AN: Well, I went to my first Mets game of the season today and…they lost. I really don't like going to games when they lose. To make matters worse, it was extremely cold in the Upper Deck at Shea Stadium. All in all, not a good game! Anyway, enough about the New York Mets and on to other things. For all intents and purposes, this story is done…mostly because I'm out of song lyrics to use. Though SOME have expressed a dislike for the combination of baseball and The Matrix, I do have an actual story written about this character. Maybe it was a mistake posing this first, though. I'm not entirely sure and now I'm not sure I want to post this character's whole story. Maybe I will…maybe I won't. I haven't decided yet…but if you want, please let me know what you think. While we're on the subject of reviews, I'd like to say something. If you're going to criticize what I write, you're more than welcome to. Like I always say, I'm open to anything…good, bad, or indifferent but if you're going to leave me a negative review, perhaps you could make it a bit more constructive and a little less a display of your proficiency in the use of four letter words. Just a thought. Thanks to anyone who read this little attempt at a story and to anyone who's left me a review, thanks! Again, I'm always open to CONSTRUCTIVE CRITICISM….good, bad, or indifferent.

Disclaimer: I own nothing except the characters I made up and their Real World alter egos. I don't own The Matrix, The Animatrix, or any of that cool stuff. I'm broke and I just finished graduate school for my Master's Degree. All I own are my Pointe shoes.

"He says, "I am the greatest, that is understood,
But even I didn't know I could pitch that good!"" (From "The Greatest" by Kenny Rogers)

Wheeler looked at the black space before him, his body stiff and still. Though he was standing completely still, his insides were shaking like leaves in the wind. The young boy found that he was, physically, afraid of the darkness before him. No matter how hard he tried, no matter what he said to himself, Wheeler found that here was no way he, despite the fact he was fifteen years of age, was going to be able to force himself to step into the yawning blackness before him.

When he was little, Wheeler had never been one of those kids who was afraid of the dark. He'd never had a nightlight nor did he have fears of monsters under his bed or living in his closet or wherever else monsters lived when you were little. Even if he had been, Wheeler knew he wasn't going to say he was.

At a young age, the now fifteen year old pitcher had learned not to question his father and not to say things that were contrary to what his father wanted to believe. If he dared to say something to the contrary, all he earned was a lecture and, even at a young age, Wheeler learned he didn't like those very much. He'd heard more than his fair share of them for just asking questions about the simplest of things.

Logically speaking, Wheeler knew there was no reason to be afraid of the darkness yawning before him. He wasn't afraid of the dark. It was just another four letter word like "pain" or "outs."

Maybe it wasn't the dark, then, that the scruffy looking boy was afraid of. The only other thing he could think of was the fact he was afraid of the truth. Afraid of what he might learn when he stepped across the threshold and into the darkened room looming before him.

Taking a deep breath and letting it out, calling on the calm he used when he pitched in big games, back when he'd been "allowed" to pitch, Wheeler continued to stare at the darkness before him, ignoring the fact it seemed to be staring right through him. He'd come this far looking for the truth-- disappearing from his high school's locker room all because a strange man, calling himself Vector, promised to take him to someone who would help him find the truth --so Wheeler figured he could go a bit farther. He could muster up the courage to go forward just a bit further.

Still wearing his cleats, a fact Wheeler only now noticed since they'd just come from his relief performance, the scruffy young boy stepped over the threshold and into the dark space. The door clanged behind him as it was shut from the outside, making Wheeler jump a good ten feet in the air. There was no turning back now that much was obvious from the sound he'd just heard. The door was closed and it was too dark to find any other exit.

Actually, Wheeler wasn't exactly sure how he was supposed to find the truth while standing in a pitch black old warehouse on the outskirts of Arcadia. He couldn't find anything in the deep darkness of the building. Not knowing what the space held, whether or not there was something there that could trip him up, Wheeler stood just in front of the now closed door, eyes straining to find anything they could in the almost absolute darkness.

With the thrum of electricity, one of the overhead lights, nothing but a weak, bare bulb, buzzed to life. The light drew Wheeler's attention to the center of the room, to a small pool of light cast from the overhead light.

It was in that small pool of light that Wheeler spotted a bald, pale man sitting rather placidly in one of the two rickety looking office chairs that had been pulled into the center of the room. The chairs were set at off angles around a small table, equally rickety looking as everything else in the room. It was a cobbled together set up, built of items that Wheeler figured they-- the bald man and the two darkly clad individuals who'd brought him here -- seemed to put together from items they'd found around the rusting buildings.

"So you must be the infamous Wheeler," the bald man said, taking in the bedraggled looking young boy before him. "I've heard a great deal about you."

The bald man-- One Captain Soren --had heard about Wheeler and the misadventure the boy had had with Calyx when he was younger. Soren and his crew had been watching the boy for several weeks, making sure to pay special attention to the rare occasions when he got to pitch, and they discovered that Calyx's fears for the boy all those years earlier had been warranted. Her going to speak to the boy and get him started on the path to discover truth was a smart decision despite the fact her captain--a young woman with dirty blond hair and a foul disposition who called herself Invisigoth --had punished Calyx for it. Wheeler might not have known it then but he was more of a threat to the system than he could ever comprehend.

Well, comprehend now anyway. If he was smart and did what Soren was hoping he was going to do, then he might be able to comprehend just how big of a threat he really was. He'd be able to understand the target he'd turned himself into just by playing a sport he loved.

Wheeler looked at the bald man, not really sure what to make of him. He was shocked that he knew his hacker name anyway. As when he'd been approached by Vector in the locker room after the game, Wheeler had reminded himself that he was a very careful hacker. He never left his mark anyplace, never made messes out of things so he might be tracked. He wasn't flashy nor did he want attention. He didn't aspire to be like the infamous Trinity or anyone like that. All he wanted was information that couldn't be gotten any other way.

"I am, sir," Wheeler answered, deciding that he should, at least, be respectful about the situation he found himself in. "I mean, sir, I do call myself Wheeler."

He was well aware of the fact there wasn't much politeness might do if this Soren person was a run of the mill crazy person but Wheeler figured it couldn't hurt. There was always the chance that the rather unassuming looking person sitting before him wasn't another crazy individual. There was always the off chance that he might have been Wheeler's ticket to the truth that had been eluding him in a rather annoying way just as Elric had been to Calyx and the, maybe, the girl named Thora Elisa Ford too.

If it was true that Soren was his ticket out, well, then he figured it would probably be smart to be nice to him. There was always the chance that he could withhold the truth from the scruffy looking pitcher if he was rude about things. Besides, both his parents made sure he knew he had to be polite to everyone, at all times. It was the…gentlemanly…thing to do after all.

"We've been watching you," Soren stated. "And, I have to say, my colleagues and I are rather impressed with you and what you've managed to accomplish. I do not mean just for your exploits on the baseball field either. Though, those feats are impressive in their own right."

A cold knot of fear settled in Wheeler's stomach, making it feel as if he'd iced down his stomach instead of his shoulder. Being watched was-- and not just on the baseball diamond on the rare days he pitched were all eyes were on him anyway --not an idea that made Wheeler comfortable. There was almost something stalker like about it and that was creepy in its very own special way.

"Watching me?" Wheeler prompted, speaking more to himself than to the other man. "How? When? Where?"

"That's not your concern right now,' Soren told the boy, gesturing for him to take the seat next to his. "What is of your concern, young man is just how come I sent Vector and Binary to come collect you tonight?"

Wheeler took the offered seat, laying his bat bag, which he'd taken with him from the locker room, on the ground next to him. A thoughtful look crossed his freckle covered face as he tried to pluck out the reason why he thought he'd been fetched from his locker room, paraded through the sewers and taken to the outskirts of the town he called home.

"Vector said that he could take me to someone who knew the truth about this world and about the Matrix," Wheeler answered, his voice hushed despite the fact there seemed to be no one else around. "He told me that this person could tell me what the real truth was and how the Matrix was connected to this world."

"Vector was right," the bald man pointed out. "My name is Soren. I know your name is Wheeler or, as you put it, you call yourself Wheeler. Perhaps because that name fits you better than the one you were given at your so-called birth."

As much as the scruffy looking young man didn't like to admit it, most of what Soren had said was true. No matter how much he, initially, hadn't liked being called "Wheeler," the name was not starting to grow on him. He was finding that he was identifying himself more and more as Wheeler and less as Robert as the days went on. He knew his mother would not be pleased if she discovered that her son was identifying more with a created persona then with his actual self but she didn't know that "Wheeler," the hacker, existed.

Only a handful of people knew about that version of Wheeler. To everyone else, "Wheeler" was a baseball player. He was a former ace pitcher who'd, suddenly, been thrown into the bullpen.

"I also know," Soren continued, knocking Wheeler out of his reverie. "That you are considered to be one of the best pitchers on your team-- A singularly gifted young man among your fellow players despite the fact you hardly play anymore--but I know you also feel yourself becoming distant from your team. You feel as if you know something they don't know. Is that correct, Wheeler?"

As much as he wished he could just lie and say that this bald man was another crazy person in the world, Wheeler nodded his head. As much as he wished he could say something to counter everything Soren had said to him, Wheeler knew that the point was made. It was out there and there was nothing he could do to change that fact. What was said was said and, honestly, it was true.

Since coming to meet Reaper and, of course, Pixie and the others, he'd grown away from the baseball player he'd thought himself to be. There was more to the world than just baseball. There was something else out there and whatever that something else was-- The Matrix, he'd come to decide --it was ruining the game he loved. Though, from what he'd learned from Pixie and the others, it might not have just been baseball that was being messed with. The Matrix might have been a bit more far reaching than that. No one was ever sure since, anyone who came close to finding out, tended to disappear without a trace.

"What is it you think is the cause of that?" Soren asked, fixing Wheeler with a stare that made the fifteen year old extremely uncomfortable.

"The Matrix," he answered, speaking softly as if the Matrix was a physical thing that might hear him talking about it and take some kind of revenge on him. "I don't think they know anything about the Matrix."

"You're a rare type of person, Wheeler," Soren complimented. "There are very few people like you out there looking for the truth. Only the most exceptional people become aware of the Matrix. The rare athlete that realizes the Matrix exists does so while on the field. They wake themselves to the truth and are often punished for their…transgressions.

Giving the tired, bedraggled boy an appraising look, he added, "You are different from them because you've discovered the Matrix in another way. Though, like a rare few athletes out there, the Matrix seems to be a plaything to you."

"What do you mean? The Matrix is something that keeps tabs on all of us. It's not something that you can mess with because it's bigger than all of us," Wheeler brought up, giving Soren the theory he'd been using in the chats he'd once had with Pixie and the others.

Part of his mind wondered if Pixie was getting the same treatment from some darkly clad individual wherever she lived. He knew something was wrong with the girl that used the name Pixie. She'd openly admitted to him that she was always ill but that she'd promised her mentor-- who wasn't a great mentor but he was all she seemed to have -- she'd try her best to stay healthy until he came back to get her just like he promised he would. Wheeler hoped that her mentor made good on his promise and came back to get her.

Of course, neither of them knew just where Pixie's mentor-- or the few other hackers they'd befriended --went. Maybe they all went to the same place but neither of them were sure. They wouldn't be sure unless someone came back to tell them and that had yet to happen.

"Yes, that's true. The Matrix is something bigger than all of us," Soren told the boy. "But it is not beyond us to exert a measure of control over it and it is not beyond us to see what it is."

Pulling something out of the inside of his black jacket, Soren added, "I can show you the truth about the Matrix, Wheeler. I can give you the answer to all of the questions you have discovered thanks to Calyx taking an interest in your left arm but there in order to get such information you must first choice."

The captain placed a small metallic box on the table that had been ignored the entire length of their conversation. A table that had a tall but dusty looking glass of water on it, though Wheeler had just noticed the water to tell the truth. With a deft motion of his hand, the man opened the metallic box to reveal what Wheeler thought were a blue and a red gel capsule. Maybe a pill or candy of some kind. The scruffy blond boy couldn't be totally sure.

"Taking the blue pill will end this meeting here and now," Soren informed the boy. "You will not remember me nor will you remember any of the events that have taken place tonight. Tomorrow morning, you will wake up and life will be as it once was."

Not pausing to allow the boy a moment to think, the suit clad man continued, "Taking the red pill will show you the truth. You'll learn what few others with your start have ever had the opportunity to learn."

Looking from the two pills to the bald headed man, Wheeler asked, "There's a catch, isn't there?"

Soren laughed and nodded his head. Despite the fact the scruffy looking boy was a baseball player; he was far from the atypical "jock." Behind all of his baseball skills, he was intelligent. There was more to him than just his baseball skills.

"There is indeed a catch,' Soren confirmed."If you want to know the truth, you must be willing to give up everything you know now. Once you see what's beyond the borders of this world, you will not be able to return to the life you knew."

Wheeler had already decided that he wanted to know the truth, whatever the price it was. Going with Vector, leaving his family behind as they waited for him in the parking lot of the school, was enough to make him realize that he wanted to know the truth. Being Robert, being what his father wanted him to be, wasn't the life he wanted. Wheeler had always wanted to play professional baseball but he didn't want to follow the path his father had set down for him. He didn't want to ruin the dignity of the sport he played by taking something to help him play better.

Maybe, then, it was time for Wheeler to make his own choices. Take the path less traveled and, instead of going with his skills on the baseball diamond, go with his recently developed skills with the computer.

Talking the red pill out of the box, Wheeler swallowed the gel capsule and washed it down with a gulp of the water from the dusty glass. When something didn't happen right away, Wheeler turned his bright hazel gaze over to Soren. A question danced in the bright hazel depths, a wanting to know what was supposed to happen next.

"Come with me," the bald man told Wheeler, watching the boy get up and stumble over his feet, still clad in their cleats.

It would be a long time before Wheeler ever picked up a baseball again and even longer before he had the courage to throw it. For now, all that mattered was the truth.