Waking Nightmare: An Metalogic Story

[Metalogic]

Chapter 1: Wake Up…

I do not normally take public transit. However, my Toyota Hardbody truck was in the shop with an alternator issue. Thankfully, I was able to work out of the shop while my truck was being repaired. I got onto the MegaCity Transit Bus at Mara, I was going to take it to Camon, then get onto the subway to the International District. I had a small apartment in Sai Kung, which made me a bit of an outsider. However, the apartment was cheap, and it was quiet. I managed to integrate myself by doing local chores and helping the landlady with small electrical problems around the complex. I even became a member of the local Dojo; I was starting to learn Aikido for self defense as well as a form of meditation.

The bus squeaked to a stop and I stepped on, there was already an array of the city’s citizens on the bus, I managed to find myself a window seat in the back. In my hands, I held a paperback copy of an Urban Fantasy novel. I had forgotten the name or the author, it had been a long time and some details escape me. I do not read the newspaper and I usually have the TV on at a low volume for background noise. I live by myself and sometimes a little background noise can make my tiny apartment seem less lonely. There has been rumbling around town about terrorist activities. A new subgroup of people calling themselves Redpills. I did not pay much attention to it, what is another gang or subgroup added to this city? What are the redpills going to do, spray paint Anarchy signs on depilated walls and bring even more trash to the barrens in Westview?

The bus was running along one of the cities freeways, a semi-quick way to get around town that did not have an overabundance of traffic lights. You also got a chance to see some of the beauty of MegaCity. However, it happened when the bus was passing by an industrial building. I was nose deep in my book when I suddenly looked up and saw the degradation of reality all around me. The world changed from physical metal and glass to green numbers and katakana lettering. As soon as it started, it was over, and I was in pitch black. Suddenly I found myself unable to breathe. I was gagging on something and drowning at the same time. I did not know what was going on; was I dead, was I still alive, am I in Purgatory? I waved my arms and legs and got them tangled in wires or tubes. I started to drift in and out of consciousness. Then something behind me opened and what sounded like a large vacuum, everything fell out and I was in free fall. In the falling darkness, I felt something hit my left leg and I felt sharp hot shearing pain shooting throughout my left leg and hips. I let out a painful scream that was silenced by my body crashing into a body of liquid.

I woke up in my bed in Sai Kung. The soft light of the neighborhood flowed into my bedroom as I twisted in my bed to look out the window. It was a clear night, stars twinkling, and the lights of aircrafts in the skies. After I pushed the covers from me, I grabbed my robe and walked out of my apartment, headed to the roof. On the roof I could see the outdoor furniture my landlady had set up a long time ago. She set up a couple of tables and chairs, she was sitting at one of the tables with a cigarette in her hand. She studied me as I walked over and sat down on a chair at her table.
“Can’t sleep?”
“Had a nightmare, I was taking the bus to a subway station to get back here and there was a…terrorist attack?”
She studied me before taking another drag of her cigarette, letting out a slow stream of smoke into the night sky. “Sometimes, dreams are so real, they feel like an alternative reality.”
“Well yes, but by the end of the day, they’re just dreams. They can’t hurt us, and we always wake up.”
Her eyes pierced my body, “Tell that to the Hmong, many of them have died in their sleep, some of them died screaming.”
“Like the movie Nightmare on Elm Street.”
She scoffed as if I offended her, “Reality is often harsher and more brutal than Western slop,” she replied derisively.
“I am sorry, I didn’t mean to offend. It was the only thing I could think of.”
“What’s important now is that you stay with us, you are aboard a Zion Medical Hoverbarge.”
“Wait what?”

“You are aboard a Zion Medical Hoverbarge, Britannic. Please state your name.”
The world of my apartment building’s roof faded into inky black, everything faded into blackness. My head started pounding and the sharp pain in my left leg returned. I tried to scream but felt my jaw was locked in place. Noise, horrible noise of people rushing, talking and screaming began to feel the void. Mechanical noise such as beeping, and suctioning came and faded into the background.

“My name is…Sean.”

[Metalogic]

The report of gun fire filled the firing range. I lowered my 12-gauge semi-automatic shotgun down to my side with my index finger resting on the barrel above the trigger. I pushed a button to my left side and a machine buzzed into activity. My target paper came up to my face and my eyes darted studying my shooting patterns. The hairs on my arm started standing up as I felt a surge of energy in the air. A green-white light filled the space next to me before being engulfed by green code. The code took the shape of my Zion Captain, Kobalt. He was a weathered black man who had salt and pepper hair and beard. He wore a vest and camo pants with combat boots. In contrast, I was wearing a t-shirt, jeans, and sneakers.

“Nice grouping, hitting the right areas to disarm and then to terminate.”

“Had a 12 gauge in my apartment just in case someone tried to break in. Kill the perp without killing my neighbors,” I replied. I didn’t know how accurate that was, I never had to use my old 12 gauge. My apartment building was filled with people just going about their day, trying to get by in the big city. Kobalt nodded as I talked.

He let out a soft sigh and then brought his right hand up to his chin. “Let’s see how you do in a real combat situation.” I raised an eyebrow to him, “We’re going into The Matrix?” He gave me a sly smile, “Not exactly.” He reached into his left pocket and pulled out a cell phone, it was the same Nokia 8110 I carried with me on my job. I always kept it off when I wasn’t on the job.

“Operator, load The Office Map.” After the phone retracted back into itself, the world around us dissolved into a cloud of falling green code, then out of nowhere a new world rushed into view. I stepped back almost tripping over before my back hit a chair. Kobalt was nowhere to be seen, I looked around and my shotgun was still in my hands. Taking in my surroundings, I noticed a table with pistols, machine guns and boxes of ammunition. A smug smile spread across my face, ‘Okay, I guess we’re going to play this game,’ I thought to myself as I limped over to the table. I grabbed four pistols, and ammo for both types of guns I was going to carry into this little game.

The map had change. It wasn’t empty office space anymore, it was filled with people, going about their day. ‘Okay, that complicate things.’ I casually walked between the cubicles and desks, walking as softly as I could even with my limp. My eyes darted back and forth, looking for any sign of trouble or any sign of my captain. I got to the middle of the floor before I heard the familiar ding of the elevator door. Dropping to my left knee I brought my shotgun up and saw a man in a suit and sunglasses appeared as the door opened. A squeeze of the trigger barked out a buckshot from my shotgun as it impacted the man’s left knee. Afterwards I twisted my body to behind a cubicle wall. The pain from my bad leg shot through my body, I gritted my teeth so I wouldn’t give away my position.

The footsteps started coming towards me. ‘What the fuck?’ I thought to myself as I sat there, listening. The man was walking like he normally would if I hadn’t blown out his left kneecap. I scrambled to my feet, and I ran to a better advantage point. A bullet whizzed by my ear hitting the pillar next to me. The man was holding up a Desert Eagle in his hand. Taking a hard right I slid back down onto my butt and waited for the man. He appeared in front of me in no time and already had his gun pointed at my forehead.
|

“Freeze,” a voice called out. Everything froze, it was so quiet that you could hear a pin drop. Kobalt stepped out from out of nowhere and stood beside the man. “Meet Agent Brown. He is a computer program designed to do one thing, hunt and destroy. He is everyone and no one. Mere bullets and shotgun pellets are worthless against him. Even the best trained marksperson and marital arts expert have died to him. The only crew to successfully take down an agent was aboard The Nebuchadnezzar and The Logos.”

I painfully pushed myself back up onto my feet and steadied myself with a nearby chair. “How do we survive them?”

“By running and hiding. Anyone and any program still connected to The Matrix is an agent. They are the eyes and ears of The System we are trying to fight and that makes him our enemies.”

I looked around to all the office workers, frozen in time. “Does that include them? The people who are just going about their business?”

“Everyone and anyone,” Kobalt empathized. “Until they are free’d from the system, they are our enemy.”

A pain hit the pit of my stomach. I run my fingers through my hair and sighed and nodded my head, “Understood.”

“One more thing, your leg paint doesn’t mean anything in here. Nothing in here, is real. Like the orientation program said, free your mind. C’mon, it’s almost supper time.” I nodded again as he phoned the operator to end the program and jack us out.

[Metalogic]

I don’t mind the goop that we eat on the hovercraft for three square meals every day. It tastes like runny oatmeal. However, having it every single day for every meal, gets a bit tiring. At least in The Matrix, I could buy a variety box of Oatmeal to eat. This came to my mind as I pour the goop into my tin bowl can and hobbled over to the mess with the others, the clank of my metallic peg leg hitting the metallic floor of the hovercraft. I sat with the crew of six and toyed with the goop with my spoon before taking a swig of what I suspect was some form of bug juice.

“So, you’re one of the survivors of the code bombs, right?” a voice asked. I looked up and it was Alpaca. He wore a dark red beanie and had thick glasses. In his hand was a fairly used paperback book which I could barely make out the writings of. He intently studied me behind his thick frames. I cleared my throat, “Um yea, was rescued by the hover barge Lusitania. Spent my recovery there before I got taken to Zion and assigned to this ship.”

Alpaca licked his lips, “what was it like, to be awakened in such a manner?”

I looked up again in slight annoyance, “Ever had a moment where you’re nestled all nice and comfortable in your bed, you’re warm and everything is just perfect? Then someone dragged you out of bed, splashed you with ice cold water and then threw you out the window naked? It was a bit like that.” I dropped my spoon into the tin bowl and made some noise that sounded like ‘excuse me’ and walked out of the mess hall down the corridor of the hovercraft.

A hand grabbed my shoulder. I quickly turned around and there was a smaller woman in front of me. She had long jet-black hair, the deepest brown eyes, her brow furrowed in a look of concern. She went by Nikko, she usually had a sunny deposition, but that wasn’t the case right now. I wiped my forehead and ran my fingers through my hair. “H-hey Nikko, sorry, you startled me there.”

She gave me a slight smile before placing her hand on her hips. “Don’t let Al get to you like that. He’s a little too, inquisitive for his own good. He’s, he’s not that great with boundaries and sometimes doesn’t know when to stop.” I sat down on one of the jack-in chairs facing her. “I understand, it’s just not something I want to relive anytime soon.”
“I gotcha, I can’t imagine how hard it is to go from one life to another in such a short amount of time and you basically had to hit the ground running.”

“Is that a jab?” I asked with a smirk.

Nikko blushes, “I did not think of your leg when I said that.” I gave Nikko a friendly soft punch to the arm before standing back up and turned towards my bunk. “I’ll catch you later Nik.”

“See you later Meta.”


* * *

I always had problems falling asleep, but somehow, I would end up asleep. I laid in my bed looking up at the cold steel ceiling then the lights buzzed on with activity. With a groan and a bit of effort, I push myself up to a sitting position on the bed. After strapping on my boots and slipping a white wife beater shirt on, I walked into the main section of the hovercraft where everyone was already gathered. Alpaca was already at the Operator’s station typing away on his keyboards, green code flowed from the three primary screen in front of him. Captain Kobalt cleared his throat, “Time to jack in Operatives.”

One by one, we jacked into The Matrix and our RSI loaded up inside of a Tea House in International. I gazed out of the window and noticed that we were in Akasaka. The crew was sitting at a table inside the tea house, Captain Kobalt to my opposite, Nikko to my left and a fourth operative to my right whose alias was Amity. He was a muscular white man who was a Kung Fu grandmaster in his previous life. His white spiky hair and deep blue eyes scanned the documents that sat on the table before us.

“We are looking for a courier,” Kobalt began, “a courier that works for The Merovingian. This person, or exile is carrying a floppy disk that has all the traffic that’s going in and out of Mobil Ave, and Zion been keeping an eye on it. While we’ve been able to gather bits and pieces here and there, this disk has the entire roster of exiled programs that visited Mobil Ave.”

My left eyebrow went up as I looked over the papers and photographs. ‘Exiles? The Merovingian? Who are these people?’ I thought to myself. “Usually the courier is unarmed,” Kobalt continued, “and without escort. However, neighborhood gangs have been known to be the eyes and ears for The Merovingian.”

Kobalt then gathered up the photos and files and rolled out a map of the city. “We know that the courier usually leaves The Abandoned Subway Station in Rogers Way. He’ll first take the green line to Manssen Park, then jot over to Stamos to take the red line to Camon. From Camon he’ll take the blue line to Sai Kung. Finally, he’ll take the purple line to Shinjuku where he’ll drop of the disk at a drop point for The Merovingian. Our best point to intercept him will be between the green line and red line at Stamos. There’s an alleyway that we can block off and quickly surround him. We’ll use the Stamos Northwest Hardline to get there and set up.” The group nodded and then got up and piled out of the tea house.

Within a few minutes, we were in the alleyway at Stamos, right next to the Stamos Red Line Station. I was put in charge of lookout, I leaned back against a building that has seen better days and started looking around. Several bluepills going about their daily lives, a couple of gang members. I had no idea if they were also bluepills or exiles. I even wondered if it made a difference. My foot began tapping against the building as I watched the street traffic passing me by. There’s just something I miss about being ‘them’, just going about my day, minding my own business. Now I’m supposed to help shake down someone on a bike? I don’t know who this Morpheus person is, and I don’t give a damn. He robbed my life from me and that’s something I’ll never forgive.

I closed my eyes to recompose myself when I heard a whistle. That was our cue to get into position. I started walking towards my spot, putting my hand on my shotgun. The courier turned a corner and came face to face with a group of redpills. It was a kid; it was a damn kid. Couldn’t have been more than 15 years old and was still fresh faced with freckles. His bike came to screeching halt as Amity towered over him with his arms crossed. Kobalt was standing next to him with his coat pulled back exposing his pistol in full view. In a low voice, Kobalt began. “Listen kid, you have something that we need. Regardless of what you think of the people who employed you to carry this over to Shinjuku, it can’t reach there.” The kid started to stammer and tried backing away, but Nikko blocked the path behind him. I’ve already released the grasp on my shotgun and walked to the other side of Amity. I cleared my throat trying to sound as gentle as possible.

“Look, we just want the disk, it has some secret data that’s been leaked and if we don’t contain the leak, our bosses over at Metacortex are going to put our asses in a sling.”

The kid looked confused and unsure, “look, how much are they paying you? I can double it.”

The kid stammered, “$100 mister.”

I raised an eyebrow but reached into my pocket and pulled out my wallet. I pulled out a $500 bill. “Let me see the disk,” I commanded. The kid reached into his satchel and pulled out a black floppy disk with a fresh label on it, wasn’t even written on yet. The kid and I traded, and I held the disk in my hand in front of Captain Kobalt. “Money talks better than threats, captain.”

He grunted under his breath and grabbed the disk out of my hand and stuffed it in his coat pocket. All the sudden, all our cell phones went off. We all answered it at the same time and was greeted by Alpca’s voice, “Morpheus has been killed. Jack out immediately, Captain Niobe will contact each Zion hovercraft on the meeting location.”

[Metalogic]

Chapter 4: Darkening

The next few days was, chaotic. Normally we would be out in the tunnels for months at a time, only coming back to Zion to recharge our batteries and to resupply. I would often try to get some bread and baked goods when back in Zion, anything that resembles actual food instead of the goop that I first encountered when I was freed or forced out of my pod.
However, we were back in Zion because of the death of Morpheus at the hand of something called The Assassin. A lot of rumors and hearsay going around the last human settlement, not a lot of fact or verifiable information. The first couple of days were a haze, I just went through the motion of my job on the hovercraft and unloading, going back to my apartment in Zion. It felt like I was going through everything on Autopilot, and that’s probably a good thing.

If my hovercraft crew knew my true feeling, if anyone in Zion knew my true feeling, I would most likely be thrown into the brig. I don’t feel any sadness or sorrow from the death of Morpheus. In all honesty, I feel like he had it coming. Planting code bombs, disrupting the working of The Matrix, ruining bluepill lives…ruining my life. If The Assassin hadn’t put a bullet in his skull, someone else would’ve done it.

My mind snapped back to reality when the captain came into the mess hall. He cleared his throat, “We are approaching Broadcast Depth. Our team will be divided into two sections once we reach Church of The Disciples when we come out of the hardline at Mannsen Park. “Nikko and I will attend the service. There will be security detail around the parameter of the church. Metalogic and Amity, you two will help out with the security.” I raised my eyebrow and then just grunted. It was probably a better idea that I worked security outside of the church rather than be inside of the church.

Jacking into The Matrix is a weird sensation. You feel like you’re falling asleep, but you feel static electricity all over your body and then you “wake” up inside MegaCity. I’ve been told that MegaCity isn’t the only city within The Matrix. It was just the location of the machine’s core, the heart of The Matrix. Tonight, there was a thunderstorm at the core of The Matrix.
Heavy rain poured down on all of us as we approached the church. A security team had the front entrance on lockdown. Our hovercraft crew walked up to the team and Captain Kobalt handed them a strange looking electronic device. One of the security officers pulled out a large, crudely made PDA. The officer took the electronic device and plugged it into the PDA. He looked through the screen and then nodded to Captain Kobalt as he handed back the device. Kobalt and Nikko walked in while Amity and I were stopped at the entrance. A younger operative showed us to the back entrance. He pointed to me, “since you’re the new guy, you can work this area. Since you’re on his hovercraft, you get to babysit him” he finished, pointing towards Amity. We both nodded and made our way to the back of the church.

The Church of The Disciples is nestled into a small block within Westview, flanked by run down storefronts and apartments run by slumlords and the intercity highway system. The back of the church was right up against the slumlord’s apartment building. I found a little refugee from the rain by leaning against the back wall of the church and holding my head underneath the roof overhang. Amity took a spot right in front of a couple of dumpsters and just started monitoring our surroundings, looking left to right, and right to left.
Everything seem to be calm, so I rested my back against the walls of the church as Amity took out a cigarette pack. His gloved hands pulled a stick out, he place it in his mouth. With a movement of his hands, he had a lit cigarette in a thunderstorm. He looked at me, watching him. He shrugged, “When you free your mind, you can do almost anything,” he spoke with a Russian accent.

He leaned back against the dumpster and took another drag of his cigarette, his gun hung from the strap on his shoulder. He took a drag from his cigarette, “You know, my family lived in Soviet Russia for a long time. In a little village in Siberia. Growing up, we were taught how great the Soviet government was. We were told we lived in the greatest country on Earth. On and on it went, then the walls fell. I traveled outside of their system of control, and when I did that, I saw the truth. The horrible, ugly, naked truth. So, when I was offered the pills, the choice was easy for me. Now, I know the full truth.”

I leaned back & rest my head against the back of the church. I could feel a slight vibration of singing coming from inside the church. With a sigh, “You were offered a choice, I was forced out by the bald asshole who’s everyone is grieving for inside of that church.” In a gentler tone Amity replied, “In Russia, especially in the rural areas, we just accepted what God gave us. Call it sin, karma, whatever, it happens to us regardless and it’s our choice in how we handle it.” All I could do was give him a polite smile as we went back to our guard duty.

The service lasted for one or two hours, pretty typical church service length. Escorting everyone back to the hardlines was fairly easy. The escortee, including myself, had to put down a few exile gang members. I was told they were on the bottom rung of the exile world’s hierarchy & shouldn’t expect any retributions from more powerful programs.
My crew was the last one to leave The Matrix. That’s when I saw it. It was a mother and her children walking down the street. They were happy, the children were laughing and running. The mother had a smile on her face as she carried two bags of groceries. I walked away from my post next to the hardline.

Something just took over me as I walked back towards the church. Flashes of memories of me with my own family played before my eyes as I slowly walked towards the church. I tucked my shotgun in the holster across my back and I pulled my handgun out of my side holster. The rain has picked up, it was coming down like a shower of bullets, lightning danced across the sky of MegaCity as thunder boomed in my ears. I was soaked from head to toe by the time I entered the church, droplets of water dripping down onto the carpeted floor. The church was dark, I could only see the pews from the flashes of lighting and thunder. I slowly walked down the isle of the church, my right hand gripping my handgun. There laid before me was the casket that held Morpheus’ RSI. I rested my left hand on the closed lid, I was about to open it when I heard a familiar voice.

“Don’t do it Meta,” my captain ordered me from behind. I closed my eyes and let out a growl before dropping the handgun, I slowly turned around and held my hands up, looking directly into the eyes of my captain.

“That’s right, just come with me, and we’ll sort all of this out back at Zion.”