"Mercury, you have to come with me!" Trinity said calculating the amount of time left before she needed to call in again. She had promised it wouldn't take this long. For some reason she could let this one go and still couldn't convince her.
"Trinity, where? If you tell me something about where we're going then I'll go! What do you expect me to think? I have no idea what you're taking about. How can I? You never tell me anything!"
They've been doing this for hours. She couldn't tell her though, not yet. The shock would kill her now and then she wouldn't even believe her anyway.
For the past couple of weeks, Trinity had gotten to know Mercury. They had become fast friends, and were surprisingly very close. Right now they were at Mercury's favorite restaurant.
After an endlessly debate that was evidently going nowhere, the waiter finally came. Silence followed as Trinity picked a dish from thin air. She didn't care what she ate here. Really, what did it matter anyway? She waited for Mercury to finish changing her mind and settle on something. Glancing at her watch, she sighed. It had never taken her this long to convince someone to leave the Matrix. And usually if it had so would have just given up and left. There was definitely something different about Mercury though. She couldn't explain it, but something told her that she had to get her out of this place, and she did not mean the restaurant.
Suddenly Trinity heard an extremely familiar noise. It was her cell phone. She had specifically asked for no interruptions. So it meant something was wrong. Alarmed, Trinity answered it.
"Hello," she said quietly. She prepared herself for an emergency.
"Trinity, you have to get out of there right now!" an intense, familiar voice exclaimed.
"Neo?" She couldn't believe it was him. "What are you doing calling this number? You know it can be bugged."
"Trinity, listen to me! Get out of there!" Neo said desperately.
"Oh no," she said softly, "agents." She started breathing faster and looked around.
"No! Don't panic. Concentrate. I'm going to give the phone to Tank to give you the nearest exit," Neo was trying to sound as relaxed as he could but he was probably more worried than she was.
"Wait, Neo. I have to get her out of here," Trinity struggled to lower her voice so that the entire restaurant wouldn't hear her. She watched Mercury's quizzical expression.
"Trinity," Neo was afraid of this, "There is no time!" Then Neo shouted: "They're coming!"
She looked around. She saw people eating their useless food, enjoying themselves. They had no idea what was about to happen. A couple in the far corner was having an argument while a pair of friends next to them was engrossed in deep conversation. The waiters went about their business. Everything looked so painfully normal. Nothing out of place. Nothing wrong. But they would be coming soon and she had to get Mercury out of here now. Mercury stared at Trinity as if she had three heads. Mercury silently thanked God that the waiter was not around anymore. She hardly wanted people to think she was crazy or possessed or something.
"Mercury!" Trinity cried as if she was trying to get her attention which of course she already had. "We have to go now." Mercury just starred at her. "There's an emergency," Trinity finished.
Now Mercury started believe that something had really gone wrong. She started thinking about anyone she knew that could be in trouble. Well, actually she should be thinking about everyone Trinity knew. Just then she had a revelation, Mercury didn't know anyone that Trinity knew. She had never met her friends at all. Thinking about it just then, it seemed a little strange. There she went, Trinity was leaving the restaurant and Mercury had no choice but to follow her. Come to think of it, Mercury did want desperately to know what the hell Trinity was talking about. Maybe Trinity would let her into her own little world and let her meet her mysterious friends and perhaps Mercury would like them too. But why was she running off from the middle of the restaurant when the food hadn't even come yet. When they were well out the door and into mall, Mercury managed to speak, "But Trinity, where are we going?"
Trinity ignored her, her attention fixed on her cell phone. "Neo! Can you give me a position?" she gasped. Trinity was now running with Mercury blindly through the mall. Mercury was overflowing with questions: "What just happened in there?" and "Why can't you tell me where we're going?" Trinity all but ignored Mercury when she heard Neo ask Tank for a read out of the building.
Watching the screens in the hope of a miracle, Neo tried to give Trinity some hope, "Trinity go right, now."
Trinity saw the secret door and turned around to grab Mercury's hand to take her along. She just had to get her to follow her. They walked in the darkened room.
"Ok," Mercury started, "I have to exactly what…" She cut off. Trinity turned around to see what had quieted her. There, standing 10 feet from them was an agent. He starred at them. He emitted robotly rage just standing there. He was dressed as they all were in a black suit, a tie and dark sunglasses. He seemed to be balding faster than the rest of them though. But then again they all had huge receding hairlines. And above all, to Trinity looked exactly the same.
"Neo, I.." Trinity managed to say the phone.
"Trinity, remember: There is no spoon." Neo tried to calm her down but throwing a little humor into the situation. But there was no humor in this.
Ok. This was it. Trinity had to face an agent. She had been training almost her whole life for this. And she was going to make it. Mercury stood back, she noticed the terror in Trinity's eye's and realized that she was in real danger.
Then it started. Trinity pushed Mercury to the side as the agent started firing his gun at them. Trinity drew her gun. And then for ten seconds Trinity jumped and turned and maneuvered in ways Mercury never seen. Up to that point in her life, Mercury had never seen anyone walk up wall and flip over only to land on her feet. Then the noise stopped as suddenly as it began. Mercury realized that the guns had no more ammunition. Paralyzed in the corner, Mercury watched as Trinity repeated the oddest phrase Mercury ever heard: There is no spoon. Finally in the midst of the kung fu moves both opponents were using, Trinity flung herself at the agent with all her energy. He actually fell to the ground: a perfect opportunity. Trinity grabbed Mercury and they ran until Trinity didn't know where she was and until Trinity was absolutely positive that the agent wasn't following them anymore.
As soon as Trinity stopped running, she let go of Mercury's hand. For a minute, Mercury tried to take in their surroundings. All she could gather was that they were somewhere outside and no long in reach of that monster thing. But what shocked her the most is that none of this seemed abnormal to Trinity. She tried concentrating on Trinity but she couldn't get past what just happened. It was against the laws of her science books, nothing like that is supposed to happen. Then the world went dark and all made sense again.
Trinity thought that this might happen; fainting is a perfectly normal response to what just took place. Normal, but horribly inconvenient. Now she needed help if she was going to get Mercury out of her which she was very determined to do. She grabbed her phone.
"Neo, I need some help. Can you get in here so that we could get her out? Tell Tank to find a port."
"Whoa, slow down," Neo couldn't believe this was so persistent about this one. "Tank's on it. But are you sure about this? I'm reading that she already fainted."
"Which is why I need you in here. Where will I meet you?" Impatiently, she looked around. But as soon as Neo got there, she knew everything would be fine. She waited for Neo but was half-expecting another agent to come flying at her out of nowhere.
"There's a phone in the inside the abandoned house on your left. I'll be there in just a minute."
And just as promised in about sixty seconds Neo was standing with Trinity examining Mercury. Neo checked her pulse. It seemed ok. Then he ran a package of salts he brought around her face. She started responding to it. Mercury opened her eyes just like she was waking up from a good night's sleep. Her breathing was heavy and slowly regulating.
"Trinity!" She screamed once she had fully awakened. Who is this guy leaning over her? He did look like he was trying to help her. Mercury's mind quickly jumped to the agent which had triggered her episode in the first place.
"I'm here," she came into Mercury's view. Trinity had been looking at for agents while Neo helped her. She knelt beside Mercury whose hands practically attacked her in hugging her.
Questions just poured out of Mercury. "What was that? How did you do that? Was that real? Who was that guy?" She was panicking again and started hyperventilating. She looked terrified.
"It's ok, Mercury. We're here," Trinity tried to distract her. Neo stood up.
"We have to go. The others are coming in. We'll do it in the warehouse down the street like we planned."
"What is he taking about Trinity? Who is he? Who are you?" Evidently, Mercury's questions hadn't stopped.
"What about agents?" Trinity asked Neo. Neo gave get a look. "Can you stand up?" She said to Mercury. As Mercury tried to stand up, Neo was already running keeping his eyes on everything at once.
"Trinity, I need to know right now," Mercury was tripping over herself trying to catch up to Neo. Trinity was holding on to Mercury's arm to steady her.
"Mercury, just give a few more minute. Please trust me until we get to the warehouse, okay?" Trinity tried to sound as if all of this was completely normal. The response she received was a vain attempt at a nod.
Stepping into the giant room of the warehouse, Mercury saw them all. The way they all seemed to know Trinity made her feel a little better. She trusted Trinity with all her heart and she couldn't understand why. She couldn't understand a lot of things about Trinity including what happened at the restaurant. But Neo seemed nice which also made her feel better. This was not like her at all. Normally she didn't do things without knowing everything there is to know about it. This was different. She liked Trinity and felt safe with her and that was strange as well. She appeared out of nowhere and had only been her friend for a number of weeks. But there was a bond. The one thing she did know about this was that Trinity knew things that Mercury never thought of, things that Mercury wanted to know, things about the Matrix.
Snatching Mercury from her thoughts Trinity spoke, "Well, are you ready to understand everything?" It was like Mercury had read her mind.
"Yes, I do," Mercury knew that Trinity meant the Matrix had something to do with what happened today. She didn't quite know how she knew about the Matrix or why she wanted to know more. All she knew was that she waited her whole like to her this, somehow. The first time they met, that had discussed it but they never quite finished the conversation. Then there were all the times when Trinity wanted to take her somewhere. Well, Mercury thought, this is where she wanted her to be. A warehouse…and whatever lay beyond.
"This is Morpheus. He will explain everything."