A/N:
Disclaimer: The Matrix is owned by Warner Bros. and the Wachowskis. Agents: The Series is co-owned by myself and Stormhawk. Tib, Zelda, and Blackbird_King are mine. Movies, songs, web-pages, books, etcetera belong to their respective creators unless otherwise mentioned.
All characters and events in this work are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual events or people, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
Chapter 5...First Contact
Damn it, Tib still wasn't online! Zelda ran a hand through her hair nervously. He should have been home from class long before this, and it wasn't at all like him not to go on the moment he got back. Zel picked her pencil up, tapped it on the pad of paper in her lap, and then chewed on the end of it. She was supposed to be doing artwork someone had requested after seeing her gallery, but she couldn't concentrate. But this was dumb, Tib was fine, he was probably just busy. She'd just go read some fanfiction until he got un-busy.
But even as she was calling up ffnet, she felt a sharp pang of doubt, and fear for the boy's safety. She had his phone number; she resolved that if he wasn't on by tomorrow night she would call his house.
***
David had been playing that game for the better part of six hours, his mother fumed concernedly. And he had not eaten a single thing, not one thing! She was unsure as to whether she'd seen him eat anything all week for that matter, he'd been acting strangely for a few weeks now, and she couldn't just ignore it anymore. His mother couldn't stand to see him suffering like that.
***
Tib sat enrapt in front of Final Fantasy 9. He'd beaten it before, but it was his favorite of the newer FF games, and he knew it would take his mind off the whole mess. But now, ten hours after he'd started, it was two in the morning and he knew he'd better call it quits before his mother woke up and yelled at him again. She'd gone to bed hours ago, with the promise from him that he wouldn't stay up past midnight. Tib saved his game, switched off the console and stood up.
He stretched, holding his bony wrists high above his head, and swatted stray locks of dust-colored hair out from in front of his glasses. He walked over the fuzzy green carpet toward his room, but was distracted by the kitchen. Perhaps he should eat something...
He headed into the normally bright and cheery kitchen, which, at this hour of the night was nearly pitch black, and Tib struggled to find the light switch. The room was flooded with electric light. He looked over at the white refrigerator, and strode over to it. He reached tentatively up the handle, and pulled the magnetic door open, the little light coming on in the back.
He felt a wave of revulsion roll over him as he studied its contents, and closed the door without taking anything. He just couldn't, the thought of eating made him feel nauseous, and he wasn't hungry anyway. He was never hungry; he didn't get hungry, not since his diet freshman year. It seemed to him that he had conquered the need for food, and now it ceased to appeal to him. There were things he liked to eat of course, every once in a while, but what was the use of putting things into your body it didn't need?
He sighed and shook his head, pulling a glass from above the sink and putting it under the tap. He let the water run, staring at it as it filled and overflowed the glass. He turned the water off and poured the first quarter of the glass out. He held the water up in front of him.
It was a silly little superstition that he'd learned when he was a small child, but it seemed to calm his nerves anyway. A remedy for hiccups, he thought to himself, drink sips of water in number equal to your age. When he was little hiccups for him had been like a synonym for anxiety, and so it had become something of a calming mechanism.
He put the glass to his lips and sipped, taking his lips away from the glass for a second every time he did so. One... two... three... four... five... six... seven... eight... nine... ten... eleven... twelve... thirteen... fourteen... fifteen... sixteen... seventeen... eighteen.
He took a deep breath and set the half-empty glass down on the counter. He smiled. When he was sixty-five that little ritual would take absolutely forever! He turned around, switched off the light and headed to his room.
His computer was still on, and the old beast hadn't frozen on him as it did sometimes when it was left on without attention for a few hours. He closed the door and sat down heavily on his disheveled bed. If he wasn't going to eat anything, maybe he ought to try and sleep instead? He looked at the bed, blankets rumpled, pushed up against the wall and the side of the dresser, spider-man sheets exposed. Pillows were strewn haphazardly on the surface as well, except for on hanging off the edge of his computer chair for padding. But he looked back at his computer and blonde screensaver beauties beckoned him to check his email and see if Zelda or XX was online.
He smirked. So Zelda's real name was Beverly. It was a cute name, and it put him in the mind for red-heads. He wondered if she was a red-head. Should he ask her?
He stood up again and sat down at his computer, his hand hovering above the mouse, but to his surprise the computer monitor woke before he touched it to a black screen.
But it didn't stay blank.
[Hey, I've been waiting for you] the letters appeared on the screen one by one as Tib stared in horror.
He squeaked. Them, this was them! His fingers were trembling as he replied to the message, and he stumbled over the keys. [hwo are you?]
[Good question, kid. I'm Sparks, but more importunately, Who... are... you?]
Tib frowned at the question. It reminded him of the old Disney Alice in Wonderland with the creepy opium-smoking caterpillar. [Don't you know who I am?]
[Sure do. But do you know who you are?]
He got irritated with whoever was behind this suddenly. It was ridiculous. [Stop talking in riddles! I'm J_Tiberius_K, now tell mne hwo you ar e and what your';e doing in my computer!] He winced at all the typing errors and regretted that he couldn't fix them.
[Twelve days ago, you followed a series of links pertaining to a person named Morpheus, indicating that you wanted to know more. It said you'd be contacted. This is that contact.]
Tib froze at the confirmation. Even with his assumption, there had been some doubt as if this was just some hacker's idea of a joke. Heck it still could be. [Well then?]
[If you want to know more the White Knight will be waiting]
Tib stared at the screen. The White Knight? The caterpillar's question? The White Knight....
[You mean that all-night diner?] He asked, but there came no reply, and his screen switched back to his desktop, Harry Potter themed for the moment with Hermione Granger wallpaper, a lovely fanart by somebody or another.
Tib stared. They were probably still watching him. He crashed his computer and turned the monitor off. He needed to think. The White Knight was the name of an all-night, greasy spoon diner a fifteen-minute walk from his house, Tib was relatively sure that was meant as some sort of a meeting place. If he went there he might find out more about what had happened to BBK, on the other hand, if he went he might get kidnapped into the cult of Morpheus as well. He bit his lip. Tib remembered the article that Blackbird_King had been looking at. The one that had said 'known to use biblical and literary references to catch the interest of intelligent youths'. It had also said that if anyone thought they'd been contacted they should call the police.
He knew he should call, but, what a big mess that would be, and he'd have to explain the whole thing to his mother, who, with his luck would then take his computer away from him. And if the police got involved he might never find Blackbird_King!
Tib steeled himself. He would have to go. He could protect himself, he knew, if worse came to worse. Unless they had guns in which case he was toast, and who these days fought with out guns? And if they wanted him alive...Tib had a vision of himself in the diner, talking with a man, while someone from the shadows tagged him in the shoulder with a tranquilizer dart.
He looked over at his door. "Oh Lara, what should I do?"
She seemed to be saying 'go for it', and he knew he had to. People in books and comics did it all the time, faced their fears, an unknown enemy alone in the night. He couldn't back down or all he'd ever be was a cringing little fanboy. And, much as he loved being a fanboy and didn't really have any aspirations to be anything else, he didn't want to be known, even to himself as a cringing, sniveling coward. He wanted to be a brave fanboy, who tried his best to emulate the characters he admired.
So he stood up, he would go forth the young hero, but he wouldn't go forth the fool. He pulled his coat out of his closet, an ankle-length grey affair with a high collar, and slipped his feet into his sneakers, tying them tightly. He picked up a ring of keys and his wallet off the dresser, putting them into his jeans pocket. Tib briefly toyed with the idea of wearing one of the old-fashioned fedora hats he liked to keep to complete the outfit, but decided against it. He rubbed his hands together, and went out into the hall, closing his door silently behind. Across the hall, and slightly to the right was his mother's room, the door ajar.
He'd trained himself in the arts of silence, and he used them now as he slipped into his mother's room and took the cell phone from her dresser. He turned as he was leaving, seeing the still-pretty form of his mother lying asleep in her bed, untroubled. He closed his eyes in a wordless, godless prayer for her peace, and departed, his coat swishing behind him. He pulled the door back to the way it had been set, and stole off down the hall to the front door. His hand was on the knob when he ran swiftly and quietly back to his room and pulled his hat on. Why not, after all, if he was going to play the hero? He grabbed a deep blue umbrella as well, though he didn't know if it was supposed to rain. He could use it as a weapon if he had to, and he thought to himself looking at the mirror on the back of his closet, the entire outfit made him look quite the mysterious hero. He grinned and headed back to the front door.
He pulled the hat further over his eyes, unlocked the door and set out into the deep of night, locking it behind him. He walked quickly and purposefully down the street, trying to get as much distance from his home as quickly as he could. What his mother would say if she knew about this...
Tib shook his head and reached in his pocket, feeling the cell-phone for reassurance, but he also found a small piece of paper there as well. Frowning, he stopped, leaning by a streetlamp and pulled it out. He inspected the paper, and smiled slightly. It was the phone number Mikhail had given him earlier that day.
The Russian was strange, but friendly, and Tib couldn't help feeling he trusted the young man. What was it he'd said? 'Call me anytime. I do not sleep either.' Tib nodded, memorizing the number. He would call him after the meeting, or if things went awry.
He started walking again, and was soon on an avenue that was full of little shops and restaurants. He sighed as he passed a Starbucks, wishing it was open so he could get one of his favorite sugar-overdose frozen thingies. No doubt the White Knight would serve nothing but coffee that's been sitting for hours. He passed the used bookshop he frequented, and often chatted with the owner, Dan. but it was dark, and closed and forbidding at this hour. The only thing still open, was the diner he was approaching, with its ugly neon sign and chess piece logo.
The diner was brightly lit and as Tib pushed the door open he was assaulted by fluorescent light. He winced and looked around. The only people here were two old men, probably homeless. He sighed, and sat down at a booth in the corner. It was possible he'd mistaken the clue, though not likely. it was also possible that he hadn't been supposed to figure it out right away in which case no one would be here. But that was fine, Tib would wait for half an hour and if no one showed, he'd go home and come back tomorrow. He'd keep coming back until he found these people or was thoroughly convinced it was all a prank of some sort. He took off his hat, and set it on the tabletop, and put the umbrella beside him.
"Can I getcha anything hon?" a dumpy waitress asked, startling him from him reverie.
"Um, coffee, just some coffee," he said shakily.
"Uh-huh. Just a sec kid," she meandered off back behind the counter and Tib returned to staring at the table, trying to fight off a bout of nerves.
"Here ya go," she plunked a mug down in front of him and poured coffee into it from a stained pot. She walked away.
Tib sniffed the coffee. Yeah, it was scorched, it had probably been simmering for maybe four hours. He picked up the sugar and tipped it over the glass, watching the white powder pour into his coffee, turning it almost to syrup. Then he poured in two little plastic containers of cream, thinning it down again slightly. He picked up the mug in both hands, and it warmed them. He sipped the coffee, feeling its saccharine thickness roll down his throat and, warm his face.
He sighed.
"J_Tiberius_K," came a voice.
Tib looked up; standing there was a woman, dark skin and trendy hair, in sunglasses and a leather coat. Sunglasses at night. This had to be the contact.
to be continued...
Disclaimer: The Matrix is owned by Warner Bros. and the Wachowskis. Agents: The Series is co-owned by myself and Stormhawk. Tib, Zelda, and Blackbird_King are mine. Movies, songs, web-pages, books, etcetera belong to their respective creators unless otherwise mentioned.
All characters and events in this work are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual events or people, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
Chapter 5...First Contact
Damn it, Tib still wasn't online! Zelda ran a hand through her hair nervously. He should have been home from class long before this, and it wasn't at all like him not to go on the moment he got back. Zel picked her pencil up, tapped it on the pad of paper in her lap, and then chewed on the end of it. She was supposed to be doing artwork someone had requested after seeing her gallery, but she couldn't concentrate. But this was dumb, Tib was fine, he was probably just busy. She'd just go read some fanfiction until he got un-busy.
But even as she was calling up ffnet, she felt a sharp pang of doubt, and fear for the boy's safety. She had his phone number; she resolved that if he wasn't on by tomorrow night she would call his house.
***
David had been playing that game for the better part of six hours, his mother fumed concernedly. And he had not eaten a single thing, not one thing! She was unsure as to whether she'd seen him eat anything all week for that matter, he'd been acting strangely for a few weeks now, and she couldn't just ignore it anymore. His mother couldn't stand to see him suffering like that.
***
Tib sat enrapt in front of Final Fantasy 9. He'd beaten it before, but it was his favorite of the newer FF games, and he knew it would take his mind off the whole mess. But now, ten hours after he'd started, it was two in the morning and he knew he'd better call it quits before his mother woke up and yelled at him again. She'd gone to bed hours ago, with the promise from him that he wouldn't stay up past midnight. Tib saved his game, switched off the console and stood up.
He stretched, holding his bony wrists high above his head, and swatted stray locks of dust-colored hair out from in front of his glasses. He walked over the fuzzy green carpet toward his room, but was distracted by the kitchen. Perhaps he should eat something...
He headed into the normally bright and cheery kitchen, which, at this hour of the night was nearly pitch black, and Tib struggled to find the light switch. The room was flooded with electric light. He looked over at the white refrigerator, and strode over to it. He reached tentatively up the handle, and pulled the magnetic door open, the little light coming on in the back.
He felt a wave of revulsion roll over him as he studied its contents, and closed the door without taking anything. He just couldn't, the thought of eating made him feel nauseous, and he wasn't hungry anyway. He was never hungry; he didn't get hungry, not since his diet freshman year. It seemed to him that he had conquered the need for food, and now it ceased to appeal to him. There were things he liked to eat of course, every once in a while, but what was the use of putting things into your body it didn't need?
He sighed and shook his head, pulling a glass from above the sink and putting it under the tap. He let the water run, staring at it as it filled and overflowed the glass. He turned the water off and poured the first quarter of the glass out. He held the water up in front of him.
It was a silly little superstition that he'd learned when he was a small child, but it seemed to calm his nerves anyway. A remedy for hiccups, he thought to himself, drink sips of water in number equal to your age. When he was little hiccups for him had been like a synonym for anxiety, and so it had become something of a calming mechanism.
He put the glass to his lips and sipped, taking his lips away from the glass for a second every time he did so. One... two... three... four... five... six... seven... eight... nine... ten... eleven... twelve... thirteen... fourteen... fifteen... sixteen... seventeen... eighteen.
He took a deep breath and set the half-empty glass down on the counter. He smiled. When he was sixty-five that little ritual would take absolutely forever! He turned around, switched off the light and headed to his room.
His computer was still on, and the old beast hadn't frozen on him as it did sometimes when it was left on without attention for a few hours. He closed the door and sat down heavily on his disheveled bed. If he wasn't going to eat anything, maybe he ought to try and sleep instead? He looked at the bed, blankets rumpled, pushed up against the wall and the side of the dresser, spider-man sheets exposed. Pillows were strewn haphazardly on the surface as well, except for on hanging off the edge of his computer chair for padding. But he looked back at his computer and blonde screensaver beauties beckoned him to check his email and see if Zelda or XX was online.
He smirked. So Zelda's real name was Beverly. It was a cute name, and it put him in the mind for red-heads. He wondered if she was a red-head. Should he ask her?
He stood up again and sat down at his computer, his hand hovering above the mouse, but to his surprise the computer monitor woke before he touched it to a black screen.
But it didn't stay blank.
[Hey, I've been waiting for you] the letters appeared on the screen one by one as Tib stared in horror.
He squeaked. Them, this was them! His fingers were trembling as he replied to the message, and he stumbled over the keys. [hwo are you?]
[Good question, kid. I'm Sparks, but more importunately, Who... are... you?]
Tib frowned at the question. It reminded him of the old Disney Alice in Wonderland with the creepy opium-smoking caterpillar. [Don't you know who I am?]
[Sure do. But do you know who you are?]
He got irritated with whoever was behind this suddenly. It was ridiculous. [Stop talking in riddles! I'm J_Tiberius_K, now tell mne hwo you ar e and what your';e doing in my computer!] He winced at all the typing errors and regretted that he couldn't fix them.
[Twelve days ago, you followed a series of links pertaining to a person named Morpheus, indicating that you wanted to know more. It said you'd be contacted. This is that contact.]
Tib froze at the confirmation. Even with his assumption, there had been some doubt as if this was just some hacker's idea of a joke. Heck it still could be. [Well then?]
[If you want to know more the White Knight will be waiting]
Tib stared at the screen. The White Knight? The caterpillar's question? The White Knight....
[You mean that all-night diner?] He asked, but there came no reply, and his screen switched back to his desktop, Harry Potter themed for the moment with Hermione Granger wallpaper, a lovely fanart by somebody or another.
Tib stared. They were probably still watching him. He crashed his computer and turned the monitor off. He needed to think. The White Knight was the name of an all-night, greasy spoon diner a fifteen-minute walk from his house, Tib was relatively sure that was meant as some sort of a meeting place. If he went there he might find out more about what had happened to BBK, on the other hand, if he went he might get kidnapped into the cult of Morpheus as well. He bit his lip. Tib remembered the article that Blackbird_King had been looking at. The one that had said 'known to use biblical and literary references to catch the interest of intelligent youths'. It had also said that if anyone thought they'd been contacted they should call the police.
He knew he should call, but, what a big mess that would be, and he'd have to explain the whole thing to his mother, who, with his luck would then take his computer away from him. And if the police got involved he might never find Blackbird_King!
Tib steeled himself. He would have to go. He could protect himself, he knew, if worse came to worse. Unless they had guns in which case he was toast, and who these days fought with out guns? And if they wanted him alive...Tib had a vision of himself in the diner, talking with a man, while someone from the shadows tagged him in the shoulder with a tranquilizer dart.
He looked over at his door. "Oh Lara, what should I do?"
She seemed to be saying 'go for it', and he knew he had to. People in books and comics did it all the time, faced their fears, an unknown enemy alone in the night. He couldn't back down or all he'd ever be was a cringing little fanboy. And, much as he loved being a fanboy and didn't really have any aspirations to be anything else, he didn't want to be known, even to himself as a cringing, sniveling coward. He wanted to be a brave fanboy, who tried his best to emulate the characters he admired.
So he stood up, he would go forth the young hero, but he wouldn't go forth the fool. He pulled his coat out of his closet, an ankle-length grey affair with a high collar, and slipped his feet into his sneakers, tying them tightly. He picked up a ring of keys and his wallet off the dresser, putting them into his jeans pocket. Tib briefly toyed with the idea of wearing one of the old-fashioned fedora hats he liked to keep to complete the outfit, but decided against it. He rubbed his hands together, and went out into the hall, closing his door silently behind. Across the hall, and slightly to the right was his mother's room, the door ajar.
He'd trained himself in the arts of silence, and he used them now as he slipped into his mother's room and took the cell phone from her dresser. He turned as he was leaving, seeing the still-pretty form of his mother lying asleep in her bed, untroubled. He closed his eyes in a wordless, godless prayer for her peace, and departed, his coat swishing behind him. He pulled the door back to the way it had been set, and stole off down the hall to the front door. His hand was on the knob when he ran swiftly and quietly back to his room and pulled his hat on. Why not, after all, if he was going to play the hero? He grabbed a deep blue umbrella as well, though he didn't know if it was supposed to rain. He could use it as a weapon if he had to, and he thought to himself looking at the mirror on the back of his closet, the entire outfit made him look quite the mysterious hero. He grinned and headed back to the front door.
He pulled the hat further over his eyes, unlocked the door and set out into the deep of night, locking it behind him. He walked quickly and purposefully down the street, trying to get as much distance from his home as quickly as he could. What his mother would say if she knew about this...
Tib shook his head and reached in his pocket, feeling the cell-phone for reassurance, but he also found a small piece of paper there as well. Frowning, he stopped, leaning by a streetlamp and pulled it out. He inspected the paper, and smiled slightly. It was the phone number Mikhail had given him earlier that day.
The Russian was strange, but friendly, and Tib couldn't help feeling he trusted the young man. What was it he'd said? 'Call me anytime. I do not sleep either.' Tib nodded, memorizing the number. He would call him after the meeting, or if things went awry.
He started walking again, and was soon on an avenue that was full of little shops and restaurants. He sighed as he passed a Starbucks, wishing it was open so he could get one of his favorite sugar-overdose frozen thingies. No doubt the White Knight would serve nothing but coffee that's been sitting for hours. He passed the used bookshop he frequented, and often chatted with the owner, Dan. but it was dark, and closed and forbidding at this hour. The only thing still open, was the diner he was approaching, with its ugly neon sign and chess piece logo.
The diner was brightly lit and as Tib pushed the door open he was assaulted by fluorescent light. He winced and looked around. The only people here were two old men, probably homeless. He sighed, and sat down at a booth in the corner. It was possible he'd mistaken the clue, though not likely. it was also possible that he hadn't been supposed to figure it out right away in which case no one would be here. But that was fine, Tib would wait for half an hour and if no one showed, he'd go home and come back tomorrow. He'd keep coming back until he found these people or was thoroughly convinced it was all a prank of some sort. He took off his hat, and set it on the tabletop, and put the umbrella beside him.
"Can I getcha anything hon?" a dumpy waitress asked, startling him from him reverie.
"Um, coffee, just some coffee," he said shakily.
"Uh-huh. Just a sec kid," she meandered off back behind the counter and Tib returned to staring at the table, trying to fight off a bout of nerves.
"Here ya go," she plunked a mug down in front of him and poured coffee into it from a stained pot. She walked away.
Tib sniffed the coffee. Yeah, it was scorched, it had probably been simmering for maybe four hours. He picked up the sugar and tipped it over the glass, watching the white powder pour into his coffee, turning it almost to syrup. Then he poured in two little plastic containers of cream, thinning it down again slightly. He picked up the mug in both hands, and it warmed them. He sipped the coffee, feeling its saccharine thickness roll down his throat and, warm his face.
He sighed.
"J_Tiberius_K," came a voice.
Tib looked up; standing there was a woman, dark skin and trendy hair, in sunglasses and a leather coat. Sunglasses at night. This had to be the contact.
to be continued...
