Title: Mindjob

Author: Emma

Series/Fandom: The Matrix

Pairing: Neo/Smith

Rating: NC-17: contains bad language, a little violence, a bit of angst, and a couple of homosexual situations.

Feedback email: etave@gn.apc.org

Archive: Yes

Blurb: A revised version of a story that was originally written for Belynda to amuse her during her recent illness, although I didn’t get it finished before she recovered, for which I apologise :) I've tried to slot it in around the film's plot as far as possible. This was a genuine first attempt at writing any sort of fiction for public consumption. I couldn’t bear to have it read by anyone before posting, so if you hate it, it’s all my fault :)

italics indicates a character’s thoughts

The story opens in Neo's cabin on board the Nebuchadnezzar, on his first night in the real world. Morpheus has just finished explaining about his search for the One.


Mindjob
by Emma

Morpheus fell silent. Neo rolled onto his back, and was tucking one arm under his head in his customary dozing position, when his arm brushed the jack at the base of his skull. A wave of nausea rolled through his guts. He tried crossing his arms on his chest, then, thinking this would make him look defensive, sat up and settled for lounging on one elbow.

Morpheus did not seem to notice his discomfort. It suddenly occurred to Neo that Morpheus might have some way of reading his mind. The thought was unpleasant, and he quashed it. He did a quick mindsweep - nope, no strangers in here. Nothing much of anything in here. He could tell he was in a mild state of shock, and was grateful for the numbness.

"What happens now?" he asked at length.

Before Morpheus could answer, there was a knock at the door. The geeky one, Mouse, put his head around it. "How's it going, Neo? Is Morpheus giving you the low-down your part in the battle to save mankind?" He grinned, showing too much gum line.

Neo shrugged, unsure what to say. "He was telling me... uh, about the war." Mouse did not appear to be listening, but stood there, grinning at him maniacally.

Morpheus glanced up. "Mouse, is there something you want to say?"

"Yeah, Dozer's just about done. He told me to come get you." Mouse nibbled on a fingernail. His eyes - light blue with long pale lashes - were still fixed on Neo.

"I'll be with you in a moment." His tone was a gentle dismissal. Mouse shrugged and disappeared into the corridor, the door swinging open on its hinges.

Neo caught a faint whiff of hot metal and stale sweat on the damp air. He swallowed dryly, feeling claustrophobic, wondering if Morpheus was about to spring a fresh horror upon him, and glared at the man sitting opposite him, who had closed his eyes and appeared to be deep in thought. Fuck off and leave me alone you sanctimonious freak, I've had enough of your New Age fate crap for one day

Almost as if he could hear him, Morpheus exhaled heavily and stood up. His shrewd dark eyes were tired, but they had lost none of their intensity, and Neo flushed, uneasy, under his gaze. "Get some rest," he said gently. "You're going to need it.

"For what?"

"Your training." Then he was gone, leaving the door ajar.

Neo got up and closed it after him. He didn't want anyone else dropping by to gawk at him. They were treating him as if he was an unexploded bomb in their midst, keeping their distance, but watching him constantly, half scared, half excited, as if they expected him to explode without warning and blow them all to kingdom come. He settled onto his bunk with his back against the wall, wrapped his arms around his legs, put his chin on his knees, and waited to fall asleep.

*************************************************

Neo was still staring into the darkness when the overhead striplights flickered on in the hallway, announcing the start of another glorious day in the Corps. Almost immediately there was a knock on his door, and it was pushed open to reveal a vaguely familiar young man, brown-skinned and very muscular, with large, almond-shaped dark eyes, and a broad, boyishly handsome face.

“Neo?”

“Yeah.” He sat up, numb and light-headed with tiredness, rubbing his face on his wrist. It had been a long night. “Come in.”

“Morning. Did you sleep?”

“No.”

“You will tonight. I guarantee it. I'm Tank. I'll be your operator.” Tank offered him his hand. His grip was strong, his palm dry and slightly callused, and his quick smile was warm and genuine.

“You don't have...”

“Any holes? Nope. Me and my brother Dozer, we’re 100 percent pure, old fashioned, home-grown human. Born free. Right here in the real world. Genuine child of Zion.” He waited, leaning against the wall while Neo slid his feet into the heavy-duty combat boots he had been issued with, pulling the knotty string through the holes with difficulty.

“Zion?”

“Zion is the place, man. You'll see it one day. Last human city. All we got left. C’mon…”

Neo followed him out of the cabin and through the labyrinthine corridors towards the centre of the ship. Tank was still gushing. “Goddamn, I got to tell you I'm fairly excited to see what you’re capable of. I mean if Morpheus is right and all. We're not supposed to talk about any of that, but if you are, well then this is an exciting time.” They arrived at the Core, and Tank hustled him towards a seat, and began strapping him in and hooking him up. “We got a lot to do so let's get to it.”

*************************************************

Nearly eleven hours later, Neo opened his eyes, and tried to sit up, groaning. Tank steadied him as he leaned forward in the seat, blood dripping down his chin. “Jesus Christ…” he murmured, “I thought it wasn't real.” He stared at the blood on his hand, then at Morpheus, who was standing by the operator’s station, reviewing what Tank had been teaching him, his big, thick-fingered hands nimble on the keyboard. “If you’re killed in the Matrix, d’you die here?”

Morpheus paused for a moment, then turned. His response was not comforting. “The body cannot live without the mind.” A fleeting smile. “You did well, Neo. Clean yourself up, and try to get some sleep.” He followed the others away from the Core towards the flight deck, leaving Neo and Tank alone.

Tank helped him to his feet. Neo did not ask why the others had left so quickly: he did not want to face their disappointment after his failure in the jump program. “I guess you were all rooting for me. Sorry.” He stood, swaying, feeling like he had been beaten with a baseball bat. His right shoulder was stiff and sore, and he rubbed and squeezed it, absently. “Perhaps I’m not the One after all,” he added, ruefully.

Tank shrugged. “You’re not getting off the hook that easily. We’ll see what the Oracle has to say.”

“But I didn’t make the jump.”

“No-one has ever made it the first time. It doesn’t mean anything. Jesus Christ, Neo, you were incredible! Your reflexes were amazing: I’ve never seen anyone that fast so soon.”

Neo glanced up, met his eyes. A slow smile spread across his face. “I was pretty fucking cool, wasn’t I?”

Tank laughed. “Yeah. You were cool.”

*************************************************

The following morning, Neo woke late. His body still ached with the exertions of the previous day, his shoulder was stiff, and Dozer's hooch had left a foul taste in his mouth, but he felt relatively relaxed and almost excited. Morpheus had told him that today he would have some time to familiarise himself with the Nebuchadnezzar, but that first, he was to be sent back into the Matrix, "to see it with new eyes".

After he had washed and eaten, Neo climbed up to the main deck and crossed to the Core. The ship was quiet. The others were already in their seats, eyes closed, faces peaceful, dreaming the Matrix. Tank was checking their individual monitors, making adjustments to clean up and boost their signals. Across the room, Mouse was sorting through a rack of micro discs.

"Hi Neo." Tank waved him over to the seat beside Morpheus. "So, are you ready? Has Morpheus told you what's going on?"

"Yeah. They'll be waiting for me inside the Matrix. Apoc, Switch and Cypher will show me around while Trinity and Morpheus meet a contact from another cell."

"Okay! We had to persuade Morpheus to let you go, you know. He was dead against it - he wanted to keep you here, out of harm's way. But me and Switch managed to talk him round. I think Switch wants to see you screw up, but that's just her way." He smiled. "Anyhow, it'll give you a chance to see the way the Matrix works from inside. Look for patterns and coincidences. Nothing's random in there, remember - there's a reason for everything. You've just got to look for it, and you'll see it." He began whistling to himself as he helped Neo into the seat harness.

Neo settled back, let him get on with his work. After a minute or so, he asked, "Do you know about the blue and red pills? Morpheus said they contain a trace program of some kind. Are they like the agents' bugs? Can they be removed?"

"Of course not," interrupted Mouse, his smirking face appearing over Tank's shoulder. "If it was part of your physical body, you'd have crapped it down the pan on your first night, and every time Tank ran a trace for us in the Matrix, the trail would've led right back here to the john. " He giggled, then, bored, turned away abruptly. "I'm going down to the lab. Got some stuff to do," he said vaguely, and disappeared from Neo's line of sight.

Tank rolled his eyes and turned back to Neo. His deft, blunt brown fingers pulled the harness close around Neo's shoulders, waist and hips, and fastened the buckles, then guided his feet into the footrests. Neo slid into a more comfortable position. "Too tight?"

He shook his head. "Go on. About the program."

"The program combines with your body's bioelectrical signature, and structures it into a signal that can be tracked by us. It allows us to find your unique signature in the Matrix. If something happens to you, I can run a search for your signal and use it to home in on you. And it works the other way too: we can use it to track your physical body here in the real world. That's how we located your pod: as soon as the trace program had taken, we were able to pinpoint your location in the power plant. Then it was just a matter of encouraging the plant sentinels to dump you."

Neo was about to ask how they did that, when Tank bent over him and slipped his hand under his head, his fingers feeling for the outlet. "Hold still a minute..." He found the place, and began to slide the jack home. Neo grimaced as it clicked loudly into place inside his skull. He moved his head a little, feeling the weight of the coaxial cable pulling at the outlet. Tank smiled. "I wish I could say you'll get used to it but you probably won't." He rested a hand on Neo's shoulder. "Lie back, and try to relax. The others are already there waiting for you. I've just got to run a few checks."

He went back to the main console, slumped into the operator's chair, and began hitting buttons. Neo watched the back of his head, wondering how old he was. Twenty-four? Younger? If he had been born in Zion, had he ever been into the Matrix? Did he have an outlet in the back of his skull? He could not see one.

"Tell me more about the trace program. Who made it?"

Tank winked at him. "Later. All you need to remember now is that if you get lost or separated from the others, you can dial me up, and I'll get you out. Don't worry, Neo, you'll be fine, I promise. I'll be watching you from here."

Neo closed his eyes, and as soon as he did so, Tank hit the button that sent him into the heart of the Matrix. A wildly disorientating falling sensation, and a softlight flash, and then he was standing in a darkened room, staring at the back of Morpheus’ shaven head. He looked down at his plain black clothing, swaying a little. The skin of his hands was smooth and clean - no holes or scars. He swallowed dryly. Apoc touched his arm. “Neo?”

Neo nodded, unable to speak. This wasn’t like being in the Construct, or one of Tank’s training programs. He was back inside the Matrix now, a place conceived by thinking machines for a purpose so horrific that it made the depravity of the human race seem banal. And yet it was the world where he had grown up, where he had worked, travelled on the subway, brought his groceries, gone to the movies, drank, slept, and occasionally fucked, all in blissful ignorance. He was beginning to understand Cypher’s envious comments about his former life. Neo suddenly felt a keen pang of loss, and to his irritation, his throat started to tighten, and tears pricked the back of his eyes.

“He’s going to crack,” murmured Switch to Morpheus as she passed him. Her pointed look told him that she blamed him for Neo’s condition.

“He won’t,” he said softly. “He’s stronger than he thinks. Look out for him, and if it gets too much, take him back to the Neb immediately.”

“Christ, Morpheus, I’m the one who warned you against this in the first place. You don’t have to tell me to be careful with him.“

He raised his hand in apology. “I know, I know. He’ll be fine.” , he added silently, watching Neo fall into step ahead of him on the stairs.

Neo felt Morpheus’ eyes boring into the back of his skull, and took a steadying breath as he plodded down the carpeted stairwell after Trinity. He was starting to understand the ambivalence of some of the crew towards Morpheus’ mission and in turn, their suspicion of him, Morpheus’ newest protege.

*************************************************

Neo, Switch, Apoc and Cypher split up from Morpheus and Trinity outside the building. A 1970s Lincoln Continental was parked there, and following Apoc’s directions, Neo slid into the back seat of one with relief, closing the door with a satisfying thud. Right now, the further he was from Morpheus and his expectations, the better.

Switch joined him in the back, giving him a quick smile that might have been sympathetic. Apoc took the driver’s seat, and Cypher hopped into the front passenger seat beside him, adjusting it to give himself maximum legroom. He sighed happily, and reached for the radio, turned it on. Loud, cheesy jazz filled the car. Cypher groaned, “Every fucking time…”, and began searching for something decent.

“Where do you want to go today?” asked Apoc, starting up the motor, revving it up. He was talking to Switch. In the mirror, his dark eyes were amused and affectionate. Neo wondered if they might be lovers.

Switch smiled warmly back at him, and said, “Just take us up town, and drive slow.”

*************************************************

Arriving back at the Heart o’ the City hotel two hours later, Neo’s mood was buoyant. Switch, Apoc and Cypher were so comfortable within the Matrix, and moved through it so effortlessly, that he was able to relax into the illusion with them. He had expected them to be disdainful of both the Matrix and his life inside it, but when he asked if they could drive through his old neighbourhood, they had agreed straight away. Cypher in particular seemed fascinated by his life “on the inside”.

Morpheus and Trinity were waiting for them in the same hotel room where they had first entered the Matrix. “How did it go?” she asked.

He shrugged. “Okay, I guess.”

“Fine,” said Switch, although she was looking at Morpheus. Morpheus dialled up Tank, exchanged a few words with him, and then disappeared in a shimmering blue flash. Apoc picked up the handset and passed it to Neo.

He took it, put it to his ear. “Tank?”

"Operator, how may I help you?” A laugh. “Hi Neo."

"I want to exit the program."

“You got it… hold on…”

Neo braced himself. As before, he felt a disorientating swooning sensation, accompanied by a bright flash of soft white light. He blinked involuntarily, then opened his eyes, relieved. What he saw wiped the grin off his face.

Instead of the mess of ducts, cables and pipework that covered the ceiling of the Core of the Nebuchadnezzar, he found himself in the same white-walled room that he had been taken to by the agents after he had given himself up at the CorTechs building. He was sitting in a cheap lightweight office chair, bolted firmly to the floor, and he was tied to it with wide straps of thick black nylon webbing that encircled his arms, chest, thighs and shins. To add to his discomfort, his hands were bound behind his back, causing his injured shoulder to throb dully.

Movement beside him: the whisper of cloth. It was the Agent called Smith. Neo stared numbly at him.

Smith smiled. "Hello, Mister Anderson. I am glad you decided to return to the us so soon - I had feared that Morpheus would keep you on board the Nebuchadnezzar until your training was complete." His tone made the word sound like "brainwashing".

The agent set a black leather case on the table beside Neo, unlocked it, and began to sort through its contents, which were hidden by the open lid. "I must congratulate you on having established yourself so securely within the Nebuchadnezzar cell in such a short space of time. I understand that this is due to Morpheus's needs rather than to your own contrivance, but you seem to have won over the other members of the cell as well - very successfully, it appears. Even Switch, whom we consider to be the most recalcitrant member of the group, seems to have... warmed to you."

Smith’s smooth, languorous tone was weirdly compelling. As he spoke, he was assembling something behind the lid of the case. Neo caught a glimpse of a coiled black cable, and a matt silver box the size of a cigarette packet. He suddenly had a very powerful urge to piss.

"However, I do not believe you are aware of the group dynamics of the crew of the Nebuchadnezzar. You have been taken in by a group of people who - let me be frank - have lived cut off from civilisation for so long, that they are no longer able to maintain a sense of perspective in their dealings with the real world."

"By the real world, do you mean the Matrix?"

Smith smiled but did not answer. He closed the case. "Before we proceed, I must remove the pill which Morpheus asked you to swallow."

Neo frowned. If the pill was not a transmitter in itself, but worked by changing his body's bioelectrical signature, what was the point of removing it? Was it possible that Smith did not know how the pills worked? Or had Tank lied to him? He dismissed that idea immediately, but was confused. Perhaps the agent was testing him to see how much he had learned on board the Neb.

Then it struck him. What if he was actually back on board the Neb, but inside one of Mouse’s programs, and this was a test devised by Morpheus to see if he would give crack under interrogation? Neo decided that this was the most rational explanation, and tried to not to grin to himself. Morpheus must think he was an idiot. He frowned up at Smith. "What are you going to do?"

"It is a simple procedure, although slightly more unpleasant than that used by your friends to remove the bug. I will deactivate the capsule with an electrical surge, applied locally, and then remove it using self-guiding forceps." Smith walked around the table towards him, holding a pair of stainless steel surgical scissors in one hand.

Neo snorted. "Bullshit - we both know that it's not a transmitter, so what's the point of removing it?"

A pause. "True, the pill was the carrier for a trace program which altered your body's bioelectrical signature, and as such is not actually a bug in the true sense of the word. Removing the pill will not reverse its effects. Tank will always be able to find your modified signature."

"So what's with the Nazi torture kit?"

"Because apart from the bio-trace program, the pill contains an anti-tampering device which interferes with certain other... appliances which we might wish to make use of. Therefore, it must be removed. Do not be alarmed, I have been assured that the operation is relatively painless."

As he spoke, Smith reached out, slipped his fingers into the neck of Neo's black Tactex shirt, and pulled it away from his chest. Neo shrank back against the chair, trying not to move, as the agent slid the cold steel blade down the neck of the close-fitting black garment and made a long vertical cut down the centre of it, exposing his collarbone and the top of his chest.

He looked down. Smith was stroking the point of the blade slowly and delicately up his chest. The shades hid the agent's expression. He can't be getting off on this, Neo told himself, he’s a computer program. Had Mouse programmed Smith to be gay? He dug his nails into the palm of his right hand to control the tickle of hysteria that was rising in his stomach.

Smith squeezed a small amount of a clear adhesive gel from a small tube onto his forefinger, and applied it to the hollow at the base of Neo's throat with small circular motions. The gel was warm and smelled like petroleum. Neo was tensing his shoulder and thigh muscles, surreptitiously testing the strength of the black nylon webbing that bound him to the chair, but it did not yield even slightly. Smith smeared some more gel onto a matt silver disc connected to the end of the black coiled cable, pressed the disc against the base of Neo's throat, and held it there until the gel began to dry. "Don't move or it will come off."

The agent's fingers splayed over the disc, touching the sensitive skin of his throat. His hands were warm and his fingertips were surprisingly gentle. Neo tried hard to steady his breathing. He was acutely aware of a tiny muscle in his right eyelid flickering wildly, and lowered his gaze, hoping that Smith would not notice it.

After a few minutes, Smith stepped back, wiped his hands on a handkerchief, and picked up the box and probe from the table, telling him not to move. Shit, were they really going to go through with it? Neo took a steadying breath and balled his fists in anticipation of the pain, prepared to ride it out without giving Morpheus, Smith or whoever, the satisfaction of seeing him crack up. Then the world exploded into a white ball of agony, and he passed out, rigid and screaming.


*************************************************


As soon as he was free of the harness, Morpheus went straight to Neo's side. "Tank, what's going on?" Neo was having difficulty breathing, and his body tensed and quivered spasmodically. Dozer had started to run a full medi-scan on him, and was hooking him up to a resuscitation machine.

"We got a problem, Morpheus. I think they've got him." Grim-faced, Tank swung round in his seat, fingers flying over keys and buttons at lightening speed. Mouse worked silently beside him, chewing his lip, his wide eyes fixed to the monitors.

"What do you mean?"

"I can't get a trace on him. He's just not there any more. I'm widening the sweep."

Morpheus swore and looked down at Neo's lovely, troubled face, thinking quickly. "They haven’t cut the hard-line, but we can't bring the others back until we know what happened, how they managed to get hold of him. Contact Trinity on her cellphone-“

“-They’ll be able to track it,” Mouse warned, his voice sharp with panic.

“That doesn’t matter right now. Tell her what's going on, then tell them to split up and rendezvous at emergency exit 6. They are to wait for my orders. Don’t let Trinity get any ideas about going after them. The agents aren't going to kill him, at least not yet. I'll try to find Neo in the Matrix while you work out what went wrong."

Morpheus went to another console and started to sweep the Matrix, looking for Neo's bioelectrical signature. After less than a minute, Tank said, "It looks like they traced his signal from within the Matrix, intercepted it, and diverted him to another location. How did they do that? How did they identify his signal? Fuck..." He hit the monitor angrily, frustrated. “There was no sign of unusual activity in the area, no warning, nothing!”

Morpheus swore softly under his breath. This was a worrying development. If the agents had really developed a way of identifying the Zionists' bio-sigs, the implications were terrifying. The alternative, which was more realistic but just as disturbing, was that they had somehow infiltrated the Nebuchadnezzar cell and retrieved the information directly from the ship's computer without anyone knowing. He exhaled slowly, collecting his thoughts.

“Right, this is what we’ll do: Mouse and Tank, you’ll have to modify a trace program to give a different key signal, and encapsulate it in another pill. Trinity and I will go into the Matrix and try to smuggle the new pill to him. Once he takes it, the pill will modify his bio-sig using the new key signal as a base, and we can pull him out, as if we were freeing him for the first time. The agents won’t be able to find him because he won’t have the same bio-sig that they traced the first time.”

“Morpheus, that could kill him.” Dozer touched his shoulder, anxiously. “You know how much trouble we had the first time. We nearly lost him.”

“I know, but we don’t have an option.”

Tank was speaking to Trinity on her cellphone, and after she had hung up, he turned to Morpheus and said, “She wanted to go after him, but I think I talked her out of it. They’re on their way to the exit point now, ETA about fifteen minutes.”

“Good. I’ll pick them up. You and Mouse get started on that trace program.” He continued scanning for Neo’s bio-sig, turning over a hundred possibilities in his mind. The one theory that he did not want to consider at the moment was that the agents had got hold of Neo’s bio-sig not by hacking into the Neb’s systems, but directly from one of the crew, and he had a shrewd idea who might have betrayed them.

"How’s it going?" asked Dozer.

"Nothing yet, wait a minute… shit! Wait a minute... Got it!" Neo’s bio-sig, loud and clear. “I’ve got his location… it’s the CorTechs building.” He punched up the details of the building and started to scan it. "CorTechs building, basement level five..."

Dozer looked over at the monitors, and felt the skin on the back of his neck tighten. A green dot sat right on top of the blue dot that indicated Neo's position in the building.

"Shit, Morpheus. There’s an agent in there with him."

*************************************************

Smith watched the man convulse, his body twitching. After the requisite length of time, he cut the power, and passed a sensor over his chest to check that his heart was still functioning within normal parameters. The sensor indicated that it was. He removed the disc and examined Anderson's throat. A circle of red flesh against the ashen skin. He appeared to have bitten his lip: a dribble of crimson blood had begun to snake its way from the corner of his mouth. His dark head lolled forward.

He tipped Anderson's head back, stuck his fingers between his teeth and opened his mouth wider, positioned the self-guiding forceps at the back of his throat, and activated them, sending three long, flexible seekers snaking down his oesophagus into his stomach. After less than ten seconds, a faint repetitive beeping indicated that the connection had been made, and that the seekers had attached themselves to the capsule. He withdrew the forceps slowly, the seekers retracting again. As the device was removed from the man's mouth, he let go of his head, and Anderson sagged forward against his bonds, coughing.

Smith removed the pill from the end of the forceps, and examined it. It was wet with saliva and streaked with a little blood. He dropped it onto the floor and crushed it under the heel of his boot, wiped his fingers on a handkerchief, then bent in front of the human.

Neo blinked at him, frowning. The agent’s face was only six inches away from his own, and Neo could smell him. He had a vaguely sweet, plasticky smell, clean but unpleasant, like warm vinyl. He began to cough again, his gorge rising.

Smith tilted Anderson’s head back, asked him to focus on his finger as he moved it to the left, then to the right, but he jerked his head back, and croaked, “Take your fucking hands off me.” He released him and went back to the case on the table. “It is over now, Mister Anderson.” He began packing away the equipment he had used. “You will suffer no lasting damage, I assure you-“

"Fuck you, get me the fuck out of this chair! There was no need for that, no fucking need at all! Do you think I’m fucking stupid?”

Turning, Smith was slightly surprised to find that Anderson was yelling not at him, but in the direction of the closed circuit TV camera which was positioned high on the wall to their left. He released the man with a thought command, causing the bonds to vanish, and went back to his packing.

Neo heaved himself to his feet, and lurched sideways, holding on to the table for balance. “Are you enjoying this? C’mon in here, Morpheus, you sick fuck, and I’ll give you something to laugh about…” He broke off, coughing again. The room dipped around him. He head was throbbing violently as if his brain was twice its usual size and, he noticed with dismay, he had pissed himself.

Smith droned on in the background. “Mister Anderson, you seem to be under a misapprehension. You are not inside a program created by Morpheus, you are still inside the Matrix. Perhaps I should explain... We have devised a way of intercepting the biological signatures of specific individuals and relaying them to alternative destinations. It is a new technique, and we are confident that the rebels do not know that we can do it. Had Morpheus known about it, I do not believe he would have risked sending you into the Matrix without adequate protection.” A pause. “Your friends thought they were sending you back to the Nebuchadnezzar, whereas in fact, we had intercepted your signal, and had brought you here. I should imagine they are trying to trace you even as we speak.”

Neo felt himself sinking into a world of shit.

"Would you like some water?" The agent’s tone was polite.

Neo ignored him, and concentrated on trying to remain standing, but after a minute or so, his strength gave out, and he sat down again, heavily. His soaked pants clung to his groin, cold and smelly. Wrinkling his nose in self-disgust, he took the water Smith had offered him, but did not drink. He could not stop his hands from shaking.

"What next? Are you going to beat the soles of my feet?"

Smith pulled up a chair that had not existed a moment ago, and arranged himself on it, adjusting his tie, twitching his sleeves, and brushing an invisible thread from the knee of his pants. “No, Mister Anderson.” He removed his shades: his eyes were an unnatural ice blue. "Now we talk."

"I don't know anything about Zion."

"I want to talk about Morpheus."

"You know more about him than I do. I only met him a couple of days ago."

Smith sighed. "Precisely. I would like to put Morpheus and his cell into perspective for you."

“Sure, whatever.” Neo sipped the water. It was ice cold and delicious.

"Did he tell you that you are relatively old to be removed from the Matrix? All of his other acolytes - all except those that were bred in Zion - were taken as children. The oldest, Apoc, was twenty when Morpheus 'freed' him."

"He told me. So what?"

Smith paused for a moment, before beginning again. "Morpheus has been living outside the Matrix for more than twenty years, and for that whole time, he has been searching for the person that the Oracle told him he was destined to find. When he found you three years ago, he was ecstatic.”

“I know the story.”

Smith raised a hand. “Bear with me. Morpheus began to watch you. Constantly, day and night, no matter where you were or who you were with. Yes, I thought that would disturb you… He could not afford to let you out of his sight, but he knew it was too soon to free you from the Matrix. The crew of the Nebuchadnezzar worked on a rota, keeping you under constant surveillance. Tempers frayed. There were arguments, a couple of half-hearted attempts at mutiny.”

Neo was starting to feel uneasy. Smith leaned backwards into the chair, and crossed his legs elegantly. He had inhumanly perfect hands.

“Sometimes he even interfered, although other Zionist leaders warned him against it. Do you remember the first time you hacked into the CorTechs system to hike your pay? You were disturbed by a security program and made a rather messy exit." The startled look on the Anderson’s face told Smith that he did. "Morpheus covered your tracks. He cleaned up after you, put everything back in its proper place. And again, when you and your friends were caught by the authorities in the pachinko bar on 8th and East? You had enough illegal software on you to put you away for thirty years. You were cornered in the men's room. Do you remember what happened next?"

"Yeah, I hid in the janitor's cupboard. There was a hatch at the back of it, under the bottom shelf. I managed to get it open, and crawled into the air conditioning system."

"You emerged in the building next door, and were able to walk away. Morpheus was there, Mister Anderson. He manipulated the Matrix to enable you to escape from the security forces…” Another pause. “There was no hatch when you first entered the cupboard."

"Get to the point." Neo was growing increasingly frustrated by Smith’s excruciating habit of pausing in the middle of sentences.

“Very well.” He leaned forward, elbows on his knees, his blue eyes fixed on Neo’s, unblinking. “My point is, you have misread the nature of the your relationship with Morpheus. Correct me if I am wrong, but I believe you look up to him as a teacher, a guru, someone who can give you the answers you seek. Regardless of how we feel about him, Morpheus is a legend among hackers, and I expect you feel privileged to have been singled out by him for special attention.”

Neo could not disagree with him, and remained silent.

“However, as far as he is concerned, you are the One that he has been searching for, the resurrection of the man who first broke free of the Matrix, and the only hope for the salvation of humankind. In short, Mister Anderson, to him you are nothing less than a Messiah.”

He started to protest, but Smith silenced him with a wave of his hand. “No, wait. This is a dangerous situation for you. You must realise this. Do you know how Morpheus would react if the Oracle told you that you are not the One?”

“I don’t know. He’d handle it. It’s not the first time-”

A knock on the door interrupted them. Smith stood, sighing . “I wish I had your faith, Mister Anderson.”

He went to the door, then stepped outside into the corridor, where the other two agents were waiting. They communicated with one another in silence for a few minutes, while Neo sat, aching and exhausted in his piss-soaked pants, his head pounding, and his hands trembling slightly. He played with the empty glass, and wondered belatedly if there had been anything else besides the water in it.

After a while, Smith returned, shades on, his manner efficient again. “Come with us please, Mister Anderson.”

“Where are we going?”

“Downtown.”


*************************************************


Whatever was in the glass, it caused Neo to fall into a deep, dreamless sleep almost as soon as he climbed into the back of the agents’ car. When he regained consciousness, he was lying on a bed in a large, fairly expensive-looking hotel room, dressed in a towelling robe. He sat up, and looked around. His clothes were gone, and he appeared to be alone, but the sound of running water was coming from a door off to his right. The response from his bladder was Pavlovian, and unwilling to risk pissing himself for the second time that day, he stood, dizzy and unsteady, and shuffled into the bathroom.

“Hello? Who’s there?”

Smith’s voice floated through the open door, cool and annoyingly pompous. “Awake at last, Mister Anderson? Good.” Neo walked in to find Smith at the washbasin, soaping his hands thoroughly.

“Perhaps you would like to shower. I took the liberty of removing and disposing of your soiled clothes.” The agent did not bother to hide his disgust. He left without a backward glance, taking a hand towel with him.

When Neo emerged ten minutes later, towelling his hair, he found Smith seated in front of a terminal at a writing desk, scrolling down the screens of code, bathed in a greenish light that gave him a spectral air. Neo eyed him suspiciously, but the agent did not look up. On the bed was a set of clothes identical to the ones Neo had been wearing earlier. Reluctant to strip off in front of Smith, computer program or not, he took the stuff into the bathroom.

As Neo shrugged on the black Tactex top, he remembered how carefully the agent had snipped open the other one a couple of hours earlier, then, reddening, the sensation of Smith’s warm fingertips on his throat. He studied his reflection in the mirror, checking for signs of latent homosexuality Fuck, Neo, you have got to get your hormones checked out Perhaps he would take Mouse up on his offer of an individually-tailored recreation program with the lady in red when he got back to the Neb.

Walking back into the bedroom, he found that a large armchair had appeared in the middle of the room, upholstered in homely dark brown velvet. Smith waved him towards it, and he sat, warily.

“So what happens now?”

“I am going to run some tests on you.”

“No way. You’ve got a whole planet full of meat sacks to practice on, you don’t need me.” He started to rise, but Smith had anticipated his reaction, and had already immobilised him. His clothes had grown into the upholstery, and he was caught fast, like a wasp in honey.

“On the contrary, since you are an unusually gifted “meat sack”, you will make a highly instructive model. We need to assess the effect of emotional and physical stress on your analytical capabilities.” Smith was pulling a couple of thin cables from a case, with jacks on each end. He plugged one end of a cable into a sleek and deceptively simple processor unit and monitor on a table by Neo’s elbow. “In any case, using an ordinary human consciousness would be pointless. The vast majority of human “minds” - and I use the term loosely - which populate the Matrix are not sentient in any meaningful way. You are.”

“What do these tests involve? Are you sure you want to risk me pissing my pants again?”

“No I do not, but we all have to follow orders, Neo.”

“What happened to ‘Mister Anderson’?”

Smith hit a few keys on the processor, studying the read-out. “I was attempting to make you feel more comfortable.”

Neo laughed. “You’re kidding, right?”

“My appreciation of humour is limited.”

“No shit.”

“Keep still please…” Smith attached the other end of one of the cables to a thin, flexible wristband, which seemed to be some sort of monitoring device, and put it around Neo’s wrist, pulling it tightly against his skin and fastening it with Velcro. He fitted the other cable into a small earpiece and settled it carefully into Neo’s ear. It was held in place with a rubber-coated metal loop that sat behind his ear. As Smith positioned the device, Neo felt a wave of nausea wash over him, and he blinked a couple of times to clear his vision.

When he opened his eyes, the room and everything in it, including the agent, had taken on a semi-transparent appearance. He could see through the walls of the room as if they were semi-transparent, to the data that had constructed them: thousands of lines of moving green code forming a grid on walls and ceiling. He looked down at his hand: his skin glowed faintly, and he could see streaming lines of code underpinning his flesh. The hairs on the back of his neck rose slowly.

“Is this the Matrix?” he asked Smith, quietly.

“Yes. Do you find it disconcerting?”

Neo nodded, unable to stop staring at his hand.

Smith adjusted a dial on the processor unit until the green grid disappeared, and everything swam back into focus again. “Is that better?”

“Yeah.” He swallowed, and added stupidly, “Thanks.”

There was a minute of silence as Smith stepped back, and leaning on the edge of the table with his arms crossed, regarded him disinterestedly. Then, as if he had made up his mind about something, he removed his own earpiece and tucked it into the inside pocket of his jacket.

“So what about these tests?” asked Neo again.

“Originally we intended to use a variety of sensory stimuli, but your recent behaviour has suggested an alternative course, and we have determined that sexual stimulation would give the quickest results.”

He blanched. “What do you mean?”

“I noticed that earlier today, you became sexually aroused when I was cutting open your shirt.”

“You what? I was not fucking aroused!”

Smith shrugged. “I am not mistaken. Your pupils dilated, your respiration increased, and I detected a visible increase in the tumescence of your penis. Homosexuality is not a moral issue for us, so you need not be ashamed of it. If you prefer, I can assume a female body for the purpose of these tests, but I think that the judicious application of the correct stimuli will be sufficient for our purposes.”

Taking off his shades, and putting them away in another pocket, Smith walked over to him, bent and kissed him on the mouth. Confused, Neo froze, then attempted to endure the kiss without showing the slightest sign of emotion. He was relieved to find that apart from the firm pressure and heat of the agent’s mouth, and the electric contact of his hand where it rested lightly on the back of his neck, it might have been his 70-year-old landlady kissing him. You’re just a computer program, Smith, don’t get above yourself. And yeah, you would have more luck if you hijacked a female body

Just as Neo began to think he could handle it, Smith swept the tip of his tongue over his lower lip. The unexpected sensuality of it startled him. Alarmed, he tried to pull back, but the agent took his head in his hands, and increased the intensity of the kiss: eyes closed, totally focussed, gently insistent. Neo realised he was growing quickly and painfully hard, and when Smith grazed his lip lightly again and took advantage of Neo’s surprised gasp to dart his tongue into his mouth, he was horrified to feel his penis leap eagerly. He writhed, and let out a muffled cry of protest.

Satisfied that he had made his point, Smith released him, and turned his attention back to the data on the monitors. Behind him, Neo fumed silently.

“Your reaction is predictable,” he told him. “Denial of certain aspects of one’s sexuality is a common human trait.”

He did not answer. Smith took this as a sign that he was listening, and continued to talk as he glanced over the data. “We analysed the contents of the VR games that you used, particularly those that were primarily sexual in nature, and extrapolated a number of scenarios that you would find arousing. You have a juvenile tendency towards masochistic passivity, due partly to your lack of sexual experience. This is fairly normal behaviour in adolescent males, but less common in those aged over thirty.”

Neo sat trembling, furious, his hard cock throbbing in his pants. He was unable to change his position because of the way the agent had immobilised him, and was forced to sit there, uncomfortably exposed, desperately willing his erection to diminish.

What happened next made him even more uneasy.

Methodically, Smith unbuttoned his black suit jacket and hung it over the back of a chair, and then proceeded to loosen and remove his tie, unbutton the top of his pristine white shirt, and roll up his sleeves to just below the elbow. The human was watching him with wide dark eyes.

“What are you doing?”

He ignored him, and knelt on the carpet between his parted knees. “May I make a suggestion? The more you talk, the longer this will take.”

Smith unbuttoned and unzipped Neo’s pants, reached inside them, and released his stiff, aching penis into his warm hand. Dizzy with arousal, he stifled a soft moan as the agent enveloped his shaft in a gentle but firm grip, and began to jerk him off with full, sliding strokes, up and down the entire length of his penis. His technique was faultless, and when he changed to lighter, quicker strokes towards the head, Neo lost control of himself for a moment, closed his eyes, and let his head fall back against the armchair, biting his lower lip to keep himself from groaning aloud, his hips rising involuntarily with every movement of Smith’s hand.

Smith was pleased with Anderson’s responsiveness, and proceeded to work his way through several popular masturbation techniques, alternating each new one with the long, slow strokes that he seemed to take the greatest pleasure in. After a few minutes, he risked a glance at the monitor on the table, but he could not see the screen from his position on the floor. However, as he returned to the task at hand, he realised that the man had stopped writhing about, and was in fact, completely motionless. He looked up. Anderson was glowering down at him, a hectic flush on his normally pale cheeks. He had obviously seen him looking at the monitor. Smith rebuked himself for his momentary lapse of concentration: he had been close to ejaculation, but the moment had passed. He considered using violence as an aphrodisiac - his investigations into the Anderson’s sexual preferences had suggested that limited physical pain would stimulate him as effectively as masturbation - but he weighed up the situation, and decided against it.

“I guess you don’t know as much about the human mind as you think,” commented Neo dryly. “Its not going to work, so why don’t you get off your knees before you get your pants creased?”

To his immense relief, Smith released him and stood. “You are right. Perhaps this will improve your receptiveness.” He walked over to the table, and readjusted the device so that the Matrix was visible again, but this time, he took it further: the hotel room completely disappeared, and glowing green grid of code completely surrounded them.

Confused, Neo looked down at his body, but all he could see was his outline, traced in green phosphorescence, as if he was a cartoon of himself. The agent was even less distinct: he was vaguely humanoid in shape, but that was all. Neo gazed above his head, straining to see beyond the Matrix, or to see further into it. It was limitless.

Shit The bastard was kneeling in front of him again, taking hold of his penis, adjusting his grip, his shirt sleeve brushing against his bare, hot erection. Neo lay still, the simultaneous reality and unreality of the situation leaving him momentarily dazed. He stared up at the Matrix, trying to make sense of the streams of data, but he could not see any logical progression in it, so he squeezed his eyes shut instead, trying to block out what was happening to him, telling himself that he was inside a computer program, that Smith was just a piece of sentient software, and that none of this was real.

Eventually, his exhausted mind took hold of the only reality left to him, and he slumped back against the non-existent armchair, and closed his eyes, just as the agent bent over his crotch again, his head low. A split-second later, his entire penis was engulfed by the wet, satiny heat of Smith’s mouth, making him groan. The agent let his lips encircle the swollen head of his penis and took him into his mouth again, slipping round and round the head, slowly and deliberately, unhurried, while his saliva-slick hand moved up and down the length of his shaft. In less than thirty seconds, Neo had lost all rationality, and was thrusting urgently into Smith’s mouth, gasping.

Still gliding his hand up and down Neo’s shaft with a fluid and regular motion, the agent sucked a little more forcefully than before, creating a gentle vacuum, then began to flicker his tongue across the tip of his penis. It was the sweetest, most intense sensation Neo had ever experienced, and Smith showed no sign of quitting, kneeling between his legs giving him head with a single-mindedness that was irresistable. Suddenly, all Neo cared about was coming as quickly as possible, in case Morpheus turned up to rescue him, and found him with his cock down Agent Smith’s throat.

Groaning, he lost control, and tried to force himself further into Smith’s mouth. The agent accommodated his desperate, irregular thrusts easily, allowing him to push his erection down his throat, but he did not relax his slippery grip, or stop sucking and licking him, and within seconds, Anderson’s whole body tensed and shivered, and crying out, he began to ejaculate into his mouth. Smith drank down the warm, creamy fluid as quickly as it was produced, holding his body tightly, and moving with him until he relaxed, and grew still.

After he had climaxed, Smith waited for a minute or so, allowing the man’s erection to soften in his mouth before releasing him, then stood, straightened his clothing, and removed the earpiece and the wristband from Anderson’s semi-conscious body, placing them on the table next to the monitoring equipment. He took a glass from the table, and spat Anderson’s semen into it in a thin white stream. Movement beside him: Anderson was coming back to his senses. He looked at down at the man, who was watching him, bleary-eyed, still panting softly. He showed all the classic signs of sexual fulfilment: a languid posture, a sheen of sweat on his flushed skin, dilated pupils, reddened lips. The agent was aware that Anderson possessed many of the physical attributes which most humans found attractive, but this did not interest him. In any case, his body in the Matrix was only a construct based on his residual self-image. Smith would never see Anderson’s real physical body, which had been stolen from a power plant by Morpheus and his crew and was hidden somewhere in the Chicago sewers.

However, he found Anderson’s mind intriguing. Smith had been created after the failure of the original Matrix - the first paradise world which human minds had such difficulty adapting to - and he had been programmed with the capacity to analyse basic human emotions. Over the years, he had developed this ability until he was able to predict human responses to various emotional stimuli with a high degree of accuracy, until eight years ago, he had been assigned to hunt down Morpheus.

Having studied the man from a distance for many years - so far, they had not met face to face - Smith knew that Morpheus had a mind of singular brilliance. Moreover, in that time he had come to realise that the best way to deal with the rebellion was to understand the human mind, and thereby learn how to shape and control it. He approached his superiors with his theories, but his recommendations were disregarded. Delving into the human mind was messy, unpleasant, often tedious work, and very few of the sentinels and agents who monitored and controlled the Matrix were programmed to do it. Instead, he was ordered to capture Morpheus, and to extract information about Zion and the rebellion from him using viral serums, bio-programs, or even crude physical torture.

Smith followed his superiors’ orders, of course, but he continued to look for a way of getting inside Morpheus’ head, and he believed that he had found a way of doing so in Thomas Anderson. The renegade human, Cypher, had passed him recordings of every interaction between Morpheus and Anderson in the last three days, from their conversations in his cabin and in the Construct, to their sparring match in the dojo, and having studied them, Smith was now as convinced as Morpheus that Anderson had a truly unique mind, and that with the correct guidance and training, the two humans had the potential to control the Matrix, and consequently, the future of the planet.

Smith glanced down at Anderson again. He had no doubt that what he had just done to him would have a major emotional impact on him, and that dealing with the aftermath of what had effectively been a sexual assault would delay Morpheus long enough for the agents to prepare a counterattack. He ejected the microdisc from the processor, putting it into his pocket. There would be time to analyse the information it contained later.

Lying spreadeagled in the armchair, his breath coming in hoarse gasps, Neo was vaguely aware of Smith standing, putting on his tie, his jacket, moving about in the room. He opened his eyes, and tried to focus on him, but it was too much effort. Then he left, and Neo was alone.


*************************************************

Neo opened his eyes: bright light, flat and yellow. He squinted around him, his head pounding. No sign of Smith, and the room was back to normal. His body looked real again too, even down to the pathetic sight of his spent cock lying in his lap, a puddle of semen and saliva collecting on his pants under the swollen tip. Feeling nauseous again, Neo tried to sit up a little. As he did so, he realised that his clothing was no longer attached to the armchair, and he leaned forward, put his head in his hands. His stomach heaved and he vomited a gout of watery phlegm between his knees onto the beige carpet. Self-disgust rose up inside him, and he vomited again.

He put his dick back inside his pants and did them up, then stood shakily, straightening his clothing. He rubbed his face on his sleeve - it was damp with mucous and sweat - and looked around. Smith had left his equipment on the table. He picked up the mini-processor, examined at it, turned it over in his hands. There was a small glass too, containing some sort of whitish fluid. He tipped the glass, sniffed it. It was his spunk. His skin crawled. For a split second, Neo was incandescent with rage. Anger boiled up inside him, and he threw the glass at the wall with all his strength, followed by the wristband, the earpiece, the processor and flip-up monitor, and an ashtray for good measure, then stopped, listening. Nothing. They could be right outside the door, communicating through their earpieces, or they could be in another part of the building. He stood in the middle of the room, unsure what to do next, then sat on the end of the bed. It was cold. His jacket was somewhere… he looked around, saw it lying crumpled on the floor beside the armchair, but he could not summon up the energy to get it.


*************************************************

It was half an hour before Smith entered the room, accompanied by his two stooges. Had he arrived any earlier, Neo’s impulse might have been to beat ten shades of shit out of him, but his anger had been replaced by fear, and desperate cunning. He knew that he could not fight his way out of this, so he had resigned himself to waiting instead, in the hope that Morpheus was coming to get him. Meanwhile, he was trying to put Tank’s advice into practice: "Look for patterns and coincidences. Nothing's random in there - there's a reason for everything”.

He was putting on his jacket on when they returned, sitting on the end of the bed. Despite the warmth of the room, he still felt cold, and could not stop himself from shivering. Smith picked up the broken pieces equipment without comment, even the shards of glass, put them back into the case, snapped it shut, and handed it to Jones. As he did so, he asked Neo if he would like something to eat.

“What’s the point? None of this is real.”

“You can still experience the pleasure of eating. I have heard that the food on board the Nebuchadnezzar is… unappetising. You might at least indulge yourself while you are here.”

Neo bit back a sarcastic response, and instead mumbled, “Okay then… what about a bacon cheeseburger, fries, and a coke?” He hoped he sounded suitably subdued.

“Very well. I will have it sent up.” Smith communicated silently with Brown and Jones for a moment. “We are going to step into the next room for a few minutes. Do not try to escape. We can trace your every move… and we will be watching you.”

After they had gone, Neo wandered round the room, looking for surveillance equipment, but soon gave up. Even if he found and deactivated a dozen cameras in the room, there were bound to be others that he had missed. He had just flopped down on the bed again, when Brown reappeared with a covered tray. He set it down on the table, and left, without a word.

As soon as the agent was out of the room, Neo went to the table, and lifted the cover on the serving dish. Bacon cheeseburger, fries, a coke - and some salad. The tomato was carved into the shape of a rose. He snorted. Nice touch He pushed the salad aside to stop the damp lettuce wilting the French fries, and as he did so, he noticed something white and elongated lurking underneath the tomato. He moved it with his finger.

Fuck! Neo stared at the tomato. Underneath it was a white pill, stamped with a white cartoon rabbit. He looked around the room suspiciously, but nothing else seemed to have changed, so he palmed the pill and slipped it into his pocket. Nervous now, he took a big mouthful of coke while he tried to decide what to do, but he knew he had already made up his mind. If the agents had put it there, it was probably another one of Smith’s little devices, but Smith could have planted another bug on him at any time - hell, he could have shoved it up his ass and he wouldn’t have been able to stop him. It had to be from Morpheus, and if he had sent it, it could be a way out. The white rabbit was his sign, wasn’t it? And a pill had got him out of the Matrix before. Perhaps it was some sort of special program. He bit back a laugh: perhaps it would give him superpowers.

Neo put down the coke glass. Trying to look natural, he went into the bathroom, locked the door, and ran a basin of water, noisily. Popping the pill into his mouth as he bent over the basin, he splashed his face with water, and swallowed some of it. The pill went down easily.
He straightened, took a hand towel, dried himself, staring at his reflection in the large mirror over the sink. He looked rough: his skin was pallid, his dark eyes were red-rimmed and intense, and his mouth was a thin, hard line.

Slowly, almost imperceptibly at first, reality started to bend. He touched the mirror as he had done before, more out of superstition than anything else, and as his fingers sunk beneath its the cold glassy surface, the mirror bent out towards him and then began to slide sideways, almost lapping at its frame, rippling a like still body of water when the wind moves across it. Fascinated, he pulled his hand back, and the cold silver pulled away from the frame like taffy, clinging to him. It started to creep up his arm. Shit it burns! It didn’t feel like this the first time

Neo sat down on the floor with his back against the side of the bath, drew his knees up, and wrapped his arms around them, waiting for the program to go into replication, willing the change to come quickly. He could not hear any sounds from the next room, but still expected Smith to kick down the bathroom door at any moment. Squeezing his eyes shut, he bore out the freezing pain of replication, and as his body began to convulse his last thought was I hope you’re out there, Morpheus, because I’m fucking coming, ready or not


*************************************************

Neo opened his eyes. Dim lighting, a maze of cables and ducts above him, and then Tank’s face was bending over him, his quick grin a flash of sweetness. "Hey Neo, welcome back."

“Tank? Where am I?”

“You’re in the sick bay on the Neb. No, don’t try to sit up.”

Tank's hand on his chest, keeping him down. The rest of the crew stood around him, watching as Morpheus and Dozer started to run medical checks on him.

"How do you feel?" asked Trinity, coming to stand beside Tank. Her dark eyes searched his face. Neo wondered how much she knew, and felt his face flush. To his surprise, she smiled at him, and took his hand in her strong, slender grip for a moment.

"Really weird, like I can't concentrate on anything... how long have I been out?"

"Two days.”

“Shit. Wait a minute, how do I know it’s really you?”

“You don’t, but believe me, it is.”


*************************************************

Neo had decided that he would not tell Morpheus about Smith, but when Morpheus visited him alone in the sick bay later that evening, the first thing he said was, “This won’t take long, Neo, I’ll debrief you properly tomorrow. I just wanted to tell you that I know what Smith did to you in there, but that we don’t have to talk about it, unless you want to.” He pulled up a chair and sat, propping his feet up against the resus-cart that still stood beside Neo’s bed.

Neo stared back at him. “I’m okay with it. Who else knows?”

“Just Dozer. He was monitoring you while we were working on getting you out. He won’t say anything, don’t worry. But he told me to give you this.” Morpheus handed him a silver flask.

Neo opened it, sniffed, grinned. “Hooch. Do you want some?”

“I bought these just in case.” He put two beakers down on the bed, and Neo filled them to the brim with the pale brown liquid. Morpheus knocked it back it as if it was coffee, then poured himself some more. Neo sipped it cautiously, but it still tasted like battery acid, and it still sent him into a coughing fit.

“Is Smith a homosexual?” asked Neo, after a pause. He knew it was a stupid question before he had even finished his sentence, but he could not help himself.

Morpheus shook his head, sighing. “No, Neo, he -it- is a computer program. You know that. Forgive me if I seem insensitive, but the details of what happened to you are unimportant.”

“Unimportant? He could have fucking killed me!” He took another mouthful of liquor. It went down more easily this time.

“If he had wanted to kill you, he could easily have done so. Neo, listen to me.” He leaned forward, elbows resting on his knees. “Do you know why Smith abducted you?”

“Yeah, to get at you. And to see what makes me tick.”

“Exactly. He wants you to feel uncomfortable inside the Matrix, in order to affect your ability to control it, and to move freely within it. If you are scared of it, or if you doubt your abilities, if you hold back at all, then they have won. You mustn't be afraid of the Matrix, Neo, you must revel in it.”

Neo absorbed this for a moment, then asked, “Did you have me followed?”

“Yes, of course.”

“He told me that you had been following me for years, and that you are obsessed with me.”

Morpheus laughed softly. “I was careful, that’s all. Now that you’ve met Smith, you know what we’re up against. Would you rather if I had let him find you first?” He drained his cup. “The time will come when you will no longer need to use an Operator to enter and leave the Matrix. They know how dangerous you are, Neo. But now you’ve seen the way they work.” He started to stand, moving slowly, obviously tired himself. “We’ll talk more tomorrow.”

“What shall I do?”

“Just try to get some sleep.” He patted Neo’s arm as he rose, and Neo caught at his hand, gripped it briefly.

“Thanks for getting me out.”

Morpheus squeezed back, hard, reassuringly. “No problem.”



end