The next morning, Tank knocked on the hatch to my room and I unlocked the door and opened it for him. "Good morning, Neo. Are you ready to get started?"
"No." I joked with a smile and he chuckled. "Let's do this."
Tank nodded and I followed him back to the main deck and off to the side of the group login stations to a lone chair with an operator console attached. Unlike the other one, he loaded the brain spike into me first and didn't automatically load me into the Construct. It just directly hooked me into the station he sat at.
Tank gave me a knowing look and picked up a stack of square disks. "We're supposed to start off with these operations programs that are majorly boring shit." He said and shuffled a few of the disks off into another pile for later. "Why don't we start with something a little more fun?" He asked and held up a disk and showed it to me. "Combat training."
I watched as he loaded it into a disk drive and the small screen near me showed Jujitsu. "Jujitsu? What if I already know it?"
Tank looked a little confused. "That's never happened before." He said and stood up. "Give me a minute and I'll go check."
I sat there in the barber chair and waited as he rushed off to talk to Morpheus. I thought about getting up, then remembered the giant metal spike sticking into my brain from the back and decided that now might not be the best time to try and get up and move around.
Tank ran past me again and hopped back into his chair. "He said to load you up anyway, just in case. It should reaffirm anything you might have forgotten, or if the memories you have, have faded with time."
"Fair enough." I said and he hit the load button.
After a few seconds, the information flowed into the back of my mind and it mostly matched what I had learned all those years ago in Naruto. The thing was, it was the difference between reading the manual of the technique to having a master teach it to you. They were technically the same information, except one was for learning and the other showed you how to use it.
"Remind me to fix a few things in those lessons later." I said, deciding to keep both versions for comparison, and Tank's eyebrows raised. "My teacher did tell me I was a prodigy."
Tank barked a laugh and switched out the disk. "After what Morpheus told us, I don't doubt that."
"What's next?" I asked and he loaded in Tae Kwon Do. "Wait, if each takes about ten seconds to load in and a moment for me to acclimate to them, why didn't you set this up in a queue last night? You could have started it then, I would have slept through it, and we would have been done by now."
"We don't have an autoloader or anything like that for the cartridges." Tank said with a shrug. "Each one has to be inserted and manually added."
I held in my sigh at the inefficiency. Why didn't they have it loaded up onto a virtual drive as an all-encompassing training program? It would save everyone so much time. "All right, I'll just close my eyes and relax while you do all the work."
Tank gave me a reassuring look. "Don't worry, Neo. I've done this a bunch of times."
That's kind of the point I was making, Tank. You didn't have to do it every time. I thought and closed my eyes. "If you listen to background music while you work, crank it up. I haven't had a good beat thrum through me since the club."
Tank laughed, getting both meanings of what I implied. "You got it. Some kick-ass tunes coming right up."
The soundtrack from the club began and I smiled as I started humming to it, then I felt it as Tank turned it up like I asked. He loaded in the next fighting technique disk to download into my head and I had the information ten seconds later.
"Awesome." I said and hummed some more, then the song reached a good part and I started singing the words. Maybe training wasn't going to be the long boring slog I thought it was going to be.
What I wouldn't find out until much later, was that the ship was pretty much made of solid metal scaffolding in a tube. The sound waves quickly resonated within the superstructure, bouncing everywhere, and carried it all throughout the ship into every nook and cranny.
Everyone started either humming or tapping their feet to the music as they worked. My voice reached them as well, and depending on the song, inspired them to work harder, smarter, or faster. None of them would realize how much easier things had been until the next time they worked and there was no music playing.
*
The next day, Morpheus slowly walked over to the personal training machine. He had been avoiding meeting Neo again after some of the revelations the young man had given to him the day before. It was time to face things properly, so he gently placed his hands on Tank's shoulders and half hugged him.
"How is he?" Morpheus asked.
"He's been going for 18 hours straight. Mouse took a shift doing this, too." Tank said and rubbed his eyes as he put the last cartridge in the disk drive and hit the load button. "He's a machine."
Morpheus held in his huff of a laugh at the comparison, because it was kind of close to the truth. He walked over to the chair Neo reclined in and stood there, quietly.
Neo finished the last of the operations programs and let out a sigh as he opened his eyes. He saw Morpheus standing there and smiled. "I know how to fight."
Morpheus leaned over him with a slight smile, as if he knew something Neo didn't. "Show me."
Neo was unhooked and both he and Morpheus were brought over to the main setup and loaded into the Construct, then Tank loaded in what they needed, including changing their clothes into traditional Gi.
"This is a sparring program, similar to the programmed reality of the Matrix." Morpheus said and waved at the walls that had formed around them. "It has the same basic rules... rules like gravity. What you must learn is that these rules are no different than a computer system. Some can be bent, others can be broken. Understand?"
Neo smiled and nodded.
"Then hit me..." Morpheus said with the same knowing look. "...if you can."
Neo did a few limbering stretches, as if that was needed, then took a fighting pose. Morpheus only moved gracefully and assumed a Crane-like defensive pose. Neo nodded and rushed over and tried to punch him in the face, only to be blocked and deflected. Another punch, a twist, and a backhand, were all deflected easily by Morpheus.
After another exchange of punches and deflections, Neo backed off and switched to a kicking style of fighting. Morpheus assumed a defensive pose again and waved him forward. Neo smirked and ran at him. He gave a front kick that Morpheus pushed off to the side that Neo used to spin around into a roundhouse kick that Morpheus had to duck, except he thought that a different kick would be coming next. It didn't.
Neo spun like a top and kept the spinning kick going, changing from a high kick to a low kick almost at random, forcing Morpheus to change his defensive stance to accommodate the changes. Morpheus barely avoided each strike, deflected the high ones, and had to back off twice to not be hit.
During the last spin-kick, Morpheus figured out the timing movement and stepped in, grabbed Neo's leg as it swung towards him in a high kick, and flung him across the sparring space. Neo landed with a tumble and quickly jumped up and back to his feet.
"Good! Adaption, improvisation. But your weakness... is not your technique." Morpheus said with a wag of his finger at Neo in a clear sign of no.
Neo huffed and darted back in with a swing kick, that Morpheus easily saw coming and ducked, then returned and his opponent ducked, too. Neo repeated this move again, then they exchanged kicks to the sides of the chest and then two punches each, both blocking each of the strikes, because Neo had figured out the timing of Morpheus' defences as well.
Outside the construct, Mouse ran to the mess hall and shoved the door open, startling everyone in the room when it banged against the wall. "Morpheus is fighting Neo!"
Everyone jumped to their feet and Trinity hopped over the bench seat she sat on near the door. Dozer and Apoc were on the other side of the table and ran around it to the door. Switch ignored avoiding the table and leapt over it as if it wasn't there and beat the men to the door and left the room right behind Trinity. Cypher came out of the small kitchen and chased after them.
They scrambled for a good spot, jockeying for a good view. There were only a few monitors, so they crowded around Tank to watch the epic show of their leader kicking Neo's ass, just like Morpheus had kicked their asses many times. Their eyes were wide as Neo and Morpheus exchanged blows at a faster and faster rate, because the supposed ass-kicking wasn't as one-sided as they assumed it was going to be.
Neo kicked out with a shin kick, Morpheus blocked and kicked as well, with Neo blocking it, then they did it again and again with ferocity. Morpheus changed tactics and gambled with a waist high swinging back-kick that Neo took and didn't move.
Both men grunted from the impact and Neo countered with a neck kick and then a head kick that were blurringly fast. Morpheus blocked both and went for a strong single-hand gut punch, catching Neo with an 'oof' sound and knocked him back a step.
"Nice one." Neo said and rubbed the spot, taking a moment to catch his breath, then he darted in with several quick as a flash rabbit-punches to the face and Morpheus defended three of them and grabbed the fourth as he yanked Neo off of his feet and tossed him over his shoulder.
Neo accepted the extra momentum after being thrown through the air and he landed in a roll before he came to a stop on one knee. He turned in time to face a very high jumping knee move from Morpheus. Instead of dodging like everyone thought he should, Neo rolled onto his back and kicked upwards with both feet as he pushed off of the floor with his arms, surprising Morpheus and everyone watching.
Neo's bare heels barely missed Morpheus' chin as he landed the knee move into the floor with a crunch and Neo used his own momentum as he somersaulted over Morpheus' back and landed behind him a few steps away. If Morpheus hadn't leaned back at the last second, Neo's heels would have hit and he would have lost the fight.
Neo rushed back in and he tried to punch at Morpheus' face, only for the man to grapple with it and hold it off, so he tried the other hand and punched, only for Morpheus to do the same thing, then Morpheus threw both of Neo's hands aside and did a strong double-punch to Neo's gut, only for Neo to tensed up as both fists hit and he didn't slide back this time.
"I won't fall for the same trick twice." Neo informed him and the people watching were stunned by what they had just seen.
Morpheus nodded as he backed off a little, then both men assumed fighting stances once more, only it was Morpheus that attacked first this time. But, he was cautious, darting in and back, like a crab testing the waters. He saw an opening and came in with a waist-high kick and connected, without causing damage.
Morpheus followed up with a punch that Neo deflected, then another, gave him a quick knee to the chest, and then grappled for a moment. Neo tried to grab his arm and shifted his weight to throw him, only for Morpheus to use that to his advantage, reversed the hold, and used Neo's own momentum to flip him and slammed him into the floor with a loud crash of wood, cratering it.
"Holy shit!" Mouse exclaimed. "He's not holding back!"
Neo rolled over and stood as Morpheus tried a classic leg sweep. He leapt over it and Morpheus braced his arms on the floor and gave Neo's torso a drop kick, similar to Neo's attempt earlier, only this one connected.
Neo flipped end over end as he flew across the sparring area and smashed into and through one of the support pillars, shattering it. He bounced off of the reinforced wall behind it and fell to the floor into a pile of splinters, slightly winded.
"How did I beat you?" Morpheus asked as he slowly stood. He was winded, too.
Neo sat up and took several breaths as he brushed the small bits of wood off of his Gi. "Experience, tactics, using my own inexperience against me, hundreds of hours in training simulations, and I'm new to the boosted neural connectivity I have."
"So, you understand that my being stronger and faster, has nothing to do with my muscles, in this place?" Morpheus asked and Neo nodded. "Do you think that's air you're breathing now?"
"No, it's my brain's cognitive association with temporary rest and recovery. I can actually hold my breath for a very long time." Neo responded and slowly stood up. "I just need to get used to not physically doing what I'm so used to doing physically."
Morpheus smiled slightly and nodded. "Then we reset and try again."
They spent a moment moving back to the center of the room and the two fighters took their positions again and seemed to still. After a few moments, Morpheus gained a determined look on his face and darted forward with a series of fast blurring punches that Neo blocked. Kicks were exchanged, then Morpheus concentrated on just the punches that Neo easily countered and returned. Faster and faster they went, blurring to everyone's eyes except to the two fighters.
"Jesus Christ, he's fast." Mouse said to Switch and Apoc and pointed at the indicators on the closest monitor Tank was using to record the stats and information of the fight. "Take a look at those neural kinetics. They're nearly maxed out!"
Morpheus tried everything he could to bring out Neo's mind to let it adapt to the process of using itself and not having to wait for a physical body to react to. The lag had been reduced already and it was only Neo's brain and its self-enforced limitations that were holding him back.
Punches, kicks, throws, and grapples happened almost in the blink of an eye, then Neo seemed to glitch backwards a step and then he punched forward with such force that it caught Morpheus in the chest and he was flung across the room like a ragdoll, end over end, and was going to slam into the reinforced wall without anything to stop his momentum.
"SHIT!" Neo yelled and glitched again to appear next to the wall and gently caught the flailing Morpheus.
"WHAT the FUCK was THAT?" Almost everyone watching asked.
Trinity was the only one that had stayed silent and she had a conflicted look on her face, because she didn't want it to be true. The oracle had told her a prophecy and she thought she knew who it might be, except he was becoming someone she was not attracted to in the least. Why did he have to change so much from the nice quiet brooding young man he used to be?
"I'm sorry about that, Morpheus." Neo said as his hands glowed gold and Morpheus' caved in chest expanded out and the man started breathing normally again. "I was too excited when I finally figured it out."
"What... did you... figure out?" Morpheus asked, still reeling a little from the intense pain, the spinning, and then the sudden relief.
"That it's all in the mind." Neo said, as if delivering a great philosophical revelation. "It's exactly like you said. The rules of a computer system can be bent, some can even be broken. But the mind? The only rules and limitations it has are what you want it to have. Since my mind has its own rules for things, I just had to figure out how to apply them properly."
Morpheus smiled and nodded at a job well done. "Then there's only one thing you need to show me now." He looked up at the ceiling. "Tank, load the jump program."
The people watching looked a little anxious and worried in equal measure as Tank did so. A normal cityscape loaded in around Neo and Morpheus as their clothing changed to what they would normally wear in the Matrix.
"You have to let it all go, Neo. Fear, doubt, and disbelief." Morpheus said. "It will free your mind."
Neo watched as Morpheus ran several steps and then the well-dressed black man leapt high into the air. He almost floated as he easily reached the other rooftop 60 feet away and landed with the crunch of roof tiles.
"Cool." Neo said and walked over to the edge of the building and looked down. A 60 storey building was pretty damn high, wasn't it?
"What if he makes it?" Mouse asked and bit his fingernail nervously.
"No one's ever made the first jump." Tank said and checked the readings to make sure the simulation was stable.
"I know, I know." Mouse whispered. "But, what if he does?"
"He won't." Apoc said and Cypher nodded.
Trinity remained silent, because she wasn't as hung up on this version of Neo. The blond hair and muscle look just didn't do it for her. Switch on the other hand, liked it a lot. No one else had similar hair to her platinum blonde, and Neo made her laugh as he teased Morpheus and Trinity about how they treated him. That earned him a lot of leeway in her books.
Neo didn't back off from the side of the building like they thought he would, to try and get a running jump. Instead, he stepped up onto the ledge and almost leaned out.
"He's not gonna take a dive, is he?!?" Mouse gasped.
"Idiot." Cypher said. "Just because it's a safe program, that doesn't mean he can't get hurt."
Trinity nodded and everyone watched the screens to see what Neo was going to do.
"It's called a jump program, right?" Neo asked and Morpheus nodded. "Is that the only way to get across?"
That question made everyone stop and think about it.
Neo hopped backwards and grabbed the small metal railing around the edge and pulled. It came free and he went around the entire top of the building he was on and came back with a partially twisted together rail of metal. He carefully finished twisting it and stood it up on its end, then dropped it across the distance. It almost reached the other building and fell down and down and crashed into the ground.
"That was pretty close." Neo said and went to the power wires next. He couldn't get enough of them to weave together, so he discarded that attempt.
The next thing he tried was opening the top of the elevator shaft on the building and he pulled out the long steel cable that held the elevator car in place, then he tore the elevator out of the shaft and left it attached to the cable.
Neo shocked everyone as he used it like a lasso and grappling hook and flung the elevator car across the distance to the other building. It was more than long enough to reach and the elevator slammed into the roof behind Morpheus.
"Holy shit, that's amazing!" Mouse almost shouted.
Both Switch and Dozer nodded, with Switch biting her lip as she tried to stay quiet.
"You might need someone to secure it on the other side, though. You shouldn't really trust it like it is." Neo said and yanked out the cable end in the elevator shaft beside him and tossed it off the edge. The heavy cable dragged the elevator car off of the other roof and it all fell down to the ground with a crash. "I have a few more ideas..."
"What else can he do with it?" Tank asked, which was a surprise, because he had written that program. He would know better than anyone what was available in the simulation.
"...like floating over." Neo said and lifted up off of the roof with no apparent means to cause it.
Everyone's mouths dropped open as he floated out past the edge about ten feet, then he floated backwards and landed on the edge of the roof again.
"I think that would take too long, though." Neo said with a chuckle. "So, why don't I just step across?"
Mouse fainted as the space between the two roofs shrank and disappeared as Neo took a single step and stood in front of a very shocked Morpheus. The space resumed its normal spaciness and the roofs were once again 60 feet apart.
Switch and Trinity barely kept themselves from fainting, too. Switch clung to Apoc and Cypher was surprised that Trinity clung to him. He hadn't been sure she even liked him and now she was holding onto him like he was a lifeline.
"Well, Morpheus." Neo said with a cheeky smile at the other man's shocked expression. "What else are you going to teach me?"
Dozer laughed at what their new crew member had done to shake things up and was glad he was aboard such a great ship. Things were definitely going to stay interesting with Neo around.