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By the end of his second centicycle of solid maximal output, Clu was officially reaching his limits. His processing speed had slipped 4 percent, and was steadily dropping as he neared the Tower, and though there was still so much to do between cancelling great swathes of Flynn’s “pet projects” so that resources could shift primary focus onto the needs of the desperately overtaxed System, and a stack of requests in his inbox, Clu gave notification that he was in need of a little downtime.
True, he wasn’t yet to the point of needing to do a full reboot, and defrag, but…downtime. A little bit of quiet, long enough to let his self repair functions run. To that end, he allowed only three programs accompany him on board the Recognizer, and quietly pilot it back to the Tower’s landing platform. Two were sentries ( Ourin and Jay, part of Clu’s newly appointed Black Guard ) and the last…was still listed as [undefined] on his System tag.
It was true, though. Tron couldn’t exactly be called ‘Tron’ anymore, because the program standing silently beside Clu as the Recognizer circled once, then touched down with a groan of locking mechanism simply had too many new variables, and functions to be called the same ‘Tron’ that was installed with the Grid when it was new. The ‘Tron’ of Clu’s earliest memory files was even more different; he at least attempted some form of output above simple automation. But with time, and the surgical, soulless genius of Bradley paring away at the program, Tron became little more than the User’s pet hunter. He stopped speaking, stopped interacting, and the only output he gave back at all was little better than broadcast, and only a succinct response to a request.
As Clu considered the quiet program that had been his shadow for the last centicycle, he thought he could see something in the program’s eyes. Something…well…alive, for lack of a better term. This program did not hunch down as much, did not have the dead stare of a half-compiled automaton. His eyes looked around, seemed to see, and be aware of much more. Recently he had even started speaking without the need for a verbal prompt, too. But most important of all? This program had displayed none of the tagged warning signs that Tron had in the millicycle after his capture.
As Clu exited the docked Recognizer, he did note that Ourin, and Jay fell in behind this silent [undefined] still with a watchful air, but…less fear. Clu couldn’t help feeling a sense of hopeful satisfaction at it – but promptly squashed the sensation before it could fully process. Too much was too uncertain, and he couldn’t afford to get reckless just because he felt ragged with frustration.
After simply closing his office after his shadow, Clu left instructions with Jarvis to give him until next shift for downtime ( which the taskmanager seemed strangely relieved about ) and circled around the edge of his desk with a flask of negating calibration script he’d tweaked himself. It mixed nicely with a tall glass of undiluted energy, and to be perfectly honest? Clu felt he had earned himself the stiff drink.
“…Want some?” he asked, and absently pushed a second glass of the exact same thing toward the quiet program. He didn’t wait for a response ( the program would take it, or he wouldn’t ) only sat in his desk chair with a long sigh, and sipped at his drink.
Obviously, Clu did intend to make good use of this break, but in his own way. Still, the surprise he had stored safely away could wait another micro, or two.
ALL ICONS ARE WRONG. Forever. |D
Date: 2012-09-15 06:37 pm (UTC)From:There were a lot of variables.
And the admin was speaking. And offering. Speech always processed easily, even past the linear demands of [command]/[call]/[dismissal]. Vocal direction was clear, and even if it didn't always match the meaning underneath, Tron knew what to do with words. The offer was harder. Attention reset to the glass. Fifty nanos in consideration. A hundred. Then the helmet split, folded away to grey-blue eyes and an uncertain frown. A reach for the liquid, and the program took his own short sip.
He was getting better at this.
Blue-white circuits brightened fractionally with the intake, but power reserves were well within acceptable ranges already. The script was interesting, though. Flavor spiked as it ran, a minute prickling through background processes. He wasn't sure he liked it.
Stare flicked to the admin. Down to the admin, and the program shifted faintly as he cancelled the automatic urge to draw inwards. Shoulders in, head lowered, spine curved—default output, but the admin never looked for default. For all that they shared a face, Clu wasn't much similar to the user that wrote him. And even less to Tron's programmer, despite having taken the role.
He took another sip, and eyes returned to the liquid, brow furrowing slightly. "New."
Re: ALL ICONS ARE WRONG. Forever. |D
Date: 2012-09-16 06:00 am (UTC)From:Clu still grinned, and nodded.
"Yeah. It's a negating script - should clear processing load by about 12 percent. Well, for me, anyway. No tests to support the figures on anyone else."
Clu also was perfectly aware that he both required, and retained a larger charge than a broad spectrum of the Grid, and as such? Could drink any program under the table, and process it all without a single glitch.
On that note, as well, he knocked back the rest of his glass in two swallows, enjoying the pleasant buzz in his circuits, and the minor sharpening of his processing.
The glow of hundred of thousands of smaller lights at street level drew his attention, and Clu swiveled his chair enough to look out the transparent wall that wrapped around three quarters of his office. Bandwidth traffic was moving steadily, lights racing by fast enough to blend into long ribbons that stretched away across the central plate of the city. Absently, he turned the empty glass in the fingers of the one hand he left resting on his desk.
"...Hard to believe how much it's grown." He commented, eyes seeking out the growing warm shades of orange creeping in hexes, and shifts across the dominant blue of the city's lights.
"Another cycle, and I'm wondering if we'll be able to see the white lights of the ISO's trading post from here.
Well...unless all my projections are rendered moot, that is."
Clu, privately, still had concerns about the strange, System-spawned programs. And Radia's supremacist ideas supported by Flynn's indulgences were causing a fair amount of strife between the ISO's factions, as well as the ISO and Basic population. But, having seen several ISO marked faces wearing Insurgent-orange of their own choice earlier this millicycle, Clu couldn't quite shove another optimistic surge of pride down.
"If Giles has his way, he'd end up inciting a riot in downtown alpha sector, just for the pleasure of throwing more trash at me." Clu added with a frown. That was another incident from the previous centicycle that was keeping Clu's cautious skepticism alive, and well. Granted, it was nearly impossible to tell who the exact culprit was in tossing a jug of over-processed energy sludge at Clu, and his guards during an energy plant inspection, but Clu had no doubts that it was a sentiment shared by many programs. Since the order that Basics could no longer work in energy distribution was overturned, and several key programs were reinstated, tensions had been more openly directed at the sysadmin than ever.
Leaning his head back against his headrest, Clu watched the glitter of his city for another beat, then muttered with a definite touch of bitterness; "The better things get, the more they keep trying to push us back toward open conflict."
Radia would have let the Grid cascade-fail around her as long as she got to see it from my glitching office.
Closing his eyes, briefly, Clu pushed the thought aside, and refocused on his quiet companion. Change of vectors was definitely needed, here, and to that end, Clu sighed, and pushed himself back towards his desk.
"Ah, don't mind me. It's been a long shift."
Tapping his own personal ID in, one of the storage slots built into the floor flared with an outlined square of yellow light, and Clu stood. As he closed the four paces between his desk, and the compiling square, a tall, rectangular lectern rose up out of it. A single bar of gold ran right up the middle. Clu approached it, and laid his hand against the blank, seamless top, and a second bar of gold light bisected the flat surface. Clu glanced over his shoulder, and gestured the quiet program over.
"C'mere. I've got something I want to show you."
no subject
Date: 2012-09-17 03:59 am (UTC)From:A solid quarter-micro of sharp/sparking processes later, the admin's quiet remark drew attention external. Stare came up, flicked between the yellow-lit shape and the city spread out past him in display. Not hard to guess what the reference was to. Or what the admin was watching. The other program's focus was drawn to the same expansion: new lights, insurgent-orange, spreading, irregular and uneven, throughout the user-blue system.
Tron just tagged them a threat.
The admin had turned away. Maybe that was what let the conflict build, source-deep unease drawing painfully across the program's face. Or maybe it was inevitable. The constant pressure of directive unfulfilled, definition and obedience blocked and halted. And something else. Something new.
It wasn't as if Tron hadn't tried. He fought—fought for the users. And when the users left, he hadn't stopped. It was simple. He'd been simple. Command, process, and execution, all a single line of output. He would execute his function, execute them. Almost amusing (if he'd remembered how to laugh) that they thought they could contain him. Tron could be patient. One slip, one error—one chance to step outside his cage, and he could output as required. Purge the system.
That was over a cycle ago.
Now he stared at the growing spread of orange lights, the yellow form (turned away) between him and them, and he wanted to scream, and he wanted to fight, and he wanted to stop. He wanted, and the program wasn't sure if that scared him more or less than the uncertainty in what. Easy to run the projections. The pre-glitched blank they'd given him for a disk wouldn't charge enough for derezz, but he had never needed a weapon to carry out his tasks before. Just get past, just make it to the window, and the streets, and he could arm himself. Get to work.
[Fight for the users.]
Tron had to (had to had to) and it hurt.
A fragile shift of touch-sensation, and the program glanced down. His hand was clenched, rigid and shaking, around the forgotten glass, a hair-thin crack edging down the side. A moment staring, numb and cold. Then he set it down. Looked back to—to Clu.
Still talking. But Clu had always talked, well before the program logged any meaning from the statements. About the system, and the ISOs. About Flynn, and users, never mind the code-deep bias in his audience. Not the first time the user's enforcer had been spoken at without expectation of return. But Clu wasn't a user, and he'd given Tron a voice, and more. The program still wasn't sure what for.
He still listened. Expression shifted with open dislike at the referenced energy incident. He'd been there for that. More reasons why this reworked system was so very glitched. Separate factions, known threats still running and active. If the users had been in Clu's place, he'd have been sent to handle those responsible—quickly, efficiently, and painfully. 'The better things get, the more they keep trying to push us back toward open conflict.' The program kept his disbelief internal, but of course 'they' would. The solution was to delete the problems, keep things under control. Clu was just bad at removing variables.
Obviously.
Attention registered, clear and sharp, and he glanced up to meet the other's suddenly fixed gaze. No direct input, so he watched, if curiously, as the admin keyed in his access, made his way toward the storage unit. Instruction came a moment later, got a fractional lag before the blue-white program approached.
no subject
Date: 2012-09-17 06:43 am (UTC)From:Clu had been working for some time on puzzling out how to rebuild this particular program from simple automation, into...well, a processing, thinking, fully compiled individual. They may be both Basics, here, but despite the User's opinions on the subject, Basics were not mindless.
As unlikely as the source was, the young program, Jalen, had once said 'the data is the execution path'. A program's code determined who they were, but moreso the input. Therefore Basics were just as valid, and useful as ISO's. Clu believed that right down to his root code, and no amount of Flynn's acidic jokes about Clu being a tool would change it.
As the [undefined] approached, Clu lifted first Tron's disk...and then a second from the storage container; one held in each hand.
With an enigmatic little smile, he let the program get a good look at both. The heavier, original disk activated, and displayed a 3D floating representation of Tron's code. Nothing more than the root directory, but call it a good sense of timing, and tact on Clu's part that prompts it.
"Now this? This has been a real puzzle. And let me tell you, there were a few times that I wanted to throw the thing across the office because your code was so glitching stubborn."
It's a fond admonishment, really, but Clu's enigmatic smile remains as he closes the interface.
And neatly clips the second disk to the first.
They mesh together perfectly, and Clu had no small amount of pride about that. It had taken him long sessions of work to develop the idea, after all. Turning the merged disks over in his hand, he brings up the interface again, and the display is as crisp, and clear as it was the first time. Only now? Clu's demonstration moves further, with a flick of his fingers, root directory cycles through it's code base; dot matrices flashing by to show all major, and minor edits, repairs, and partitions done with Tron's code over the last 1.5 cycles.
Clu had, in essence, mirrored great swathes of code, and on one side rearranged, took apart, and used those pieces to expand past the locked off limitations on Tron's decision tree, until there actually was enough to be called higher processing. Both disks functioned together, but the secondary, the "control" disk was a shorter log. Only the more recent edits, since the disk's creation, showed.
Another short demonstration to show 'Tron' the effects of the new disk, and the edits, and Clu paused. Then closed the interface entirely, and when his blue eyes flicked up again, he was not smiling. In fact, it was a look that through sheer force of personality, of will, would have this [undefined] look back. There was no other option beyond staring the admin right in the eye.
"I won't lie to you, I never have, so if you're thinking that this is a test, you are correct. But regardless of pass/fail, I've come to a decision."
No more theatrical flourishes. No more demonstrations. And no more delay.
"It's time you rejoined this System. But it's also time you chose for yourself how you want to do that.
So I'm giving you time and letting your lights shape as comes naturally. This is how my new System will operate. The Users were vague, abstract, distracted by their own selfishness. I will let programs know what the Grid wants from them, and stamp out the User clogs of rumor. Let the data flow. The System should be clean. The System should be free."
Clu held the twinned, merged disks out to the program in front of him in silent offering.
"Freedom is perfection. Whether you decide to turn away from me, here and now, or disappear into the merging data streams, it's your choice to make. But if you choose to stick with me? Together we can turn this place into something so much better.
Together we can protect, and perfect the Grid."
no subject
Date: 2012-09-17 05:42 pm (UTC)From:And then? Clu pulled out a second disk.
...New.
Gaze fixed, sharp and wary. Flicked from the new disk, neutral white, to his own blue-shaded backup. The latter opened, codebase expanding up in light-traced lines. Not the first time the admin had shown it to him. But then the display closed, and Clu—merged them?
One disk on the other. Not just connected, not just stacked for copy or transfer. Combined. And then that disk opened, and the program stared at the output that scrolled up above. Separate changelogs. With a joined codebase.
Datasets were as merged as the physical shapes. But the structure still read distinct, white lines branching through in uneroded partitions to section off his code. Small links of redirect cut past the preset loops and rigid hooks of strict if-then; the locked constraint of Tron's directive neatly bypassed. The white disk had barely a fraction of the code in size and managed to map out new definition for the whole of it.
It was new. It was terrifying, and absurd, and it worked where it couldn't have. It fit together. The program stood, and stared, eyes flicking from one sequence to the next. Searching. Because there had to be something else.
He didn't find it.
The display snapped off. A moment's stunned blankness before his focus drifted up—stopped again, trapped and held, as Clu's look met his. A test. A decision. But choice and time and so many other words that had to be a lie. The squirming, building question pressed up underneath, and he wanted to shake his head, reject the words, make the admin tell the truth. He knew what Tron was for. They both did. The admin had taken Tron apart, slower than a disk blow, but no less final, obedience and automation meticulously unraveled. And what kind of glitching impossible lie was it to be given a weapon before they tied him back into his place?
A frozen lag before he reached out for the merged disk. Stare fixed, expression open and painfully lost. The program didn't move to dock, or even strip away the blank. He didn't look back up, either. Couldn't. Just held on to the disk, both hands around the narrow white ring as if it could break, or slip away.
He was shaking.
A quiet static breath, and he output, harsh and raw. Spoke. Asked, the same burning, simple query he'd spent over a cycle struggling to answer. The thing he'd waited for and watched to find, through every edit, through each moment following in the admin's wake, through every micro and milli and decicycle in his cell. He'd never asked aloud.
"...why?"
no subject
Date: 2012-09-18 12:07 am (UTC)From:"You need to clarify, I'm afraid." He answered, and signaled a [retry?] for good measure.
Why are you doing this, Clu? Shaddox quiet baritone voice played in memory files, I respected Tron as well, but...I also saw what the Users did to him. You can't write an entirely new program.
Clu had elected not to share his reasons with the sober program, either. Simply responded that it was at his discretion that Tron lived, and by his hand alone that Tron would be deleted. That was all Shaddox needed to understand to perform his function.
Please...I know what he became, but you must know? You must know that is not the Tron that I know. Yori's voice, harsh with repressed fear, and an emotion that Clu had no proper name for.
Let me just see him. Speak to him. Consider me a gauge test to see if there's anything...anything left of him. Ten micros, Clu. That's all I'm asking.
He had granted her sixty, and it was that one meeting that cemented his decision more than all the stats, and safety concerns that others, sensible, competent programs all, had supplied.
But even that wasn't why. Not really. Clu had the idea before Yori begged him for Tron's life, he just didn't let on otherwise.
Why, then? Because as silly, and nostalgic, and possibly flawed as it was, Tron was the first program that Clu had truly known. He was written, and even still in beta, but Tron was already there. And then the sober, serious smirks became less, and less. His eyes stopped having the spark of vitality in them, and as Clu grew more confident, and more powerful, it was as though Tron were fading away.
Clu privately logged the mode as a glitch, this sentimentality, but for reasons even he did not fully understand, he hastily deleted it mere micros before Flynn's arrival. By then, the ISO's were demanding much more of his creator's attention, anyway, and while Clu couldn't know it at the time, Flynn never again looked at his ACL.
Deep in his most secret logs, Clu was...afraid. Afraid of being completely alone.
Though whether his runtime spanned micros, or hectocycles, Clu would derezz before he ever admitted that particular secret out loud. He had earned the right to prove, to himself, and the System, that Clu was capable of restoration. That he could do what the Users never did; he could bring programs back. That was all anyone needed to know, after all; that Clu was as capable a programmer as Flynn ever was, and with far less resources at his command.
Everything else, was subject to the variable of opinion.
no subject
Date: 2012-09-18 06:20 am (UTC)From:"Why?" Even harsher on the repeat. There was a static skip beneath the word that had nothing to do with the function of his vocalizer. "Why did you take me? Why the edits and tests? Why voice?" Left hand released to come up, a quick, sharp gesture towards his throat. His right lowered with the disk, inactive edges digging in painfully as his grip clenched tighter.
"Unmade me. Changed my code. When does it go back?" The controls. The commands. The fixed, pre-ordered sequences of automation. The admin had to know enough by now, and what he'd written, he could unwrite, and you didn't leave an experiment running. 'Regardless of pass/fail.' Terminate and wipe, reset or delete, but he was always fixed back into place eventually. Always useful.
"Why let me go?" Why lie? Why pretend? Why let him pretend that this could be any kind of end? He knew better. He had to, always had, always knew what he was for. And it hurt to think otherwise, and he thought Tron was too far gone to feel that. Another thing Clu changed.
He was breathing, quick and ragged, tremors increasing past any measure of control. And maybe that was a failure too. Mouth opened, closed, and his stare finally broke. Dropped. Caught again, on a neutral-white disk empty of constraints. Another breath, slow and shaky. He could feel the stifling pull of source-chained command, even now. He always did.
"Why this?"
no subject
Date: 2012-09-18 07:48 am (UTC)From:But this sort of shock? Less practiced, and for a moment, Clu was flustered. What was the correct response? What were the words, or scripts that would convey what he needed to in order to communicate the core of his meaning? He wasn't sure, couldn't decide, and while his expression was perfectly mastered, the faint tremor in his fingers, then the curling, and uncurling of his hands into fists gave away his unease.
"Go back?" Repetition, restate to buy time while his processing furiously caught up.
"It doesn't go back. There is no going back, and even the System doesn't register you as the same program anymore. You were the User's enforcer.
Now you are simply yourself."
That wasn't right. It lacked clarity, and likely did nothing to put the program at ease, so Clu's lips tightened into a thin line, and he narrowed his eyes in irritation - mostly at himself - as he tried again to expand the parameters of his response.
"It's simple, really. I mean to reclaim the Grid. To build a perfect System out of the remains of partitioning, and code damage that the Users left behind. How can I prove to programs - to anyone that I am as capable a programmer as Flynn ever was? How can I possibly hope to rebuild the Grid if I can't rebuild a single, severely damaged program?"
It sounded a far sight better, in Clu's opinion, than admitting to the small, frightened part of him deep down inside that was terrified of being all alone with this same chaos. That he was not sure he could do this by himself.
That he wanted - needed....help.
"Did you think yourself to be so easily replaced?"
Redirect. It was a deflection, because Clu could see this would start edging into dangerous territory otherwise. After all, he knew what his functions, and longterm goals were. He was System Administrator, and as the sysadmin, he was looking for something more solid from this program than the continuing [undefined]
Then, in a moment of insight, Clu tilted his head to the side, and studied the program with that same calculating, curious gaze that he had leveled on 'Tron' the first time they ever met. And, while it may have been a gamble, Clu's processing finally caught up with a better way to redirect.
"If all I wanted from you were your functions, I would not have bothered rebuilding higher processing, nevermind vocal functions at all.
But the true test here? Is what do you want for yourself?"
no subject
Date: 2012-09-18 04:28 pm (UTC)From:Simply yourself. He shook his head. Didn't look up, stare lingering on the undocked disk clenched desperately in hand. Vocals were shot—he'd spoken more in the last 'clarification' than at any point in the last cycle and a half of careful edits. He'd still have laughed, if he didn't hate the way it would come out. He'd been the user's enforcer, yes. But he knew his own tag now, and [undefined] didn't read as any sort of self. Just a blank value, waiting to be locked down. Fixed, past the need for cells or guards. And until they finished? He was anything but simple.
No reason to leave variables. But then the admin gave a reason, and the program stilled as the solution mapped into place, line by line. How can I prove to programs that I am as capable? He was more than an experiment. He was the proof. A demonstration, for the system. The program didn't move, didn't react. Just a faint, sharp line of tension as his jaw clenched shut. It made sense. Even if he didn't want to be shown. Even if it left the question of what would happen after the admin's point was made.
He missed the deflection. Didn't look up enough to catch the frustration or the curious examination. Just audio, and the next phrase almost startled out a laugh regardless. Replaced? No. Another fractional shake of the head, a quiet whisper slipping out in correction. "Reused."
The last query didn't have an answer. It had too many, and he didn't know which were valid, and which were his, and which were even safe to process. Half a micro's fractured silence before he output a shrug.
no subject
Date: 2012-09-18 05:42 pm (UTC)From:Clu's frustration was starting to slip around the edges.
"Stop that. Stop assuming I am like the Users - like him."
Hands shaking outright, despite being curled into tight fists, Clu straightened, and stepped closer, purposefully invading 'Tron's' space with an almost challenging look.
"20% of your new integrated disk is tidy, and all of that inherited from Bradley; the rest needs work. It needs a lot of work. But before any of that can happen, you must tell me what your desired function is.
It would be a waste, but you could go join an outer relay in one of the colonies, become a signals encoder, live with Yori, and put the infamy of Tron behind you. And I would help you to do it, because I am not Flynn. It is not my desires that the System is here to serve, it is I who serve the System.
Do you understand, yet? To become a fully compiled, self-aware program you still need work. But this is the point in which function, designation, and assignment are given."
The frustration cracked a bit further to show a flicker of desperation in Clu's blue eyes. You have to understand this, you must, or no one will. He wasn't Flynn, he would not take, and take, and push the Grid to breaking without so much as a second thought. Clu was better than that!
"I don't want to 'reuse' you. I am going to reclaim you."
no subject
Date: 2012-09-18 07:20 pm (UTC)From:Desired function. Features twisted, distrust becoming incredulity without stopping on the way for shock. It was impossible, and it was a lie, and he was one glitched half-process from flagging it that way aloud, never mind the admin's anger. He didn't get to have those kinds of choices.
And maybe it wasn't the probability of a lie that scared him most.
Clu wasn't Flynn. But Flynn had never owned his code. Not Alan-one, then. But the admin didn't have to be a User to use or reuse, and Tron was a threat to the system. A tool, a weapon—barely a program, at least in any full sense of the word. 'Better', his user had called him. Clu's reference had been 'broken'. Too many definitions, and he wanted to break the stare, step back, run and keep running or delete them all. The strangling pressure of directive surged back, and of course it was this that made him realize he was standing half a pace from his captor with a weaponizable disk in hand.
Fight for the users, came the perpetual whisper, and it never let him think and he wanted it to shut up.
Eyes lowered again to the weapon. Identity disk. Disks. Hand angled slightly, and he stared at the clean white circle, watched the light refract and merge with his own blue-white glow. He could feel his function, and it hurt. He could feel the blank, too—still docked, still a empty, itching null blocking out sync.
Vocals were rough and small and halting when he looked up. "...don't—I—I don't want to be Tron."
no subject
Date: 2012-09-18 07:57 pm (UTC)From:"Then don't be."
Whatever decision he does come to, it must be his choice alone. Clu understood that, though the urge to simply snatch the merged disk out of 'Tron's' hand, and snap it into sync was strong, Clu mastered it.
Instead, he turned away, tossing the blank carelessly onto the edge of his desk, and with a pointed rattle it came to rest there.
"When you've sorted through your processing load, make your decision." He all but snapped, and left the program standing in the middle of his office.
Clu had to turn away. He couldn't let any more of his true reactions show; it was too dangerous. Instead, he paced in silence around the edge of his desk, and took up a position that allowed him to watch the city's lights through the expansive, glassine field. His reflection left a ghostly double-set of yellow circuits hovering next to him as Clu clasped his hands at the small of his back.
And waited.
no subject
Date: 2012-09-18 10:23 pm (UTC)From:And then Clu tossed it aside, and turned, and left, and the program didn't need visuals to track the steps. He listened to the distance grow, heard the admin stop. And wait.
Make your decision.
A micro's stillness, and the disk came up. Disks. The program stared for a moment, then brought his left hand back to grip the ring, felt for the distinction, and gave an experimental tug. They split. One neutral-white, barely a fraction of the code. The other blue. His. He could sync that, instead. No change, no edit—and he'd have his weapon back. Plus a spare.
(Tron's weapon.)
Attention shifted to the second disk, a fraction's hesitation before he triggered a command. The program blinked, visuals refreshing in surprise when it responded, light scrolling up in open readouts of stored code. Full access privileges. But the contents were fragmented, disjoint—a fraction the code, and with even less meaning. Designed to support, not replace.
He closed the output. Put them back together.
A moment's lag. A moment, or a micro, or something that felt like another glitching cycle, as logged memory fed him the sequence in reverse. Edits and tests, containment and talks, and Tron's stunned, utter confusion when he rebooted with a voice. Being caged. Being left. Commands he still couldn't flush, and the constant, constant need to serve the users' will.
The program reached back and snapped the merged disk into place.
Sync. Processing blanked, cache dumped, and sensory data vanished entirely under the sudden stream of data. Of rewrite. Input/output, but no matter how long since his last sync, there was far more being written to his mind. A flinch as already-fragmented processes terminated, restarted, were blocked as lines of code cut off from access or effect. He was losing parts, and desperate focus scrambled after. Because he didn't want to forget and he didn't want to be empty again, and it took a long, panicked search to realize that he wasn't.
Externals were far past processing. No attempt at motion, but he still staggered, motor functions activating just fast enough to catch himself before he hit the ground. Circuitry flickered, air drew in with a blade-sharp breath, and he stalled in place as the download continued. A thousand normal edits couldn't have prepared him for this sensation, two distinct and separate disk codes meshing together to restructure his whole.
And just as suddenly, the process finished. Sync complete, disks integrated and linked. The changelog made no sense, but it was still in access. Realization followed response—he knew, because he'd tried. Because he still wanted to know.
He was still there.
('He'.)
Something else wasn't. That realization came even slower. Dim circuitry flickered, then restabilized, efforts faltering, because he had to know. It was there, always there, and he didn't understand the quiet, empty absence, and he needed...
No. He didn't need.
The program opened his eyes, and stared at his own white lights, and tried to process the partitions where compulsion should have been.
no subject
Date: 2012-09-19 01:43 am (UTC)From:The soft click of disks being separated made his fingers tense, the old scripts relating the promises he'd made to many unbidden in his processing; If he becomes a hazard, I will derezz Tron, myself.
Then they fused.
Then the quiet click of both - thankfully both - snapping into place, and Clu allowed himself a small, hidden smile.
He also risked a glance back as the [undefined] staggered, knees buckling, and finally sat down a little too hard to be casual right there in the floor. The smile grew.
Stubborn code, indeed.
But as upgrades, and edits were processing, Clu pushed down his own stung pride, and moved the two paces back to his desk to press a command in. Quick, and neat, a platform rezzed itself into being underneath the half-collapsed program, salving dignity, and adding a measure of comfort at the same time. No disruption to the examination occurring, and no comment until Clu returned to the middle of his office, and eased himself down to sit beside his silent shadow.
"See? All of that fuss, and it didn't even hurt."
The smug smirk was the correct response here, and Clu held out a small vial of moderately processed energy.
"Here. No negating script this time. Should be enough to recalibrate your energy management."
Leaning back onto one hand, Clu looked the newly updated program over, noting the reshuffling from User-loyal tags, to neutral. That was also expected, and seeing as how the decision had been made, the relevant questions could move back to the fore of priority queue.
"Alright, then. You can't stay as an undetermined, now. Your code is still intended for combat, and your subroutines still read as Security. But...it's your decision.
In the meantime, since you've made it clear you don't want to be Tron, you'll need a new designation."
no subject
Date: 2012-09-19 03:52 am (UTC)From:The platform registered peripherally as it rezzed into place beneath him, but it wasn't until the admin approached that he paused analysis. He looked over as Clu sat down beside—and remaining wariness dropped in favor of a glower at the comment. Expression didn't help. Less smug, Clu.
Still, the program took the vial, only a moment's lag before uncapping it. Recharge was straightforward enough. But he had a feeling a lot of him would need recalibrating now. He wasn't sure he liked the thought.
Wait. He was sure. He didn't.
Two swallows, and the vial emptied, white circuits brightening faintly. He stared at the glow, hands turning slightly as he remapped the change in color. That would take a while to get used to. It took a moment to drag attention back to Clu's words. Stare fixed carefully, but he didn't respond to the first part. Whatever the result, he wasn't volunteering for any large-scale repurpose in the next millicycle. If it was 'his decision'. Shouldn't trust that. Utterly improbable. But maybe...
He could hope.
The last words were unexpected. But it made sense. However much a lie it was before, he wasn't Tron, now. And he didn't want to go back. The program shifted, lingering tension in the shrug, but no disagreement. Head angled in silent question.
no subject
Date: 2012-09-19 04:36 am (UTC)From:"Alright, then a new name. Form should follow function, though, and this would be easier if I knew what you planned to do."
Codified Likeness Utility, after all, was more a description than a name, but truth be told, Clu hadn't put much thought into his own name, before. What about something else for Tron?
Hm. Maybe a shrug wasn't too far off by way of reaction.
"...I could always give you a new one?"
Clu felt a spark of interest he couldn't quite scrub out of his voice, entirely. Usually that was a User's prerogative, and without function to narrow possibilities, Clu had no idea where to start. But he was quite sure his facility for something so simple as an identifying tag was not lacking. How hard could it be? Something interesting, though. Unique.
Clu grinned a little at the thought.
no subject
Date: 2012-09-19 05:39 am (UTC)From:And then the admin suggested it... and grinned. A stare, in return. The expression was bad enough, but the speculative interest in Clu's tone didn't help. Suddenly this read as a really good time for the program to test the boundaries of his supposed decisions.
None of which, of course, gave him anything useful to actually output. Instinct said to scan through logged memory, but the task aborted after just nanos. Plenty of designations. No longer in use, even. But he wasn't going to be Tron, and identifying as one of his user-tasked kills didn't seem like much better of a break from pattern. Something new.
No memory-logged tag. No function, either. And he needed something now—by the admin's look, he'd already started calculating. The program pulled a string at random, discarded the first try. He wasn't even sure how to vocalize the second. A randomized sequence next, parameters cutting down the output, resulting list scanned and assessed for usability...
"Rinzler."
Eyes flicked to Clu, tone stubborn, and hopefully more certain than he actually was. But the name wasn't on his records. New. And at the very least? It had to be better than whatever Clu would generate.
no subject
Date: 2012-09-19 06:17 am (UTC)From:Frowning a little at the choice, Clu repeated it back, testing for vocal rhythm.
"Rinzler? Hm. Well, it is certainly new."
And totally unlike anything Clu had heard of, before. Not the shorter, more efficient designations assigned to most Basics, nor the mixtures of User-program sounds, and numbers the ISO's favored, either. Fitting, really.
"Alright. It's your name, and your choice."
Clu's smile dimmed, and his eyes took the faraway look they always did when he was remotely hooked into System feeds. He could do it from his desk, and commit his processing to multiple tasks that way, but...more personal this way. And it would help him level out, making use of this needed downtime.
[Rinzler070203] [BFos.3] [Reclamation Stamp: 91990_0228]
The System dutifully recorded the designation, checksum, serial number, and reclamation stamp. When Clu blinked after a half a micro's quiet lag, he raised his free hand and held it out to receive Rinzler's new disks.
"Done. I can add it all to your ID now, and after the next full System sweep, your new permissions will be in effect."
Whether or not Clu, personally, was given the chance to choose a name, it was far better to have a known ( if still unstable ) program sitting next to him, now. That code-deep itch to have all known variables tallied, and solved no less a compulsion that set heavily on Clu's processes than the User's hooks had been set into Tron - into Rinzler's
"Is there significance to it? Rinzler?"
no subject
Date: 2012-09-19 01:59 pm (UTC)From:(Hope was terrifying.)
So he watched the admin. Cautiously. Verbal confirm/deny was one thing, but it was the distant look of system access that shaded his processing with faint relief. Processing was still more, and strange, attention in parallel to observation and analysis, his own ongoing diagnostic and the meaning in—
Gesture parsed simultaneous to the vocal string, and the program froze as the demand mapped. Stupid, really. Clu had kept his disk for over a cycle's worth of edits, well before asking would produce results. Now was hardly the time to balk at so minor an update. He broke the lockup, head ducking in a nod as he reached back to pull the disk from dock. He held it in both hands, a moment's uncertain strain before he offered it out. Unfamiliar white identifier, strange merged design. Clu's creation. That didn't stop a stubborn new process insistently flagging mine, in a way Tron was never able to. Eyes flicked from disk to programmer, his own silent demand behind the small frown and unblinking stare.
Give it back.
Permissions tripped a hex of desperate queries, but he held them back for now, glance tracking the disk. Head shook slightly in answer to Clu's own. No significance to the name. Just that he wanted it, too.
Wanting was almost as bad as hope.
no subject
Date: 2012-09-19 07:59 pm (UTC)From:And there was always more field trips shadowing Clu to consider.
The disk in hand was easily opened, and Clu didn't bother to hide anything anymore, there was no need. Rinzler seemed suddenly nervous about letting it go, but Clu only added the new designation, checksum, serial, and reclamation stamp into the appropriate fields. The reclamation stamp showed up just after the original Tron log displayed the recent sync, and Clu smiled as he tagged this date as the first of Rinzler's newly functioning runtime.
Closing the interface, he handed the disk back, and then? stretched, and leaned back until only his legs dangled off the side of the platform.
"Well. One out of two isn't bad. I'll keep your temp listing as 'repairing' logged, so when you've settled on a function there won't be too much need for re-prioritizing."
Laid out on his back, Clu tucked his hands behind his head, all in all looking very satisfied with himself.
"Welcome to the Grid."