Chapter two.
The woman was wearing some smooth yellow overalls showing which district she belonged to. She had short brown hair that flowed down to her shoulder beautifully and in her right hand she held a sci-fi handgun. She has smooth skin and dark brown eyes, like bottomless pools of darkness. She was the authority. No other way to explain it.
Martyn stared at her and was alarmed to see that 'yes' she had uploaded him into the chat room and he survived the process. But with the gun in her hand, would he survive her?
"Hello, what is your name?" Martyn whispered with some tiredness after being transferred by electrical impulse.
"Names are not relevant right now. I still don't know if I can trust you." She shouted ferociously and pointed the sci-fi handgun at my head.
"Well you trusted me enough to upload me. Plus, seeing as we have somewhat of a crisis on our hands with the agents coming to annihilate us, you don't really have a choice." Martyn retaliated, without a weapon, but armed with his confidence and armoured by his bushy grey hair.
She smiled her lush lips and closed her eyes calmly, whilst lowering her gun.
"You've got guts, I'll give you that. My name is Olivio and I am trying to start a group to get rid of our great leader. Ten years we have struggled since the capture of Zion under Big Brother's rule. We tried to escape the machines but instead were caught in his net and now there is not one room in the city that cannot be traced by him."
"And now you want to get even? But how?"
She walked over to the side of the room, where the cameras and speakerphones could not hear them, even though they would still be disable for another two or three minutes.
"There is a way. You see, everyone believes that this matrix is identical to the first. But is it?"
Martyn pondered on the thought. He looked utterly perplexed. Now that he thought about it for the first time, this matrix was a lot different to the first. Firstly, the second matrix came complete with the most advanced technology and its own ruler Big Brother where as the Creator ruled the last.
"Well, mostly, it is the same yes. It has the same code as the last one. Same power source. They are almost indistinguishable." I replied to her question.
"Only almost! You see, there are things that are different. I was one of the first to notice it when I came here. The districts. We didn't have that in the last matrix. So I began to weave in my head, the possibility that there were more flaws; flaws that we can't see at first glance. I did my research. My homework, if you will; on the new matrix. It seems that a virus on Zion's mainframe accidentally created it, hours before the final attack. The virus I believe is still there, keeping us alive. The same virus that allowed you to see all the agents gathering to swat us like bugs. And what is more baffling than this…is that they are using the virus as an uplink, a way to get to us. A doorway, so to speak. There, I have clearly demonstrated one vital difference.
Another is what is below the city. Hundreds of thousands of miles of mechanical pipelines big enough for mother ships of any organisation to fly through, connecting all of the districts together."
Martyn thought about this. Was what she was saying true? By strict rule of Big Brother, no districts were to be connected as it shows weakness. It allows the smuttier of the race to clutter the better. Logically, however, it seemed stupid to have seven different systems supplying food, water, waste removal to all seven different districts.
"Are you sure? The only way the districts communicate is by computer. That is how, illegally people travel from district to district, via, illegal as I say it again, uplinks…"
She cut him off. Her eyes darted towards the speakers and the digital screen nearby. They were trying to gain access to the room. The screen flickered with glimmers of green light. Adrenaline rushed through her blood and she knew they only had a few seconds to escape. She rushed to the computer that she used to upload Martyn.
"Computer! Quick! Martyn, I have trusted you. Now you must trust me. If they see us together, we will be killed. You either trust me on my theory or you die. It is your choice." She screamed at him, hysterically.
She tapped at the keys ferociously and clicked at the mouse and Martyn watched as her body dissolved into green symbols and at the speed of sound rushed into the computer screen, leaving him alone in the chat room.
The speakers came to life and an awful formidable, robotic voice boomed out of them.
"Outsider detected. Initiating deletion of illegal chat room. Loading defensive weapons against intruder of yellow district. Mini-guns armed. Locked on target. Ready to fire in five seconds."
Martyn looked at the computer screen and saw a flashing link. It read a message that somehow did not register in his mind:
Uplink used 02:09:21. Completed signal transfer 02:09:43. Destination required. Uplink safe. Reload Uplink?
Martyn wondered what whether to hit the return button on the keyboard or not. If he did he would narrowly escape the clutches of the evil demon hunting him and would speed digitalised towards an unknown destination or he could stay here and survive for about another three seconds before a computer-controlled mini-gun would pump him full of lead. What to choose? Unknown destination. He smacked down hard on the return button just in time to hear the first bullet cut the still, stagnant air as his body exited the terminal and by emergency power managed to route its way through a cable to a computer where he thought nothing existed.