Prologue
Alan sighed as he looked over the paperwork. Things were going up; the only problem was to make things continue that way...
"Sam?"
He had barely glanced up to see the said man walk past the door. At his name, the CEO of Encom stopped and took a couple steps back. His face immediately went from shocked to a forced smile.
"Alan! I didn't know you'd still be here!"
Alan lifted up the paperwork slightly and gave a slight upward turn of his mouth in return. "Just finishing up work. How's Quorra? Is she doing well?"
"Oh?" Sam was caught off guard, "Yeah she's doing good. She's just working on adjusting from the...different life in..."
"...Sam? She's from Nevada, correct?"
Sam refocused, "Oh yeah, right! I always forget. She's doing good."
"Oh?" His gaze returned to his work. "Well good."
Sam stole a quick glance down the hallway, then after a moment of silence, spoke:
"Listen, I better get going. I told Quorra I'd be home soon."
"Alright. I'll see you tomorrow then."
"Right." But as Sam left, his smile faded into something much more solemn...much more anxious. He gripped the SD card carefully as he started towards the other hallway; one people rarely used due to the fact it's 'off the beaten path' of almost all projects going on currently. Sighing slightly, he pulled out a key. He put it in the lock and after a click, the door opened. He grabbed the edge and slipped inside, closing the door almost soundlessly behind him.
/
The sky was dark. No sun. No moon and no stars.
The ground was not as blank as the sky. Rubble covers the current view and humanoids stumbled around the wreckage, looking for friends that were hopefully alive.
After a moment, the group of survivors huddled near where the square of the town once was. Some were trembling with tears, and others were staring numbly at the ground, soundless. Their world had been shaken physically since the explosion.
But internally, they've had multitudes of problems since the start.
And who do they blame?
The Users, that's who.
Of course, in a sense, their blame is justified. Flynn had created CLU. CLU had gone to great lengths to achieve the perfection Flynn programmed him with that almost all the ISO's were gone, and they were ruled by a tyranny that pulled many programs into an endless spiral of what programs know what could be defined as their own digital Hell.
Then...the Son of Flynn showed up. Changed everything. Though the revolutionaries had been freed, it was at the cost at the fact that many soon lost their lives, either to the Occupation or to the explosion that rocked their world soon after.
Then they were both gone. So was CLU.
The programs were alone.
"What...what do we do now?" One of them asked, clutching their arms in a hollow pain.
All the programs there were silent for a moment. Finally, one program looked up.
"We've got to move on."
His words were instantly met with gasps and mutters of surprise.
"How?" the first program protested, "We have no System Administrator, our cities are in rubbble, and we are on our own! What exactly are we supposed to do about that?"
The program that had suggested stopped and looked down, thinking.
"We can help."
Programs gasped and turned to see a small group of masked programs come out from behind the rubble.
"We can start here and rebuild one city. Become our own Masters of Fate. Then, we can stretch out to other survivors and stabalize ourselves to the Grid we once were!"
By now, the lead program had attracted all the programs in, so he brought down his voice from a yell to almost a whisper.
"Now who's with me?"
As they conversed, none seemed to notice the portal flicker to life, then die into darkness.
/
"Crap!"
Sam slammed his fist on the desk, making the pencil holder tremble. Sighing, he ran a hand through his hair.
This had been his seventh attempt. He routed the Grid into the computer successfully via the SD card, but there was no way to access it now...the code had become jumbled and meaningless.
Cursing under his breath, he looked at his watch.
Four a.m.
Sighing, he knew he had to call it quits now. He logged off the computer and grabbed the keys. Opening the door again, he quietly closed and locked it before putting the keys in his pocket. With a tired sigh, he stumbled towards home. He would come back multiple times but never be able to figure out why he couldn't reach the Grid...
/
One year later...
"Your name?"
"Nicolette Sanders. But I prefer Nico."
"Nico...huh?" The man flipped through her resume behind his desk. Behind him, pictures of people Nico didn't really know plastered the wall.
"Yes..."
"Ah. It says here you have some experience with programming."
She blinked. having been distracted by one of the pictures, "Yeah. I did small time programming jobs while I was in college."
The man didn't say anything else as he quietly reviewed her resume. After a moment, he sighed and set it down on his desk.
"Miss Sanders_"
"Nico."
Guessing by the look on his face, the man had not wanted her to speak at that moment. She bit the inside of her lip to keep from blurting anything else out.
After a moment, he cleared his throat, "I am extremely...hesitant...to give you this job for reasons I have decided not to waste my time going through."
She stayed quiet, psychically holding back a retort about why he would consider not hiring her. That, of course, would be exhibit A.
He watched her for a moment, before putting her resume to the side, "However...I have seen some of your work. With your talent, you could do something great for Encom."
He stood and she took this as her cue to stand as well. He held out his hand, "Welcome to Encom."
After a moment, she took his hand and shook it, "Thank you so much_"
He laughed and shook his head, "Don't mention it. I'll be your boss: Roy Kleinberg. You start Monday."
"After a moment, she let a smile show and nodded, "Yes sir!"
With that, she walked out, Roy watching after her.
So this is apart of a challenge I'm doing called 'March of the Fanfics' and I will be doing this as much as possible throughout March.
But um, anyways, let me know what you think so far. I will defintely be posting a chapter hopefully tomorrow, time be willing.
