A Blacker Shade of White
By Dylan

HEY PEOPLES! LOOK WHO'S BACK! Isn't this amazing? I finally pulled myself together to write the first chapter of the sequel. And I'm posting it on my BIRTHDAY. That makes me extra awesome, just so you know. Haha.

Most Important Thing EVER: Do NOT read this unless you've read Third Variable first. Well... you can try. But I can promise you with a hundred percent of my soul that you will NOT understand a THING. Honestly. The original fic was confusing enough on its own; trying to read the sequel without the background information will be just impossible.

Third Variable can be found under my ffnet profile. If you have any desire to read this fic, read Third Variable first.

Disclaimer: I own Helen and Hexen. Everything else is property of and copyrighted to the Wachowskis and Warner Brothers.

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My eyes jolted open, and I pulled for a gasp of air. The light, the complete and surrounding whiteness burned my vision. I could see nothing but white. Shining, bright, flawless white.

Had I died? Was I in Heaven? What else could be this white, this pure? And why didn't I feel any pain?

I realized that I was flat on my back and pulled myself into a sitting position, still staring at the ever-present white. It seemed to go on forever—I could make no distinction between floor and wall, wall and ceiling, ceiling and open space. Hadn't I moments ago been plummeting from the roof of a hundred-something story building? Falling... with her.

"About time," a voice I knew far too well caught my attention, and I spun my head around to face her. There stood Hexen, standing a mere five feet from my back. Before I even felt myself doing it, I was on my feet and glaring at her.

"What's going on?" I demanded. "Where am I? Where's Two?"

She smirked. "You pathetic, stupid little girl. Why would I give you any answers?"

"Where am I?" I repeated forcefully. "How did I get here? Where did everyone else go?"

"They are outside," Hexen replied smugly. "They aren't here to help you this time."

"Outside? Outside of what?" I eyed her cautiously.

She gave a barely-audible snort at my question.

"Outside of you." She spoke, approaching me with fire in her eyes.

"What do you mean?" I backed up, "Explain!"

"You haven't figured it out by now?" My clone gave a full-fledged laugh, her mouth twisting evilly. I said nothing in reply. "We are in your mind," she leaned in close to me to whisper sardonically. "The program construct that is your brain."

"This is my brain?" I pulled back to shoot the question at her. She laughed again.

"Yes. Quite empty, isn't it?"

I glared at her, an angry heat rising in my body.

"This is your mind's construct," Hexen stated coolly. "Program construct."

"So I only have this empty space because I'm part program?" I asked cautiously. Hexen rolled her eyes.

"Must I hand-feed every scrap of information to you?" Her voice was aggravated.

"I believe you're going to have to until I understand," I spat back.

"You don't need to understand, half-breed filth!"

"Whore!" I shouted back.

"You'll pay for that, you digital mutt!" Hexen threatened, lunging at me. My first instinct was to throw myself backwards, which I did with much more ease that I thought plausible. Without controlling my actions I rebounded off my palms in a handspring, landing smoothly on my feet. My eyes widened. How had I managed that? Luckily I had dodged Hexen's charge, and she now kneeled on the ground behind me.

"What now?" I asked her. "We fight until one of us dies here, inside my program mind?"

"Finally, you figured something out yourself for once." She smirked at me from the floor. Next thing I knew she attacked me again, and again my body responded before my mind could: out of sheer reflex I had jumped in the air and kicked her around the head. She countered and swung at me, but for some reason my fighting skills had elevated to rival Trinity's, and I dodged.

We broke apart, both of us with looks of surprise on our faces and both for the same reason—how and when had I developed these skills? A sudden dawning of realization flickered in her eyes, but briefly. I frowned; she knew something I didn't.

"You've learned quickly, haven't you, mongrel?"

Having no lashing comeback, I bit my tongue and stayed silent, praying she would tell me more information. We simply stood there, ten feet apart, waiting for the other to strike. I furrowed my eyebrows at her curiously. Why wasn't she attacking me anymore?

"Well come on then!" I provoked her. Why shouldn't I? There was nowhere to go, no one to help me, and nothing else to do until one of us was dead. Then again, it probably wouldn't be that exciting after the battle, anyway. An eternity in an empty white purgatory inside my own mind.

"You want me? Come and get me!" I shouted, unnecessarily loud.

Hexen eyed me shiftily. She was mulling something over, I could tell. I didn't understand—was it because I spontaneously knew how to fight? Had I scared her? Again, she knew something I didn't and it was driving me mad.

She peered into my eyes, and suddenly a sadistic grin curled its way around her face. I fought to keep my face neutral, though the task was becoming increasingly difficult.

"She does not realize... she does not know!" Hexen spoke, more to herself than to me. I was reminded strongly of Gollum from Lord of the Rings, and it creeped me out. Suddenly she lunged at me, aiming a kick at my skull, and I instinctively blocked her with my arm. Again, this surprised me. How did I know how to fight? And how the hell had it overridden an instinct as basic as "do not voluntarily stick body parts out in the path of an oncoming attacker"?

Hexen frowned at me once more as she jumped in the air, attempting to knock me over with a spinning kick. I launched backwards into another handspring and crouched on the ground, waiting for her next attack. To my complete amazement, she stopped directly in mid-air and turned upside down. I already knew that Hexen could fly, but what was most astonishing was the fact that her hair still fell down across her shoulders, as if she truly was right-side up at that angle. My mouth must have been gaping, for she gave me a scornful and arrogant look.

"I'm sure you didn't realize this either, did you?" she hissed, walking towards me. I scrambled to my feet.

"What, that you use too much fucking hair gel?"

With a cry of anger she lashed out at me, and for several seconds my mind whirred as my body reacted independently, fighting her off. I blocked every punch and kick she threw at me. I didn't even have to tell myself to. What was up with this?

"How could someone as stupid as you feel like she's worthy of such a position?" Hexen sneered, now standing sideways. I blinked. Sideways?

"I don't think I'm 'worthy' of anything, but I know that you're worthy of less."

She attacked me once more, jumping through the air and landing on the empty space as if it were a solid platform. I leapt backwards for what seemed the millionth time to dodge her attacks.

"How are you doing that?" I asked finally, and she smirked.

"Doing what, half-breed?"

"Standing in mid-air!" I shrieked with frustration and was met with an arrogant chuckle.

"Air? There is no air here. It's a construct."

"Explain."

"Why should I?"

"It'll make the fight more interesting." I spat, my words burned with hatred.

She looked amused. "Fine. You can move through the space because you believe you can. You don't fall through the bottom because you believe you won't. Gravity only applies to you because you expect it to. But if you believe that this—" she stepped up about a foot or so, resting perfectly naturally in space, "—is the floor, then it is. You can move anywhere, at any angle. There is no gravity. There is no starting point. Look around you. It's blank space! It was your mind that told you that what you're standing on now is the floor. You are limited only by your pathetic, rule-driven human brain."

My eyes widened. She was right, wasn't she? There was nothing but white here; no distinction between the floors or the walls or the ceilings... but in truth, none of those were present. My expectations of having walls, floors, and ceiling present were the only things that kept my body locked here. This was empty space. Anything could be walked through, while at the same time anything could be stood on. It was only what my mind told it to be. Hell, this place was my mind!

"There," spoke my clone, "that will make this a little more eventful, won't it?"

"Quite."

Again we lunged at each other, fists and boots flying. I rebounded off the 'air' as we whirred through a dizzying array of summersaults and martial arts. By the time we broke apart, I had no idea which direction had been up to begin with, but it didn't matter. Finally, Hexen struck me across the face, her sharp nails leaving a short trail of blood under my eye. It was then that the real amazement hit me: under her own eye, Hexen sported the exact same wound.

What the hell...?

Hexen's expression burned with contempt as she saw I was beginning to understand. Slowly I raised a finger to my face, never keeping my eyes off of her, and dragged a painful and bleeding line with my nail down the side of my cheek. I watched as the exact same cut appeared on her face, though she had made no move to touch her own skin. I almost laughed.

"You can't kill me," I smirked. "You've become a part of me."

I was a virus, and I had enveloped her.

"Bitch!" she hissed, lunging forward for my throat. I defended myself with a kick, and heard the sickening crack as her nose broke. I watched her, the blood gushing from her face as she glared in hatred, and I raised my hand up to my own nose. It was perfect. She replicated my pain, and yet I didn't replicate hers. Now I understood why she, the most perfectly engineered being in the history of the Matrix, had reason to be apprehensive of me, and why my ignorance had been a source of strength for her.

"You can't win," I taunted her, reveling in my discovery. "It's impossible."

"Perhaps." Her eyes, my eyes, stared me down in hatred as she whispered threateningly. "But you will never, ever be rid of me."

I gulped, a shudder running down my spine. What did she mean by that? Why did everybody in this damn world have to be so cryptic? What was she planning? But more prevalent... what could I do to stop her?

"You are limited only by your pathetic, rule-driven human brain."

This was my mind...

It was only what my mind told it to be.

This was my mind. Mine.

"You!" I wheeled on her. "This is my mind. Get out! Get out!"

A flicker of some unknown emotion passed across her face before she smiled wickedly. "And what makes you think I'll obey?"

"Because this is my mind." I frowned. "You have no power here!"

"Says who? You said it yourself – I've become a part of you."

"You are a parasite." I spat in fury, my brown curls being tossed around my pale face by the sheer momentum of my speech. "I am dominant here."

"How do you know?" She walked as she spoke, and once more we began to circle one another. Our identical green eyes locked, neither of us ever faltering.

"For all you know," she continued, "I may have already overtaken your system. I'm that powerful."

"You are a program. I'm only half. You can't control the human side of me, no matter how hard you try." I smirked. For all the put-downs given to humanity, it was being at least partially human that had saved me from her infection. One of those mystical end-of-the-movie scenarios, I guessed. But this was not the end of anything.

"But you are falling." Her voice shook with suppressed laughter. "You are being overcome. Every second that you love him the virus replicates inside you. Soon you will have nothing left of the self you used to know. As of now we are linked. You shall be mine. You would never give it up."

"We are linked." I repeated with a fair amount of skepticism. After all the dialogue that had been thrown back and forth, this was too melodramatic for me to swallow. "Well that's my job, isn't it? I kinda expected something more convoluted from you. You don't have anything to say about the mystical 'Sands of Time' or whatever? Isn't that the kind of bullshit you're supposed to keep spewing at me? Stuff about fate, maybe? I'm sick of it."

"Your job, " she taunted, "is to get rid of me. And it looks as if you're failing, doesn't it?"

"Get rid of you..." I breathed, sudden thoughts rising to the front of my mind.

This Helen girl will be able to stop her?

The basic coding of both Helen and her Merovingian clone are exactly the same, and because she is the link Helen is able to absorb programs with coding that matches hers.

Once that code is absorbed it can be sent back to the Source.

That was what I needed to do, wasn't it? Absorb her. But... how the hell was I supposed to do that? Honestly. Was I supposed to latch onto her and start sucking at her skin like a goddamn leech? It was ridiculous. And Morpheus had had faith that I would know how to do this? What was he smoking?

"I love it when you're confused," Hexen cackled devilishly. "It makes it all that much easier."

"Oh, and I assume that you know exactly what I'm supposed to do?" I shot back.

"I know enough."

"Then you should know that I possess the ability to kill you. I just... don't know how to yet." My hard exterior faltered for a second as I let that second sentence slip. I winced momentarily at my own stupidity.

"Exactly the reason I'm not running for my life." Her entire body radiated sarcasm, and I felt a blush sneak its way up into my cheeks. I closed my eyes, trying to make her disappear. I knew it was a stupid idea, as she could attack me while I wasn't looking. But I didn't care. Maybe if I just willed her away, she'd disappear, or I'd wake up and this would all be over.

Opening my eyes, I was met with the most surprising sight. There she stood, completely frozen in place, her face an expression of surprise and slight fear. My eyes widened. What? Was... was this it? All I had to do was close my eyes and will her away? It seemed way too anti-climactic, to be honest. Then suddenly, she smiled.

"So, you've figured it out, have you? It's not exactly the achievement you were expecting it to be. Even so, it's not your triumph. You're going to be faced with a choice, Helen. Once you've taken me completely into yourself, you can send my code back to the Source and kill me. In the time it would take you to do that, however, the virus will have replicated itself inside you completely. It will kill your human body outside the Matrix. You will be a program forever, and you will never be allowed to leave."

"Why would that matter to me?" I blinked.

"It is the quest of all rebel humans to destroy the Matrix. If they accomplished this, you and your twins would both perish. You will be betrayed by the humans you trusted, Helen. It is inevitable."

I frowned. "No. You're just trying to confuse and trick me. I don't care what you say. I know what I have to do." In reality, however, I wasn't nearly as confident as I sounded. What was she talking about? She couldn't be right... could she?

I wouldn't listen to her. I just wouldn't.

"What else are you willing to sacrifice for the war?" She whispered, and I shivered. There was a quality of pure evil in her voice; nothing like that had ever existed within me. I swallowed.

"Everything, bitch."

I closed my eyes, concentrating wholly on bringing her into myself, to become one with her and absorb her being into mine. I could feel it. She was being drawn into me. It was working! It was working! And then... we were whole.

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