Title: Episode Two: Attack of the punching bag
Author: Stormhawk
Rating: PG
Disclaimer:
Matrix universe and associated characters: Wachowski brothers.
ATS universe (of which this is a parody) co-owned by me and Overlord Mordax.
Angel, Star and T'Lorie belong to themselves. And the men with white coats.
Bob was invented by Mordax (well, his first appearance was 3am), named by Zane and is owned by Brown.
Word Count: 1809
Summary: The buggy random agents get their own agency and set about causing trouble.
Notes: Don't take this seriously or your head will hurt.
Ok, this is too fun to give up so I will be continuing it whenever the random mood hits me.
Please read and Review.
The trio of buggy agents skipped out of the central New York agency and off down toward the one that they had been assigned. They hadn't actually visited it yet; they'd been living in an apartment for the month that they had been online.
But first, shopping.
Agents Angel, T'Lorie and Star spent four hours shopping and when they were dead on their feet – at least figuratively speaking because they were programs and couldn't get really that tired – they hefted their bags full of clothes, CDs and other such things they finished walking to their new home.
"Oh man," Angel said upon seeing the agency.
"This place is a dump," T'Lorie said.
"It defiantly would look better pink," Star agreed.
Angel smirked, "girls, I think it is time for some requirements." The other two grinned evilly. About an hour later, after some debates on color for the internal walls (because if they changed the outside walls the other agents would get suspicious) it was more to their liking.
Especially their rooms.
Traditionally agents had offices and it was only the recruits that had actual bedrooms, but these agents being RA, they wanted their own rooms.
Each room was approximately the size of a penthouse apartment, and they decorated them to their own tastes.
T'Lorie sat at her computer causing random glitches in whatever parts of the Matrix she could hack into, Angel devised interrogation techniques and ways to get information out of rebels.
Star was in her room, requiring different hairstyles. Tonight she would go and look for Neo.
She had always thought of him as Neo, not Anderson or 'the anomaly' as the other agents did. She wasn't anything like the old agents, well neither were her co-workers because they were new and experimental but she had been programmed with a purpose.
All agents had purposes, kill rebels, kill exiles and destroy at all costs the anomaly Anderson. So far the third one hadn't been accomplished so when the RA's had been brought online she had been programmed as an alternative. If they couldn't kill Anderson, at leas they might be able to distract him for a while.
She was a deception and distraction agent. What she did to distract him was up to her.
At first she had hated him, studied all his files to discover his weaknesses as to exploit him. Then something had changed, she wasn't sure what it was but she fell in love with him.
Yes, it was possible for an agent to be in love. Well, not the old agents because they had no emotions whatsoever but she and her co-workers had been programmed to be more human.
She shifted into T'Lorie's room. The blond agent was cackling evilly.
"T'L what are you doing now?" Star asked as she required a chair and sat down beside her. T'Lorie grinned and pointed to the screen.
"For the love of the mainframe…" Star groaned as she watched the scrolling code display of the other agency. The screen showed Agent Brown sitting in his office typing out a report. "What are you going to do?"
"Just watch him, he never stays long in his office, he just types out his reports then goes into his gym." They waited for a moment for him to finish typing, he sent the report then went through the door into his private gym, so he didn't have to train with anyone else.
He walked across the room toward his punching bag, it was such a human thing but it gave him a place to focus his energy. Cracking his fingers he punched the bag and waited for it to swing back toward him.
"Ow."
Agent Brown stopped and looked around, Star watched on in confusion but T'Lorie had already fallen off her chair and was giggling hysterically.
"What's going on T'L?"
"I WILL ASK THE QUESTIONS!" Agent Angel roared from behind them, "so what's going on?"
T'Lorie pulled herself back together and clambered back onto her chair. "I reprogrammed his punching bag, watch."
Agent Brown shook his head, surmising whatever he had heard had a logical explanation.
Oh man, was he ever wrong.
He kicked the slightly swinging punching bag, which his recruit had amusingly named 'Bob' Brown disapproved of inanimate things having names but if something as stupid as humans could have them then he would allow it.
"Would you please stop hitting me?" A softly accented voice asked. "It does hurt you know."
"What?" Brown asked as he drew his gun.
"I said," the voice was quite annoyed now. "STOP HITTING ME!"
"Who's there?" the combat agent asked of the otherwise empty gym.
"Umm…that would be me smart-ass, your punching bag," as it spun Brown took a step back in horror as it now had a face. The face was made of the folds in the worn leather two eyes stared out at him, if Brown had been human it would have reminded him of the sorting hat from Harry Potter.
"What is going on?"
"You're going to find something else to bash up."
"This isn't happening."
"Yes, it is," the punching bag said.
"This is a glitch," Brown reasoned.
A gloved hand appeared next to the punching bag and flew over to Brown, it stopped inches from his face…
…then slapped him.
"Would you feel that in a glitch?"
"Yes. There is pain in glitches, but the events in them don't actually occur."
"Cool," Bob said, "then I can b1tch slap you again."
"No, you can't," Brown said, "It's time for this to end." He drew his Desert Eagle and shot the punching bag several times.
"That wasn't very nice…" the punching bag said as it bled sand all over the gym floor. "You shot me." Brown smirked, hopefully once all the sand was gone it would cease talking and this extremely odd glitch would be over.
The punching bag phased like the Twins and it reappeared good as new with all the missing sand replaced. Brown gulped. The hand b1tch slapped Brown again before flying back over to Bob. Another appeared and they unhooked Bob. The punching bag, once free of the cord holding him to the roof smirked and a pair of shoes appeared under him. It rose off the floor and started to punch Brown.
Brown tried to fight back but whenever a punch got near him the bag or hand would phase and the blow would pass straight through it.
***
All three of the RA's were rolling around on the floor in hysterical fits of laughter. This was the best thing T'Lorie had ever programmed…besides maybe reprogramming the Washington agents' suits bright pink for a day and having them followed around by insane sheep. All of whom were named Billy, except for one who was named William.
***
Brown took a couple of steps back from the Frankenstein-like punching bag and tried to shift from the room, but he was unable to. Unknown to him, the reason for this was that T'Lorie had put a firewall around his gym preventing him from exiting the room.
Finding himself trapped Brown hurriedly pressed two fingers into his earpiece and called for help.
"Oh, has cry-baby had enough?" the English-accented punching bag asked. "How does it feel?"
"But you're just a punching bag!" Brown screamed.
"Punching bags are people too!" Bob yelled back.
"No they're not!"
"Yes they are!"
"Agent Brown?" Smith asked from across the gym.
"Sir the punching bag is attacking me!" Brown yelled across the room then looked back at Bob, the hands, shoes and face had appeared.
Agent Smith blinked and waited for an explanation that didn't sound like it had come from an agent high on mainframe access.
"It appears normal Agent Brown, are you sure it wasn't a glitch?"
"It wasn't a glitch."
"Glitches can be very real," Jones reminded him, "and it seems to be the logical answer."
Brown raved on like a mad man telling them how it had come to life and attacked him; he imitated the accent and started to act out what it had done. He was so involved in the explanation that he didn't notice Stef's smirk crack into a smile, which became a giggle, then a smothered laugh, now she was holding onto Smith's arm to stop herself from slipping to the ground with laughter.
It cut out as soon as she saw something strange. "Um…Smith?" she asked letting go of him, as she was sane enough to hold herself up now.
"Yes?"
"The punching bag just blinked."
"What?" Jones asked.
"He mustn't be glitching, I saw it blink."
"See?" Brown asked desperately. "I was telling the truth." He took a couple of steps back and waited for Bob to betray himself.
They waited for a minute.
And kept waiting.
And waited some more.
"Oh, to hell with this," Brown said and shot the punching bag.
"Ow, I told you not to do that," Bob said as he phased to repair the damage.
A hush fell over the agents as they saw that Brown was indeed, in his right mind, and that a punching bag had come to life.
"Well, I think it's time to make my exit," Bob said. "Cheerio chums," he said as he ran toward a window and jumped through it.
"I think I saw this in a trailer once," Bob said as he fell toward the ground.
He landed beside two tall albino men. "Hello chums," he said, "know where a fella can get a pint around here?"
"Two," One said, "did that punching bag just talk?"
"I think he did brother."
"Well?"
"There's a pub down the street," Two said. "We were just headed there ourselves."
"Jolly good," Bob said as his shoes reappeared and he smiled at the twins. "Let's go. First round's on that guy," he said pointing to Nameless Bodyguard #1 who was on the way to the pub with them.
"Why me?" NB#1 asked.
"Cause I said so," Bob said.
"Oh, ok."
***
"Bob?" T'Lorie cried at the screen. "Where for art though Bob?"
"Bob went exile," Star deduced from the readout.
"No, not Bob, I liked him," Angel said as she required a handkerchief and blew her nose.
***
"Why did my punching bag turn homicidal?" Brown asked the other agents.
"It could be an unforeseen type of glitch," Jones suggested. "Or it could have been the RA's."
"Damn female agents," Brown cursed.
"Hey!" Stef said angrily.
"Damn buggy female agents then."
"Can we please take them offline, I think they are dangerous," Brown asked.
"No, we can't." Smith said. "They have to remain online."
"Just get another punching bag Agent Brown," Jones said as the others left.
Brown waited until they had left, then he put his fingers to his earpiece. "Recruit Zane report to my gym."
To be continued…
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Hey, I'm glad you guys are liking this so far. This is so fun to write, I practically did what T'Lorie just did and fell off my chair while I was writing this.
I couldn't resist making Bob a sentient character, and giving him an English accent was just a random idea (maybe I should have him meet up with my lie detector, does anyone remember that thread?) and sending him exile gives the opportunity for more random stuff in chapters to come.
Hopefully next chapter I can introduce the rebels (damn rebels, we hates them forever…*Gollum*) at Star can get at Neo (here's a tip Mr. Anderson, run REALLY quickly)
Oh man, I feel so dirty for mentioning Potter *throws self at feet of PJ and grave of JRR 'please forgive me masters, I know not what I do!'* but it was the best way for describing how Bob's face would work.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
And now the reviews:
AoD: Clowns will eat us all while we sleep
Chosen Shadow: More is on the way
Shadow Peach: Come visit us on the board, this is only a taste of our insanity. The blankie line is my fav too.
Two Bored Idiots: Well, Angel part of this is your fault
Star: Yes, Brown's sanity will be questionable at least several more times
RedPony: I'm so happy it caused you pain Zane (that rhymes), maybe you can follow them in chapters to come
AgentGreen0814: *Gollum* that's my saying you tricksy false thief
Alocin: Yes, I am insane, and I can I borrow your koalas?