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THE SUNSET
* 11 *
Agent Greene was not in the best of moods.
Exhaling in frustration, Greene applied greater leg pressure to the broad sides of his new horse to achieve greater acceleration and greater velocity... But this was all he was going to get at full gallop.
"Fuckin' rebels!" he repeated aloud.
After he was left stranded along the Mirrorbrook at the edges of the dismal Flatlands, Greene departed the plugged-in body of the useful but inconsequential horseman, and returned it to him in program-activated unconsciousness... beside his dead horse.
The closest available human body with immediate access to such a beast, had been a poorly armored horsemen who strayed drowsily beyond the border of the rural village he guarded... along the eastern edges of the Rollingridge... nearly 10 miles southeast of the fog-protected program degradation... and nearly 20 miles south of his confrontation with the rebel bikers.
But neither of these locations was his target.
Prior to his instantaneous cyber-transition from body to body, Greene initiated a preliminary trace for any rebel-hacking signals within 100 miles of the glitching degradation. While a preliminary trace offered less consistency and reliability than a detailed trace, it also provided more immediate results... and he needed to act immediately.
The rough trace revealed a faint and flickering signal point... about 2 miles south of the degradation... and on his current approach from the village, he was less than 10 miles southeast of that signal point.
Even on this new horse, Greene was less than 30 minutes away.
'Less than 30 minutes,' he noted to himself.
The signal trace could be unreliable... But this was his only clue to pinpointing and decapitating the unauthorized rebel access to the Matrix.
This was his secondary mission.
This was his target.
Their bright headlights piercing the blanketing night, Million and Threads raced southwards at full throttle along the sweeping and streaming curves of the ancient Mirrorbrook.
Million drove her rock-scuffed mud-encrusted dirt bike with the long-haired girl harnessed snugly behind her, while Threads rode his taillight-shattered bike with the boy harnessed tightly behind him.
Gripping onto her right handlebar, Commander Million used her left hand to unclip the blood-red cellphone from her hip-holster belt, hit the auto-dial button with her thumb, and bring the phone to her ear.
"Operator," replied the voice at the other end.
"Unicorn!" the red-haired commander shouted above the rush of the wind and the buzz of her bike. "We're less than ten miles from the tepee!... Tell the captain we have the kids and should be there in fifteen minutes!"
"Already told him," the senior operator replied.
"We also tried to wake them!... But they seem to be in some deep sleep!"
"Yeah, I noticed that too... I'll tell him."
"Good!... Tell him one more thing!"
"What's that?"
"We found markings on their bodies!... Marks of the Matrix!"
"Marks of the Matrix?" repeated the transmitted voice of the captain.
"That's what she said," Unicorn confirmed into his headset as he monitored Helios, Million, and Threads on his main screens.
"Interesting," Helios ruminated. "More evidence of their connection to the glitch."
Unicorn admitted, "Looks like it."
"We'll see soon enough... Thanks for the update."
"Don't mention it, Captain. We'll let you know if--"
"Shit!" Hitchhiker interrupted as his dark eyes widened before the geographical and security displays, his voice catching the attention of his senior operator beside him and his captain in the Matrix.
Both Unicorn and Helios reacted, "What is it?"
"The lead Agent is back... We just detected his code signature..."
"Shit," the senior operator breathed.
"Wait, it gets worse... He's much closer to the tepee than we anticipated..."
Captain Helios had hoped that the closest plugged-in human hosts were located at Mirrorbrook Castle... almost one-hundred miles north... But this was merely a hope. There was no way to accurately predict the presence or number of any humans who resided in or roamed into the region... especially in such an outdated virtuality... where their geographical data could be just as outdated...
Helios braced himself for the worst. "How close?"
Hitchhiker verified the distance on his displays. "Less than ten miles southeast of your location."
And Unicorn verified the time. "Dammit!... And at his current speed, that's less than thirty minutes away."
'This is the worst,' Helios thought.
To free the teenagers from the Matrix, Helios would coordinate the crucial timing of the rescue operation... But he needed Threads to trace their pill-disrupted signals to their real-world location, Million to monitor their real-time vital-sign information, and an operator on the 'Nosferatu' to relay the exit signal to their real-world location...
In less than fifteen minutes, Million and Threads would arrive with the teenagers... And in less than thirty minutes, the Agent would arrive with overwhelming wrath...
'But is fifteen minutes enough to get us all out?'
If the situation called for their best fighter -- Million -- to delay the Agent, he needed one more crewmate in the Matrix to take her place...
Helios took a deep breath and made his decision.
"Unicorn, I may need your help."
Searching for their fellow guard under the wind-tossed flames of their hand torches, the two horsemen ventured beyond the border of their modest village.
"Jacob!" the older grayer guard bellowed into the blackness. "Jacob! Where are you?"
"Jacob!" the younger larger guard echoed, following nearby. "Jacob!"
Slowing his horse, the gray rider turned to his comrade. "Are you sure this is where you last saw him?"
"Very sure," nodded the young rider. Then something caught his eye, and he pointed, "Look! His torch!"
A quick gallop carried them to the wooden object.
Leaping down from his beast, and squatting over the dirt, the large youth verified that the object was indeed a torch, probably Jacob's torch... and even though its flames were burned out, the torch was still warm.
He stood up and squinted into the darkness. "Why would he leave it behind?"
The gray rider shook his head. "I don't know..." Then his eyes sparkled, "Maybe the eyeless demons have taken his soul."
"Eyeless demons?" the youth chuckled. "Not your old fables again."
"Believe what you will... But they are not mere fables."
"I'll believe it when I-- Uhhh! UUUGGGHHH!"
Instantly, the young guard felt it... the burning pain!
"Isaac? What's wrong with-- Ahhh! AAAGGGHHH!"
Moments later, the gray guard felt it... the searing intensity!
Together, the riding comrades suffered the agony... the blinding agony that pierced every nerve... sliced every muscle... and streaked through every fiber of their spasming bodies!
And then it was gone.
Quickly transforming and commandeering the useful plugged-in bodies of the inconsequential horsemen, Agents Gray and Graham adjusted their reflective sunglasses, corded earpieces, and crisp neckties... and extinguished their hand torches with the painless grips of their bare hands.
Dropping their dead torches, Gray examined their starlit surroundings as Graham mounted his beast with negligible effort. Finally, with reins firmly in their hands, they rode northwestward towards the rebel signal point... as summoned by Agent Greene.
And left the dead torches behind.
As Captain Helios stood within the tremendous computer-constructed tepee, calibrating and confirming the accuracy of the various instruments, his black-coated form in the quiet firelight cast an eerie and enlarged shadow that wavered against the curved canvas walls.
Once again humming the tune 'Sittin' on The Dock of the Bay' to himself, he contemplated the situation... the teenagers... their strange deep sleepiness and marks of the Matrix... the Agent threat... his crew... Million, Threads, Unicorn... and his son... Hitchhiker.
And then he heard it... the buzz of motorbikes.
Immediately, on the other side of the shelter, Helios pulled and tied back the canvas entry flap, and found the distant headlights approaching at high speed.
Cutting their lights and engines, Million and Threads rolled to a stop just outside the entry flap. Too aware of their shortness on time, Million unstrapped and tossed away her midnight-black helmet.
"Sorry about the delay, Captain," she breathed, unfastening the belts that harnessed the girl and her arms around the biker's slender leather-clad waist. "That fog was a bitch to avoid."
"How are they?" Helios glanced from the girl to the boy in genuine concern.
Threads tossed away his own helmet. "Except for their little nap, they're fine." And he began to unharness the boy.
"And their marks?"
"See for yourself," Threads suggested. Dismounting from his bike, and clearing the belts aside, he quickly pulled up the dirt-stained shirt, and pointed to the vertical arrangement of emerald-green markings across the boy's chest... over the boy's heart.
As Helios bent lower and extended his fingers towards the strange marks, Million stopped him, "I wouldn't do that, Captain... I got burned by the girl's marks trying to strap her in."
Jolted by the sharp voice of his catsuited commander, Helios straightened and returned his full focus to their situation.
"Thanks, Commander," he answered then added urgently, "Come on, time is of the essence... An Agent will be here in ten minutes!"
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