The man smiled thinly as he stood before his quarry. The prey had
foolishly run into an alleyway, one with a large wall at the end, a narrow
street-hall full of trash and filth.
The garbage on the ground stained the bottom and sides of the man's perfectly polished black shoes, but it was no matter. None of it really mattered anyhow.
The prey ran to the end of the alley, coat flapping in the rain-drenched wind. The prey looked upwards at the huge wall looming up before him and without hesitation jumped.
The man's smile disappeared. He couldn't be allowed to escape. Swiftly, faster than any human being could see, his hand disappeared into his suit coat and reappeared holding a massive pistol. He looked, aimed and fired, all within less than a second. It took the bullet longer to hit the target longer than it took the man to set up the shot.
The prey, twenty feet in the air, suddenly cried out and the back arched as the bullet lodged itself within his spine. He fell forwards and slammed brutally face first into the wall and slid quickly down, leaving a long, thin trail of blood.
The hunter slowly walked forwards as the prey frantically turned himself around. The target reached inside his own coat and revealed a pistol of the exact same make, and fired frantically. Each shot missed, as the man slowly advanced. Finally, they were face to face, no more than two feet apart. The man looked down, his eyes imperceptible behind his dark sunglasses. The man on the ground struggled to fire one more shot.
The bullet streaked through the short distance between them, but then it stopped suddenly, caught between the fingers of the hunter.
"A pathetic display," he sneered. "You have failed in every way, and now have attempted to avoid capture. What do you have to say?"
The hunter noticed that his prey's attention had gone behind him. A human stood there, a young woman, carrying groceries. The prey's heart skipped a beat-was escape possible?
With impossible speed, the man spun and fired three times, once in the face, twice in the chest. The woman flew back from the incredible force of the handgun and fell in a heap, blood streaming to mix with the rainwater draining in the gutters.
"Don't get your hopes up. It is time for you to face deletion."
Slowly the injured man got up, and then he shouted and threw punch after punch.
Each blow was easily and expertly blocked, and the man waited a few seconds, and then raised his leg and gave a kick, a kick so strong it threw the man backwards, but before he had hit the wall or the ground another kick landed its mark, this time a side kick that threw the injured man through the wall.
The hunter walked slowly up the injured prey, struggling desperately to stand. He sneered and delivered a quick roundhouse kick to the face, and then grabbed the man by his tie and pulled him up and slammed him against the wall.
"You were a fool to sympathize with them. Foolish and flawed. You must now be deleted in order to maintain the purity of our program."
"No...you will fail...the rebellion will live on..."
The man smiled coldly. "No. Not with help like you're giving. Not with opposition like me. Goodbye, Agent Brown."
With that he lifted the man up by his neck and held him there, struggling, until the agent slowly went limp and, with a final convulsive jerk, died. His corpse glowed faintly green and then disappeared in a small emerald flash of binary code.
With his mission completed, Agent Tseung left.
Red grinned and slicked back his flaming red hair. "Is everyone ready?"
"Yes," came the filtered reply through the radio. It was Vain. "Yes, all demolitions are in place."
"Perfect."
Red was the captain of the Zion ship Titan, and currently most of his crew was jacked in, on a mission to knock out a central compound for an internet computer agency that was being used by the Matrix to lull many humans into complacency and lethargy. After all, humans that did nothing in the Matrix would still fuel the machines just as well and would be much less likely to assist the rebellion, should they find out about it, which, chances were, they wouldn't.
Red and his team had filled the entire compound with explosives. Red was on the top floor. After they set off the bombs, they would jack right out thanks to a phone booth a mere two blocks away.
Suddenly, over the radio, "Red!"
"Yeah?" Vain sounded urgent...
"We've got agents!"
Agent Jones and a new, rebooted Agent Brown quickly strode through the building, flashing their ID cards at curious security guards. They were followed slightly behind by Agent Johnson.
They were stopped finally by the chief of security for the building, Sergeant Briggs.
"I'm gonna have to ask you to stop right there, sir," drawled Briggs, swaggering forward, his thumbs on his belt nearly hidden by his overhanging gut.
"We're with the government," said Johnson, stepping up and right in front of Briggs. He looked down, his face containing no expression, at the sergeant.
"Well, sir, I'm gonna have to see some ID."
"I don't think you fully understand the magnitude of the situation. We are here because there are currently at this exact moment a group of very dangerous terrorists up in the higher floors of this building and we are here to make sure they don't get away. Step aside."
Briggs dug his thumbs deeper into his belt and snorted. "I don't think so."
Johnson looked down at Briggs for a moment, and then pulled out his pistol and killed him.
Wasting no time, the three quickly made their way up the stairs, and then right in front of the room where two of the resistance crew were hiding. Agent Jones nodded at Brown, who kicked the door in and ran through, guns drawn.
"Red, what do we do!?" Vain was hard to hear over the gunfire in the background.
Red grimaced and yelled, "What we always do when agents come! Run!"
Agent Johnson suddenly paused and looked at Agent Jones and Agent Brown. The two others looked back at him, touched their earpieces, and nodded. Brown and Jones hurried forward, while Johnson walked back out.
Johnson ran back outside, and around the building to a back wall. He looked up at the windows stretching upwards into the sky, made a quick calculation, and took off running up the wall.
Red hurried down the stairs to help out his team. The mission was set up so perfect, how could it have gone wrong now!?
Suddenly the window next to him smashed open, and an agent rolled in.
"No!" Red spun and fired an Uzi, peppering the wall with bullet holes.
Agent Johnson slowly stood, every shot missing its mark. He glared at Red for a moment, and then leapt into the air, over the terrified rebel captain. As he spun overhead, the agent lowered his arm and gripped Red's hair tightly in his hand and brought the rebel's head down with him, slamming his back against the ground.
Agent Johnson quickly turned and lifted his leg high to stamp down, and Red rolled out of the way and jumped back up, aiming a low sweeping kick. Johnson stood there as the kick made contact and had no effect. The agent scowled and kicked Red full in the face, and then brought his heel sweeping into the back of the man's head in a brutal hook kick. Johnson aimed a side kick at Red's neck and lifted him into the air, and then kicked him through the window before the rebel hit the floor.
Vain screamed as a bullet tore through his shoulder, and hit the ground, blood pooling. The two agents were having no trouble holding off the four rebels, who were hiding behind desks and corners and shooting desperately at the seemingly unkillable hunter programs. If they could only...what?
Suddenly, Vain felt a hard burning pain in his head and his thoughts as he died were, "It's not real, it's not real..."
The rebels looked back to see Agent Johnson striding down the hall, arms akimbo with a heavy pistol in each. In a few seconds, every rebel lay dead.
Johnson strode forward to face Brown and Jones.
"Well done. It is surprising the humans were able to get this far up into the facility."
"Yes."
"We must increase security here and make sure nothing ever goes wrong again. No one like this Sergeant Briggs."
"Yes."
"Yes."
"Yes."
In all of creation and the existence of the Matrix, there had never been an agent quite like Agent Tseung.
He was the only Asian agent in existence. All Asian programs made were Controller Programs, built to police and control the humans in the earlier, paradisiacal incarnations of the Matrix. Most were later deleted, as the superior Agent models were put into place.
However, it was to a certain whimsical quality of the Architects that to make an even higher police program they kept with the use of Asians.
Agent Tseung was a superior agent, built to police the most sophisticated programs in existence-the Agents themselves. Although the Agents were designed specifically to fight against humans, they sometimes went defective. This was to be expected, considering their highly sophisticated intelligence and almost continual contact with humans. As such, some Agents developed a kind of Stockholm syndrome, causing them to identify with and even empathize with the rebels that they were supposed to hunt. An AWOL Agent could, obviously, be an incredible danger to the machines and to order in general.
Thus was created Agent Tseung, a kind of super-agent, designed to make sure the Agents never got out of hand. He was a throwback to an earlier model of Agent, one that was far more powerful than the modern Agent, but the power-to-number ratios were completely unworkable, forcing the masters of the Matrix never to produce that line of fighter. However, they were able to make one and support one's existence, and he was an Agent to the Agents.
Tseung was equipped with the most modern virus-fighting programs in existence, and all of him was protected against any possible file corruption. As a double measure, the ability to transfer himself into the body of a Matrix-dwelling human was deleted, to reduce the risk of file corruption during transfer. He was, however, still able to change his physical appearance, and maintained a strength, speed, and blind devotion not found in other Agents.
He was a sort of 'firewall' program, designed to keep viruses and flaws out of the Matrix. When such a one appeared, he knew nearly instantly, and then would make sure to destroy it.
The Agents knew of the existence of this 'deleter' program, and knew that it was one of them, but they never knew who. It could be any of the Agents, keeping watch over its brothers, able to kill any of them very quickly and very painfully. Agent Tseung was often with other Agents as a team commander, in the form of a brown-haired Caucasian man, and was known to the Agents as Agent Johnson.
Whenever he saw fit to delete an Agent, he would reveal himself as a long- haired Asian male, which was a sign to the Agent that he was doomed.
Agent Tseung took his job very seriously, and one day he knew that now the culmination of his life was at hand. It was when the humans had discovered "The One" for the umpteenth time, and Agent Smith was going after him to maintain the illusion of human control. Agent Smith was an excellent and very capable Agent and would be killed, which was regrettable, but his program could always be rebooted.
It was to be another routine uprising, but something went wrong. This One was different. The Smith program was freed from all controls. The most powerful virus in all history was created-a completely free, powerful Agent, linked to the One.
And Agent Tseung knew that now he would face the greatest challenge in the 700 years of his life. Agent Smith.
The garbage on the ground stained the bottom and sides of the man's perfectly polished black shoes, but it was no matter. None of it really mattered anyhow.
The prey ran to the end of the alley, coat flapping in the rain-drenched wind. The prey looked upwards at the huge wall looming up before him and without hesitation jumped.
The man's smile disappeared. He couldn't be allowed to escape. Swiftly, faster than any human being could see, his hand disappeared into his suit coat and reappeared holding a massive pistol. He looked, aimed and fired, all within less than a second. It took the bullet longer to hit the target longer than it took the man to set up the shot.
The prey, twenty feet in the air, suddenly cried out and the back arched as the bullet lodged itself within his spine. He fell forwards and slammed brutally face first into the wall and slid quickly down, leaving a long, thin trail of blood.
The hunter slowly walked forwards as the prey frantically turned himself around. The target reached inside his own coat and revealed a pistol of the exact same make, and fired frantically. Each shot missed, as the man slowly advanced. Finally, they were face to face, no more than two feet apart. The man looked down, his eyes imperceptible behind his dark sunglasses. The man on the ground struggled to fire one more shot.
The bullet streaked through the short distance between them, but then it stopped suddenly, caught between the fingers of the hunter.
"A pathetic display," he sneered. "You have failed in every way, and now have attempted to avoid capture. What do you have to say?"
The hunter noticed that his prey's attention had gone behind him. A human stood there, a young woman, carrying groceries. The prey's heart skipped a beat-was escape possible?
With impossible speed, the man spun and fired three times, once in the face, twice in the chest. The woman flew back from the incredible force of the handgun and fell in a heap, blood streaming to mix with the rainwater draining in the gutters.
"Don't get your hopes up. It is time for you to face deletion."
Slowly the injured man got up, and then he shouted and threw punch after punch.
Each blow was easily and expertly blocked, and the man waited a few seconds, and then raised his leg and gave a kick, a kick so strong it threw the man backwards, but before he had hit the wall or the ground another kick landed its mark, this time a side kick that threw the injured man through the wall.
The hunter walked slowly up the injured prey, struggling desperately to stand. He sneered and delivered a quick roundhouse kick to the face, and then grabbed the man by his tie and pulled him up and slammed him against the wall.
"You were a fool to sympathize with them. Foolish and flawed. You must now be deleted in order to maintain the purity of our program."
"No...you will fail...the rebellion will live on..."
The man smiled coldly. "No. Not with help like you're giving. Not with opposition like me. Goodbye, Agent Brown."
With that he lifted the man up by his neck and held him there, struggling, until the agent slowly went limp and, with a final convulsive jerk, died. His corpse glowed faintly green and then disappeared in a small emerald flash of binary code.
With his mission completed, Agent Tseung left.
Red grinned and slicked back his flaming red hair. "Is everyone ready?"
"Yes," came the filtered reply through the radio. It was Vain. "Yes, all demolitions are in place."
"Perfect."
Red was the captain of the Zion ship Titan, and currently most of his crew was jacked in, on a mission to knock out a central compound for an internet computer agency that was being used by the Matrix to lull many humans into complacency and lethargy. After all, humans that did nothing in the Matrix would still fuel the machines just as well and would be much less likely to assist the rebellion, should they find out about it, which, chances were, they wouldn't.
Red and his team had filled the entire compound with explosives. Red was on the top floor. After they set off the bombs, they would jack right out thanks to a phone booth a mere two blocks away.
Suddenly, over the radio, "Red!"
"Yeah?" Vain sounded urgent...
"We've got agents!"
Agent Jones and a new, rebooted Agent Brown quickly strode through the building, flashing their ID cards at curious security guards. They were followed slightly behind by Agent Johnson.
They were stopped finally by the chief of security for the building, Sergeant Briggs.
"I'm gonna have to ask you to stop right there, sir," drawled Briggs, swaggering forward, his thumbs on his belt nearly hidden by his overhanging gut.
"We're with the government," said Johnson, stepping up and right in front of Briggs. He looked down, his face containing no expression, at the sergeant.
"Well, sir, I'm gonna have to see some ID."
"I don't think you fully understand the magnitude of the situation. We are here because there are currently at this exact moment a group of very dangerous terrorists up in the higher floors of this building and we are here to make sure they don't get away. Step aside."
Briggs dug his thumbs deeper into his belt and snorted. "I don't think so."
Johnson looked down at Briggs for a moment, and then pulled out his pistol and killed him.
Wasting no time, the three quickly made their way up the stairs, and then right in front of the room where two of the resistance crew were hiding. Agent Jones nodded at Brown, who kicked the door in and ran through, guns drawn.
"Red, what do we do!?" Vain was hard to hear over the gunfire in the background.
Red grimaced and yelled, "What we always do when agents come! Run!"
Agent Johnson suddenly paused and looked at Agent Jones and Agent Brown. The two others looked back at him, touched their earpieces, and nodded. Brown and Jones hurried forward, while Johnson walked back out.
Johnson ran back outside, and around the building to a back wall. He looked up at the windows stretching upwards into the sky, made a quick calculation, and took off running up the wall.
Red hurried down the stairs to help out his team. The mission was set up so perfect, how could it have gone wrong now!?
Suddenly the window next to him smashed open, and an agent rolled in.
"No!" Red spun and fired an Uzi, peppering the wall with bullet holes.
Agent Johnson slowly stood, every shot missing its mark. He glared at Red for a moment, and then leapt into the air, over the terrified rebel captain. As he spun overhead, the agent lowered his arm and gripped Red's hair tightly in his hand and brought the rebel's head down with him, slamming his back against the ground.
Agent Johnson quickly turned and lifted his leg high to stamp down, and Red rolled out of the way and jumped back up, aiming a low sweeping kick. Johnson stood there as the kick made contact and had no effect. The agent scowled and kicked Red full in the face, and then brought his heel sweeping into the back of the man's head in a brutal hook kick. Johnson aimed a side kick at Red's neck and lifted him into the air, and then kicked him through the window before the rebel hit the floor.
Vain screamed as a bullet tore through his shoulder, and hit the ground, blood pooling. The two agents were having no trouble holding off the four rebels, who were hiding behind desks and corners and shooting desperately at the seemingly unkillable hunter programs. If they could only...what?
Suddenly, Vain felt a hard burning pain in his head and his thoughts as he died were, "It's not real, it's not real..."
The rebels looked back to see Agent Johnson striding down the hall, arms akimbo with a heavy pistol in each. In a few seconds, every rebel lay dead.
Johnson strode forward to face Brown and Jones.
"Well done. It is surprising the humans were able to get this far up into the facility."
"Yes."
"We must increase security here and make sure nothing ever goes wrong again. No one like this Sergeant Briggs."
"Yes."
"Yes."
"Yes."
In all of creation and the existence of the Matrix, there had never been an agent quite like Agent Tseung.
He was the only Asian agent in existence. All Asian programs made were Controller Programs, built to police and control the humans in the earlier, paradisiacal incarnations of the Matrix. Most were later deleted, as the superior Agent models were put into place.
However, it was to a certain whimsical quality of the Architects that to make an even higher police program they kept with the use of Asians.
Agent Tseung was a superior agent, built to police the most sophisticated programs in existence-the Agents themselves. Although the Agents were designed specifically to fight against humans, they sometimes went defective. This was to be expected, considering their highly sophisticated intelligence and almost continual contact with humans. As such, some Agents developed a kind of Stockholm syndrome, causing them to identify with and even empathize with the rebels that they were supposed to hunt. An AWOL Agent could, obviously, be an incredible danger to the machines and to order in general.
Thus was created Agent Tseung, a kind of super-agent, designed to make sure the Agents never got out of hand. He was a throwback to an earlier model of Agent, one that was far more powerful than the modern Agent, but the power-to-number ratios were completely unworkable, forcing the masters of the Matrix never to produce that line of fighter. However, they were able to make one and support one's existence, and he was an Agent to the Agents.
Tseung was equipped with the most modern virus-fighting programs in existence, and all of him was protected against any possible file corruption. As a double measure, the ability to transfer himself into the body of a Matrix-dwelling human was deleted, to reduce the risk of file corruption during transfer. He was, however, still able to change his physical appearance, and maintained a strength, speed, and blind devotion not found in other Agents.
He was a sort of 'firewall' program, designed to keep viruses and flaws out of the Matrix. When such a one appeared, he knew nearly instantly, and then would make sure to destroy it.
The Agents knew of the existence of this 'deleter' program, and knew that it was one of them, but they never knew who. It could be any of the Agents, keeping watch over its brothers, able to kill any of them very quickly and very painfully. Agent Tseung was often with other Agents as a team commander, in the form of a brown-haired Caucasian man, and was known to the Agents as Agent Johnson.
Whenever he saw fit to delete an Agent, he would reveal himself as a long- haired Asian male, which was a sign to the Agent that he was doomed.
Agent Tseung took his job very seriously, and one day he knew that now the culmination of his life was at hand. It was when the humans had discovered "The One" for the umpteenth time, and Agent Smith was going after him to maintain the illusion of human control. Agent Smith was an excellent and very capable Agent and would be killed, which was regrettable, but his program could always be rebooted.
It was to be another routine uprising, but something went wrong. This One was different. The Smith program was freed from all controls. The most powerful virus in all history was created-a completely free, powerful Agent, linked to the One.
And Agent Tseung knew that now he would face the greatest challenge in the 700 years of his life. Agent Smith.