Phoenix took a step back, releasing Fiona. "Just havin'a little fun you crazy knife chick!"
Sydney advanced, brandishing the weapon. "Maybe I am crazy. And if I am, well, I wouldn't mess with me."
The gang member's ugly features twisted into a grimace. This pale female was a very obvious threat to his macho-ness.
"Piss off!"
"Alright, don't have to bite my friggin head off," he said as he ran.
Sydney laughed out loud, high on adrenalin. "See Fiona, that's the only way to deal with these freaks!"
Fiona smiled gratefully. "Th-thanks Syd, I should be okay from here."
Fiona smiled gratefully. "Th-thanks Syd, I should be okay from here."
Sydney blinked. "What? why did you just -" a cold shiver of fear ran down her spine. "I - I gotta go. See you in school." Then she turned and ran, shaking her head furiously, as if to get rid of the memory. Something is very wrong, she thought.
Sydney blinked tiredly, scrolling up and down the countless images and words on her computer screen. Someone, please help me. I know you're out there. Help. Please.
"Dammit! I need to know!" she yelled, crunching her keyboard with her fist.
Suddenly, her screen went black. "What? what's going on?" She pressed Ctrl+Alt+Delete, Esc, Ctrl+x, but the moniter remained blank.
Then, green words appeared on the screen. Do you know the question? they said.
"What is this, some kind of virus?" the teenager whispered. She knew it wasn't.
The words appeared again. Do you know the question?
"What is the matrix?" The words escaped her lips before she could stop them.
Yes. The answer is looking for you, Switch.
"How do you know that name?"
We've been watching you. If you want to know the truth, wait for us Switch. We will come for you.
Then her screen went back to normal. Only then did she realise that she spoke the words, not typed them. "They are watching me," she hissed. "How did they know what I said?"
A man in a dark suit smiled. "We have the name of their next target. The name is Switch."
The next day in school, duringmath, Sydneysaw the green columns of numbersagain. "Help me, whoever you are," she whispered, a quiet but desperate plea for salvation.
"Miss Marando?" Her math teacher was looking at her strangely. "Is there something wrong?"
"No Mr. Smith . . . I just-" Sydney stared at the middle-aged man in shock. His face was distorting, stretching, changing. "What the hell?" Sydney yelled.
The kid sitting next to her didn't seem to notice anything was wrong. Suddenly, his cellphone rang. He answered it in confusion. "I thought I turned this off," he muttered. Then, "It's for you," he said, handing the phone to Sydney.
"Hello?" she whispered, eyes glued to the transforming man in front of her.
"Switch, if you want to live, you must do exactly as I tell you." The voice was one she'd never heard before, male, deep, and calm.
"Help me, dammit, don't give me any cryptic shit." She was almost crying with fear.
"Run Switch, run now!"
Suddenly, the math teacher's face stopped melding, and was now the face of someone she'd seen once before, on t.v. He's that terrorist hunting guy, Sydney realised.
"Miss Marando . . . what a pleasant surprise."
Sydney stood there for a moment longer, frozen like a deer caught in the headlights of an approaching car. Then she bolted.
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