Disclaimer: I don't own The Matrix, though I still say that the Wachowskis stole my idea. I'd always wanted to write this story where someone found out that the world was actually just some virtual reality thing created by a bunch of bored scientists, after a glitch in the system caused the programme to go crazy and reveal the truth to him... It's not exactly like the Matrix, but it's close enough for people to accuse me for plagiarism if I ever write it.

Oh well. I'll settle for fanfic.

THERE IS NO CAFFEINE

This night was different, somehow.

The past few days all seemed one long blur - events happening one after another without a break like some fast-paced action movie. But now, it was as though time had suddenly stopped. Neo lay on his bed in the darkness, listening to the quiet hum of the Nebuchadnezzar's engines and vaguely hoping that the storage compartment hanging over his bed would not decide to fall on him.

If you fall on me, I'll bash you, he thought darkly. And I know kung fu, so I can probably bash you pretty hard. Neo gave the wire frame of the storage compartment a warning look, and then wondered why he even bothered.

He rolled over in bed and stared at the metal wall, stained here and there with bits of grime, rust, and who knew what else. Neo didn't feel all too comfortable staring so intently at it, so he rolled back over and tried once more to fall asleep.

He'd spent the better half of that day flying around inside the Matrix and freaking out the occasional person who might spot him. Sometime later, he had gone to get himself a cup of coffee from Starbucks for no apparent reason other than the fact that he missed the beverage. So what if it wasn't actually real? The taste of the drink was good enough for him. In fact, it had been so good that he'd bought another cup.

Unfortunately, Neo had overlooked one of the more common side effects of consuming too much caffeine. Somehow he'd never thought that it would be an issue, what with the coffee not being real and all that.

The mind makes it real, Morpheus had once said to him what, a week or two ago? It felt more like only two hours.

The mind makes it real. For some reason, Neo had always thought that that only applied to injuries, death, and that sort of thing.

Apparently, though, that wasn't the case.

So here he was now, suffering from insomnia because of too much digital-coffee-derived imaginary caffeine in his system. It was kind of pathetic, when he came to think of it.

Neo closed his eyes. "There is no caffeine," he thought aloud, waited a few seconds to let the words sink in, then opened his eyes again. It didn't seem to be working. He swore under his breath.

Maybe it would help if he walked around a little. Getting off the bed, Neo left his room and turned right into the dimly lit corridor, running his fingers lightly against the wall. That soon turned out to be a mistake - the walls were kind of greasy.

Several seconds later, Neo entered the mess hall, illuminated at this time by a single light near the food dispensers. Ah, the wonderful food dispensers that dispensed the nutritious glop which the crew of the Nebuchadnezzar had to eat three meals a day, twenty-four seven.

The mess hall was empty and devoid of any life forms, humans or otherwise. That was, unless you were one of those people who believed the rumours that the aforementioned nutritious glop had a mind of its own and came alive at night.

Neo missed real food. Then he realised that he'd never actually had real food before. Until he was unplugged, he had been just another one of the many billions of humans jacked into the Matrix - living off nutrients fed through tubes, with the occasional dead guy thrown into the mix. But at least he hadn't known back then that the slice of pepperoni pizza he was eating technically didn't exist and was merely an artificial construct of the Matrix.

Ignorance was bliss. Neo wondered what a real Big Mac would taste like. Two flame-grilled patties, lettuce, tomatoes, cheese, on a sesame seed bun... Oh great. Now he was hungry, and save for the possibly alive stuff in the food dispenser - which was a rather unappetising option - there wasn't anything to eat.

Neo left the mess hall and went back to his room. He might as well just lie down, even if he couldn't sleep. Besides, there was nowhere else to go. The main deck of the ship was still a complete mess, the result of the sentinel attack the day before. If he were to go up there, the chances of him tripping over a robotic tentacle and seriously injuring himself were relatively high.

Back in his room, on his bed, staring at the ceiling and wondering what his life had got to.

He didn't want to be The One, not really; didn't want to know to that so many people were depending on him to do something he didn't know much about. At any moment, he felt as if something would happen and he'd be exposed as a fraud... just like the so many potentials Morpheus had picked up before him who turned out not to be the real deal. Sure, so he'd defeated several agents that past week - something no one else before him had been able to do - and he'd sort of come back from the dead too - but what if all that had just been flukes? Improbable, but the possibility was still there.

What had he done to deserve all this, anyway? What made him so special? Back then in his life in the Matrix, he was just a normal guy - Thomas A. Anderson, employee of a respectable software company by day, computer hacker by night. He'd spent most of his life trying to escape from it all, always feeling that there was something else beyond the world he knew.

And now he was here, and things weren't much better.

Sometimes he envied all those people still plugged into the Matrix, blissfully oblivious about anything and everything that happened in the real world. They went about their normal, routine lives day after day, year after year, completely ignorant of the fact that all around their physical selves, a huge war was being waged between the free humans and their AI creations.

Yet Neo had the feeling that quite a few of those plugged-in people would give anything to be in his position now. The chance to escape from all they knew just like that: no more work, no more school, no more stress... who wouldn't want it?

The grass was always greener on the other side.

It struck him that he'd never actually seen grass before. Down here on the Nebuchadnezzar, travelling through the sewers, there wasn't a single green blade to be seen. There were probably none in the underground city of Zion either, unless some people grew plants of their own.

Nature. Neo had never really realised it before, but that was what was most lacking in the real world. The surface above, dotted with the last vestiges of humanity: crumbled buildings, now deserted, scattered under the blackened sky. Somewhere above the clouds, perhaps the sun still shone... but its rays would never penetrate far enough for green life to start again. And somewhere, the machines waited, waited for the day when they would finally overthrow the last of their creators, the humans. The humans who were relying on Neo to save them.

He didn't want to think about that now. Eventually, the time would come when he'd have to, but not yet. Not now.

Neo rolled over in bed again, mentally cursing the day's coffee indulgence whose effects were starting to drive him crazy. Right, he thought to himself, firmly pushing away all distractions from his mind. Concentrate. Step one: close eyes. Step two: try to sleep. There is no caffeine...

He managed to fall asleep eventually, only to be rudely awakened a mere two hours later to discover that it was already morning.

It just wasn't fair.

THE END

Review? ;P