a/n: The idea first came to me when I realized there was a distinct lack of coffee shop AUs in the Tron fandom, because every fandom needs a coffee shop AU. I decided to write a fic where Sam is a barista and Tron is a regular customer, then drew a blank on what Tron's occupation would be. Nothing sounded right for a guy whose day job is a computer firewall and then I thought - on a whim - "what if he's a S.H.I.E.L.D. agent?"
Several months later this happens. Oops.
Featuring characters from Tron (1982), Tron: Legacy, Tron: Evolution, Tron: Uprising, Marvel Comics, and the Marvel Cinematic Universe, plus a cameo. Kudos to whoever figures out who the cameo is and what film/show/book/comic the cameo is from.
collide (come here, come on)
After he kicks the bucket and mop back in the janitor's closet he saunters across the gleaming floor to the counter. He props his right arm against it and stares intently at the older man. His presence is calmly ignored but that just further cements his suspicions.
"You're a federal agent, aren't you? What is it - FBI? CIA? IRS? USCIS? NCIS, maybe?"
"What makes you say that?" the man rumbles. His voice is like Sam's father's special morning brew - deep, rich, strong, and a bit rough around the edges. Sam resists the urge to curl his toes.
"You... act like one? Expensive suit? Smartphone that's permanently set to vibrate? You never answer it in here? You wear gloves all the time even though it's late August to hide fingerprints? I'm pretty sure I saw your shoulder holster under that jacket?"
The man sets his cup down and Sam gulps. Shit, maybe he doesn't work for the government. Or the police. What if he's a mobster, a narc, a hit man, a-
"I suggest you keep that last detail to yourself," he says, eyes level and burning into Sam's head. Sam swears they flashed electric blue between one rapid blink and the next. "But," and he takes another mouthful of coffee, "you're half right. I'm an agent."
"You mean federal-"
"Not exactly. Also you watch too much TV."
Sam frowns. "What are you an agent for?"
"Strategic Homeland Intervention, Enforcement, and Logistics Division."
He cocks an eyebrow. "Now that's a mouthful. What, no acronym? Or is the full name supposed to put people off or bore them into changing the subject?"
The agent snorts into his cup. "We occasionally call it S.H.I.E.L.D."
He started coming to the coffee shop four months ago. Sam only noticed because it's easy to spot new faces here - everyone here is a regular and the stranger who walks in, desperate for caffeine or just plain curious, is no longer a stranger in a week. Sam can't tell if it's his father's magic touch or the cluster of old-as-Sam arcade games at one end of the coffee shop that draws in the crowd.
Sam was marking up Mr. Gibbs' order on his cup when the door swung open. He glanced up out of habit - and ended up drawing an impeccably straight line across the cup while gawking at the new face. Faces. A man and a woman stood behind Mr. Gibbs, talking quietly. She had a British accent and he was wearing leather gloves in late August.
"So," he said slowly when Mr. Gibbs stepped aside so that they could place their order, "new to town?"
The woman raised an eyebrow. The man said, "What makes you say that?"
Sam made a show of sweeping his gaze all over them, judging their attire. Then he looked up, locked eyes with the clearly unimpressed man, managed not to blush, and casually said, "You're dressed like you just flew into town from elsewhere, like out-of-state."
The man narrowed gray eyes at him; the woman smiled easily, amused. "That so?"
"Mind getting those orders in?" his father said somewhere behind him and to the left. "Line's forming."
Sam started and then peered around the man. Five regulars were milling about behind the two, looking increasingly grumpy. He waved at Roy and then uncapped his Sharpie.
"So, what'll it be?" he asked.
Only the man becomes a regular. The woman - Drew, she made Sam label her order with that name - swept in and out of the coffee shop for a month before vanishing. He recalled only three words from that last conversation he overheard while wiping down a table behind them and spent the slower hours mulling over "hydra", "banner", and "black widow".
He didn't know the man's name, not that it mattered. He knew everyone's orders, would glance at a customer's face and ask, "Medium, black, two pumps hazelnut?" just to double-check. He's the reason why his father never bothered to hire another barista to cover for him whenever he went off to class. He's just too good.
"Really like Dad's morning blend, don't you?" he asked one day. He's already going through the motions, grabbing a medium-sized cup and filling it up with freshly brewed coffee. "That'll be - oh. Thanks."
He counted the coins on the counter, tucked them and the bill in the cash register, and then pushed the cup to the man. He looked up to see a warm, indulgent smile and ended up spending the rest of the day feeling lighter than air.
"You comin' down with something?" his father asked suspiciously while being hopelessly beaten at Mortal Kombat.
"Nope," Sam replied and K.O.'d him. "Next quarter's on you."
His suspicions - curiosity, really - were first aroused during an afternoon shift. He puttered around behind the counter, waiting for his father to get back. His best friend was playing Galaga, waiting as well because she wanted to see if she could be hired part-time.
When the door opened he looked up, expecting an afternoon regular, and ended up staring because the nameless man was walking in, frowning down at his phone while touching an earpiece. He was wearing a suit but seemed to have rolled out of bed because his shirt wasn't tucked in properly and his jacket was wrinkled and was that a shoulder holster-
"We're out of the morning blend," he said when the man fixed him with a look that could level Pasadena. And people on the wrong end of the man's hidden firearm.
"That's fine. Just add an espresso shot," the man rumbled in reply. He sounded pissed about something. Either that or he's pissed at something on his phone, which he hadn't looked up from.
Sam managed to overhear two very interesting words while putting together the man's order.
"You saw him, right?" he asked later while he and his friend were hunched over their assignments. It was that slow time between lunch hour and rush hour and the only other people in the shop either already had their drinks or were here just to play a couple games.
"Was that the guy you've been telling me about the past four months?" Quorra said, chewing on her pencil.
"You make it sound like I have a crush on him," Sam muttered.
She laughed, then leaned forward, almost butting heads with him. "Was he actually wearing an earpiece?"
"And a shoulder holster," he said. "Saw it when he was going through his inside pocket."
Her eyebrows shot up. "You mean he's been walking around with a loaded gun under his jacket?"
"When you put it that way..."
Their conversation stalled when Sam got called away to fix the old Donkey Kong game - it kept spitting out quarters. When he came back she said, "I've been thinking. He looks too good to be an undercover cop-"
"You don't know that," he said. "They can look like anyone."
"But he doesn't. When you're undercover, you're undercover. You're not supposed to stand out. Maybe he's a bodyguard?"
"He's not a douchebag," Sam said. He had first-hand experience, not that he's saying all bodyguards are silent assholes who always look ready to kill.
"So? I've met perfectly nice bodyguards. Jalen's nice."
"Of course you'd be on first-name basis with a bodyguard," Sam said.
"Who got you into that party again?" she shot back. "And covered for you when your dad called while you were passed out on the roof?"
It was definitely not one of his finest moments and cemented his decision to never go poking around parties hosted by rich kids again. It was still a fun night, even if said bodyguard gave him the stink-eye when he kissed Ophelia on the cheek.
"Maybe he's an agent," he said. Then he thought about the words the man muttered as he left with his coffee. "Maybe for the IRS."
"What does he need a gun for?"
He shrugged. "People really hate the IRS?"
"That's a CSI: Miami episode."
"He did say 'Stark' and 'ENCOM'," Sam replied. "Could be dropping by to spook them into showing him they're paying their taxes on time."
"You think Mr. Stark's gonna be afraid of a guy with a gun?" she asked.
She had a point.
Before he could latch onto something else - the gloves, the man always wore gloves - his father dragged an empty chair over to their table and sat down with a clipboard.
"So, Quorra," Flynn said. "What hours are you free?"
Googling "S.H.I.E.L.D." and "Strategic Homeland Intervention, Enforcement, and Logistics Division" doesn't give him the information he's looking for, oddly enough. He manages to piece together the bare bones of the agency - its predecessor kicked Nazi butt, it was formed during the Cold War, and while "Homeland" is in its name it has nothing to do with Homeland Security - but he doesn't know enough. One link did say S.H.I.E.L.D. was involved in Tony Stark's much-publicized declaration that he's Iron Man but Sam decided not to believe it; the website also had things to say about devil's gates and magical guns that can kill demons.
Thoroughly annoyed that he still knows next to nothing, he decides instead to pretend he doesn't have lab work and chat with a friend while playing an MMO.
arcade_circuits83: ever heard of S.H.I.E.L.D.?
bigbadredh00d: nope. why. fancy acronyms. better mean something good.
arcade_circuits83: means 'strategic homeland intervention enforcement and logistics division'
bigbadredh00d: that's a mouthful
arcade_circuits83: that's what she said
arcade_circuits83: met a guy who said he's an agent for it. never heard of it tho.
bigbadredh00d: just showing off. maybe trying to impress you?
arcade_circuits83: with a fake government agency?
bigbadredh00d: point. want me to look into it?
arcade_circuits83: already tried. don't think even Anon knows shit about it.
bigbadredh00d: which Anon? our Anon or guy fawkes Anon?
arcade_circuits83: forget it. how are you, btw?
bigbadredh00d: i'm good, i guess
bigbadredh00d: will it get easier?
arcade_circuits83: eventually, i think. it was a long time ago. don't really remember her anymore.
arcade_circuits83: you know you can talk to me about it anytime, right? want my number, too?
bigbadredh00d: ew. you're too old for me. :P
bigbadredh00d: stop killing me i'm on your side!
arcade_circuits83: my bad
"Are you ever gonna tell me your name?" he blurts out, Sharpie hovering over the cardboard cup's blank surface. It's morning and there's already a herd of marked cups to his left, waiting for his father, which is why he's even bothering to jot down what he memorized months ago.
"Why? You already know what my order is."
"Yeah, but Dad doesn't. Why do you think I'm here almost every morning instead of sleeping in before class?"
The man - the agent, of S.H.I.E.L.D., gives him an indulgent smile. Sam would say it's condescending if it didn't make him feel warm and pleased for no reason at all.
"You don't ask anybody else for their name," the agent says.
"I've known them for at least a year." He glances over the agent's shoulder at old Mrs. Sanchez, who at least appears amused by their exchange. "I could just yell out your order but that just makes it impersonal."
His father bumps into him while grabbing two more orders. "Have small talk later, kiddo. Glad you're expanding your social circle beyond me and Quorra but not on your shift."
Sam rolls his eyes at his father's back, then jumps when the Sharpie and the cup are yanked out of his hands. He whips his head around to see the agent scribble something on the cup and set it and the marker down on the counter with two bills. Sam stares at him until Mrs. Sanchez coughs quietly and says, "Just the usual, Sam."
Three minutes later Sam holds up a cup of morning brew and squints at the name written in a tight, controlled hand. "Tron?"
After Sam finds out his name he starts seeing the agent more often. He - Tron, his name is Tron, what the fuck kind of name is Tron? - doesn't leave right after he gets his order and instead lingers at one of the tables, glued to his smartphone. He's always there during the morning shifts but he starts showing up when Sam's manning the register in the afternoon, too.
"I know Dad's stuff can be addicting but seriously? You need it that bad?" he asks when Tron shows up during his second afternoon shift of the week.
"I don't know what you're talking about," Tron says.
"All that coffee can't be good for you," Sam says. "You were already here in the morning-"
"I wasn't, this morning. Medium, black. Keep the change."
Sam opens his mouth, then thinks better of it and waits until after Tron leaves and Quorra saunters in to take over.
"I think he only shows up when I show up," he says while perched on the counter, watching two kids have a go at the air hockey table. "Asked Dad if he ordered something the other day I wasn't working mornings and he said no, Tron didn't show, and that's a strange question, why am I asking? So I think he only buys coffee when I'm behind the counter."
"He's too old for you," she promptly replies.
He hears his neck crack when he whips his head around to stare at her. She tilts her head at him and cocks an eyebrow. "What, it's true."
"I - I don't - what makes you think - why, Quorra?" he ends up moaning into his hands.
"How else am I supposed to interpret this?"
"It's an obsession," he says. Because that's what it is - an obsession. Sam's obsessed. It's not the same thing as a crush.
"Your obsessions have strange taste," Quorra says and then stands up straight when the first of the evening crowd wanders in, chatting nonstop on her phone while wrestling several books and a laptop under her other arm.
"Hey, Mara," Sam says. He slides off the counter, waves to his one-time TA, and wanders over to the arcade corner to play Space Invaders.
He spends the rest of the evening stewing over his so-called obsession by himself because bigbadredh00d isn't online. He leans back in his office chair and stares out the window at the bright yellow-white moon, then sighs and picks up his textbook.
"So what does S.H.I.E.L.D. do?" he asks one day.
There's no line behind Tron and Sam can pour black coffee into a medium-sized cup blindfolded so he has time to spare.
"Keep tabs on the threats no normal government can handle," Tron says readily.
"Like what?"
"That's classified," is the reply.
Sam waits until the agent sips the afternoon blend and wears a blissed out smile. "So it's like the CIA."
"No."
"Hawaii Five-O?"
"That's a TV show."
"But they take on threats normal governments can't," Sam says.
"We're not NCIS, either," Tron says. He doesn't look or sound the least bit annoyed by the inane questions.
Sam looks around the coffee shop, pressing his lips together while thinking of a way to pry more information out of Tron. He wonders if he can ask about Tony Stark and ENCOM without revealing his tendency to eavesdrop on other people's business.
"So why the gloves?" he ends up asking.
Tron glances down at his hands. Today he's not wearing leather but a strange dark synthetic material. Sam wonders what the function is for the grooves running along the back of the thumb, index, and middle fingers from tip to wrist.
"It's cold," Tron says mildly but there's a guarded look in his eyes now.
"Not that cold," Sam says. "It's never cold enough to wear gloves."
"I get cold easily."
Sam almost believes him, judging by how tightly his hands wrap around his cup, but he had two customers strolling in wearing shorts and sandals earlier today. "Can't be that cold."
He lifts his right hand off the counter and then abruptly realizes that he's trying to touch Tron's face to see if he's really that cold. Mortified, he grabs the ever-present Sharpie instead and taps it on the counter, pretending to be the fidgety sort.
"Don't you have S.H.I.E.L.D. business to take care of?" he asks.
"Why? Are you trying to get rid of me?"
"You never stick around just to chat up the barista."
Tron shrugs. "I'm not needed right now."
Sam wonders how to steer the conversation back to the gloves. It doesn't happen when Tron nods over his shoulder at the cluster of machines and air hockey table. "Coffee shops usually have books, not an arcade straight out of the eighties."
"Dad used to own one," Sam says, grinning. "Before that he worked for ENCOM."
He doesn't miss the sudden interest in Tron's eyes.
"Is that so?" Tron asks.
"Yeah. Created a shit ton of games," Sam says. "Ever heard of Vice Squad? Space Paranoids? Lightcycles?" At the slow nod and nostalgic smile, he says, "Dad made them."
"Why did he leave?"
Sam shrugs. "Guess he didn't like where ENCOM was going. They used to be innovative; now they're like... Stark Industries, before Mr. Stark got kidnapped."
He watches the agent carefully but doesn't get much more than a knowing smile that actually looks more like a grimace, like Tron knows exactly what Sam's talking about. The agent then sets his coffee down and wanders over to Lightcycles, sliding a gloved hand over one of the joysticks. There's something vaguely pornographic about the way Tron's fingers wrap around it with such intimate familiarity and Sam shrugs off the shiver down his spine, watches and wonders what he's going to do next.
"Sam?"
He jerks, blinks rapidly, and looks at Tron. Tron never says his name. "Yeah?"
"How good are you?"
A grin works its way onto Sam's face. "Are you challenging me?"
Tron fishes a quarter out of his pocket and holds it up. "Loser pays for both."
"That'll be you," Sam says, ducking under the counter and snatching a quarter out of the tip jar. "You really want to challenge me? 'Cause I've been playing with that old thing since I was three and I own the current high score."
"We'll see," Tron says.
Sam kind of regrets volunteering to stay behind to close shop. Today is not a good day for both Flynns but they simply don't have enough people to keep things running without them. After much prodding from both Sam and Quorra, Sam's father hired another barista but nobody trusts Beck to run things smoothly on his own.
Beck left almost an hour ago because business is just that slow. The only people in here in the past hour is a couple sitting in the far corner of the coffee shop, talking quietly over cold lattes and iPads. Sam sighs and slumps over the table, bored. Given today, he doesn't have anything useful to keep him distracted from his thoughts; he fiddles with a base code on his phone for ten minutes before shoving it back in his jacket pocket and faceplanting on the cool surface.
He wonders if he should feel more, if he's obligated to feel as strongly as his father does. All he has are old Polaroids and grainy memories and a tower in downtown Los Angeles bearing the ENCOM logo, and with each anniversary their significance fades away a little more.
Maybe he should try to beat the brand new high score on Lightcycles. Or Vice Squad. Or Mrs. Pacman, come to think of it. Or he can just stay here and doze until the couple leaves.
"You shouldn't sleep on the job," a warm, amused voice says above his head.
Sam cracks an eye open and glances up at Tron. "You're breaking routine. Should I be worried?"
The agent sits down as Sam lifts his head. There are stress lines under Tron's eyes and on his forehead but he's smiling. "You noticed."
"Mass media's portrayal of federal agents is good for something, just so you know," Sam says. "You're never in this late."
"You weren't here all day."
Sam can't help the involuntary wince and Tron's eyes narrow. "Something wrong?"
Tempted as he is Sam keeps his mouth shut. He may have started considering Tron has a sort-of friend but that's not a good enough reason for him to confide in the agent. "Family business."
Tron nods and presses his lips together like he's contemplating words. Sam tenses, expecting an order for coffee, but grins instead when Tron nods to the arcade corner and says, "How do you feel about Mortal Kombat?"
"Does your dad know you're friendly with a federal agent?" Quorra asked two days ago while they trekked across the campus.
"The question should be, does Dad know he's a federal agent?" Sam corrected. "And he's not exactly federal."
"You know what I mean," she said. "Is it okay to talk with him all the time? You know, be seen with him?"
"You make it sound like we're having an affair. Which we're not."
She stopped walking. "I'm serious, Sam."
He sighed. "He wouldn't be talking to me if it'll get me in trouble. I just serve him his coffee; what are they supposed to read into it?"
A lot, apparently.
Their plans don't go according to plan. They didn't anticipate Sam fighting back - most people don't know he took capoeira classes when he was younger and too rebellious for his father and grandmother to handle - and it took a jarring blow to his left jaw to subdue him.
"So, not trying to steal Dad's vintage bike," he slurs, ever mindful of the cold press of metal to the base of his neck.
The one truly disconcerting thing about the mess he's in is that the people hauling him to the pathetically conspicuous van parked at the end of the block is the couple who'd been frequenting the coffee shop. He thought they were grad students.
"He'd better be worth the trouble," one of them grumbles.
"Madame will be the judge of that.'
He thinks, over the haze of pain and adrenaline high, that he should be more terrified than he actually is.
They're almost at the van and his heart starts beating faster. This is happening, these people are abducting him, he might not survive. His legs start shaking and his feet start dragging, and his captors notice, start shoving him forward. Sam stumbles and for a second he doesn't feel the muzzle of the pistol at his neck.
An electric crackle and ozone tinges the cool air. Someone shoves Sam to the ground and he flips himself around to see one of the people slam into the wall of the dry cleaning store. Tron advances out of the shadows, hand outstretched, and Sam stares at the bright white-blue lines on the backs of his fingers, the ones that he just knows follow the grooves on the back of his gloves. White-blue dots mark his - armored cat suit, and the image is so jarring and intimidating that Sam almost forgets what's going on around him.
He sees the other would-be captor reaching for the dropped gun out of the corner of his eye and he slams the heel of his foot into the back of the man's knee. He looks over his shoulder when someone gets out of the van. It's the driver and he's holding a gun right out of a sci-fi TV show, like a BFG.
"What the fuck," Sam says, scrambling to his feet.
The driver ignores him and instead advances on Tron, who... who's pinned someone to the ground by the neck, fingers laced sharp electric blue. The lights pulse brightly and the person's limbs flail uncontrollably, a strangled cry trapped in Tron's grip.
"Tron!" Sam yells.
The agent looks up and the rest of Sam's warning catches in his throat. Tron's pupils glow the same blue as on his hands. Tron's not human.
The driver swings his gun around to Sam.
Sam instinctively throws his arm up but before he can brace himself or roll out of the way something bright streaks through the air and hits the driver's arm. The gun fires wildly and Sam throws himself away from the driver, scrambles to his feet just in time to see Tron slam the glowing edge of a disk into the man's chest, throwing him backwards into a dingy sedan.
A hand suddenly grips Sam's upper arm and he yells as he's hauled to his feet. He tries to use the momentum to shake off his assailant but ends up stumbling into the wall. He pulls his face away from the rough surface and glares at the man pinning him against it. "Lemme go!"
"Quiet, kid," the man says. He's watching Tron advance on the driver but doesn't take advantage of the agent showing his back to them.
"He's safe, Jimmy, let him go," Tron says darkly. Then, "What the fuck were you thinking?"
"You keep expecting us to tell you anything," the driver replies. Something cracks, like a pill bitten through. "Cut off one head, two more will take its place. Hail, Hydra."
The driver starts choking and convulsing, then slumps forward and collapses on the sidewalk. Sam stares at the foam around the man's mouth and then looks up at Tron. The man's face is impassive, stony as he locks the disk onto something on his back and glances over to the other two bodies. Their mouths are flecked with cyanide-induced foam.
"What the fuck's going on?" Sam asks shakily and that seems to snap Tron out of it.
"Let him go, Jimmy," Tron says and manages to catch Sam as his knees give way.
"I'm sorry. They thought you were an informant. They weren't sure who infiltrated their operation and somehow managed to connect their troubles with my meeting you."
"Should I be flattered they thought I was an agent? I don't even know them."
The wry smile doesn't reach Tron's eyes. They're gray again, with flecks of green and brown. Sam wonders how his pupils could light up such a bright, electric blue. He leans forward without thinking, trying to get a good look, but the agent just glances away.
"They were sloppy tonight," Tron muses to himself. "Either poorly trained or under intense pressure. Or a diversion..."
His words melds into the background haze of sirens, radio crackle, and stern voices. Sam glances down at his shaking hands and then jumps when someone drops a thermal blanket on his shoulders.
"For the shock," S.H.I.E.L.D. Agent Jimmy Woo says. "Held up better than most others, though. Had good reflexes, too-"
"Don't," Tron growls. "Not him."
Woo holds his hands up in surrender. "All right. Fine. Also, you're mostly right - they were poorly trained and a diversion, but the others are on it."
"Good."
Sam hears a voice rise above the noise. His father, yelling his name. He's up before he's conscious of it, staggers a few feet, and almost falls. Tron hauls him back up and helps him to the yellow tape.
"Dad," he says shakily and his father crushes him to his chest.
"Oh my god, Sam," Flynn says. "You're all right, you're all right."
"Thought they - they just wanted the bike," Sam mumbles into his jacket. "Want to go home."
"I'll send the Ducati to your address," Tron says somewhere behind him, and Sam feels his father's arms tighten around him.
"So who are you and what's your role in this?"
"Mr. Flynn, I'm from S.H.I.E.L.D.," he says. Then he adds, hesitantly, "My name is Tron Bradley. This was a case of mistaken identity. I apologize for dragging your son into this; it wasn't supposed to happen."
"S.H.I.E.L.D.?"
"Strategic Homeland Intervention, Enforcement, and Logistics Division," Sam says. "Tried to look it up but didn't find much. Couldn't get past their firewall, but I can tell you they're not exactly federal."
He means it jokingly but it comes out faint, shaken. His father tightens his arms even more, trying to pull Sam further away from the agent.
"You plan on visiting my coffee shop again?"
Tron shakes his head and Sam tries to ignore the sinking feeling in his chest. "Not anytime soon."
The answer seems good enough for Flynn. "Come on, kiddo. Let's get you home."
As he's herded far away from the flashing sirens, the yellow tape, the LAPD, and the ambulances he looks over his shoulder at Tron. The agent is standing guard near his trapped Ducati, the white-blue dots glowing on his back.
Three hours later, curled up on the couch with his father and watching a Mythbusters marathon, he realizes that this is the first time Tron touched him.
The novelty of getting caught up in the kind of business usually seen in shows and films wears off, like coming down from an adrenaline high, and Sam ends up skipping the rest of the quarter. He spends his days either holed up in his room or in the coffee shop, teaching bigbadredh00d basic programming code by phone while manning the cash register. He finds it harder to smile, even when greeting the regulars, and tries to avoid occupied tables as much as possible.
"Don't say 'I told you so'," Sam says when he sees Quorra two days after the incident.
"Of course not," she says. "I was gonna ask if you're okay. Are you?"
He shrugs. He has a scrape on his cheekbone and a bruise on his jaw. He can't sleep for more than two hours at a time without reliving the moment that driver - that Hydra agent - pointed that BFG in his face. He's effectively grounded from riding the Ducati even though he's at least three years older than two-thirds of the undergrads on campus and he had to fight to be allowed to walk there on his own.
"I've had worse," he finally says.
"Not really," she replies, staring at him openly. She doesn't press the issue, though, and instead drags him over to the arcade corner for a rousing round of air hockey.
"You're moping."
Sam doesn't deny it, which apparently isn't the reaction Quorra was bracing for. He just nods and turns his attention back to his laptop.
"What's wrong?" she asks and her voice is softer.
He shrugs. "Dunno."
She presses her lips together, already regretting the question she's about to ask. "Is it about that night?"
Sam shrugs again. "Not exactly."
He knows that she knows what's on his mind, but to her credit she doesn't say anything about it. Instead she slams his laptop shut. "We're going clubbing."
"What?" Sam shoves her hand off the laptop and quickly opens the screen just to find that the firewall's patched itself again. "Great, now I have to start over - and what do you mean, clubbing? We don't club."
"Or we can bar crawl. Look, Sam, I'm worried about you. You're not yourself, so I'm taking you out of your element. We're going out for the night and then you're sleeping over at my apartment. On the couch."
She's about ten seconds away from physically dragging him out of the coffee shop. He sighs and clears his browsing history. "Fine."
What bothers him about their bar/club crawl is that he can't stop staring at tall, lean dark-haired men. He doesn't know why he keeps hoping to find one with a pair of gray eyes and a warm smile.
"I haven't seen him since he saved my ass," he says in their third-to-last bar of the night.
"Of course you'd be a moody drunk tonight," Quorra grouses over her mojito. "Moody and oblivious."
"Oblivious?"
She smiles fondly and then reaches across the tacky lacquered table to rap him on the head with her knuckles.
"I told you, you idiot - you never stop talking about him. It's a crush, not an obsession."
He stares at the whorls in the table, unable to hide his grin. "A 'crush'? Really?"
"Are we going back in time to high school and my 'crush' on Jules Verne?" she teases.
He shakes his head and takes another sip of his Sam Adams. "Do we have to?"
"No." She hesitates, then presses forward. "How about back two weeks to right before those assholes tried to kidnap you?"
"Quorra-"
"You were, you were happy," she says, determined to get her words out. "I could tell. Maybe you were just happy trying to figure him out. Was that it?"
Sam shrugs half-heartedly. "Maybe."
A month passes and Sam gives up on ever seeing Tron again. That's okay, though, because he no longer has nightmares and he's drowning in labs and papers. He just wishes he can stop dreaming about a dark-haired man whose eyes and hands glow white-blue.
"Medium, black."
A gloved hand pushes the exact change plus a dollar tip across the counter and Sam can't stop smiling as he looks up.
"So what's with the gloves?" Sam asks again.
Tron frowns at them. "I was hoping you'd forget."
"I can't," he says honestly. "Not after what happened. So what's with them? How do they work?"
He reaches across the table, maybe to see what they feel like, to initiate contact, but Tron withdraws his hands. The agent glances around the coffee shop warily, shoulders tense. He looks ready to flee.
"You don't - don't have to answer if you don't want to," Sam says, trying not to sound disappointed, hurt.
"No," Tron replies quietly. "You deserve at least an explanation."
He holds his hand up so that the back of his hand is facing Sam. Tron's eyebrows furrow with concentration and the grooves on his glove start glowing white-blue.
"Bioelectricity," Tron explains while Sam stares at the lines lacing his fingers and thumb, at the dots of light on his finger joints. "These gloves help me channel and control the currents."
"Bioelectricity?"
"Do you know what an electric eel is?"
"Do you know what NatGeo is?" Sam counters. "Why, is that how your gloves work? But they can't be bioelectric. Needs a biological component and gloves aren't biological."
Tron nods. His eyes remain guarded and his smile is stiff. "I generate the currents."
"What, so there are wires connecting you to them or something? Is that why you're always wearing long sleeves? Don't want to advertise them to the world?"
"I... I'm not exactly human."
Sam stares at him.
"I told you more than you need to know," Tron continues. "This wasn't a good idea."
He starts rising to his feet and Sam's hand shoots out before he can stop himself, gripping the agent by the forearm. Tron flinches and jerks his arm away, and that's when Sam realizes that he doesn't want to be touched at all.
"You can't say that and just walk away," Sam says instead. "You can't... come in here almost every day for four months, save my ass, disappear for a month, and come back just to not tell me anything."
"You don't have the necessary security clearance," Tron says and there's a cold edge to his voice that makes Sam wants to recoil. "No collateral damage. That means you."
Sam doesn't stop the agent standing up and leaving the coffee shop. He watches Tron disappear from sight and then buries his face in his arms, smothering a sob.
"Samuel Flynn?"
He jerks at the use of his full first name and then freezes upon realizing that he knows that British accent. Slowly he turns around and takes an involuntary step back as the woman approaches him.
"Long time, no see," he says carefully while she scans the area around them. "Not a fan of Dad's coffee?"
"Not what I'm here for," she - Drew, he remembers scribbling it on a cardboard cup - says. "Let's go somewhere private to discuss something."
"Define 'private'," he says. She has to be a S.H.I.E.L.D. agent, if her association with Tron meant anything. She probably knows a hundred and one creative ways to hide his body.
"Somewhere where people can't eavesdrop on our conversation," she says, "and where everyone can see us."
They end up sitting in front of a cafe a couple blocks west of campus. She buys them both coffee and a scone for herself. He stares at the steaming cardboard cup in front of him while she pries the lid off of hers and takes a sip.
"What do you want?"
She quirks an eyebrow at him and he thinks absentmindedly that he's never seen such sharp green eyes before.
"Besides you to stop trying to hack into our systems?" she asks calmly. "It was an impressive effort. You were the first in months to get past the firewalls."
"Do I need to call a lawyer?" he asks. She doesn't look like she's here to interrogate him on his Internet activities, but he can't be sure.
"That's not what I'm here for," she says. "Not my area of expertise."
"Then what is?"
She smiles and breaks her scone in half. "That's classified."
He finds he hates that word. "I figured."
He decides to try the coffee. It's not strong enough for this conversation.
"Look," she says, leaning forward, and strangely, suddenly, she looks nervous. Incredibly uncomfortable. "If it were up to me I wouldn't be here, having a conversation with you. I'd be elsewhere doing my job. But I'm here on behalf of my colleague."
"Tron?" He tries not to sound hopeful because that would be pathetic.
"Nobody is at liberty to disclose classified information with you," she says. "You don't have the security clearance and he already risked your life and our operation once."
He feels cold all over, even with the coffee in his hands. So this was Tron's way of telling him that they're done, that Sam needs to stop prying into S.H.I.E.L.D. business and move on with his life. He nods numbly and watches an elderly woman walk by the cafe with a tall poodle in tow.
"I'll stop hacking your system," he says hoarsely. "I won't say anything, I swear, I don't know anything."
"I'm glad to hear that, but that's not what I mean," Drew says. "I understand you've been applying for internships."
He blinks. What.
"You applied to both Stark Industries and ENCOM," she continues. "I can guarantee the one at Stark Industries."
He stares at her.
"Consider it an apology from my colleague," she says. Then the corner of her lips curl up in a smile. "And a promise to see you again."
Sam still goes in for an interview with ENCOM.
"Son of Flynn, huh?" his hipster of an interviewer says. Edward Dillinger, Jr., son of the CEO and one of ENCOM's leading programmers. "You're not just here because of your father, are you?"
He scowls. "That's inappropriate."
"He's right," says the other interviewer, an older woman with a kind smile. Her eyes spark wickedly and Sam doesn't know if he's worried or willing. "So, Mr. Flynn, what do you hope to gain by interning at this company?"
The interview goes without another hitch and he's sure he made a very good impression on the older woman. He just can't shake off the feeling that she knows something about him.
"Thank you for your time, Sam," she says while Junior finishes his notes on his tablet. She shakes his hand but doesn't let go. "Say hello to your father for me. Been a long time since I last laid eyes on him."
"You worked with him?" he asks.
"I used to date him, too," she says and his jaw goes slack. "I hear he owns a coffee shop that moonlights as an arcade now?"
"Uh, yeah. Um. It sunlights as an arcade, too. It's called Flynn's Arcade. Has all the classics." He feels so awkward right now. "You can... google it, if you want to stop by and say hi."
"I'll consider it," she says and finally lets his hand go. "Tell him Lora wants that cup of coffee. He'll understand."
"Right," Sam says faintly and then almost falls over his chair in his haste to leave.
Two weeks into his internship at Stark Industries he's eating lunch at his desk while trying to salvage a fellow intern's botched code when someone drags a chair over and sits down next to him.
"So," Mr. Stark begins and Sam stares, a mouthful of Chipotle burrito crammed into his right cheek, "tell me - how'd you hack into S.H.I.E.L.D.?"
"Is there a reason why you're trying to hack into the S.H.I.E.L.D. database again?"
Sam jerks his head up and then finds he can't stop smiling.
"Hello, Sam," Tron says and holds out a cup of coffee.
His father only raises an eyebrow when Sam spills into the coffee shop.
"Hey, Dad," he says, slides under the counter, and dumps his backpack in the storeroom. He comes back out to see Tron on the other side, placing a dollar bill and three quarters on the counter.
"Been a while," Flynn is saying casually.
Sam wants very badly to tell his father to stop acting so suspicious because that'll make everything look and sound suspicious to the wrong outsiders, but he can't so he just focuses on filling a medium-sized cardboard cup with the afternoon blend.
"It has," Tron says agreeably.
"So, I was playing Space Paranoids last night and it turns out that you have the high score."
"I play it in my spare time. Did you know ENCOM made a mobile app for it?"
"They did?"
Sam tries to elbow into the conversation but his father's having none of it. He manages to slide the coffee over to Tron, who scoops it up with a grateful smile. Sam absolutely does not shiver when his hand brushes against the agent's.
"It's not the same as the real thing," Tron says smoothly while removing the lid. He takes a whiff of the coffee and his smile grows wider. Then, "You really want the high score back?"
"May the best man win," Flynn declares, sliding under the counter, and Sam covers his face with his hands.
"It's all in the wrist," his father says conspiratorially to poor Beck, who got stuck dealing with the evening traffic while Sam tried to play referee for Flynn and Tron. The top score for almost every machine now boasts "FLYN" except for Lightcycles but nobody mentions that.
"Whatever you say, Mr. Flynn," the college sophomore mutters as he mops the floor.
Sam rolls his eyes and sends another text to Quorra.
"What do you think of your internship?" Drew asks.
Her full name is Jessica Drew. She's British, is fluent in too many languages, and keeps offering to teach him self-defense. He rejects her politely each time, feeling he'll be better off just knowing capoeira. She also seems too interested in him.
"It's only been a month," he points out.
"A month and two weeks," she corrects. "Stark likes you a lot. I hope it's not because he can talk you into breaking into our system every couple days."
"How d'you guess?"
She smiles knowingly and he gets the feeling she wants to pat him on the head. "Don't go asking questions you know you'll never get answers to."
"Okay... so, is that it? You want to know what I think of my internship?"
"Well," she says, "it's more than that." She leans on his desk and looks him straight in the eye. "We're interested, Sam. You have potential. You have a good head, you reacted to pressure better than most, and you know your way around computer systems."
Is she trying to recruit him for S.H.I.E.L.D.? He opens his mouth, closes it, furrows his eyebrows, and then asks, "What does this have to do with my internship?"
"You're graduating in a few months. If you like it here Mr. Stark will definitely hire you. If you don't..." She shrugs and he glances down at the eagle logo on her suit. "S.H.I.E.L.D. is always looking for new recruits."
He licks his lip as he ponders her words. "What if I just want to go back to Pasadena?"
Drew is so good at keeping a smile and an easygoing attitude but he can still feel her stiffen and her gaze harden. "If that's what you want. Nobody's going to stop you, but you should know that you have potential. Don't squander it."
She pushes away from his desk and he thinks this'll be the last time he'll see her. "Just... one question."
"And...?"
"About Tron," he starts, then stops and glances around the floor. They're the only ones. "He tried to tell me - I asked him about his gloves and - why did he say he wasn't exactly human? He looks human. He acts human. But-"
"He told you what they do."
Sam nods. "Bioelectricity. I looked it up. That doesn't explain how he can make it visible; humans can't generate that much electricity, not even static-"
She holds her hand up. "I can't tell you everything-"
"Classified, confidential, security clearance, I know."
"-but you do deserve to know something. Starting with me." She turns her wrist and snaps her fingers. Hot yellow light sparks and the air suddenly burns with ozone. "Bioelectricity, generated by my own body."
"Shit." Sam doesn't even realize he was pushing his desk chair back until it hits the edge of his table. "How - that's not possible."
"It is," she says and her smile softens into something sad and weary. "When I was very young, my father injected me with a serum to save me from radiation poisoning. Nobody knew of its side-effects until I almost killed someone by touching him."
"But-"
"You can't deny this." She snaps again. He flinches but nothing hits him. "And I'm not the only one."
"You mean Tron," Sam says when he can get his mouth and voice working again. His throat is so dry but he can't bring himself to go fishing in his backpack for his water bottle. "How come you're not wearing gloves?"
"I have better control and he generates much stronger bioelectric currents. For a long time he couldn't control them at all; it took us years to engineer the suit he wears now."
"Why, what happened before?"
"I told you - I almost killed someone because I didn't know what that serum did to me. They tell you to stay away from downed power lines, away from live wires. Same effect if you touched his skin."
Sam stares down at his hands, at the long bony fingers, the whorls and calluses, the thin white scars from his motorcross phase. "So that's why."
When he looks up she's gone, and he still didn't get an explanation for why Tron said he wasn't exactly human.
Sam is stopped at the front door by two S.H.I.E.L.D. agents.
"What...?"
"All employees at Stark Industries' Los Angeles branch are to stay home for the next couple days," Woo says.
"Why?" He doesn't stop Tron removing his helmet from his grasp.
"Didn't read the news this morning, kid?" Woo looks over his shoulder to scan the neighborhood.
"It's Stark," Sam says like that's the answer to everything.
"Not quite," Tron replies. "Don't go too far."
Sam scowls at the agents' retreating backs and then turns around when he hears his father shuffling up to the foyer behind him.
"What, your supervisor couldn't just call to tell you that?" Flynn asks.
"Fuck if I know," Sam mutters. Then, "Wait, he took my helmet."
Tron returns it four days later by walking into the coffee shop and setting it on the air hockey table. Sam pointedly ignores him until after he takes the last order from Quorra and passes the latte over to Mara.
"Why didn't I have your number to call you to give it back to me?" he demands while snatching it back. "Let me guess - it's classified."
Tron leans against the table, arms crossed, and gives him a look. "You never asked."
"What - I - I never asked - you gotta be kidding me."
Tron's smiling. He's neither confirming nor denying but in the half year Sam's known him he never joked about something this, whatever this is. What is this anyway?
"You tell me," Tron says quietly and Sam realizes he asked that out loud.
He can feel Quorra's curiosity burning at his back but it's not as strong as the weight of Tron's eyes on his. He doesn't know what to do with the scrutiny, or that warm and utterly indulgent smile, or the cautious half-step the agent takes towards him.
His breath catches in his throat when Tron lifts his gloved hand and presses a curled finger against the left side of Sam's face. His skin tingles, hums with the contact, and his heart thumps loudly. Sam licks his lip and Tron's eyes follow the movement. His pupils flicker electric blue and the air starts smelling of ozone.
Someone's phone vibrates and Tron abruptly withdraws his hand. Frowning, he reaches into his coat pocket just as Drew and Woo burst into the coffee shop.
"Level seven," Drew says, giving Sam only the briefest acknowledgement. Woo waves to Quorra. "It's Project P.E.G.A.S.U.S. He's calling all of us in."
"You guys come up with fantastic acronyms," Sam says, not that it helps alleviate the tense atmosphere or even gets acknowledged.
All three agents seem to be thrumming with pent up energy, jaws clenched and eyes hard. He realizes then that something big is happening. He glances at Tron and gets a meaningful look in return, like Tron expects him to understand without being told outright. And he's right, Sam knows something, and that something is connected with whatever happened at Stark Expo; with the so-called military training mishap in Puente Antiguo, New Mexico; with the unexplained disappearance of the uploaded camera videos recording a brawl between two hulking humanoid things that Sam knows are - or were - human.
He remembers Tron saying that S.H.I.E.L.D. keeps tabs on threats no normal government can handle. He remembers how Tron took down those Hydra people, remembers the white-blue glow of his eyes. He remembers the electric yellow spark Drew created just by snapping her fingers.
He knows now what Woo tried to say that night, why Drew got him the internship at Stark Industries, why Tron tried to keep him away.
"We need to go," Drew says and turns to the door. "Now."
The three of them turn to leave, and Sam doesn't think, reaches out and grabs Tron by the arm. The agent flinches away but stops and turns around.
"You're coming back, right?" Sam asks and he can't stop the shaking in his voice.
Tron hesitates, fissures forming in his carefully blank mask.
"So level seven is a big fucking deal," Sam continues, sparing a look at Drew and Woo. They're watching and waiting, patience wearing thin. "Look, I-" Mind spinning wildly, he shoves his hand in his pocket and fishes out what he hopes is a quarter. He grabs Tron's hand, ignoring the way the agent twitches, and presses the coin into his palm. "I'm loaning you a quarter. You owe me. Come back and we - we'll-" He gestures at the machines. "-play doubles, okay? Same team. Please."
He ignores the twitch in Woo's face, the barest hint of a smile. Time is so short and he's becoming afraid, deathly afraid of whatever level seven is, whatever Project P.E.G.A.S.U.S. means.
"Okay," Tron says and wraps his fingers around the coin. "I can try that."
Sam nods and steps back, trying distance himself from Tron. It doesn't work because the agent is suddenly yanking him forward with a grip on his jacket front. And then Tron is kissing him, mouth warm and reverent and tingling with what must be bioelectric currents. Sam presses back, lips parting slightly, and he can taste heady salty-sweet ozone.
The kiss lasts forever and ends too soon. Tron pulls back, presses his forehead to Sam's briefly, and then lets him go. Sam watches the three agents quickly leave the coffee shop, with Tron glancing back at him, and then touches his numbed mouth.
"Sam?" Quorra says tentatively and he jumps. His knees don't work right and he crashes to the floor. She yelps and darts over to his side. "Are you okay? Did you hit your head? I didn't mean to-"
"I'm fine," he says. "I'm fine, Quorra."
She shakes her head. "No, you're not."
He takes a deep breath. "No, I'm not."
They watch it all unfold on Sam's laptop. Sam, his father, Quorra, Beck, Mara, Lora, Roy, Mr. Gibbs, Mrs. Sanchez, and everybody else who walked into the coffee shop looking for something familiar end up crowding around the air hockey table, watching the livestream of the battle in Manhattan, New York.
"This is insane," Flynn says in awe as giant alien eels fall out of the hole - the gateway - above Stark Tower. "Radical, even."
Lora shushes him.
"They have to close that gate," Sam says. "If they don't they're gonna lose."
Quorra's hand tightens on his shoulder, fingers curling in. "They'll close it. They have to."
And it does, after Iron Man - after Stark - flies up into the gateway and falls back out. Everyone collectively sighs in relief and out in the street people are shouting to each other, crying, chanting the names of the people who saved them.
Sam tries not to think about Tron and Drew and Woo.
"Should I do it?" Sam asks while they're closing shop.
"Depends on you," his father replies. "What do you want to do?"
A part of him always wants to take over this coffee shop and its arcade corner. He knows how to run it, knows how to roast and brew the coffee, knows everyone's orders by heart. But a part of him wants to follow his talents, take him as far as Stark Industries and ENCOM. He can contribute to the world.
The persistent voice in the back of his head, backed up by the occasional chats with bigbadredh00d, tells him not to waste his potential and follow Tron into S.H.I.E.L.D.
"I don't know."
Two days after requesting an interview with a S.H.I.E.L.D. recruiter, Sam is manning the coffee shop with Beck while hacking into ENCOM from his phone when a gloved hand places a quarter on the counter.
"I borrowed a quarter a couple weeks ago," Tron says. "I believe I owe you."
Sam doesn't even realize he'd dropped his phone and catapulted over the counter until he's wrapped up around the agent, legs wrapped tightly around Tron's waist and a hand caressing the side of his face. Sam looks down at Tron, taking in the fine stress lines and the fading scar crawling up the left side of his neck, and just barely remembers to fucking breathe as Tron's eyes flash electric blue.
"Hi," he breathes out. He sees the growing audience out of the corner of his eye but he doesn't care.
Tron smiles at him and it hurts because he'd been missing it for days and days.
"Sam," is all Tron says and it's enough.
Sam kisses him.