A/N: I have no excuses for this, besides that I was not in a writing mood after Revo. Waaaah! Anyway, no excuses, just a lot of gratitude for everyone who's waited for this. Thank you so much.

Most embarrassing was the fact that I could have split this chapter into two and uploaded it MONTHS ago. That and the fact that I managed to do up the whole chapter in less than an hour in these months! Okay, beat me with Neo-sticks! BEAT ME, I DESERVE IT.

Thanks for the reviews. They're really helping. Yes, my tone has slipped considerably – I'm having too much fun! Bad Jenn! *pulls a straight face* It slips around here too, but I promise the next chapter will be more coherent.

Kudos to anyone who gets the half-reference to 'there is no spoon'.

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I am de Merovinnndian! ~ Raen

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Chapter three

It's hard not to question. Yet it's the role of a soldier – to follow. It brought you here, and, ironically, is bringing you out again, empty-handed. Mindless. Soulless. Don't think, just play along.

You watch the restaurant contract as the doors of the elevator seal. One of the twins blows you a kiss. You don't appreciate it. You're not worried about lustful programs chasing after you – it wasn't a friendly face.

The doors shut and the elevator hums, descending gently. You wonder what you will do now.

"Well, that didn't go so well," Neo comments. You tell yourself not to tense up. Lately, you've been wary about going into elevators with him. After Zion, you can only wonder what he thinks of you, and wish you didn't have to.

"Are you sure the Oracle didn't say anything else?" The Oracle. The question you ask him is the question you've been asking yourself. It's been so conscious in your mind lately that it spills from your lips thoughtlessly.

Get a grip. Please say you don't expect answers from him.

"Yes."

He sounds so sure of himself. He's beginning to change places with you.

You can't stop thinking, though, of your own predicament. "Maybe we did something wrong."

"Or didn't do something," Neo contributes dully. His tone corrodes you. He might be just as confused.

Morpheus jams a bolt in your thoughts. Firmly, he states, "No, what happened happened and couldn't have happened any other way."

"How do you know that?"

"We are still alive."

His logic is notoriously impeccable, not only correct but also completely frustrating. Oh, captain my captain. One of life's constants.

Neo.

The Oracle said you would fall in love with the One. She never said he would love you back.

Maybe this is where your path ends. Maybe-

The doors open. Persephone – the Merovingian's wife – stands framed within the doorway. Her voice is richly accented, just enough so as to seem either sophisticated or abrasive. "If you want the Keymaker," she intones, "follow me."

You glance only once at Neo, who seems unperturbed. Persephone leads you down corridors like a white rabbit, and you follow her.

It's not your role to question.

-

Initially, you'd returned to your room to sleep, or at least to rest, but your thoughts only mounted, propping you up until you sat on the edge of your bed. The more you try to clear your head, the more it clutters.

Persephone.

You can almost hear her voice saying, "When we first came here, it was so different. He was so different. He was like you."

You wondered what could ever have made the Merovingian like you. You only speak English and high school Spanish.

She finished applying her lipstick and turned around again, preening. You admit that it was hard not to look at her.

"I'll give you what you want, but you have to give me something." She leant forwards.

"What?" What could she have possibly wanted from you?

Persephone flashed you a smile like that of a purring cat. Apparently she was very pleased with herself – Little Miss Cheshire, curling around a metaphorical tree branch. "A kiss."

Before you even had time to absorb the full meaning of the request, Trinity fired an immediate response.

"Why should we trust you?"

"You don't have to," Persephone passed smoothly, "only he does."

A kiss for the Keymaker. It sounded like a decent deal to you. Just decent.

"Okay," you told her. Morpheus nodded, but, eyes shielded behind her glasses, you couldn't tell if Trinity was looking at you or not. She certainly wasn't facing you.

Resigned, you looked at Persephone again. She's beautiful, yes, but somehow just not… attractive. She isn't real. You forced that thought into your head as you stepped within a few inches of her, and then she stopped you suddenly, placing one hand gracefully over your collarbone, just touching your shoulder.

Heels clicking, she tiptoed, pressing into your shoulder for needless additional balance, flaunting the plunging front of her dress. Your face was half buried in her hair as she slowly whispered, "I want you to kiss me like you were kissing her."

Your fingertips lightly touch the part on your neck where her whisper lingers, clinging to you like an oil spill. Asphyxiating. (Kiss Persephone.)

Nothing like Trinity. Trinity's touch was… soothing. Tender. Caring.

(Kiss Persephone, but like you were kissing Trinity.)

Something screams, that's some kind of oxymoron, isn't it?

Your eyes flickered tentatively to Trinity, hours ago. The same thought struck you then, but her expression, light cutting through her tinted lenses at just that angle, extinguished it on the spot.

You wanted to ask Persephone so many things. How did she know…? You yourself hardly know what you think of Trinity, though you see her every night. Jumping. Shooting. Falling.

Sometimes your dreams are not nightmares.

Could there have been something in your code that Persephone could be reading? Hardly likely, but then, could it have been a lucky guess?

Persephone's lips gently traced your jaw line, then nudged your earlobe, settling there. You suddenly shivered, you couldn't help yourself. Her lips were icy cold.

You didn't even have time to object before she continued, "You love her."

It was full, complete stop and not the mark of an uncertain question. The thought makes your stomach roll over and your heart stop, even now. You love Trinity, and Persephone's the one who knows it.

"A long time ago, I knew what that felt like." She pressed her forehead against yours, turning her face so you were cheek to cheek. Her sideward gaze was almost sly, right into your eyes from under your glasses. And her smile was predatory, rapacious, haunting, hinting.

"I want to remember it. I want to sample it." Her teeth were like daggers, and she parted their bloody sheath. "That's all, just a sample."

You wouldn't have minded just a moment before – before you cast a sideways glance at Trinity. Her eyes were tightly shut. It's not for privacy's sake - her fingers were wrapped around her gun. Persephone unsettled her. That much was clear. But she hadn't heard, couldn't have… how had she known?

Your head spun with women. You've heard somewhere, something about trusting them. Or not.

If you waited, or thought, for just one more second, Trinity might've started firing blindly from where she stood. Her knuckles were white.

And so you kissed her. Her, being Persephone. One quick caress of her lips - a summary of all the confusion in your heart. Your lips nearly froze to hers.

Persephone literally didn't have time to draw breath before you pulled away. Yet she didn't release you – only pulled you closer. Her retort was heavy in your ear.

"Terrible."

The voracious half-smile returned.

Her fingers slid fleetingly past your eyes like a frosty gust of wind. Before you realized what she was doing, your glasses were in her hand. You looked down at her with eyes that felt naked.

Her breath was smoky. Incense, not from a cigarette or a pipe. She confidently rested her hands on your shoulders. She captured your lips – oh, ice – leaned into you. You lowered your eyelids, and the last thing to go was the triumphant gleam of her smile.

Persephone was the driving force, the hunger, rushing into your empty harbours. Her tongue nudged yours and triggered an insatiable twitch somewhere bade you clutch her as your anchor, lest you be shipwrecked ashore. It felt like hours without oxygen, like how you awoke in a pod of pink gel with a tube rammed down your throat, when you were being forced to breathe. You tasted every word she'd spoken like poison, like acid that gnawed at your gums.

When she let you go, you were surprised not to see grimy slush pouring from your mouth. You'd rather spit, but you swallowed hard. Something tickled the back of your throat, and your stomach felt as though an iron fist is wringing it.

You take a deep, calming breath. You let it out slowly. It feels good to be in control of yourself again.

You'd looked up, then, to see Persephone smirking at Trinity. Had you seen Trinity flinch, out of the corner of your eye? No… Trinity never slips.

You'd looked away shortly after, because you knew Trinity was glaring back, but not at Persephone. You recall the scathing look she gave the Twins. You felt worse, much worse, than any program could have ever felt.

(Trinity, Trinity, Trinity. I feel the need to apologize, and I'm saying sorry to you.)

You admitted to yourself that you were ashamed to take your proffered glasses back from Persephone. All you wanted was for her to evaporate on the spot and leave the Keymaker. She didn't. Instead, she leaned over your shoulder again. What she said disturbed you, and still does. You remember – frighteningly – that you felt like you could kill her when she told you-

The grating of your door as it opens diverts your stream of thoughts. The sight amazes you.

"Trinity?"

She looks up quickly. "I thought you were asleep," she states simply, as means of explanation for her being here. She sets the tray she's been carrying on the small chest of drawers by your bed.

"You've been bringing me food?"

"I thought you might be sleeping," she repeats, in that same toneless tone. "I saved you some dinner in case… in case you got hungry."

Every time you'd skipped dinner for the past six months, at least, you'd woken up to find a tray next to your bed. You'd sort of assumed that Morpheus had nothing better to do with leftovers.

"It's okay. I'm… not really hungry." You swallow. She pins you with a knowing gaze, and it feels like the breath's going out of your lungs. "Yet," you add.

Your neck cricks from craning your head to look at her. You wish you could draw a chair up for her, but you have nothing of that sort in your room. "Are you going to…" You make a vague gesture for sitting towards her.

She raises her eyebrows and quickly says, "If you want me to leave…"

Perhaps too vague, or too much towards her. You touch her arm as she turns, and it works. "No, don't."

- - -

"You went to the oracle, didn't you?"

"So did you."

"No one goes more than once. She must have had a lot to say to you."

"She… asked me about these dreams I've been having." He fixes his gaze determinedly to the floor.

"You never told me what they were about," I remind him, genuinely curious.

His reaction is almost funny. He peeks at you, something like a mouse peeking out of its hole and, deciding that you are a cat, hurriedly stares down at the floor again.

"You won't tell Morpheus?" he mumbles, half-pleadingly.

"No." He would have told the captain himself if it had been important. "You can tell me."

"Well…" A slow blush creeps up his neck as he looks at you again. "You're in them."

You stare at him.

Instantly he appears to regret what he said, stammering, "Not like that." Hastily he adds, "The oracle said… I had the sight. I think… I think I was seeing my future."

So you're a part of his future?

Pushing that thought quickly aside, you frown and say, "Is it part of being the One? If you've been seeing anything else…"

"No." His reply is rooted, his gaze pensive. Maybe you've scratched the surface of the deep pool he swims in, frozen over though it is. Abruptly he turns himself around and asks, "How do you make up your mind, Trinity?"

The tried and trusted answer floats to your lips, and you unsuccessfully keep it down. "I follow."

"What happens when you have to lead? How do you make choices?"

The words don't sound like his own. You search for the words that will explain it the clearest.

"It's faith," you say simply.

It's heart.

His gaze holds yours another moment. "I didn't mean that. Let's say I knew all the choices you were going to make. How would you make a choice then?"

"Maybe you'd still make it. You'd know exactly what I wanted to say, but I'd still make that choice. Unless you told me."

He sighs, head to palm, elbow to knee. His tone is weary, on the brink of bitter. "It's like this, Trinity. Right now, I'm making the choices. On faith. And that's why the Oracle can't tell us everything. Wait, but she said I wasn't making the choices." His brow furrows, you can almost see the cogs turning slowly in his head. "I'd already made them. I was just coming, waiting to understand them."

You can just hear him whisper to himself, "World without time."

"You've got to let time go. Let everything play out, Neo." The advice is empty on your ears.

He closes his eyes. "I hope so."
 
Despite the gravity of the situation, you realize he's the largest teddy bear you've ever seen. Desperate for solace and a hug.

It takes time, but he turns to face you again.

- - -

"She told me that I had left something… unfulfilled."

As expected, alarm briefly registers on Trinity's features. "Like something incomplete?"

You shake your head. What the Oracle told you is beginning to sound stranger and stranger each minute. "She used the word 'unrequited'. Something important. Something that's 'been staring me in the face, all along'." You sigh. "I only remember you unplugging me after that."

Trinity has an oddly closed expression on her face – like she's trying to conceal something struggling to burst free. "Is that all she told you?"

"Morpheus knows the rest," you answer, as a reply. You know Morpheus tells Trinity everything. Sometimes you wonder, staggering under the weight of leadership, skepticism and faith, how very lonely that man could be.

She replies earnestly, "I want to hear it from you."

Did her eyes brighten, or was it just a trick of the light?

"You jacked in, we saw you fighting an unknown program… and you disappeared after that." She studies your face again, and her eyes pierce your gaze. It seems as though the can know everything you're thinking just by looking at you. It's an unnerving feeling. There is plenty you'd rather she not knew… and plenty you wish she did.

She presses on, "That program followed you to the Oracle, didn't it?"

"Yeah. Chinese restaurant – new hideout for a program, apparently."

Trinity raises her eyebrows. "No noodles?"

"No, he was drinking tea," you answer distractedly. Her reply reminds you of something. Something she said at least a half year ago that felt a lot longer than it was. "You still haven't told me what the Oracle said to you, when you went to see her."

You are genuinely interested in knowing, but you'd meant that last comment much less seriously than Trinity seems to realize. Every now and then, when you least expect it, you let slip something that just bruises her.

Steadily, steely blue eyes again looking beyond yours, she says, "That was a long time ago."

Yes, that sound familiar too, yes, the first time you met her, at the club, she'd said that to you. When you'd mistakenly called her a guy, and she'd wanted to change the subject. To be honest, you remember mostly how the leather clung to her skin, how warm her words sounded in your ear, tempting with the allure of the rare and the unknown. Still, you can't help but ask again, "What did she tell you?"

She flashes you the thin, tight-lipped smile of an oyster, and just as quickly, it vanishes again. Like that time in the car on the way to the Oracle. Homemade déjà vu in reverse.

Trinity is silent, just thinking. You wish you could read her features the way she reads yours. She keeps looking as if she wants to tell you something, only to swallow her stillborn words the next second. She finally begins, "She told me…"

Her look is troubled, and, as you have gradually come to realize, self-deprecating. This is the mask she wears when she's fighting a battle within herself. This is how she's dealt with her problems all along, and as much as you admire that, you cannot fathom why she won't discuss how she feels.

It's faith.

You don't mean to touch her, but you hand ends up on top of hers. Trinity turns her palm over, feeling your fingers loosely as if she can't see them. She's done that a lot lately.

"You can tell me," you echo, "just as friends."

You'd meant it in a forthcoming way, but Trinity suddenly pulls away, like your words have sharp edges. Your hand falls limply to the bed. You've just ruined another conversation with her. You could scream in frustration. She closes up every time you try to learn more about her.

The ship is eerily quiet, and her footsteps, usually whisper-silent, somehow remind you of the ticking of a clock. Just by the door, though, she stops. It looks almost like she's waiting for your permission to leave the room. You're just waiting for her to leave, when she unexpectedly turns around. Where Trinity is concerned, you can hardly hope for a routine. Did she catch your wishful expression as you were watching her go?

She looks at you and again, falters. In a cruel, unintended way, you have rendered her speechless.

"Was it something I said?" you finally ask, but she shakes her head.

"It's nothing… nothing you have said." She nods to your untouched bowl. "Finish your dinner."

You steal a quick glance at the tray. It's unlike Trinity to bring you food, but even more so to forget to bring something to eat it with.

"Trinity?"

She turns back again – far too quickly. "Yes?"

You shouldn't push her, but you have to know.

"Why can't you tell me?"

You aren't really expecting an answer. Not really. Yet she quietly gives you one, a definite, well-rehearsed reply, along with the saddest smile you have ever seen.

"Because you're the One, Neo."

The door closes, but you haven't the heart to eat. Somehow, without fail, Trinity leaves behind more than her touch or a basic, burning longing; she leaves a heartbreaking silence, and a void in you that never fills until you see her again, by your side or in your dreams; until you see yourself again, reflected in her eyes only.