on "*.*inv" of which
there seemed to be billions of files, (each one, oddly enough, with a
person's name on it), provided no clues. However, she did manage to
find pages asking about "Matrix 16" and "What is the Matrix?"
References to legendary hackers Morpheus, Trinity and others abounded
in these discussions. She even found a message board dedicated to
speculation of the origins of the Matrix.
Angela remembered the content of the post she left on the board.
To: matrixquestion@yahoogroups.com
From: Boulton@d...
14.03.99 2245
Hacked NSA. Found server "Matrix 16" full of *.*inv files. What are
*.*inv? Is this part of 'the Matrix' as you call it? What does this
mean? Where are Matrix 1-15?
Boulton
Angela was sure that they didn't trace her from that post. CX
domains were the anonymous "hackers' domains" set up to hide dodgy
activity and provide a firewall from where hackers and spammers could
conduct their activities with masked IPs.
Whomever these guys were, however, Angela was sure that they had to
know something of her activities online, if not the NSA job, perhaps
when she did the Bank of England or the CIA. She stared up at the
fluorescent light panel in the ceiling and faintly felt a rumbling.
A tube train. She realised that these offices were underground in
abandoned train lines. What she couldn't figure out is why her
captor had an American accent?
She remembered reading references of "Agents" - government personnel
who were akin to cyberspace police, if she understood their role
correctly, who were responsible for monitoring activity and
prosecuting hackers online. Could her captor be an Agent? The idea
filled her with fear. Very few hackers who had come into contact
with Agents had ever been heard from again.
Just then the door opened and the man returned into the room. He sat
down very slowly, casually, precisely. He took his time opening the
folder in front of him and placed a pen on the table in exact
symmetry with the line of the folder.
"Ms. Harris. You have been brought here today because of a certain
activity that you like to participate in your spare time, or should I
say, in time you should be spending doing your work." The man rested
his hands on the table, oddly, also in exact symmetry with the pen
and folder.
Angela took a deep breath. She hoped that her outside appeared calm
because her insides were churning and shaking. She could make out
the whites of his eyes through his sunglasses, which, strangely
enough, he was wearing indoors, and also, she recalled, in the dark
of night on the train station and while driving in the car.
"I don't understand," Angela managed to squeak out.
"Bank of England, CIA, MI5, and most recently, NSA. Does that jog
your memory, Ms. Harris?"
Angela said nothing. She could feel her body involuntarily
shivering, despite the fact that the room was not cold.
"Regardless if you answer me or not, we know all about your double
life that you spend online, under the hacker alias Boulton. We also
know that you have been contacted by the highly dangerous outlaw Neo,
this evening."
"Neo." Angela whispered.
The agent sat backwards in his chair and laced his fingers together,
relaxed yet in charge. He eyed his quarry with some amusement.
[Accessing file on Angela June Harris; .. Age 28, Resides: Bromley,
Kent, United Kingdom, European Matrix Configuration, Family: none,
Acquaintances: none, Hobbies: hacking, Description: short blonde
hair, green eyes, 5'6", 130 lbs.. Best Methods of Ensuring
Compliance: Authoritive, Threat of Loss of Liberty, Logic, Pain,
Threat of Death, Forced Sexual Encounter, Serums, Death]
"We cannot allow you to have contact with this man, Ms Harris. Or,
shall I say, we can allow you to have contact with him for the right
reasons."
Smith contemplated how the description given in her file did not
paint a clear enough picture of the human sitting in front of him.
She was exceptionally pale, a smattering of freckles spaced
approximately 1 millimetre apart on the bridge of her nose. She was
medium built and would be considered physically attractive by human
standards. By agent standards she would be considered something else
entirely. He pushed those thoughts to one side for one moment and
continued his authoritive approach.
"What are the right reasons?" she asked, with trepidation.
"Our reasons, Ms. Harris. Our reason that we would allow you to meet
this man is to capture him. You would be assisting us in bringing a
known fugitive to justice."
"And what would I get in return?" Angela asked, figuring she had no
way out of this anyway.
"We would be willing to negotiate with you. You could go back to
your life, not hacking anymore, of course, and we would erase your
former indiscretions and.wipe the slate clean."
"What can I do, specifically, to help you?" she asked.
Smith's eyes roved over her body. Underneath this scared behaviour,
Smith knew what he was really dealing with. They had been watching
Boulton work for some time. At first she had been hard to pinpoint,
covering her tracks exceptionally well for a human. Her logic, and
the methods she used to gain access into the Matrix were admirable.
Most people he saw had either stumbled upon it by mistake or were
given the information by the Resistance. She figured it out with no
outside help. A keen, exacting mind, logical, rational, determined
and precise. In Smith's experience, this couldn't be said for most
humans. Her file indicated that she did not need the company of
others, and generally eschewed social events. Even her work
evaluations praised her for her work, high flagging her for the top
if only she would kiss the right ass. Of all the humans he had the
misfortune of dealing with, she should be the easiest, because he
understood how her mind worked. The Mainframe had made that clear
when assigning him.
"So you are agreeing to be of assistance to us?" Smith asked her.
"Do I have any other choice?" she asked.
"A wise decision, Ms. Harris. You won't regret it." Smith smiled
and removed his sunglasses. Angela was taken aback by his deep
cobalt blue eyes. Seeing the Agent's full face made him seem a bit
more human, but his mere presence around her still felt threatening.
He was not unattractive, much the opposite in fact. Either the suit
or the clean precision of everything about him created a very
alluring and striking package, reminding Angela of how very alone she
was, in every way. His voice jolted her from that thought and
brought her back to reality.
"Would you like a cup of tea?"
Angela slowly nodded. The agent stood up and opened the door for
her, leading her out of the room, through what appeared to be some
sort of reception area. Angela swore that it was not there earlier
when she was being led in. The stark white and grey of the room
illuminated by fluorescent panels only accentuated the emptiness of
them. He led her through another door into a canteen of sorts.
There was a kettle, teabags, milk, sugar, lemon and a single teacup
with spoon sitting on a solitary counter against the wall, almost as
if it had been laid out for her. Again, a single table, slightly
larger, with four chairs, sat in the centre of the room.
"Help yourself," Smith said, and then he disappeared from behind her,
back into the reception. Angela busied herself making the tea, and
did not hear Smith re-enter with two others. When she turned around
from the counter she was face to face with three Agents, as if from
nowhere.
"What is going on?" she asked Smith, fear rising again in her throat,
reminding her of the anticipation of sitting at the doctors waiting
for a jab. "Can I please have some real answers?"
Smith sat down calmly. The other two agents sat around him, leaving
the empty chair across the table from Smith. He held out his hand
for her to sit and slowly, tentatively, she did, spilling her tea
slightly over the rim of the teacup and saucer because her hands were
shaking.
"An experiment, Ms. Harris. An experiment we wish to conduct," Smith
answered.
"What sort of experiment?" Angela asked. She nervously stirred her
tea and fidgeted slightly.
"One that may change the very precedents of this world you live in,"
the taller one answered.
"One that may provide more insight into humanity," the short, fair
haired one chimed in. Angela noted that they were all wearing their
sunglasses again.
"And where do I fit into all of this?" she asked Smith, growing more
afraid and annoyed simultaneously. He smiled again, which only
served to make these feelings worse, as she couldn't help but notice
a touch of the sinister in the smile.
"You are the test subject, Ms. Harris."
[Mainframe log call: carrier line anomaly]
[Log recording: trace programme running]
[Trace executed: 0.2043241 seconds Time of trace 2138]
[011 44 208 566 9145 United Kingdom Sector, European Matrix
Construct]
[fork]
[dispatch agent (random) to location /identify]
[/identify agent (smith)]
[/fork]
[copy log of transmission]
[copy:
Boulton@d...
Boulton:
The Matrix has you.
We have found you.
Beware the Ides of March. And London Bridge.
Especially at 2200.
/copy]
[/log]
[/end]
Angela Harris stood on the platform at London Bridge train station,
turning up the collar of her ankle-length black woollen coat against
the icy Thameside breeze and the smell of cigarettes, fast food and
decay that permeated into her hair, skin and clothing. Her train was
delayed by approximately ten minutes.
`Typical,' she though to herself. `Bloody typical.'
The train platform was crowded for a Friday night, per usual.
Drunken yobs shouted to each other from across the platform,
obviously just coming off of a lads' night out. Angela, herself, had
just come from work, where she was working late, again, per usual.
Tower Bridge was lit up in all its glory, and the night had taken on
a particularly jet black, thick presence around her, the only lights
being those from the station and the bridge.
Someone behind her nudged into her, pushing her a few steps forward
of the painted yellow line on the dirty concrete station platform.
She was about to turn around and hurl abuse at the inconsiderate
commuter when she felt a hand grasp her arm, firmly, with the promise
of bruising if she resisted.
"Ms. Harris," the resonant baritone voice spoke into her ear, just
loud enough for her to hear. "I've been looking for you."
Angela didn't know what it was, but the sound of that voice sent an
icy, rigid spike up through the core of her spine and she felt like
the very contents of her stomach had turned to molten acid and
dropped into her bowels, simultaneously warming and nauseating her.
She turned her head to get a look at her assailant. The warning she
received via email right before leaving the office flashed in her
mind. Why didn't she pay attention to it? Whomever sent it, how
could they have known this was going to happen?
One glimpse of the black suit and sunglasses caused her unease to
develop into full grown panic. Her eyes grew wide and breathing
became rapid. It was as if all the other commuters on the platform
had disappeared and all she was aware of was this man, this
mysterious government agent holding her arm. She trembled from fear,
the cold making it somehow worse.
"Come with me." The man kept his grip on her arm and led her down
the station steps and through the concourse to the outside where a
black car with tinted windows was waiting for her. He was not
hurried, and he gently, yet forcefully loaded her into the car,
shutting the door behind her. Angela noticed the car doors had no
handles on the inside. He strode to the drivers' side and got in,
driving her from London Bridge to the depths of Westminster through a
maze of narrow back roads, most of which Angela had never been down
before, causing her to lose her bearings.
"What is this about?" Angela asked to the back of the man's
impeccably trimmed head, although she suspected that she knew, in the
pit of her stomach.
"All in good time, Ms. Harris."
"Where are you taking me?" she asked.
He didn't answer. The car had black leather interior and was
completely silent on the inside. To his credit, the car was warm,
which was the only welcoming thing about the whole situation. Angela
sighed and watched as the streets of London slid around her, the dark
night, and bright pinpoint lights.
They pulled into a nondescript underground NCP car park and he
escorted her, oddly, Angela thought, downstairs into a white room
with a grey table. After motioning to her where to sit, he walked
out of the room, silently shutting the door behind him, leaving her
alone to wait.
Angela's mind raced wildly. Webpages and hours spent logged on the
net both at work and at home, hacking into government files, slid by,
along with the whispers and innuendos they contained on them. She
spent her life posing as an IT Helpdesk manager to give her access to
her company's domain in which to hide behind when she performed her
covert illegal activities. Recently, she hit up against a wall
trying to hack into the NSA's security system. Trying to get access
to the largest programme she had ever encountered
called "construct.exe", had proved exceptionally difficult, but once
she had managed to bypass the system locks she came across a whole
new network, one larger than she had ever imagined, contained in a
server called "Matrix 16". She did not identify any of the file
extension names and doing an internet search on "*.*inv" of which
there seemed to be billions of files, (each one, oddly enough, with a
person's name on it), provided no clues. However, she did manage to
find pages asking about "Matrix 16" and "What is the Matrix?"
References to legendary hackers Morpheus, Trinity and others abounded
in these discussions. She even found a message board dedicated to
speculation of the origins of the Matrix.
Angela remembered the content of the post she left on the board.
To: matrixquestion@yahoogroups.com
From: Boulton@d...
14.03.99 2245
Hacked NSA. Found server "Matrix 16" full of *.*inv files. What are
*.*inv? Is this part of 'the Matrix' as you call it? What does this
mean? Where are Matrix 1-15?
Boulton
Angela was sure that they didn't trace her from that post. CX
domains were the anonymous "hackers' domains" set up to hide dodgy
activity and provide a firewall from where hackers and spammers could
conduct their activities with masked IPs.
Whomever these guys were, however, Angela was sure that they had to
know something of her activities online, if not the NSA job, perhaps
when she did the Bank of England or the CIA. She stared up at the
fluorescent light panel in the ceiling and faintly felt a rumbling.
A tube train. She realised that these offices were underground in
abandoned train lines. What she couldn't figure out is why her
captor had an American accent?
She remembered reading references of "Agents" - government personnel
who were akin to cyberspace police, if she understood their role
correctly, who were responsible for monitoring activity and
prosecuting hackers online. Could her captor be an Agent? The idea
filled her with fear. Very few hackers who had come into contact
with Agents had ever been heard from again.
Just then the door opened and the man returned into the room. He sat
down very slowly, casually, precisely. He took his time opening the
folder in front of him and placed a pen on the table in exact
symmetry with the line of the folder.
"Ms. Harris. You have been brought here today because of a certain
activity that you like to participate in your spare time, or should I
say, in time you should be spending doing your work." The man rested
his hands on the table, oddly, also in exact symmetry with the pen
and folder.
Angela took a deep breath. She hoped that her outside appeared calm
because her insides were churning and shaking. She could make out
the whites of his eyes through his sunglasses, which, strangely
enough, he was wearing indoors, and also, she recalled, in the dark
of night on the train station and while driving in the car.
"I don't understand," Angela managed to squeak out.
"Bank of England, CIA, MI5, and most recently, NSA. Does that jog
your memory, Ms. Harris?"
Angela said nothing. She could feel her body involuntarily
shivering, despite the fact that the room was not cold.
"Regardless if you answer me or not, we know all about your double
life that you spend online, under the hacker alias Boulton. We also
know that you have been contacted by the highly dangerous outlaw Neo,
this evening."
"Neo." Angela whispered.
The agent sat backwards in his chair and laced his fingers together,
relaxed yet in charge. He eyed his quarry with some amusement.
[Accessing file on Angela June Harris; .. Age 28, Resides: Bromley,
Kent, United Kingdom, European Matrix Configuration, Family: none,
Acquaintances: none, Hobbies: hacking, Description: short blonde
hair, green eyes, 5'6", 130 lbs.. Best Methods of Ensuring
Compliance: Authoritive, Threat of Loss of Liberty, Logic, Pain,
Threat of Death, Forced Sexual Encounter, Serums, Death]
"We cannot allow you to have contact with this man, Ms Harris. Or,
shall I say, we can allow you to have contact with him for the right
reasons."
Smith contemplated how the description given in her file did not
paint a clear enough picture of the human sitting in front of him.
She was exceptionally pale, a smattering of freckles spaced
approximately 1 millimetre apart on the bridge of her nose. She was
medium built and would be considered physically attractive by human
standards. By agent standards she would be considered something else
entirely. He pushed those thoughts to one side for one moment and
continued his authoritive approach.
"What are the right reasons?" she asked, with trepidation.
"Our reasons, Ms. Harris. Our reason that we would allow you to meet
this man is to capture him. You would be assisting us in bringing a
known fugitive to justice."
"And what would I get in return?" Angela asked, figuring she had no
way out of this anyway.
"We would be willing to negotiate with you. You could go back to
your life, not hacking anymore, of course, and we would erase your
former indiscretions and.wipe the slate clean."
"What can I do, specifically, to help you?" she asked.
Smith's eyes roved over her body. Underneath this scared behaviour,
Smith knew what he was really dealing with. They had been watching
Boulton work for some time. At first she had been hard to pinpoint,
covering her tracks exceptionally well for a human. Her logic, and
the methods she used to gain access into the Matrix were admirable.
Most people he saw had either stumbled upon it by mistake or were
given the information by the Resistance. She figured it out with no
outside help. A keen, exacting mind, logical, rational, determined
and precise. In Smith's experience, this couldn't be said for most
humans. Her file indicated that she did not need the company of
others, and generally eschewed social events. Even her work
evaluations praised her for her work, high flagging her for the top
if only she would kiss the right ass. Of all the humans he had the
misfortune of dealing with, she should be the easiest, because he
understood how her mind worked. The Mainframe had made that clear
when assigning him.
"So you are agreeing to be of assistance to us?" Smith asked her.
"Do I have any other choice?" she asked.
"A wise decision, Ms. Harris. You won't regret it." Smith smiled
and removed his sunglasses. Angela was taken aback by his deep
cobalt blue eyes. Seeing the Agent's full face made him seem a bit
more human, but his mere presence around her still felt threatening.
He was not unattractive, much the opposite in fact. Either the suit
or the clean precision of everything about him created a very
alluring and striking package, reminding Angela of how very alone she
was, in every way. His voice jolted her from that thought and
brought her back to reality.
"Would you like a cup of tea?"
Angela slowly nodded. The agent stood up and opened the door for
her, leading her out of the room, through what appeared to be some
sort of reception area. Angela swore that it was not there earlier
when she was being led in. The stark white and grey of the room
illuminated by fluorescent panels only accentuated the emptiness of
them. He led her through another door into a canteen of sorts.
There was a kettle, teabags, milk, sugar, lemon and a single teacup
with spoon sitting on a solitary counter against the wall, almost as
if it had been laid out for her. Again, a single table, slightly
larger, with four chairs, sat in the centre of the room.
"Help yourself," Smith said, and then he disappeared from behind her,
back into the reception. Angela busied herself making the tea, and
did not hear Smith re-enter with two others. When she turned around
from the counter she was face to face with three Agents, as if from
nowhere.
"What is going on?" she asked Smith, fear rising again in her throat,
reminding her of the anticipation of sitting at the doctors waiting
for a jab. "Can I please have some real answers?"
Smith sat down calmly. The other two agents sat around him, leaving
the empty chair across the table from Smith. He held out his hand
for her to sit and slowly, tentatively, she did, spilling her tea
slightly over the rim of the teacup and saucer because her hands were
shaking.
"An experiment, Ms. Harris. An experiment we wish to conduct," Smith
answered.
"What sort of experiment?" Angela asked. She nervously stirred her
tea and fidgeted slightly.
"One that may change the very precedents of this world you live in,"
the taller one answered.
"One that may provide more insight into humanity," the short, fair
haired one chimed in. Angela noted that they were all wearing their
sunglasses again.
"And where do I fit into all of this?" she asked Smith, growing more
afraid and annoyed simultaneously. He smiled again, which only
served to make these feelings worse, as she couldn't help but notice
a touch of the sinister in the smile.
"You are the test subject, Ms. Harris."