I did, in fact, pour myself into that corset, with no small amount of distraction from my resident rogue agent.
"Will you just tie the damn thing?" I pretended to snap at him.
"No," he said, taking full advantage of my bare shoulders. He was standing behind me to cinch and tie off the corset in theory, but in reality he was just kissing my neck & shoulders.
"We're going to be late."
"Hmm," he said from somewhere underneath my hair, sounding highly unconcerned. I rolled my eyes & smiled, shaking my head.
We were late, but it isn't like it mattered. Club Hel is a den of amoral decadence. No one really cares what time you show up, just so long as you're prepared for debauchery when you get there. I had grown to like it, when I was in a certain mood, and tonight I was certainly in that mood. Ghost's news about the radical faction had stuck in my mind. The mention of Smith's "continued existence" grated on my nerves; as though they knew anything about what his existence now entailed. They begrudged him even the simple life he had now: making cookies with Sati & Tirzah, walking in the park, saying "boo" at the odd intimidated Exile, teasing me about my taste in music. They were making assumptions regarding things they knew nothing about. I ground my teeth in frustration.
Persephone waved and smiled at me from the balcony, and we waded through the crowd to take our usual spot with her and the Merovingian. I say "waded" but it isn't as though we were impeded. Smith had long since calculated the best way to "scare lesser programs", as I'd called it, and it involved wearing a dark parody of the agent uniform: black suit & tie, angular sunglasses, tie clip, and a blood red shirt. I usually dressed to match, in red and black. Tonight, however, I was wearing a gift from Smith: the dark bronze leather corset with a floor length red skirt and matching opera gloves. It's not something I'd ever have gotten myself, but I must say there was a sense of power in it. If Smith knew one thing well, it was power, and the best way to display it. The programs scurrying out of our way weren't all gawking at Smith.
Our drinks were waiting on us at the balcony. Persephone greeted me with another smile. Though I had been utterly intimidated by her sheer beauty at first, she was one of the reasons I was glad I took Smith's advice and stopped avoiding Exiles. Whereas most programs came to see me as Smith's property of some sort, and therefore greatly to be feared, Persephone didn't. Being wife to the Merovingian probably gave her a bit of perspective other programs lacked. She'd taught me quite a bit about the inherent abilities of all programs, including how to change things slightly about my own code. One of the "tricks" she'd taught me had allowed me to accomplish the upswept hairstyle I wore tonight. I never could quite get the trick of hairpins, but thanks to her I no longer needed them. Most importantly, she'd become a friend. A real friend--the kind who cares what's going on in your life and lets you know that. I hadn't had one since my incident had driven the wall of the Matrix between Phaedra and me.
Tonight she seemed concerned. "There's talk," she said flatly, handing me my drink.
"Talk about what?" I asked her, hoping she wouldn't say what I knew she would.
"Radical rebels and their...issues...with the Exile community."
I sighed. "Their issues with Smith," I corrected, rolling my eyes.
"Not only that," Persephone said. "My husband has never precisely endeared himself to the redpills. But yes...they're terrified of Smith, it's said. They're beginning to be...vehement. I'm told they've been leaning on a few of the Exiles for information, Etna. Like locations."
"As in, where we live?" I asked her incredulously. She nodded. Again, I sighed. "I can see why they're terrified. I can. I was afraid of him, too, when I found him. But people change. Programs change. It's simple common sense, and I can't think of anything he could do to convince them of that!"
Persephone winked. "Take up ballet, perhaps?" The image of Smith in tights came unbidden to my mind.
I giggled in spite of my mood. "Maybe knitting."
"Perhaps leading a troop of Boy Scouts?" Persephone was laughing now, too, and this derailed our serious conversation entirely as we came up with more and more unlikely hobbies Smith could take up to convince the radicals that he had, in fact, changed. I choked on my drink when she suggested "cookie baking".
"Nah, we tried that one, and it hasn't worked."
Persephone's eyes widened and she leaned forward, making certain Smith, Merv, and the Twins couldn't hear her from their nearby seats. "He baked cookies?" she whispered hysterically.
"Bakes them regularly. With 7-year-olds," I said. "In a Hello Kitty apron," I added, and sent her into gales of laughter. She had to wipe her eyes, and I had to reassure her several times that I wasn't lying through my teeth.
"Do you have pictures?" she asked giddily, her accent showing slightly now that she was off-guard.
"Pictures of what?" Smith asked, having been mildly distracted by our fits of laughter.
"Nothing!" Persephone and I said in unison, images of perfect innocence. Smith looked unconvinced; not that I blamed him.
"Then if you don't mind my stealing her, I think I would like to dance with my favorite Exile," Smith said, extending his hand to me.
"Not at all," Persephone answered, smiling at me. I giggled, and impulsively leaned over and kissed her, full on the mouth. She started, then sighed.
"I thought you might like a bit of the mood you've put me in this evening," I told her. "Thank you, and now go attack your husband before he starts attacking people with questionably coded chocolate mousse cake." I thought for a moment, then added "Though if you find he has any of that cake, do call me before you dig into it, yes?" She laughed and promised, and I let Smith sweep me out onto the floor to what passed as a slow song in this club. He took one of my hands in his and put his other at my waist. I followed; we'd discovered, ironically enough, that knowing hundreds of martial arts styles had made us both rather graceful dancers. Graceful wasn't what he'd been designed for, and it was certainly not something I'd ever thought of myself. We'd also discovered we both enjoyed it, though, something neither of us had known before. It was part of the reason we kept coming back to the club.
His brow was furrowed. "What did Persephone have to say?" I told him the beginnings of our conversation.
"So basically it was the same thing Ghost said to us at the Oracle's," I concluded. "What did dear old Merv have to say about the situation?" Trinity's mocking nickname for the Merovingian had made its rounds quickly, though I may have been the only person who knew Persephone had encouraged it secretly.
"The same information. The precarious tolerance the redpills have for the machines and Exiles is being tested by my existence here," Smith said. "Some are calling for my deletion."
My hand tightened involuntarily on his arm, and my heart seemed to want to jump out of my chest. I remembered what Persephone had said about the radicals looking for locations. "Smith, they can't--" I started, but he interrupted me.
"Don't start worrying about it now. They won't make a move that drastic; they know that even if I AM an Exile, the machines may take that as a breach of the peace. They won't move until they're certain."
I calmed only slightly, but let him pull me a little closer. "I wish there was some way they could know what I know."
"And what's that?" he asked.
"You're not the same thing you were before. I can't understand how they don't see that, with Ghost and Tamar and Tirzah and me..."
"But I am still code. The same code that caused the deaths of hundreds of their colleagues. And I'm afraid you don't count as 'human' to them anymore, Etna," he said quietly. I sighed, and laid my head against his shoulder.
"No, I suppose that's true." I kept fighting that assessment, but the reality of it was beginning to sink in. It had been easier to accept this inevitable conclusion with Smith there. The Oracle had been right about that; this road was definitely an easier one to walk when you weren't alone in walking it. We danced a while longer until the music changed again, this time into a throbbing techno.
"I am not in the mood to join the mosh pit," Smith told me ironically, as though he ever was in the mood to join a mosh pit. Mentally, I noted I'd have tell Persephone to add that to the list of Potential Smith Hobbies. "Let's go home."
We walked through the park on the way home, completely overdressed for it as we were. But it was quiet, and we were both in a subdued mood after our conversation in the club.
"I have something for you," he said, leading us to a park bench to sit down. "I bought them some time ago, but I didn't...I don't...I'm not sure how this works," he finished, with the tone of someone confessing. He opened his palm and extended it toward me. "I've noticed some people wear them. The Merovingian & Persephone do, and I thought we could, if you wanted to."
I blinked & looked down at the two rings in the palm of his hand. I blinked again and looked up at him, not quite understanding. "It's all right, if you'd rather not. I know you don't wear jewelry, and..." he started to put them away, but I stopped his hand, heart beating in my throat.
"It works like this," I told him, and took the larger of the two rings to put on his hand, shaking slightly. I offered my own, and he placed the smaller one on my finger. I started to laugh self-consciously.
"You're blushing," he pointed out. I could never figure out how he could see that in the darkness of this park. "You're laughing, too. How am I supposed to tell if I did something wrong?" He glared at me in confusion. I laughed harder and threw both arms around his neck, trying to kiss him and laugh at the same time. He stopped glaring and just looked mildly confused. "You don't usually do that when I've done something particularly wrong, so..."
"You didn't do anything wrong," I reassured him, and he relaxed a little, and started to kiss me back. I climbed onto his lap and began to deepen the kiss, hanging onto his tie as I slid my tongue across his lips. He groaned and began to kiss across my jaw & down my neck to my shoulders, as I used both my teeth and tongue to tease his ear. My pulse quickened, and seated on his lap as I was, I could tell his had as well. His hands were beginning to climb my legs beneath my skirt. "On the other hand, you'd better get me home quick before I do something entirely inappropriate for a public park," I growled into his ear.
He got me home in record time, and we set about doing many things that weren't standard park behavior. Several of them were rather loud. I thought I might have to apologize to Loki again. After a very long time, Smith and I were both feeling very content.
"So the rings were a good thing," he determined as we lay in the tangled mess of our sheets, surrounded by clothing tossed into very unlikely locations.
"A very good thing," I confirmed, holding up my hand so my ring caught the light. It was a plain metal circle of brushed steel. Smith held his up beside; they matched perfectly. I took his hand and brought it down with mine to lay against my chest, above my heartbeat. "I refuse to let them have you, Smith."
"I told you, Etna, they aren't likely to--"
"They're calling for your deletion," I said viciously. Something had snapped in me during the night. Maybe when he showed me the rings, maybe when his voice broke as he was calling my name, maybe when I'd collapsed on top of him and he'd wrapped his arms around me so tightly I thought I'd break. "I will not let them. I will not let their blind ignorance ruin our chance at being happy, for once."
"I know," he told me, and kissed the top of my head. "Just, for now don't think about it. We can deal with everything in the morning." There was the firm, crisp agent voice again, but it was tempered by his hand stroking my bare skin from hip to waist to shoulder, lulling me. I nodded & laid my head against his arm, dark thoughts finally giving way to sleep.