The MATRIX: The One

7 - Katniss explains life and death

Katniss POV

I scuff my boots against the grating. I can't figure out exactly how I feel. Embarrassed from blubbering all over Peeta in the Construct. Angry with myself for losing my shit like that. Subdued because, damn it, I'm no Mary fucking Poppins.

I sigh and reach out to pick at a flake of rusted metal. Peeta looks up at me. I try not to stare at him as we linger next to his door like a couple of teenagers saying fidgety farewells at the end of their first date. Not that I'd know.

"Did you leave any family behind?"

I suck in a breath.

He backpedals, "I'm sorry. I didn't—"

I hold up a hand and take a moment. Shit. I hadn't expected that, but he'll need to know. I have to answer him, just— just—

He waits for me to figure out what I want to say. When I do, I realize I don't want to say it in the corridor. It echoes out here. Badly. "Can I come in?"

He nods and pushes the door open, gesturing for me to go first. I sit down on his bunk as there's nowhere else to relax in the tiny, grey cell. Two people are meant to share this berth, but the top bunk has been locked up flat against the wall to give Peeta more headspace. My own little slice of District Twelve looks exactly the same.

Peeta pulls the door shut but doesn't lock it. He moves slowly and slides onto the mattress next to me. His hand curls around the edge of the mashed-down and lumpy pallet. His pinkie finger nearly brushes the outside of my leg. There's a fine tremor in his hands and his knees seem to wobble back and forth ever so slightly. He's exhausted.

I hate that I can't think of any way to begin without asking him to relive that day again.

"What do you remember seeing on the subway platform, um, before you tried to help me?"

He's quiet for a long moment. "Some guys – like, uh, FBI or CIA guys – wrestling your dad to the ground."

I nod. My throat works. I hadn't seen much through the crowd, not after my dad had shoved me away and yelled for me to run, but I'd glimpsed those men. Only, the truth is— "They're not FBI or CIA. They're not even people. I mean, they are, but…" Deep breath. Try again, Everdeen. "They're programs. Computer programs that scour the Matrix for anomalies, maintaining the status quo so no one who suspects what the Matrix really is has the chance to try and corrupt the system from the inside. It's their job to get rid of potential troublemakers."

"Like your dad?"

I blow out another breath. "That's the irony of it. Finnick and his wife, Annie, had been watching us. Me. But the agents thought they were targeting my dad, so they took him."

"Took him where?"

"For interrogation and disposal."

Peeta's mouth hangs open. "Jesus…"

"It didn't take them long to figure out that it wasn't him Finnick and Annie were after, but by then it was too late. I was out." I have to pause and gather myself before I can tell him the next part. "I was just a kid and I didn't understand anything. I wanted my mom and my sister. I was hysterical. Annie went back into the Matrix to hijack them for me, but…"

I close my eyes. Open them. Glare at the rusted floor between the toes of my ratty boots. "My mom had already disconnected. That's what they call it when your mind separates from your body. The shock of losing my dad – stuff like that happens to people on the inside sometimes. It's like when a computer freezes up."

"And there's no way to, um, reboot?"

I shake my head. "No. Not that anyone has figured out anyway. Now she's like a ghost, existing only in that moment when the police showed up on her doorstep and told her my dad was dead. Her mind is still trapped inside the system but without direct access to her brain, she can never snap out of it. She'll never remember anything beyond that moment. We can't use the red pill for her because the signal won't make it all the way to her body and without that we can't get her out. So she's stuck there until… disposal."

Peeta sniffles. I look up in time to watch him press the heels of his hands to his eyes. "Shit, I'm so sorry, Katniss," he mumbles thickly.

"Don't be sorry. Just… be careful. I mean, in the Matrix. If your mind dies in there, your body becomes catatonic here in the real world. And we don't have the resources to keep people like that alive."

He drops his hands. "So it's a death sentence."

"Yeah. And if your body dies out here, there's nothing for your mind to hold onto in there."

He nods. "That makes sense. But, what happened with your mom is that what happens if… I mean, if you reenter the Matrix from here but something happens while your mind is inside, if someone yanks out the jack—?"

"Yeah. You're disconnected. You're left with whatever thoughts and memories and ideas you took in there with you. And you'll never take it all. Why would you? You have a link to your physical mind through the jack, so you can access your memories instantaneously. Besides, uploading your entire digital self into the Matrix would take weeks." And that's a helluvalot longer than the average expedition to broadcast level.

"Have you ever met anyone like that? Someone from the outside whose mind is trapped inside the system?"

I know of only one, but I'm not ready to tell him about that. Instead of answering, I scoot a little closer, asking a question of my own in silence.

Peeta answers. His arm trembles with fatigue as he wraps it around my hunched shoulders. He's so warm. I lean into him. Just for a moment. A minute. I just need one minute and then I'll sit up. I'll be strong again.

"That isn't what happened with your sister, is it? A disconnect?" he whispers into my hair.

Maybe it'll be easier to explain while we're like this, curled around each other like puppies in a cardboard box. "My sister – Primrose – she's alive, but the system has her. Trapped. The agents…" I open my mouth to elaborate, but I just can't get the words out around my heartache. Fuck, it feels like my chest is about to explode. "I was told you could help me get her out."

Peeta shakes his head slowly. "But… how? I'm just a normal guy."

How does he always manage to ask questions that I don't have a fucking clue how to answer? "I have no idea."

He rubs my arm. His other fingers seek out mine and pull our joined hands onto his thigh. "Who told you I could help you?"

I confess, "There's someone inside the Matrix that Finnick trusts: a guide. He's the one who told Finnick about me, told him to hijack me before it was too late. His name is Haymitch and I went to see him the day I, uh, found you outside the bakery. He said you could help."

My gaze flicks up and I study Peeta's thoughtful frown for a moment before I feel compelled to add, "That alone wasn't enough to convince me to get you out, but it was enough for me to want to check on you. I asked Gale to run a search and when your name turned up in a disposal schedule, I—" Swallow. Count to ten. Okay. "I had to take a chance."

"So… you hijacked me not because this Haymitch guy told you to? You did it because I was about to die?"

I nod. "Yeah. I, um, have a habit of wiping my ass with Haymitch's advice, if you know what I mean."

Peeta snorts. The sound breaks through the layers of sorrow piling up around us and I feel the weight of the past slide back into the shadows.

He teases hoarsely, "Is it bad if I say I can almost picture that?"

I cough out a sound that might have been a bubble of laughter under other circumstances. Yeah, Peeta probably knows me well enough by now to imagine how stubborn I am. "It's just… when he mentioned you it was…" Like getting punched in the stomach.

He turns toward me and I force myself to answer the question I can see in his eyes.

"I didn't even know your name until I turned eighteen. We can't hack into the Matric from Zion. I had to wait until I was old enough to sign myself on as a member of the crew before I could look up the name of the boy from the subway tunnel."

I interlock our fingers, gripping so hard my joints go bloodless. "And I found out about your leg. And that you were still alive. And…" I yet I'd had no idea how blue your eyes are or how soft your voice can be or how warm your hands feel… I bite the inside of my cheek. He doesn't need to know any of that.

With one more deliberate breath, I meet his gaze. "What?" I demand, stiffening at the sight of his slack-jawed amazement.

"I just… um. I had no idea that you knew I was there. I mean, that it was me, the kid with the pocket change…" He trails off, perhaps realizing that he's not making any sense. I'd tracked him down at his family's bakery, hadn't I? Of course I'd known who he was.

Closing his eyes, he blows out a sigh. "For years, I wasn't sure. People told me you might not even remember the accident at all and that's why you didn't contact me or—"

"Peeta." I lean closer. "You don't forget the face of the person who was your last hope."

Even now with as thin as he is, he is still that boy. Despite his pallor and shorn hair, I'd recognize him anywhere. It's his eyes, I decide. They seem so dark and wide and infinite, but they are unchanged. He's still the boy who would toss a dollar and fifty cents in change into my father's guitar case every morning at the station. My dad always lamented over that – "A boy your age shouldn't have to give up his money!" – but more than once his contribution had bought us a dozen eggs and a loaf of day-old bread.

"What would you have done if I hadn't—um, if I'd chosen to stay behind?"

I have to look away. "I'm not sure I could've let you."

"Wow," he breathes after a long moment. "I guess I didn't have a choice, either."

I want to refute him, but it would be pointless. I tear my hand from his and push myself up off the bunk. I'd say I'm no better than Finnick, but I know what he'd sacrificed to save me. It doesn't take a genius to realize Annie's fate is the reason why so many of his smiles are fake. If I ever loved someone like that, there's no way I could give them up, not for anything. I'm too greedy, too selfish, too flawed.

I'm not who Finnick thinks I am. I'm not the person Annie sacrificed everything for.

I'm nobody.

"Get some sleep," I tell Peeta, navigating around his bony knees on the way out. "You're going to be busy tomorrow."

I'm nearly to the door when he rasps my name. His fingers brush against my hand. I turn around and, when I see how far he's leaning over the edge of the bunk, I take a quick step back in his direction. He's barely steady enough to keep from toppling onto the cold, metal floor.

"Yes?" I prompt, kneeling when he tugs on my hand.

"I wish I could save them. All of them."

"I know. But you saved me. You see that now, right?" If I'd died in that subway, there would've been nothing left to hijack. Mind: gone. Body: disposed of. End of story for one Katniss Everdeen.

He nods. His hands tremble as he frames my face. "Best thing I've ever done in my whole life."

"You'll do more. You'll do great things, Peeta."

He shakes his head, refusing to accept my faith in him. "No, when it all boils down, I'm pretty selfish. Does it make me a bad person if I don't regret coming here?"

I reach for his face and brush my thumb over his cheek. The soft, blond beard stubble tickles my fingers. "No."

He looks at me with soulful blue eyes until I can't take the intensity anymore. I shut my eyes. I curl my hand around the back of his neck and tilt his head forward until our brows touch. Our breaths wash over each other's cheeks. If dared to open my eyes at this proximity, I think his brilliance would immolate me on the spot.

"I matter to you." His words are little more than a breath. "Real?"

"Real," I confess. He matters more to me than I can fully express, so my admission is hardly costly. It's just the tip of the iceberg, as they say. I pet the soft bristles of his slowly lengthening hair, press a quick kiss to his cheek, and stand. This time, he doesn't try to stop me when I yank the door open and lurch into the corridor.

I stomp down to my own berth and lock the door behind me.

Shit.

In the Matrix, it had been so easy to convince myself that my attraction to him had been as shallow as it'd been sudden, but it has just dawned on me that I don't give a rat's ass what Peeta looks like or how strong he'd been or what he used to smell like inside the system. It's his essence – his incorruptibly good heart and pure soul, his gentle touch and aching vulnerability – that calls to me.

How the hell am I ever going to get Prim out now?

Notes:

Just about everything in this chapter has been tweaked from the way things are explained in the movie. Mr. Manny knows a lot about networks and IT stuff, so he briefly explained how a "zombie" program might still be left running in a system even after its hardware had been unplugged. That's what the deal is with Mrs. Everdeen.

In the movie, if you die in the Matrix or if your body dies while you're in the Matrix, death is immediate. I never liked that. Too simple, I guess. So, in this fic, if your mind is killed in the Matrix, you're body is still alive, but you're in a coma or something. As in: the lights are on but nobody's home. And since there's no room in Zion (like District 13) for people who put a drain on the resources, they can't afford to keep them alive when there's no hope they'll ever recover. (I think the machines might even get a little vengeful satisfaction from making the humans kill their own kind.)

More on Primrose later. I'm being purposefully vague at the moment.

Next up: Peeta starts his training aboard the District Twelve.