EDITED & Re-Loaded
A/N: Weaving a bit of original Tron 1982, Tron2.0 (which I haven't played and only use to reference and acknowledge Alan's son) and Tron: Legacy together to create this. All other A/N notes will be at the bottom of chapters. Please enjoy!
(Question: why is there not more Tron slash? If you have any please send me a link I'd love to read it!)
Warning: *Contains SPOILERS* slash – developing relationships between men
Disclaimer: I don't own any of the characters or worlds
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Tron: Connection – Chapter 01
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Sam catches his breath.
The air is sharp, clean, sparking in his mouth.
The world is quiet; no sound of traffic, but there's a hum pulsing beneath his feet. He's never felt it before.
Running out of Flynn's arcade, the world is black around him, illuminated by threads of neon light.
"This can't be happening." His words fall flat in the strange environment, and he's moving before any of this registers. His only thought is that Allan will never believe this, that everything his dad told him was true. He hopes the older man won't worry when he arrives at the empty arcade back in the real world.
The thought stops him, pausing, he contemplates going back. He wants to share this new discovery with the older man, explore this new world with him. Tell him he was right. Right about everything.
Red lights descend from the sky and his thoughts are pushed back.
Need throbs through him, or is it the low rumble of the machine vibrating through him where he stands?
He has to find his dad.
Knows he's still alive, waiting for him to come.
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Allan sighs, runs a hand through his white hair, takes off his glasses and rubs his tired eyes.
He's tried his best with Sam, after his mother died he was there to support Flynn and the small boy. Even through Flynn's persistent taunts of 'program', the man's erratic moods and the just plain weird looks he received after Flynn's regular short-term disappearances, he stuck around. Shielding, protecting the boy became the purpose of his life and after Flynn disappeared with no sign of coming back he became the shoulder to cry on, the surrogate dad.
Sam's taunting words of earlier that night coming back to him. He lets out a bemused chuckle.
He's given his life to that boy.
Staring at the empty arcade he watches the neon lights flicker from inside, escaping between broken cracks in the boarded-up windows and casting vibrant patterns against the damp pavement. The loud music booms, muffled by the closed doors and echoes eerily in the empty street.
The sign is dark, but with the help of the dim street lights he can make out the word FLYNN'S.
That man had asked and he had bent over backwards to please him. It was strange; he had fought so hard to get Lora, fought hard to keep her and her mind off Flynn. But when it had all slotted into place, when she had put her hand in his, had smiled up at him and seen only him and not Flynn, he hadn't wanted her any more. She'd taken him to Flynn's arcade that first night, the three of them had sat close conspiring against Dillinger and the MCP. So close he could feel the warmth seeping through Flynn's jeans, their thighs touching - of course Lora had been sitting just as close on the other side of Flynn, so he had tried not to make too big a deal of it. But the energy sparking off the man's skin, the energetic wave of hands as he spoke, his twisted grin as he retold his story, gaze caught, watching Alan's reactions. In those eyes he'd seen the intelligence, the sharp wit that had earned the man the title of the best programmer Encom ever saw.
He'd been drawn in by his personality, his charm, that grin and Lora had seen it and let go without a struggle. He hadn't noticed as she distanced herself, he'd been too preoccupied with Flynn's first disappearance and the sudden revelation of the man's genius. Even after the birth of his son, he still spent most of his time with Flynn, and after Lora's death, it had been too late to fix anything.
He had lost himself, devoting all he had to give to a crazy, wild and amazing man, and nothing else mattered. It had been signed and sealed when Flynn had returned from his first disappearance and greeted both he and Lora with open arms. Alan had become a welcomed member of the board, head of security while bonus after bonus rained down on him as he continued to develop TRON.
Alan chuckled darkly to himself at the memory. Flynn had swept him of his feet, he'd fallen for his wife's ex-boyfriend, smitten by the man's charm, by the quick, unexpected attention suddenly showered on him. He'd been unable to retaliate against all that unleashed energy, developing a solid crush on his new friend, but Flynn's interest wasn't directed at him, but at his pet project. Tron.
Only once had he ever come close to revealing his feelings to the other man. They'd been drinking, having a late night in the chairman's office as usual and arguing over programs and the possibility of AI and its development in the near future. The conversation had run its natural course and they were both leaning in close, lost in their own thoughts and he'd looked up just in time to catch a slew of emotions running across Flynn's face.
"You're not wearing your glasses." The voice had trembled and Flynn was inspecting his face with an openness Alan had never seen.
"Ah, no, I've started wearing contacts." He'd almost shied away from the staring, but a sudden flash of remorse crossed Flynn's face.
"You look... you look..." The other man had struggled with the words. Dropping his eyes to his hands hanging between his legs. "I'm getting married to Jordan Canas. I mean I proposed, and she said yes." It sounded more like a confused confession than a happy announcement and before Alan could comment, Flynn was on his feet moving slowly to the other side of the room.
"I need you to wear your glasses from now on." He'd tossed the command over his shoulder without looking back as he slipped from the door, leaving Alan sitting in the empty room, wondering what had happened.
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Placing his glasses back on the bridge of his nose Alan stared at the old arcade from the front seat of his car. Sam's bike was next to a lamp post out the front, he wouldn't have arrived much earlier than fifteen minutes ago.
Tapping the steering wheel he checked the time, he'd been sitting in the car for five minutes now, not wanting to break the flow of memories, not really wanting to go in and disturb what he hoped was a cathartic experience for the boy. But of course Alan wanted to be there, in case something went wrong, in case Sam needed him.
It had taken years for his feelings for Flynn to ebb and fade away, it had been hard at first, watching the newlywed couple, so in love flit about his everyday life, in the office, invited to dinners, turning up at his door step, turning to him for advice. He had wanted to distance himself, but Flynn had dragged him into his life, made him a permanent fixture, and suddenly he was the Godfather of Sam Flynn. The baby boy with the largest blue eyes and cutest snub nose.
And so he'd directed all that frustrated love into this tiny creature that could no more reject it nor accept it. It just was.
He was Sam Flynn's protector.
One night before he had disappeared Kevin Flynn had come up to him, placed a hand on his shoulder, smiled a smile that was too old for him and looked him in the eyes.
"You're just like him. Thank you."
Five days later he'd disappeared.
Alan never found out what Flynn had meant by that cryptic comment.
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Kevin Flynn, Encom Protégée, the User, the Creator, the False God and Missing Father. The names had flown over him twisting and changing who he had thought himself to be. Or maybe the names had changed to fit who he had become.
Removed from the glowing grid as he was, he could still feel its hum in his veins. Kneeling, eyes closed, breath loose on his lips, the source floating up and caressing his skin where he sat, brushing the loose white fabric of his clothes, he let himself remember.
Quorra thought he meditated. Sometimes, very rarely, he actually did.
But most of the time, when he could no longer stare out past the wasteland at the towering bright lights, at the spot where the beacon used to shine, when he could no longer flip through the delicate and dusty paper pages and could no longer stand to stare at the chess board, he remembered. Each memory was categorized, pixilated and put into place.
Life before the Grid, Dillinger and the MCP, meeting Tron, returning, Sam, the rebuilding of Encom and the nurturing of the new Grid. Tron again and Clu. Jordan's death, Sam's tears, Alan's shoulder, Tron's comfort and Clu's devotion. Then it turns dark, darker than he had thought possible. The betrayal, the purge, the exile.
But each moment, no matter light or dark, is positioned carefully in his memory and in turn brought out, the data examined, relived and analysed.
He still has trouble remembering Clu's betrayal and Tron's death. Oh, he's analysed the events that led up to it a thousand times, tried to figure out how he could have stopped it, how things could have been different. What if, what if, what if circles behind his eyelids.
It's a mantra that parodies the zen he's suppose to feel.
But the actual event, the memory that is sharp and hard has him shying away, watching it from a distance. He can never look at it too closely, flits over Clu's challenge, the surprise he felt, Tron's hand on his shoulder.
Time hasn't dulled the heavy pause, the last look Tron shoots him as he turns.
"Go."
The whirr of disks.
Stark orange against black.
He remembers the sound of everything shattering.
His heart wrenching.
His legs burning as he runs and keeps running, city lights fading behind him.
Nothing had felt real.
Sometimes he doesn't know if he just can't stand to watch those memories, or if he really hadn't been present in that moment. It had all seemed so surreal at the time.
But he does dream.
And his dreams feel more real.
And Tron is still alive.
He doesn't sleep, sleep here is impossible, the bed in the other room he keeps as a familiar reminder of an old habit, from a past life.
But when he's so deep in his own mind, when all the memories have been loaded and reloaded over and over, his mind shuts down, it goes on standby, and he feels like his old computer back home. Screen goes blank, and the circuits and motherboard fizzle and crack as the machine cools down, the hum of the grid flows through him freely keeping him attached, but only just.
"I dreamt of Tron." Quorra's presence drags him back to the world. He keeps his eyes closed so she can't see how much it hurts. It's been cycles since he last dreamt of him. The youthful face had looked up into his own, years younger and less grizzled. They'd shared a hopeful grin while strolling through the streets, Flynn had thrown his arm over Tron's shoulder and they'd walked comfortably side by side. The Creator producing neon butterflies for the young programs that trailed after them and Tron's laughter bouncing happily off the pavement.
Half memory.
"I miss you." He'd whispered in Tron's ear and the other had turned in confusion.
"But I'm right here." A smile and a warm comforting hand on Flynn's shoulder.
"Please don't leave." He'd found himself saying, half afraid this dream figure would dissolve into a nothingness and he'd be left alone again with nothing but regrets and memories. He'd wanted to hold onto that moment for as long as possible.
"I'm not the one that always leaves." Tron had pointed out as his gaze dropped.
Flynn hadn't quite caught the emotion that flitted and disappeared across the others face, here, there, then gone like the butterflies that no longer surrounded them.
The statement surprises him. It's a conversation he'd never had with Tron, the security program had never asked why he left, never complained why he stayed away for so long. But was always happy to see him when he returned.
"I have to go back." He'd half murmured. "Sam needs me."
"I know, but we need you here." Tron replied, without meeting his eye. This was a side of Tron he'd never seen. Flynn couldn't help but believe that this dream was something he had always subconsciously wanted to happen.
Why didn't Tron ever ask about Flynn's world? Why didn't he worry when he was gone longer than usual? Why didn't he ask him to stay? More than once Flynn had caught himself watching the younger man, catching the spark in his eyes, the smile on his lips. The program had to have an emotional core, Flynn had seen the program develop, learn, improvise. Or maybe it was a pre-written code that Alan had infused the simple security program with, his friend had always had an interest with AI.
Tron had always been an enigma, even during Flyn's first time in the Grid. He'd looked up to the program, respected him - of course he'd been a little wary of the program at first. He had looked so much like Alan, the man who had stolen Lora from him, and when Yuri had turned up, cute and sparky in her skin tight outfit he'd felt more than a slice of jealousy pierce him.
But that had changed the longer he travelled with Tron, and when they defeated the MCP, when Tron had defeated it, it became a necessity to reboot the system and to reload Tron into this new grid. Because without Tron what was the point of returning to rebuild a new world?
But it was hard balancing the two lives, even with the time difference on the Grid, and so he'd created Clu. Tron had never asked about that either, and that had bothered Flynn slightly – did Tron ever think to differentiate him from his creation?
But he'd been too immersed in the power of creating, of raising buildings that touched the sky, of the heady feeling of life at his finger tips to let it bother him for long. He'd missed the caution with which Tron had first regarded Clu and the guarded conversation they'd had about the new program had never held much meaning with Flynn until it was too late. He'd brushed it off as Tron's natural encoded paranoia.
They were on top of the world, the three of them, and nothing could go wrong.
What did it matter if they sometimes didn't understand why he'd suddenly stop in thought, or when he'd let the excitement and pure joy rush out of his lungs in a loud whoop. That they'd shrug it off as User eccentricities – incompatible with their pre-programmed objectives.
He'd throw an arm around each programs shoulder and they'd traverse their perfect world, lights would flicker in their steps, growing brighter as they walked past. They were together and their laughter, their voices filled the void and soon other programs joined them, networks were established, a system created.
And if he found himself walking a little too close to Tron, their hands occasionally brushing, or if he leaned a little too close to converse with him it was just a little oversight on his part. After all no one was perfect.
Returning to the real world always threw him, the only thing that could stabilize him was Sam. His little Sam with his big grin and larger than life soul, with his tall shadow standing protectively over him. Alan Bradley, Sam's very own Tron, Sam's very own protector.
Flynn found it hard, the more he aged, the older he looked, the more he craved being back in the digital world, back with Tron. It scared him to look at Alan and see the years reflected back at him. In Alan he saw what Tron would look like if he aged at all, greying hair and deep lines of worry etched around his eyes.
But there was one thing that always comforted Flynn about Alan, he always wore his glasses.
There had been one night when they'd been younger in years, he'd turned and noticed how very much like Tron Alan had looked. He wasn't peering at him from behind rimmed glass, they'd been eye to eye, like he always was with Tron. Alan had muttered something about contacts and Flynn found himself blinking at the resemblance.
It would've almost been funny, him comparing Alan to Tron and not the other way around, if it hadn't stabbed him straight through the heart. In those clear eyes had been laughter, love and a gradual shift into worry. Something he'd never seen in Tron's.
It had made him want to tell his work colleague all the things he had wanted to tell Tron. All the emotions and feelings that had been building up inside him, things that a program just wouldn't understand. How could something so irrational, so illogical as love be explained to a program, when even he himself couldn't quite grasp how it had happened, what it meant.
But Alan wasn't and never could replace Tron. They looked the same but were completely different, like him and Clu; a difference that couldn't be measured or calculated. And besides Alan was Sam's very own Tron, whenever Flynn went to the Grid he knew he could trust Alan to look after his son and it was this trust that was something he would never jeopardise.
Even in this Alan would have understood him, love, emotion, feeling, all these abstract concepts that Tron would never be able to grasp. But it wasn't Alan that made his heart ache and no matter how much he wanted to tell the other man what he was doing, what was happening, he couldn't. That night when he'd stared into those clear eyes wanting to confess he instead spat out his wedding announcement and departed. At the doorway he'd demanded that Alan never wear contacts again, because if their eyes caught each other's it would have to be through a wall of glass. All those emotions he could see running through Alan Bradley's eyes would be syphoned through the thin lens and never be mistaken for Trons.
"There are no guests here."
He dismisses Quorra's words with that simple statement. Eyes opening slowly to take in the city before him. It no longer matters; Alan could no longer remind him of Tron, because he'd never see the other man again. And Tron, he'd never have to worry about the wrong words or wrong emotions surfacing, because the man, the program, no longer was.
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Sam watches the old man's back, greying hair falling gingerly around the white collar of his outfit.
The man's words, rough and full of accepted sadness, hang heavy in the pure white room. So much tired emotion with no outlet in this slick and unaffected world, he seems so human and so old.
The way he'd spoken of Tron, of the dream he'd had, with a hint of hope, of longing for a better time, pulls at something in Sam's chest. He remembers the stories his father has told him, Tron had been the hero, strong, brave and loyal. To hear his dad talk of the man as if he was real...
It hits him here. That all this, all those old stories, all those old games were real.
It hadn't quite touched him when he'd stepped out of the arcade, it hadn't registered as he was dressed down by sterile faced women. The arena had thrown his body into gear while his mind still tried to catch up with what was happening. The light cycles had provided him with something familiar to grab hold of, and the rescue had swept him off his feet.
And now
Standing in a pure white room that holds the dark at bay with a digital screen, the city of the Grid a strip of light on the horizon, his father dressed in white - aged beyond years, on his knees and dreaming about a man that should never have existed...
Now it all clicks, connects.
It's all real.
And his father turns, astonished, to face him.
"Sam."
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To be continued