Be Like Neo!

Inquirer

"No need to thank me," I say. "Just passing through. Thought I'd help."

Morpheus blinks a little bit, but manages not to sputter out a "Thanks". Instead, crossing his arms and awaits and answer, stern look all awhile as if to prod me on.

Well, sorry Morph me boy, it takes a lot more than just stern looks to make this mechanical lass to be rattled! Even with his friends standing behind him, also looking like they'd like to shake the answers out of me, Thank you! However, I'll be kind enough and provide something.

Yes, lies.

Or perhaps I'm not being so kind after all, really. Oh well, cannot help it now, alas.

"As for your questions," I continue, still smiling (forced still) as if nothing was wrong, "The name is Inquirer and I came Zion, of course! Where else in the world would I come from?! Ship got ambushed by Sentinels... It was...ugly. Don't know if the others got away but I managed it, and HAD to in order to try to warn you about some intel we'd intercepted whilst in the Matrix! The intel which....I almost was too late when Biscuit boy here almost fragged your Operator...and you folks next! It...."

I look away (silently damning myself for being forced to play this next card, knowing that this'll hurt him (but I moralize it by telling myself it's for the best AND he'll get over it once he finds out the truth).

See in his face he's going to ask MORE questions (which I'll be unable to answer). Damning myself for what happens next, strangeness aside, I'm going to be playing on Morpheus' affections for a woman with it). Never saw the movies after the first in the series but my departed brother, Ajax (who looks like Morpheus) had. I never let him try to draw me in, shutting him down in the offing, but enough info had gotten passed along in the attempts for this next gambit.

Which actually beats having me to fight my way out of here to get to the City, by the way. Do not have time for unnecessary fights.

"I had hoped that Niobe had somehow gotten here ahead of me," I whisper, hiding a wince at how Morpheus' knees almost go out on him as the implications of my lie hit him....hard.

He visibly has to gather himself, muttering something about believing me being from Zion (and perhaps still too emotionally wrought over the seeming death of his old girlfriend...I admit I did hit him in a VERY sensitive place...apparently).

Sigh.

Well, it looks like some of the others (like the second in commmand of this ship, Trinity) want more from me (smelling a rat), but when the gabbing Operator shouts something about somethign coming in from the Matrix....and the crew's Avatars themselves (basically themselves dressed up in rather more stylish clothing than the raggedy stuff the "real" people have on now) suddenly materialize within those Hacker chairs...all Hell breaks loose as arguements on who's real and who's not start.

Of course, I'd be an utter fool not to take advantage of this opportunity.

See, here's the thing. I got to get to the Cyberpope (who's still somewhere within the City from the readings I get from my stuff) and the quickest route is one of those Hacker chairs). Had planned on using that lie (Creator forgive me for having to use one like that but BILLIONS upon BILLION of lives here are at risk if I don't bag this, as well as the other High Lords) to ride in with them on...some kind of made up mission I'd shine them on with. I'd seperate myself from them (be like Neo and fly away, heh) and then do some recon and figure out just where in the W%$^# that High Lord was! Yes, it's dastardly what I've done to his emotional state. Then again, compared to the lives who'll be lost his emotional state is a small thing!

Besides, once he discovers that it was a lie...oh he'll hate my living guts but at least he'll be also relieved to see her alive!

I can live with that.

But now, I'm going to change plans a bit and ride in alone....and as I connect the cable into my Avatar's interface/implant (modified on the fly so I can do that) I feel my Avatar fade and get sucked INTO the Matrix streams of data. Doing the binary dance, I pause as I see....a source of disturbance that I get a feeling IS just right where the Cyberpope is holed up at!

Just a guess, but then again there is nothing QUIET like it in this unreal world. Heck, there is something off in the distance that I figure is the THIRD NEO (hey, with the Matrix crossing over into the Godnet, bet on the One becoming Three...a Holy Trinity...not to be confused with a biker chick/hacker with a tendency to wear fetish wear while at work within the Matrix). . . but I leave that guy well alone and let him sort out things with his two "brothers" I left behind back in "reality".

Best to concentrate on the task at hand!

Now, what I do next isn't expected (or allowed), usually within the Matrix by it's ordinary denizens. However, I can do it because of two things. First, I'm "being like Neo" in that I don't acknowlege those rules. Second, I am NOT going to let a second rate sim tell me what a being of Cyberspace can do!!

....

I zip in and FORCE myself through what the Matrix says is an....Agent's radio earplug! Agent Smith, who'd been soldiering on despite apparent "hiccups" within himself (would clear it up as soon as he "possessed" somebody else, he'd planned), was about to share a revolation with his unwilling guest, Morpheus (the Matrix Avatar one, folks)....

1. When it happens....

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