Awake or Still Dreaming
Smith Feeds The Ducks
I've done it. I've crossed over.
I now dream in the key of Matrix.
Several years pre-Neo. Trinity has just begun talking with some guy who calls himself Morpheus.
I'm her best friend. Actually I'm the only person who will even talk to her anymore. Her old friends, the popular preppy set, abandoned her after she adopted the signature all-vinyl look.
Anyway, we've got study hall, so we're outside, across from the quad. Which has a pretty pond in it, and there's an oak hanging over it, Spanish moss dripping off the sunlit sides and dangling into the water.
"Homework sucks," I whine.
"Yeah," she says, not looking up from her homework--advanced FORTRAN or something...
There's a man in sunglasses, with a wicked hairline, standing down by the pond. He wasn't there a second ago. He doesn't notice me noticing him.
"Hey." I nudge her and she blinks. "Who's that?"
"Huh?" Looking at the empty hallway behind me, at the classmates around me. Totally looking the wrong way.
"The guy. By the lake." I sort of crane my neck to get a better look. There's a definite faint smile on his face. He produces a brown paper bag from somewhere and proceeds feeding bits of toast to the ducks, palms on his knees. He looks very fobidding and somehow nice at the same time. Approachable, yet steely--the cold fish that always gives you socks for Christmas, but only because you needed them anyway and would not have bought them for yourself. "The one feeding the ducks," I elaborate needlessly.
Trinity turns pale--her face white and blank like a piece of paper, blue eyes huge with fear.
"Shit!" she hisses, scrambling lower in her seat. "Shit shit shit..."
The man in the sunglasses, the suit, looks over at us, smiles and waves.
I wave back, grinning.
"He's kind of cute."
"Don't LOOK at him," whimpers Trinity, "don't look! He's an Agent...Oh God, Morpheus said this would happen...."
Someone clears his throat behind me. Another guy in a suit, with sunglasses, but there's nothing friendly about this one. At all. He reminds me of something cold and surgical, like he should be made of steel under that jacket and tie.
"You're coming with us," he says.
There's another of them behind Trinity. Where are all these guys coming from?
"If you'll follow me," says the one behind Trinity, who forlornly puts her hands on her head--the fellow behind her has a length of steel pressed into the back of her head--a Desert Eagle.
"Who are you people?" I ask, fascinated. My heart is leaping in my chest, like I've been running. "And what's with the guy by the pond?"
The two Agents look over the tops of our heads, at each other, sharing a sneer.
"Smith," they growl at the same time.
I woke up, after that.
The human subconscious rocks ^_^
