A/N: Okay.. I've got the rest of the story outlined out, and it's a pretty tight fit. So if you want to see anything happening with any of the characters, now would be the time to suggest it! Other than the kissing scenes. Which I promise I'll get to soon…
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Solace was hitting the punching bag till her knuckles bled through the rags around her hands. It wasn't making her feel much better, but the pain burning through her hands and up her arms was starting to become intense enough to distract her. Jokes with Tank aside, the strange and worrying circumstances were starting to pile up around her and overwhelm her. The argument with Agent Smith, the fact that she couldn't put him out of her mind for more than half an hour at a time. Tank's injury, and the resulting sickness that would eventually kill him… she still couldn't figure out how that one had got past everyone. Probably the confusion following Morpheus's capture, maybe with a healthy dose of survivor's guilt for having lived where Dozer, Apoc, and Switch had died.
… Switch.
Her eyes clouded over with tears again. She slammed the punching bag so hard it spun around and slammed her in the side, knocking her back into the bulkhead, hard. Deep breaths, gasping for air. She sat on the bench next to her and dropped her head to her hands, exhausted.
"The recluse emerges from her cave. And here I thought we'd seen the last of you till we got back to Zion."
Dis.
Her face contorted into a snarl that she had to have learned from Agent Smith. Other than that brief expenditure of energy, though, she didn't move. "Aren't you supposed to be on watch?" she muttered in a deceptively soft voice.
"Ended fifteen minutes ago," he shrugged. "You've been down here for three hours."
Three hours. She didn't remember being down here for three hours. But then there wasn't really any way to tell time except for the big clock in the cockpit, or the terminals in the war room. "Oh."
"What's up?" Dis asked, and this time she did look up in startlement. He was rarely friendly to any of the other crew-members, adopting a position of smug arrogance and superiority instead. None of the rest of the crew was really sure what had caused Morpheus to accept his application to fill the empty crew spots, or even what had prompted him to apply. To all outward appearances he was a misogynistic, arrogant bastard whose skill and speed within the Matrix made him tolerable, if not necessarily well-liked.
"Nothing… just… thinking. A little at loose ends, with the experiment over."
Dis sat himself down on the bench across the room, idly kicking at the punching bag with one foot. "Kind of like you don't have a purpose anymore, or like you've forgotten what it is. Your problem is you've gotten so wrapped up in your old job you can't figure out how to transition from that to the new one."
It was more words than Dis had ever strung together without throwing in something lecherous, rude, or condescending. Solace leaned back and slumped with her shoulders against the bulkhead and stared at him. "When did you get to be so smart?"
He smirked. Now, that was more like it. "You never bothered to listen when I told you what I used to do for a living, did you?"
"Not really." Her tone was dry, bored, in anticipation of another long story extolling his virtues and skills.
"I worked for MI-5… one of their best agents." It was the sort of answer she had come to expect from him… and yet it did explain a lot. His casual, preening tone seemed to almost parody itself as he spoke. "Felix Leiter, James Bond, very hush-hush. That sort of thing."
"I get the idea, thanks."
Dis frowned. "I'm serious."
Sol shrugged. "I never said you weren't."
He frowned, not sure what to make of that, and decided to ignore it. "Anyway. The point being… I have an idea what it's like. You've gotten too caught up in the role. You've gotten too wrapped up in what you were doing then. You've forgotten what you're supposed to be doing now, and you feel strange… like when you were first unplugged. That sense of alienation."
She was starting to tune him out, and the sudden jerk back to his speech-making was almost physically jarring. "What?"
He smirked. "I'm right, aren't I?"
Damn him, anyway. "Sort of…" she looked away.
Dis shrugged slightly. "You really should just let it go. Take a vacation. Give it a rest. Relax somehow, somewhere that doesn't remind you of what you used to do and what you should be doing."
Hell. Maybe the man had a point. Solace stood up, stretching and wincing slightly as her shoulder and upper arm muscles screamed out in protest at being moved. "You could be right…" She started to unwrap her hands. Dis practically leaped forward, snapping up the chance to peel off the makeshift protective bandages and give her little caresses over her hands as she did so. "Dis…" she sighed.
"Yes?"
"Stop that. I'm really not in the mood…"
He just smiled that annoyingly superior Dis-knows-best smile and kept unwrapping. He did, however, stop touching her in entirely inappropriate, intimate ways. "Sure."
She grabbed the bandages and started walking away from him as soon as he'd completely unwrapped them. The showers, water recycling units, condensation catchers were just down the hall. With any luck he'd stay in the cobbled-together gym and spend some time punching his own frustrations out, whatever they were. Right now Solace wasn't in the mood to deal with anyone, even Neo, even Tank, and most certainly not Dis.
No such luck. He followed her down to the showers, and watched as she meticulously scrubbed the scrapes on her knuckles clean.
"Dis…" she sighed. "The effort is appreciated. Honestly. But I'd really just rather be alone right now."
"Sol…" he mimicked her sigh. "Honey, I know how you feel. Honestly. But that's the last thing I should do right now. You shouldn't be left alone, not with the way you're thinking."
One eye rolled to glare in his direction. "And just how do you know what I'm thinking?"
"Because I've been there. Really. I have. And as much as you may not like to admit it, I know what you're going through. You need more than just a good workout to distract you. At least…" he touched her shoulder. "Not that kind of workout."
She slapped his arm away. "Give it a rest, Dis."
"Seriously, kiddo. You need to lighten up. Relax. Do something other than beat yourself up over what you've been doing for the past few months for a change…" He touched her hair. She pulled away.
"Fine. I'll figure out something to do. I'll prune some goddamn bonsai. Just… leave me alone."
"Sol…" He put his arms around her and hugged her. "I'm serious." It actually sounded serious, for once, instead of lewd or suggestive. She sighed and hugged him back, hoping he was just trying to be friendly or lighten the mood. They stood there for a little while, and he didn't move, and Solace started to think that maybe they'd all misjudged him. Maybe he wasn't as bad as he acted… or maybe he'd just gotten used to acting like a jerk. Or maybe they'd all gotten used to him acting like a jerk, so it just went around in a vicious cycle. She didn't know. Did it really matter? They'd all gotten so caught up in their patterns of behavior… Morpheus with his obsession with the One, Neo with his confusion over being the object of that obsession, Tank with his morbid humor at his own imminent demise… her with her fascination with the nature of humanity, and where the AIs fit in. Maybe they'd just all gotten lost in themselves.
And then she blinked as she realized she'd gotten so lost in her thoughts that she'd completely failed to notice Dis' mouth kissing her forehead, her temple, her cheek… She pulled her head back, annoyed. "Okay, I just needed the hug, Dis. I don't need you coming on like some sort of romance hero…"
"Come on, Sol…" he murmured into her ear, stroking her hair again. "It's not like…"
She knew… she just knew… that the next words out of his mouth were going to be the same old thing, some sort of misogynistic crap that got tossed around in romance novels and bad suspense movies and the Skinemax flicks that were shown late at night on weekends. Angrily she twisted out of his grip and backed up. "Okay, now you've run out of leeway. Either stop hitting on me or…"
He grabbed her by the shoulders and kissed her. Gently, but his fingers were digging into her shoulders. She brought her knee up, he twisted aside as though anticipating her move, and she twisted with the movement and snap-kicked him in the groin.
"Back off…"
His head came up to glare at her as he doubled over, eyes blazing hectic blue that reminded her, oddly, of Smith. Why was she thinking… the momentary distraction was enough for Dis to bear-tackle her, knocking her into the bulkhead.
"Okay…" he growled, "That was just uncalled for…"
For one split second she thought, panicked and writhing, that he was going to try and rape her. Instead he just picked her up by the shoulders and shook her, and the relief was so strong that at first she couldn't respond, couldn't fight back. Then anger took over.
"Oh, and your groping me wasn't?" she threw her arms up and inwards, then slammed them out, breaking his grip. Creativity of motion failed her; she settled for simply punching him in the face. "You're such a jerk…"
He punched her back. "And you're awfully frigid for someone so young," he taunted. She rubbed her jaw and kicked him in the back of the knee, sending him stumbling.
"Frigid??" Her other knee came up, into his jaw, rattling his teeth. "You're a damn whore… who the hell are you to call me…"
He grabbed her thigh and pushed upwards, sending her backwards onto the floor. "Psychotic…"
She rolled to one side and kicked out, somehow managing to connect with his ribs. "Slut…"
The namecalling lasted only a couple seconds longer. The fight lasted for several minutes. There was none of the artistry or grace of the in-Matrix battles. It was a pure knock-down drag-out tavern brawl, spent mostly rolling around on the floor trying to gouge at eyes or punch sensitive bits. Solace hadn't been in a physical fistfight like this since she was twelve. It was, oddly enough, as refreshing as punching the bag had been… and much more satisfying.
Even as she was thinking it, somewhere in the middle of the fight Dis began to tickle her ribs. She squirmed, screeched, and tried to retaliate. Her knee ended up connecting, not with his groin again, but with his inner thigh. Gasping, he rolled off of her.
"What the hell was that for?" she asked, irritable but still unable to stop giggling.
"Feel…" he took several deep breaths, trying to regain his powers of speech. "Feel better?"
She blinked. "Oddly… yeah. I do."
"Good…" he closed his eyes. "I'd hate to have gone through all that for nothing."
"… you mean all that crap… earlier… it was all a pose?"
He sat up, rubbing his head, checking himself over for sore spots or scratches. "Mostly, yeah. I wasn't kidding… I do have some idea of what's happening to you. But I figured, getting angry at someone who deserved it was a pretty good way to cure you for a few hours, at least." He tossed his mop of hair back from his eyes and stared at her owlishly. "I'm not as much of a jerk as I act, you know."
She pushed herself up to a sitting position and arched eyebrows at him. "Really?"
Shrug. "Mostly."
Solace frowned. Maybe her earlier assessment had been right. Maybe they'd just all started to work off of reflex, assumption, rather than actual thought. "Maybe…" she thought out loud... "Maybe I misjudged you."
"Don't beat yourself up about it. Everyone does." They dragged themselves to their feet, wincing as they stretched bruised ribs or aching backs. "At least you're feeling better."
The sheer absurdity of the whole situation alone would have made her feel better, even if the distraction of the physical pain from both workouts didn't. "Thanks…" she murmured, thinking.
He grabbed her lightly by the face and kissed her square on the mouth, then stepped back out of range of either hands or feet before she could react. The trademark smirk had returned. "I'll be back to collect later, when you're feeling better," he retorted, winking.
She sighed, rolled her eyes, and turned her back on him. "Some things never do change, do they?"
"Are you kidding? And miss out on all that fun?" He didn't follow her as she walked away, for which she was deeply grateful. "Keep me in mind if you need another distraction, will you?" He called after her.
"Sure," she muttered as she headed back up to her room. "Right up there with playing chicken with the squidees. Crazy bastard."
But she did feel better.
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Solace was hitting the punching bag till her knuckles bled through the rags around her hands. It wasn't making her feel much better, but the pain burning through her hands and up her arms was starting to become intense enough to distract her. Jokes with Tank aside, the strange and worrying circumstances were starting to pile up around her and overwhelm her. The argument with Agent Smith, the fact that she couldn't put him out of her mind for more than half an hour at a time. Tank's injury, and the resulting sickness that would eventually kill him… she still couldn't figure out how that one had got past everyone. Probably the confusion following Morpheus's capture, maybe with a healthy dose of survivor's guilt for having lived where Dozer, Apoc, and Switch had died.
… Switch.
Her eyes clouded over with tears again. She slammed the punching bag so hard it spun around and slammed her in the side, knocking her back into the bulkhead, hard. Deep breaths, gasping for air. She sat on the bench next to her and dropped her head to her hands, exhausted.
"The recluse emerges from her cave. And here I thought we'd seen the last of you till we got back to Zion."
Dis.
Her face contorted into a snarl that she had to have learned from Agent Smith. Other than that brief expenditure of energy, though, she didn't move. "Aren't you supposed to be on watch?" she muttered in a deceptively soft voice.
"Ended fifteen minutes ago," he shrugged. "You've been down here for three hours."
Three hours. She didn't remember being down here for three hours. But then there wasn't really any way to tell time except for the big clock in the cockpit, or the terminals in the war room. "Oh."
"What's up?" Dis asked, and this time she did look up in startlement. He was rarely friendly to any of the other crew-members, adopting a position of smug arrogance and superiority instead. None of the rest of the crew was really sure what had caused Morpheus to accept his application to fill the empty crew spots, or even what had prompted him to apply. To all outward appearances he was a misogynistic, arrogant bastard whose skill and speed within the Matrix made him tolerable, if not necessarily well-liked.
"Nothing… just… thinking. A little at loose ends, with the experiment over."
Dis sat himself down on the bench across the room, idly kicking at the punching bag with one foot. "Kind of like you don't have a purpose anymore, or like you've forgotten what it is. Your problem is you've gotten so wrapped up in your old job you can't figure out how to transition from that to the new one."
It was more words than Dis had ever strung together without throwing in something lecherous, rude, or condescending. Solace leaned back and slumped with her shoulders against the bulkhead and stared at him. "When did you get to be so smart?"
He smirked. Now, that was more like it. "You never bothered to listen when I told you what I used to do for a living, did you?"
"Not really." Her tone was dry, bored, in anticipation of another long story extolling his virtues and skills.
"I worked for MI-5… one of their best agents." It was the sort of answer she had come to expect from him… and yet it did explain a lot. His casual, preening tone seemed to almost parody itself as he spoke. "Felix Leiter, James Bond, very hush-hush. That sort of thing."
"I get the idea, thanks."
Dis frowned. "I'm serious."
Sol shrugged. "I never said you weren't."
He frowned, not sure what to make of that, and decided to ignore it. "Anyway. The point being… I have an idea what it's like. You've gotten too caught up in the role. You've gotten too wrapped up in what you were doing then. You've forgotten what you're supposed to be doing now, and you feel strange… like when you were first unplugged. That sense of alienation."
She was starting to tune him out, and the sudden jerk back to his speech-making was almost physically jarring. "What?"
He smirked. "I'm right, aren't I?"
Damn him, anyway. "Sort of…" she looked away.
Dis shrugged slightly. "You really should just let it go. Take a vacation. Give it a rest. Relax somehow, somewhere that doesn't remind you of what you used to do and what you should be doing."
Hell. Maybe the man had a point. Solace stood up, stretching and wincing slightly as her shoulder and upper arm muscles screamed out in protest at being moved. "You could be right…" She started to unwrap her hands. Dis practically leaped forward, snapping up the chance to peel off the makeshift protective bandages and give her little caresses over her hands as she did so. "Dis…" she sighed.
"Yes?"
"Stop that. I'm really not in the mood…"
He just smiled that annoyingly superior Dis-knows-best smile and kept unwrapping. He did, however, stop touching her in entirely inappropriate, intimate ways. "Sure."
She grabbed the bandages and started walking away from him as soon as he'd completely unwrapped them. The showers, water recycling units, condensation catchers were just down the hall. With any luck he'd stay in the cobbled-together gym and spend some time punching his own frustrations out, whatever they were. Right now Solace wasn't in the mood to deal with anyone, even Neo, even Tank, and most certainly not Dis.
No such luck. He followed her down to the showers, and watched as she meticulously scrubbed the scrapes on her knuckles clean.
"Dis…" she sighed. "The effort is appreciated. Honestly. But I'd really just rather be alone right now."
"Sol…" he mimicked her sigh. "Honey, I know how you feel. Honestly. But that's the last thing I should do right now. You shouldn't be left alone, not with the way you're thinking."
One eye rolled to glare in his direction. "And just how do you know what I'm thinking?"
"Because I've been there. Really. I have. And as much as you may not like to admit it, I know what you're going through. You need more than just a good workout to distract you. At least…" he touched her shoulder. "Not that kind of workout."
She slapped his arm away. "Give it a rest, Dis."
"Seriously, kiddo. You need to lighten up. Relax. Do something other than beat yourself up over what you've been doing for the past few months for a change…" He touched her hair. She pulled away.
"Fine. I'll figure out something to do. I'll prune some goddamn bonsai. Just… leave me alone."
"Sol…" He put his arms around her and hugged her. "I'm serious." It actually sounded serious, for once, instead of lewd or suggestive. She sighed and hugged him back, hoping he was just trying to be friendly or lighten the mood. They stood there for a little while, and he didn't move, and Solace started to think that maybe they'd all misjudged him. Maybe he wasn't as bad as he acted… or maybe he'd just gotten used to acting like a jerk. Or maybe they'd all gotten used to him acting like a jerk, so it just went around in a vicious cycle. She didn't know. Did it really matter? They'd all gotten so caught up in their patterns of behavior… Morpheus with his obsession with the One, Neo with his confusion over being the object of that obsession, Tank with his morbid humor at his own imminent demise… her with her fascination with the nature of humanity, and where the AIs fit in. Maybe they'd just all gotten lost in themselves.
And then she blinked as she realized she'd gotten so lost in her thoughts that she'd completely failed to notice Dis' mouth kissing her forehead, her temple, her cheek… She pulled her head back, annoyed. "Okay, I just needed the hug, Dis. I don't need you coming on like some sort of romance hero…"
"Come on, Sol…" he murmured into her ear, stroking her hair again. "It's not like…"
She knew… she just knew… that the next words out of his mouth were going to be the same old thing, some sort of misogynistic crap that got tossed around in romance novels and bad suspense movies and the Skinemax flicks that were shown late at night on weekends. Angrily she twisted out of his grip and backed up. "Okay, now you've run out of leeway. Either stop hitting on me or…"
He grabbed her by the shoulders and kissed her. Gently, but his fingers were digging into her shoulders. She brought her knee up, he twisted aside as though anticipating her move, and she twisted with the movement and snap-kicked him in the groin.
"Back off…"
His head came up to glare at her as he doubled over, eyes blazing hectic blue that reminded her, oddly, of Smith. Why was she thinking… the momentary distraction was enough for Dis to bear-tackle her, knocking her into the bulkhead.
"Okay…" he growled, "That was just uncalled for…"
For one split second she thought, panicked and writhing, that he was going to try and rape her. Instead he just picked her up by the shoulders and shook her, and the relief was so strong that at first she couldn't respond, couldn't fight back. Then anger took over.
"Oh, and your groping me wasn't?" she threw her arms up and inwards, then slammed them out, breaking his grip. Creativity of motion failed her; she settled for simply punching him in the face. "You're such a jerk…"
He punched her back. "And you're awfully frigid for someone so young," he taunted. She rubbed her jaw and kicked him in the back of the knee, sending him stumbling.
"Frigid??" Her other knee came up, into his jaw, rattling his teeth. "You're a damn whore… who the hell are you to call me…"
He grabbed her thigh and pushed upwards, sending her backwards onto the floor. "Psychotic…"
She rolled to one side and kicked out, somehow managing to connect with his ribs. "Slut…"
The namecalling lasted only a couple seconds longer. The fight lasted for several minutes. There was none of the artistry or grace of the in-Matrix battles. It was a pure knock-down drag-out tavern brawl, spent mostly rolling around on the floor trying to gouge at eyes or punch sensitive bits. Solace hadn't been in a physical fistfight like this since she was twelve. It was, oddly enough, as refreshing as punching the bag had been… and much more satisfying.
Even as she was thinking it, somewhere in the middle of the fight Dis began to tickle her ribs. She squirmed, screeched, and tried to retaliate. Her knee ended up connecting, not with his groin again, but with his inner thigh. Gasping, he rolled off of her.
"What the hell was that for?" she asked, irritable but still unable to stop giggling.
"Feel…" he took several deep breaths, trying to regain his powers of speech. "Feel better?"
She blinked. "Oddly… yeah. I do."
"Good…" he closed his eyes. "I'd hate to have gone through all that for nothing."
"… you mean all that crap… earlier… it was all a pose?"
He sat up, rubbing his head, checking himself over for sore spots or scratches. "Mostly, yeah. I wasn't kidding… I do have some idea of what's happening to you. But I figured, getting angry at someone who deserved it was a pretty good way to cure you for a few hours, at least." He tossed his mop of hair back from his eyes and stared at her owlishly. "I'm not as much of a jerk as I act, you know."
She pushed herself up to a sitting position and arched eyebrows at him. "Really?"
Shrug. "Mostly."
Solace frowned. Maybe her earlier assessment had been right. Maybe they'd just all started to work off of reflex, assumption, rather than actual thought. "Maybe…" she thought out loud... "Maybe I misjudged you."
"Don't beat yourself up about it. Everyone does." They dragged themselves to their feet, wincing as they stretched bruised ribs or aching backs. "At least you're feeling better."
The sheer absurdity of the whole situation alone would have made her feel better, even if the distraction of the physical pain from both workouts didn't. "Thanks…" she murmured, thinking.
He grabbed her lightly by the face and kissed her square on the mouth, then stepped back out of range of either hands or feet before she could react. The trademark smirk had returned. "I'll be back to collect later, when you're feeling better," he retorted, winking.
She sighed, rolled her eyes, and turned her back on him. "Some things never do change, do they?"
"Are you kidding? And miss out on all that fun?" He didn't follow her as she walked away, for which she was deeply grateful. "Keep me in mind if you need another distraction, will you?" He called after her.
"Sure," she muttered as she headed back up to her room. "Right up there with playing chicken with the squidees. Crazy bastard."
But she did feel better.