Post by trx on Nov 21, 2010 13:25:26 GMT -5
As TRX had not jacked in for some time, the insertion of the interface pin was a bit uncomfortable. Lyrics, having preprogrammed the interface, initiated the sequence that would send the Captain to the South Vauxton Central hard-line, a phone booth in the relatively dangerous Downtown section of the Megacity.
.
As TRX’s mind adjusted to the data feed, his avatar slowly morphed into his residual self image near the phone booth in South Vauxton. As an experienced operative he did an automatic scan of the immediate area looking for any glitches or something out of the ordinary that would indicate lurking danger. With everything looking clear, he took an equipment inventory at which point he took his cell phone and called Lyrics, “Uhmm question? Why didn’t you load the PDA I normally have in my coat? Now I can’t open my map display. You will have to direct me to the building where I need to meet Niobe.”
"It seems there has been a glitch when loading you equipment Sir, but no worries, I’ll lead you to it. Ok, I have the local map up on my data display. To your right the street dog legs to the right, there should be a parking lot on the right. There is a building facing the street and the parking lot. You will need to go around that building and into the building behind for your rendezvous.”
"Ok, thanks"
The moment TRX terminated the call; Lyrics saw activity in the code indicating there was an agent nearby. She immediately tried calling TRX back, but only got a busy tone. “Damn we are being jammed!” she exclaimed to Linotype as both operators watched the drama unfolding and willed their Captain to notice the approaching danger.
TRX unaware of the unfolding situation crossed the street when he reached the parking lot. His intention was to take the alley on the right side of the facing building in order to bypass it and arrive at the designated destination. As he walked into the alley, he was surprised to find an Agent within hand-to-hand range blocking his path. The Agent, straightened his cuff-links, and flexed his virtual muscles as he greeted TRX with “Hello, Mister Parker” before immediately attacking the surprised Zionist.
This particular agent was well know to the operatives of Zion, as Agent Brown, and while not the most formidable of the Agents arrayed against the forces of Zion he was more then able to take on and defeat the most skillful warriors Zion could field in one-to-one combat. TRX was a good fighter, but not yet in the top tier of Zion’s elite, though each time he entered the Matrix he learned a little more about manipulating the code and intensifying his attack and defense capabilities. Just as in the time Neo, an operative’s best tactic in such a one on one confrontation was to flee. The difference in the post-Neo era was the ability to “hyper-jump” that Neo had mastered and passed on was commonly in the repertoire of most operatives training after only a short time within the Matrix. For some reason, most agents had not learned this capability, so one or two successive hyper-jumps were sufficient to break a hot pursuit. The difficulty was an operative needed to gather him or herself before launching themselves into the ballistic trajectory that would quickly carry them to safety.
TRX, surprised, did not have the necessary time to launch himself to safety, but his combat instincts were still with him as he used the force of the Agents attack against him, causing Agent Brown to momentary become un-balanced giving TRX a slight temporary advantage. The Agent’s off-balance follow up punch was easily blocked setting Brown up for a powerful right-handed uppercut, known as a guard breaker move, seemingly delivered in slow motion as TRX’s heighten combat senses kicked in. Against another operative with about the same combat ability such a solid strike would be enough to give a TRX an advantage for the rest of the fight, if not down the opponent outright. Not so against this formidable adversary, never-or-less, the strike did knock Brown to the ground which was just the opening TRX needed to roll away, gather himself and leap to the roof of the building he had meant to bypass.
TRX’s landing was picture perfect and by “the Book”, the force of the landing absorbed as he went down on one knee, one fist touching the rooftop as a slight seismic wave rippled the roof structure transferring the energy of the jump to the building. The Agent had recovered quickly from the knockdown and tried to bring down the fleeing operative with his semi-automatic pistol, but to no avail. TRX, gunshots echoing in his ears, heart pounding with the adrenaline rush, quickly got his bearing and sprinted for the edge of the roof so that he could leap the 20 meters or so to the destination building. Ducking behind a roof-top shed structure containing the roof access stairwell, TRX pulled out his cell phone and contacted Lyrics as he opened the shed door and raced down the stairs.
Lyrics had not been idle as Rex was fighting for his life, She had managed to readjust the signal strength and burn through the jamming she first encountered when trying to warn her Captain. When her Captain called she was ready with the information he needed as she answered: “T, run down the stairway until you reach a brown door on the third floor, enter it, close it and then wait!"
TRX found the door half way down the stairway, entered and immediately closed it behind him while still holding his cell to his ear. Lyrics staying with Rex, told him to have a little patience and to wait for one minute. After a minute she said "Ok Sir, you lost him, the Agent has left the immediate area. Move toward the end of the hallway behind you, take the elevator to the top floor."
TRX, racing heart slowing to a normal pulse rate, walked with a firm and steady cadence down the hallway and took the elevator.
Lyrics continued providing directions "Sir, as you get out of the elevator, there will be wide doors in the middle of the big hallway, that’s where Niobe is waiting, in the office behind it."
"Thank you Operator, I’ll call you back later", TRX closed his cell phone as he walked down the big hallway, decorated with suits of medieval armor, pushed the wide doors open, and entered the office.
As he entered the room he saw Niobe standing at the big picture windows with First Mate Ghost beside her, Liaison Officer Merrit was slightly to the left nearer the corner of the room.
Niobe said, "Just in time Captain. Say, you’re eyes look like you just walked out of the wilderness".
TRX chuckled and replied, "Greetings Captain Niobe." He tipped his hat to Ghost and Merrit while saying their names.
TRX continued, "I was hardly jacked in at the central hard line, when I ran into Agent Brown in the ally on my way here.” Followed by a grin, "But I managed to let him eat my dust".
The corner of Niobe's mouth lifted a little, "Well TRX, at least you haven’t lost your skills, after five months of sitting on your ass!"
TRX moved closer to the Logos II crew, as he thought to himself, "Well, I guess I had that coming".
Niobe continued, clearly not satisfied with TRX’s long vacation "What part of the rules that state the maximum leave is three months did you not understand Captain? And not to rub your face in the dirt too much, but, this is second time you have done so."
When TRX took too long to answer, she punctuated her point by stepping into his space and piercing him with her gaze. The fact that she had to look up at him, in no way minimized the power of her presence in such close proximity as she firmly promised, "If there is a third time, you can count on Zion command to take your vessel from you, as well as your Captain status for a while. Is that understood, Rex?"
Just before answering her question TRX caught Merrit in the corner of his eyes, having a hard time not laughing at TRX, because of the expression on his face.
"Roger that Captain", he said while trying not to think of Merrit as she turned to face the window and cleared her throat. Ghost was looking at the toe of his shoe and coughed, also amused.
Niobe said with slight smile "Good! Welcome back then." as she straighten Rex's tie.
TRX now feeling a little more comfortable, responded, "Thank you Niobe. Uhmmm, I guess you didn’t get me here just to bite me did you?", as he took a cigarette and lit up with a Zippo.
Niobe sighed, "Nah. I wish that was the case Rex. I admit, I enjoy scaring you a little, but unfortunately, now that I had the fun part, we have more important business to…."
Before she could finish she was interrupted by her cell phone,
"Yes Operator? What?! Ok, give me the location of the nearest exit."
Merrit and Ghost went on instant alert hearing the tone of their Captain’s voice.
As she hung up, TRX asked Niobe what the emergency was.
"Sentinels!” she almost shouted. "Follow me! Quick!"
TRX's cigarette dropped on the floor, before he ran out the room behind the Zion elite crew and towards the stairways to quickly get to the roof. Two quick hyper-jumps allowed them to leap from building to building and then down to the street. Dodging traffic as they crossed the street, they could see the phone booth in the distance, as they sprinted to cover the distance as quickly as possible.
As they ran past the lobby of an office building, two agents ran out and took pursuit. Only Niobe’s timely warning and quick reactions had allowed them to just avoid the ambush.
They were not out of the woods yet. TRX, running at the end of the column saw that the agents needed to be delayed in order to allow the Logos II crew time to jack-out in order to defend their hovercraft from sentinel attack in the Real. As Baby Blue was not in imminent danger, the job would to fall to him. Glancing over his shoulder, he saw his chance, as the agents were running in line ahead formation. Urging his compatriots to hurry, Rex slowed slightly, allowing the agents to close the distance. Picking his moment, he planted his foot and used his forward momentum to pivot around in a 360 degree round house kick that connected with the lead agent’s chest. A devastating blow to any enemy, except for an Agent. However the laws of physics were faithfully encoded into the code of the Matrix, and the momentum of that strike was transferred to the agent who was lifted off his feet and thrown into the path of the trailing agent. The pair of agents went down in a tumble as TRX tucked and rolled and started running in a different direction in the hopes of drawing the agents away. He had executed a flawless hit and run attack. As he turned a building corner he saw Ghost, the last of the trio, disappear into thin air, jacking-out. He had accomplished his mission, but now had two agents on his tail as he headed to another nearby hard line he half remembered.
Fortunately, his operator was on the case and surmised his destination. So when the cell phone beeped and Rex answered with a shout "Get me out of here!” He was treated to Lyrics, with a pumped up, but steady voice providing precise instructions to his destination.
"Ok, hard right; backdoor in front of you; left; right; now straight; take the front door out; across the street. Around the next building on your right; Hyper-jump 11 o'clock.....Now! You’re going make it, make a left; hard line in front of you. Go! Go! Go! Don’t look back and grab the phone."
Just before TRX felt his RSI transfer into code, he saw the agents stopping their sprint, raising their guns and emptying them as fast as they could pull the triggers.
The next thing he knew he opened his eyes, back in the Baby Blue’s Broadcast Station to the sound and feeling of the pin being removed from his head.
"Phewwww... That was close" he said to Lyrics, seeing Linotype next to her with a very pale face and eyes opened wide in awe.
“Not to mention a prefect ‘Trinity style escape’, Cap” whispered Lyrics with a smile.
.
As TRX’s mind adjusted to the data feed, his avatar slowly morphed into his residual self image near the phone booth in South Vauxton. As an experienced operative he did an automatic scan of the immediate area looking for any glitches or something out of the ordinary that would indicate lurking danger. With everything looking clear, he took an equipment inventory at which point he took his cell phone and called Lyrics, “Uhmm question? Why didn’t you load the PDA I normally have in my coat? Now I can’t open my map display. You will have to direct me to the building where I need to meet Niobe.”
"It seems there has been a glitch when loading you equipment Sir, but no worries, I’ll lead you to it. Ok, I have the local map up on my data display. To your right the street dog legs to the right, there should be a parking lot on the right. There is a building facing the street and the parking lot. You will need to go around that building and into the building behind for your rendezvous.”
"Ok, thanks"
The moment TRX terminated the call; Lyrics saw activity in the code indicating there was an agent nearby. She immediately tried calling TRX back, but only got a busy tone. “Damn we are being jammed!” she exclaimed to Linotype as both operators watched the drama unfolding and willed their Captain to notice the approaching danger.
TRX unaware of the unfolding situation crossed the street when he reached the parking lot. His intention was to take the alley on the right side of the facing building in order to bypass it and arrive at the designated destination. As he walked into the alley, he was surprised to find an Agent within hand-to-hand range blocking his path. The Agent, straightened his cuff-links, and flexed his virtual muscles as he greeted TRX with “Hello, Mister Parker” before immediately attacking the surprised Zionist.
This particular agent was well know to the operatives of Zion, as Agent Brown, and while not the most formidable of the Agents arrayed against the forces of Zion he was more then able to take on and defeat the most skillful warriors Zion could field in one-to-one combat. TRX was a good fighter, but not yet in the top tier of Zion’s elite, though each time he entered the Matrix he learned a little more about manipulating the code and intensifying his attack and defense capabilities. Just as in the time Neo, an operative’s best tactic in such a one on one confrontation was to flee. The difference in the post-Neo era was the ability to “hyper-jump” that Neo had mastered and passed on was commonly in the repertoire of most operatives training after only a short time within the Matrix. For some reason, most agents had not learned this capability, so one or two successive hyper-jumps were sufficient to break a hot pursuit. The difficulty was an operative needed to gather him or herself before launching themselves into the ballistic trajectory that would quickly carry them to safety.
TRX, surprised, did not have the necessary time to launch himself to safety, but his combat instincts were still with him as he used the force of the Agents attack against him, causing Agent Brown to momentary become un-balanced giving TRX a slight temporary advantage. The Agent’s off-balance follow up punch was easily blocked setting Brown up for a powerful right-handed uppercut, known as a guard breaker move, seemingly delivered in slow motion as TRX’s heighten combat senses kicked in. Against another operative with about the same combat ability such a solid strike would be enough to give a TRX an advantage for the rest of the fight, if not down the opponent outright. Not so against this formidable adversary, never-or-less, the strike did knock Brown to the ground which was just the opening TRX needed to roll away, gather himself and leap to the roof of the building he had meant to bypass.
TRX’s landing was picture perfect and by “the Book”, the force of the landing absorbed as he went down on one knee, one fist touching the rooftop as a slight seismic wave rippled the roof structure transferring the energy of the jump to the building. The Agent had recovered quickly from the knockdown and tried to bring down the fleeing operative with his semi-automatic pistol, but to no avail. TRX, gunshots echoing in his ears, heart pounding with the adrenaline rush, quickly got his bearing and sprinted for the edge of the roof so that he could leap the 20 meters or so to the destination building. Ducking behind a roof-top shed structure containing the roof access stairwell, TRX pulled out his cell phone and contacted Lyrics as he opened the shed door and raced down the stairs.
Lyrics had not been idle as Rex was fighting for his life, She had managed to readjust the signal strength and burn through the jamming she first encountered when trying to warn her Captain. When her Captain called she was ready with the information he needed as she answered: “T, run down the stairway until you reach a brown door on the third floor, enter it, close it and then wait!"
TRX found the door half way down the stairway, entered and immediately closed it behind him while still holding his cell to his ear. Lyrics staying with Rex, told him to have a little patience and to wait for one minute. After a minute she said "Ok Sir, you lost him, the Agent has left the immediate area. Move toward the end of the hallway behind you, take the elevator to the top floor."
TRX, racing heart slowing to a normal pulse rate, walked with a firm and steady cadence down the hallway and took the elevator.
Lyrics continued providing directions "Sir, as you get out of the elevator, there will be wide doors in the middle of the big hallway, that’s where Niobe is waiting, in the office behind it."
"Thank you Operator, I’ll call you back later", TRX closed his cell phone as he walked down the big hallway, decorated with suits of medieval armor, pushed the wide doors open, and entered the office.
As he entered the room he saw Niobe standing at the big picture windows with First Mate Ghost beside her, Liaison Officer Merrit was slightly to the left nearer the corner of the room.
Niobe said, "Just in time Captain. Say, you’re eyes look like you just walked out of the wilderness".
TRX chuckled and replied, "Greetings Captain Niobe." He tipped his hat to Ghost and Merrit while saying their names.
TRX continued, "I was hardly jacked in at the central hard line, when I ran into Agent Brown in the ally on my way here.” Followed by a grin, "But I managed to let him eat my dust".
The corner of Niobe's mouth lifted a little, "Well TRX, at least you haven’t lost your skills, after five months of sitting on your ass!"
TRX moved closer to the Logos II crew, as he thought to himself, "Well, I guess I had that coming".
Niobe continued, clearly not satisfied with TRX’s long vacation "What part of the rules that state the maximum leave is three months did you not understand Captain? And not to rub your face in the dirt too much, but, this is second time you have done so."
When TRX took too long to answer, she punctuated her point by stepping into his space and piercing him with her gaze. The fact that she had to look up at him, in no way minimized the power of her presence in such close proximity as she firmly promised, "If there is a third time, you can count on Zion command to take your vessel from you, as well as your Captain status for a while. Is that understood, Rex?"
Just before answering her question TRX caught Merrit in the corner of his eyes, having a hard time not laughing at TRX, because of the expression on his face.
"Roger that Captain", he said while trying not to think of Merrit as she turned to face the window and cleared her throat. Ghost was looking at the toe of his shoe and coughed, also amused.
Niobe said with slight smile "Good! Welcome back then." as she straighten Rex's tie.
TRX now feeling a little more comfortable, responded, "Thank you Niobe. Uhmmm, I guess you didn’t get me here just to bite me did you?", as he took a cigarette and lit up with a Zippo.
Niobe sighed, "Nah. I wish that was the case Rex. I admit, I enjoy scaring you a little, but unfortunately, now that I had the fun part, we have more important business to…."
Before she could finish she was interrupted by her cell phone,
"Yes Operator? What?! Ok, give me the location of the nearest exit."
Merrit and Ghost went on instant alert hearing the tone of their Captain’s voice.
As she hung up, TRX asked Niobe what the emergency was.
"Sentinels!” she almost shouted. "Follow me! Quick!"
TRX's cigarette dropped on the floor, before he ran out the room behind the Zion elite crew and towards the stairways to quickly get to the roof. Two quick hyper-jumps allowed them to leap from building to building and then down to the street. Dodging traffic as they crossed the street, they could see the phone booth in the distance, as they sprinted to cover the distance as quickly as possible.
As they ran past the lobby of an office building, two agents ran out and took pursuit. Only Niobe’s timely warning and quick reactions had allowed them to just avoid the ambush.
They were not out of the woods yet. TRX, running at the end of the column saw that the agents needed to be delayed in order to allow the Logos II crew time to jack-out in order to defend their hovercraft from sentinel attack in the Real. As Baby Blue was not in imminent danger, the job would to fall to him. Glancing over his shoulder, he saw his chance, as the agents were running in line ahead formation. Urging his compatriots to hurry, Rex slowed slightly, allowing the agents to close the distance. Picking his moment, he planted his foot and used his forward momentum to pivot around in a 360 degree round house kick that connected with the lead agent’s chest. A devastating blow to any enemy, except for an Agent. However the laws of physics were faithfully encoded into the code of the Matrix, and the momentum of that strike was transferred to the agent who was lifted off his feet and thrown into the path of the trailing agent. The pair of agents went down in a tumble as TRX tucked and rolled and started running in a different direction in the hopes of drawing the agents away. He had executed a flawless hit and run attack. As he turned a building corner he saw Ghost, the last of the trio, disappear into thin air, jacking-out. He had accomplished his mission, but now had two agents on his tail as he headed to another nearby hard line he half remembered.
Fortunately, his operator was on the case and surmised his destination. So when the cell phone beeped and Rex answered with a shout "Get me out of here!” He was treated to Lyrics, with a pumped up, but steady voice providing precise instructions to his destination.
"Ok, hard right; backdoor in front of you; left; right; now straight; take the front door out; across the street. Around the next building on your right; Hyper-jump 11 o'clock.....Now! You’re going make it, make a left; hard line in front of you. Go! Go! Go! Don’t look back and grab the phone."
Just before TRX felt his RSI transfer into code, he saw the agents stopping their sprint, raising their guns and emptying them as fast as they could pull the triggers.
The next thing he knew he opened his eyes, back in the Baby Blue’s Broadcast Station to the sound and feeling of the pin being removed from his head.
"Phewwww... That was close" he said to Lyrics, seeing Linotype next to her with a very pale face and eyes opened wide in awe.
“Not to mention a prefect ‘Trinity style escape’, Cap” whispered Lyrics with a smile.
