20. Into The Machine City

"All right, this is it. Now, you all know me, so I'll just say this as simple as I can. If it's our time to die, it's our time. All I ask is: if we have to give these bastards our lives, we give 'em hell before we do!" Mifune claimed as all soldiers yell in agreement inside their APU...

Niobe's grip tightens, banks the ship to slip over the fallen debris. Unfortunately, it scrapes against a jagged metal, creating a noise. "Shit!" She cursed...

Zee loads two oil-can rounds and hits a woman, Charra, on the shoulder. She fires it. They watch as two rockets hit the Digger's knee. It breaks, but the Digger begins to rebalance...

Hammer lurches up, curling into the air, rolling over into a back-dive, even as the Sentinel lasers cave into its armored underbelly. Roland almost drops onto his head by the impact. "Holy Christ, I didn't know this ship could do that!" He blurted...

"Just give me one clean shot," Charra muttered, aiming her weapon below...

Morpheus flies over the pad controls as he tries to keep up. "30 degrees... 80... 60 degrees... 20," he informed...

Mifune's face is already covered in blood and heavy injuries from Sentinels. "You have to open that gate," he told Kid. "Cut the counterweights... You can do it... Hurry... There's no time," he insisted before he died...

"What do you see?"

The visions disappear as Enigma hears Neo's voice. Trinity had already cleaned his injury and put a blindfold on his eyes.

"Hold still," she warned her as she feels liquid streaming into her right retina.

The blonde wines to take a moment to process her visions. "Zion's battle," she started as Trinity rips her sweater as her temporary bandage. "The Sentinels attack the city. It was... horrible."

"Can they hold it?" She asked, gently covering her right eye.

She closes her left eye, letting her visions enter her mind.

Zee uses the lightning gun to disconnect the Sentinels surrounding Kid. "Do it, Kid," she told him...

"Neo, Enigma... I believe," Kid whispered, firing the weapon throughout the braided alloy, making the counterweight fall, towing the right half of the gate along its steel channel, grinding as it opens...

Link cranks the detonator, activates the EMP as the ship arrives inside Zion, sending all Sentinals into deactivating...

She let out a calm breath. "They succeeded," she informed her parents, gently touching the tattered sweater that Trinity already put on her head as she helps Neo sit down. "But," she hunches while Trinity sets the ship online. "Their defense..." she quietly shook her head. "Not good."

Trinity nods, moving the ship to their destination. Enigma watches as Logos banks along the thick pipe with steam that's breathed from a series of openings caked with human grease and machine rust.

"Temperature's dropping," she informed, weaving the ship into a wormhole through the debris until she and Enigma can see the dim light streaming into the opening. "Here we go."

Enigma wraps herself with her arms as she spots the pipeline cracked and separated, one side wrenched from the other. She watches the view in silence until they reach the surface.

Upon witnessing the fetus field, Enigma holds herself much tightens. She remembers her first awakening and the horror of reality. Even after three years, looking at the pickers continues their work in sync, the high tower of Power Plant at far, and the dark sky that leak a pale yellow light still hit her so much.

"We're over the fields, aren't we?" Neo guessed.

"How do you know that?" Trinity asked, curious.

"I can feel them."

Enigma briefly sees what Neo sees. A night sky filled with stars through pressed flat, as if into a circuit board, wired into the distant towers that vibrate with violent flashing light. But soon, it disappears.

"Over there," Neo pointed out across the charred dessert that surrounds the fields. Just like the one Enigma saw. "There's our path. Can you see it? Three lines."

Enigma nods. "The Power lines."

"Follow them."

Trinity steers the ship along the path of the giant umbilicus. So far, nothing worse happen. Despite knowing there's no way this goes well, Enigma hopes their path will go smoothly.

"There, those mountains," Neo gestures. "That's it."

Trinity glances at the hologram that's showing Sentinels. "Do you see what's out there?"

"Yes."

"If you tell me we'll make it, I'll believe you."

"We'll make it. We have to," he promised as they three hold each other's hands, ready with whatever will come to them.

Enigma takes a deep breath, trying to calm herself as massive Sentinels approach Logos. They attack in frenzy, with red lasers stabbing into Logos as the larger armored crab-like machines spit bolts of energy that break against the hull, sending a shiver of sizzling electricity through the entire ship. The blonde girl can see Trinity's struggle to keep in control while Neo holds her hand in tight.

"Incoming," Enigma warned as she and Neo lifted their hand in sync, exploding the first Sentinels immediately before it hits Logos and doing the same with the next one. For a while, they manage to destroy each Sentinel that gets into their path, but Enigma soon realizes how tired she is and how many machines still attack them. Even Neo already lost his focus.

"There's too many," Neo breathed.

Suddenly, a Sentinel in golden light straight into them, passing their body as their connection slowly gets weaker and weaker, lessening their grip from each other before Trinity takes it. "Gotcha!" She reacted. Enigma exhales, gripping her hand as sweat comes. "Come on, Neo, Enigma. I need help here!"

"I can't beat them," Neo shook his head.

"They're weakening our connection," Enigma panted, afraid as fearsome machines approached them. "Try left. Bank left."

Another impact hit the ship as Trinity banks left. Several monitors explode with the main lights die. She looks lost. "What'll we do?"

"Go up, over them," Neo suggested.

"What?"

"The sky. It's the only way."

"Then up we go," she noted, pounds on the pedal, making the ship blast above, rocketing towards the black sky. Several Sentinals still stuck outside, but soon those machines lost their grip as Logos plunges into the sky with high speed. It shakes violently, Enigma had to hold Neo's sit from behind so she won't throw away.

As they reach above, Trinity and Enigma witness a perfect blue sky, lit by a beautiful yellow sun and a crescent moon. The light washes into their face with warmth and beauty that neither of them ever experienced before.

"Beautiful," Trinity whispered by its beauty.

On top of a building, a woman stands up, looking as the sun rises. Lines of codes illuminate other buildings, the birds, the sun, and so many more. From a closer look, the woman is none other than Trinity, albeit looks older, face covers with minor injuries. She takes a deep breath, looking so enchanted by what she witnesses. "...it's so beautiful," she gasped, looking at her and Neo like finally waking up from a long dream...

Enigma doesn't get her chance to think about it as the ship slowly begins to fall, slipping quickly back into the billowing black clouds. Enigma can feel her stomach - and most likely her parents' too - pitch when the ship buffeted by storm and wind, splashes out the clouds, revealing the city beneath them.

Their fall accelerates, the city rushing towards them as Trinity turns to Neo and Enigma.

"Pump the igniter, the ship will start," he told her. Trinity grabs the lever and pumps for ignition, but nothing happens.

"Again," Enigma said as her mother does it again, "slowly."

With calmness, Trinity pumps the lever with each distance of the ship and the city gets closer and closer. From Neo's eyes, Enigma sees the energy in the ignition slowly building as a single tower looms across them.

"Now!" Neo shouted.

She hits the ignition until the engine fires. The pads crackle with life and their fall slows, but not fast enough. Still holding each other's hand, Trinity let out a scream as she pulls the ship into the tower at the front.

The last thing Enigma recalls before knocking out is the windshield explodes, causing Neo, Trinity, and herself tore apart by the big impact of a harsh landing.