She never knows his name. never knows who or what they are running from as she spins to a stop beside his always familiar, outline in the haze of a new day.
This time she spots him in a new place and wearing a new face as she spins her motorcycle keys around her fingers as if in challenge.
He looked older now than she was used to seeing him. Still appealing. Still annoyingly kissable. Just older. More matured.
"You found me." He'd breathe as if hardly daring to believe what he was saying as he climbs onto the purring motorbike behind her, his hold so trusting and sure as she'd whipped the bike into a tailspin to peel out back onto the roadway his grown-out hairstyle tickling the back of her neck as they drove.
She'd be sure to change that soon. She preferred the length she could easily run her fingers through. The one from her memory. But for now…
Keep off the main roads.
Stick to the shadows.
Keep him out of sight.
Keep him safe.
"Neo."
His head lifts slowly from its bowed position over his rationed bowl of morning porridge. "You've got to see this."
His arms around her waist feel so solid that for a moment she could honestly believe that they could be instead of the lingering haze of a well-remembered daydream before she fully woke up for a new day. An incredibly dangerous state to be operating her prized motorcycle but a risk she was willing to take if it meant she could spend a little more time with him.
"She slept at the shop again?" Neo reasoned. They don't call him unless it was true in the few short days since he'd been freed once more from the machine's hold.
"Winner, Winner." This new operator joked hitting a few more keys before the already changing codes could disappear from their view. "Seems your girl is especially feisty today." He notes with a grin as the final key was hit with a flourish. "Clawing at that control." He praises making Neo lean in curiosity as to what had trigged Trinity this time.
The soft almost second-skinned layering of that newly found blue oversized shirt she'd decided to layer under her jacket before leaving for her morning round of coffee truly does wonders for keeping out the early morning chill as they weave too fast yet not fast enough in and out of traffic that wasn't there so early in the morning. "I'm not letting go." He'd promise in a whisper against her ear over the roaring purr of the Deca's engine.
"What's wrong?" Neo questions squinting at the still-forming lines of code scrawling along the computer screen.
"Don't know." The operator stammers his fingers flying over the computer keys causing the changes in the coding. "It's like she's trying to break out…"
"But…" Neo probes dreading the answer.
It's always different based on how he looks when they first meet.
The one that practically ripped her heart from her chest in when she finds him standing weak kneed in bloody clothes littered with bullet holes yet showing no signs of being shot yet his eyes are tightly wrapped with thick strips of rust colored cloth.
Other times she finds him looking almost drunken and disordered in a rumpled button-up shirt with his tie hanging unevenly from his throat as she all but drags him onto the motorbike behind her.
Those ones she almost considers leaving.
"Mrs, Wizard. Get me outta here." He'd plead to her some mornings as he'd run to keep up with her and the almost factor would drain away as she'd stop to let him climb up behind her.
"Like there. You see that. That kinda sparky looking line there?"
Neo doesn't need to look closer to see what the operator was pointing out to the rest of the watching crew at his shoulder.
"I'm not letting go." She promised him each and every time as she gunned the gas to surge them away from whatever it might be chasing after them.
"Neither am I." he echoed nuzzling his unshaven cheek so affectionately against the back of her neck. "I can't." he'd sigh against her skin his lips pressing the ghost of kisses along her neck as he settled in behind her.
"I love you too damn much." Neo echoed to some compelling voice inside his head as his still adjusting sight trained on the dancing code lines of the woman he loved.
Her heart always summersaults hard against her ribs every time she catches that husky promise from those unseen lips. Never had anything her husband says to her not even in the throes of the most intimate of moments when they can find time together without the children distracting her make her feel so wanted. So desired. So, seen.
Because she knows he means it.
The old scar against her stomach tinged in something of remembered longing to feel that touch in more than just an echoing memory as his lips brush against the back of her neck. "Don't worry." He soothes as they gain speed in the early morning dawn. "I'm not letting go."
"Trinity," Neo murmured his fingers reaching with a noticeable trimmer towards the still falling code lines twisting in and out of the lines attempting to stabilize it.
Tiffany groaned in aching longing behind the visor of her helmet at the feather-like touch seems to dance along her skin always seemed to radiate from that single scaring mark at her stomach. Every time she remembers those six simple words. A scar from what had obviously been a bullet wound that for the life of her she couldn't remember getting. She remembers the ripping throb of the life-ending metal shard taring into her flesh sure, and her own guilt-ridden "I'm sorry," to some unseen someone hovering over her willing her to live after it but as far as anything else.
Nothing.
"Stay with me." She pleads to the owner of the voice inside her own mind hearing the hitch in the breathing from the unknown one snuggled so intimately against her back sagged against her. Not her true one but close enough for her heart to freezing mid beat at the idea of losing him now.
No. no. no. She can't lose him. Not again.
She gunned the gas racing against what she couldn't say. Only that this was a race she was sure as hell was going to win. They needed more time as a sudden swarm of cars and people seemed to drop in around her.
"They're closing in on her." The operator warns not that any watching the screen needed verbal confirmation.
"I'm not letting go," Tiffany promises tears stinging her eyes as she struggles to keep the groaning motorbike steady amid the sea of sudden traffic.
Another reason she hated going on the highways.
"Morpheus was right," Tiffany growled behind her helmet shield as she drops back a few car lengths weighing her options as the roadway fills up with a literal swarm of cars and trucks. But almost as soon as the thought had crossed her mind Tiffany gives her head a hard shake.
Since when has she known anyone named Morpheus?
"Can you make her an exit?" Morpheus asks his eyes like Neo's locked on the stronger of the falling code.
"I mean I might."
"Might?"
Neo snickers at the hard edge of his old friends echoed asking.
"You know as well as any that no one makes it on the first jump. And what's worse she hasn't taken the pill yet so it's harder to lock in." the man at the computer reminds pulling up a map of possible exit points given Tiffany's speed and trajectory.
"Trinity can." Morpheus reminds resting a hand against Neo's shoulder in silent support. "we only need to remind her."
Tiffany breaks hard when a car she was sure hadn't been there before cuts in front of her sending her serving fast onto a safer stretch of the roadway.
"I've done all I can." it wasn't a lie given how claustrophobically tight the traffic had become around them.
They- she was trapped. Pinned down. "I've done all I can." she mumbles the words sound so strange to her even as she says them over the groaning of the motorbike under them. "now it's your turn," she says knowing her fantasy was coming to a close when nothing could block out how the scratching itch of the wrapping around her passenger's eyes irritated her skin when he pressed closer to her as if in quiet apology.
Something seemed different today. Normally she could handle the itch but today it was so bad she physically squirms away from him as much as she was able on a moving motorcycle still weaving expertly along the highway.
"We're losing her." Morpheus's voice wavering in unease as he says this.
"I told you it would be tricky without a stronger lock on her signature."
"I can't do this alone." the words ripped at her heart as the wavered breath that whispered them grazed her ear almost causing her to run over a curious white bunny, she'd been unconsciously chasing down this clearing stretch of side street.
"your not alone," she promises hating how broken his voice sounds in striking contrast to how solid and grounding his hold was at her waist.
"I'm not letting go," His voice was weaker now, nearly lost in the groaning roar of her motorcycle. "I love you too damn….."
The shrill ringing of her cell phone inside her jacket almost has her flipping her Deca as Tiffany scrambles to slow down enough to answer it. Especially when she realizes the road she was on was a dead-end street with a half-finished bridge at the end of it.
Not a jump she was willing to try as she fishes her phone free.
Seems the boys were demanding her famous tasty wheat pancakes for breakfast again. With a heavy sigh, Tiffiny sends a replied "on my way" message back before turning her motorbike around to head back the way she'd come.
Only after a beat or two to stop and enjoy the quiet view of the changing early morning sky.