+J.M.J.+
Title: This Shouldn't be Happening...
Author: "Matrix Refugee"
AU Scenario: What if Mpreg was possible among programs...
Rating: PG-13 (I guess you could call one bit in this chapter Twins/Flood pre-slash, if you can see the subtext in it, but do you really want to use the word "slash" when you're talking about the two ghostly assassins armed with cut-throat razors?)
WARNING: Read at your own risk...
Author's Note: I'm typing this just after getting some in-game intell that I didn't need to hear. It looks like the snarky Exile might be the next victim sacrificed on the altar of the Storyline, and that's not something I want to hear. Oh why do they have to go after the really good characters!
Enough bad news: the good news is, I've got another chapter of this crazy thing for your amusement and perhaps mild horror… P.S. I would be delighted if someone would fanart-ize the bit with the Twins, not because I'm a Twins-fan, but because I got a certain gleeful, horrified jag while I was writing that bit.
EDITED 1-28-2006: Small holes patched.
Disclaimer: I don't own the "Matrix" series, its characters, concepts or other indicia, which belong to the Wachowski Brothers, Paul Chadwick, Warner Brothers, Village Roadshow Pictures, Joel Silver Productions, Burlyman Entertainment, Monolith, Sony Online Entertainment, etc.
Chapter Three: Unexpected Confinement
Later that night, when the rest of the Chateau had settled for the night, and the Exiles who had learned to sleep and learned to delight in it lay in repose, Flood slipped out of bed and went to his laptop to settle a few private matters -- mostly emails to various operatives and other personages of slightly more intimate acquaintance, among others. The Merovingian had delegated Flood's duties to other "trustworthy" members of his court -- none of whom Flood considered worthy to succeed him in the chain of command (even temporarily), but he had no more say in that than he had in his most recent new assignment -- and had announced that his second-in-command would be away for some time on a leave of absence, attending to some "highly confidential matters entrusted to our most faithful servant's care". Thankfully, the King of the Exiles had refrained from connecting those "confidential matters" to the reason why his principal lackeyhad started to have troublebending over to tie his shoes or why he'd gone up two trouser waist sizes in as many months.
Fortunately, this didn't prevent him from tapping into the security scans for the Chateau sub dimension, as was Flood's habit before seeking out some pleasurable company for the night. Thankfully, he found nothing worthy of attention, except that the feed from the Merovingian's suite was blocked. As usual. 'Le Roi s'amuse… the king amuses himself, Flood thought with a trace of envy.
An idea had come to him while he had been forced to rest that afternoon. Before his near-deletion and exile, Flood had served the system as a weather subsystem manager, keeping track of rainfall totals and preventing -- or in some cases allowing -- river levels from rising too quickly and overflowing their banks. Since then, the days when he was known as "the Floodwatchman", he had learned and acquired other skills, but he had still retained his ability to influence the weather, though at his advanced age (eight iterations each lasting around one-hundred years, but thankfully he still looked hardly a day over thirty-five), he could only influence a limited area. That included the Chateau sub-dimension.
Perhaps he could put this to use. Tapping into the folders that housed the weather protocols, Flood made some small changes in the files there, setting certain codes to execute after he had left the sub-dimension. Then he password-protected them, with a word only he remembered, the better to prevent someone from quickly reversing those changes. No one would know the difference, and no one would suspect a thing until the effects had caused a problem for the personage who had tampered with his code.
That done, he shut down the laptop. Hearing what he thought were footsteps passing and pausing in the hallway, he cocked his head toward the door, but the sound must have been the structure settling as the temperature dropped. Shrugging it off as a fit of "nerves", he crept back to bed.
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Elsewhere in the Chateau, the Merovingian lay in bed with his wife, his back turned to her as he started to initiate sleep mode.
"Is it true what I heard rumored?" Persephone asked.
He aborted his sleep processes and peered over his shoulder at her. "And what is this idle tittle-tattle you have heard, woman?"
"The reason why you're sending M'sieu Flood away so suddenly," she said, drawing closer to him, close enough to tantalize him, but not close enough to touch him.
"What cause? You must have overheard the scullery maids prattling wild fallacies," he said.
"Are they prattling that you tampered with his code and made him terribly ill?"
"I wouldn't know a wit of what you're talking about," he said, trying to sound innocent and failing.
She pulled away from him. "Then there is some truth in it. I can sense you hiding something from me, husband," she said.
"And what gives you cause to think that?" he demanded.
"Your tone hints that you're concealing something, my love," she said.
He snorted. "I am merely protecting some sensitive data," he replied and nestling his head deeper into his pillows, he reinitiated his sleep mode.
"And what is so sensitive that you must hide it from your wife?" she asked. But he made no reply: he had already fallen into a deep sleep.
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The next day, while Flood was packing his suitcase (one of the few things Aesculaepius allowed him to attend to) someone knocked at the hall door of his rooms. He closed the lid of the suitcase to hide the contents -- which included a dozen off-the-rack shirts several sizes larger than his normal 36-34-35 -- and went to answer it.
On opening the door, he found no one there. Feronus, the prankster among the Merovingian's werewolf guards, must have been trying to get a rise out of him. Again. Sighing with annoyance, Flood closed the door and turned to head back to the bedroom to finish packing.
As he did so, the sparking crackle of the code stream bending caught his attention. He followed that sound, looking over his shoulder in time to see the demon-like forms of the Twins phazing up through the carpeted floor.
He stepped back from them as they approached him, malicious smirks crossing their pallid faces. He felt their gazes running up and down his figure, even though the dark lenses of their glasses hid their eyes. He knew they were parsing his code and the code planted in him.
"So it's true…" one said.
"…What he did to you?" said the other. Flood could never tell them apart, for all the years he had worked for the Merovingian, and consequently thought of them as "This one" and "the Other one".
"He told you?" Flood asked, the thought chilling him more than the presence of the two ghostly assassins.
"We know…"
"…All about it…"
"After all, we're coveringfor you…"
"…During your…"
"…Unexpected.."
"...Confinement."
Flood caught himself smirking sourly at that last word, that coy termused in Victorian novels when a female character was expecting a child. Confinement… yes, that's the best term for what he's putting me through…
The Twins stepped closer to himclose enough that Flood could almost see their pale silver-blue eyes through their dark glasses, peering at him with cruel delight. Before he could step back from them, they had each caught him by his shoulders with one hand, keeping him from escaping. As cool-blooded as Flood was, the Twins felt far colder to the touch. He knew if he tried to break loose, they would produce those cut-throat razors from inside their dusters and menace him. They each ran the fingertips of their free hand down his chest to his abdomen, one cupping his hand over the bump under Flood's vest, the other cupping his hand under it.
"So soft…"
"…And small."
"Did it hurt you…"
"…When he planted the code in you?"
"Not at all: I didn't feel a thing. I didn't know he'd put it there until it started showing," Flood replied, a trickle of apprehension running down his spine.
This One leaned in a little closer, his icy breath fanning the side of Flood's neck as the Twin peered down at their captive's waist. The Other one did the same, edging closer to Flood's cheek.
"Too bad…"
"…That you're being sent away."
"That would be a delight…"
"…To see."
"Watching you swell out…"
"…With his offspring."
"Wonder which of you…"
"…It will look more like."
Flood cringed internally at their insinuations, but he attempted to reply with the most blasé look he could manage. Don't show fear around them, for Code's sake: they're ghosts, they feed off fear and use it to their advantage, he told himself. The mental images their mocking words suggested were enough to make him scream in disgust and horror, but he had to choke that cry back.
At that juncture, the door opened and the Merovingian entered. The Twins released Flood and stepped away from him, faux-innocent smiles crossing their faces. Flood shook himself and brushed off the front of his vest, as if somehow the Twins' touch had soiled it.
"Let him alone, mes phantomes: you'll frighten my surrogate and harm my offspring which he carries," the Merovingian ordered. "You are excused."
"We were merely…"
"…Checking on your brood-mare," the Twins replied, feigning innocence, but they left the room as their master had bidden them.
Flood breathed an audible sigh of relief as soon as the intruders had left. Perhaps there was a perk in his departure after all: He wouldn't have those freaks breathing their icy breath down the back of his neck.
"And how does our young surrogate fare this fine morning?" the Merovingian asked, gently guiding Flood to the bed and with one hand on the shorter program's shoulder, compelling him to sit down.
"I was as well as can be expected in this circumstance I've been plunged into, until those two pallid freaks came along and started fondling me," Flood replied.
"Ah yes, taking their pleasure from another's discomfort. I had told them that they were not to disturb you, and yet they had to slip one more prank past my warnings."
"And for what reason do you grace me with your presence now, sir?" Flood asked, bracing himself for some aspect of his "other duties as assigned".
"I merely intended to see to your well-being -- and I came not a moment too soon for that -- and I also came to inform you that all the arrangements have been made regarding your sojourn from this place. I have spoken with the Abbot and he has promised that you shall have complete seclusion during your confinement."
"I'd sooner be shut up in the Blackwoods prison…" Flood murmured, thinking of the prison which the Merovingian maintained deep under the mountains, a relic from the hellish Second Iteration.
"What was that?"
"Nothing of note, sir."
The Merovingian gave him a look as though he were not completely convinced, but he said nothing more about this remark. "Of course you will not be sent into the wilderness alone: you shall have Aesculaepius in attendance and I have seen to it that a discreet guard will see that nothing disturbs you. The fresh air and the solitude and the quiet of the forest will have a positive effect on your well-being and that of my offspring."
"Sounds delightful," Flood replied, more than a hint of sarcasm in his tone. He much preferred the hustle and bustle of the Mega-City… but there again, there wouldn't be anyone out there in the woods to see him like this. Perhaps this would fare better than he'd thought it would.
"I shall visit you to make note of your condition and your well-being," the Merovingian said, ignoring the sarcasm. "Have no fear, ma cher: Your condition leaves you so frail that I cannot approach you for an embrace. And as Aesculaepius asked me to relay to you: you will be unable to engage in that sort of congress until my offspring's time is come."
"Not that I'm likely to find a woman to my liking in the woods, and even if I did, what woman in her right mind would want to cozy up with a knocked-up man!" Flood said, covering the disappointment that had settled in between his thighs, with a show of snarking.
"At least your condition has not had an adverse effect upon your acerbic sense of wit," the Merovingian said. Rising, he added, "I shall leave you to your preparations, but remember, ma cher, you're under doctor's orders and my orders not to strain yourself." With that he went out.
Flood sighed helplessly, but that helpless feeling started to fade, once he glanced out the window and noticed the rain clouds starting to gather against the mountain peaks in the near distance. Soon enough, his plan would go into effect…
To be continued….