Alright, folks. I said that I would only post this if there were 25 hits to 'Silent Partner'. You guys outdid my wildest expectations, with 33 view within 3 days of its posting. And a request for a sequel!

I love you people. *sniff* I really do...

They found her on the shore.

Unusual power spikes had been reported to Tron, even though he was gone from the Grid almost as much as the User. When the other programs found something that that was beyond their abilities, they were still more likely to go to the security program about it, rather than Sam Flynn. While many programs were still left feeling uncertain around the User, Tron was their protector.

Tron was waiting for Sam at the arcade, when Sam entered the Grid. He needed to talk to Sam about the unexplained power surges. He really didn't want to, didn't like the thought of Sam and unknown things, potentially dangerous things; however, he knew he would be telling Sam about them, anyway. Because as a User, Sam could locate where they were coming from; and would be the one best able to fix whatever had led to the power spikes. And, because if he didn't tell him, Tron knew it would lead to a nasty argument with his lover as soon as Sam found out.

Lover.

The word always sent a frission through him when he thought of it in connection with Sam Flynn. And, whenever he wasn't thinking of Sam, it sent a vague, undefined feeling of missing something, of something being...lost.

He shrugged the sensation off as unimportant to the matter at hand, and went towards the User that was exiting the arcade. They could deal with this issue together.

-

It had not taken Sam long to pinpoint the location of the power spikes as the edge of the Sea of Simulation. The area that was producing the surges was known for having currents that swept the Sea, washing anything that fell into it up on the shoreline.

They fully expected that they would find some randomly generated code interacting with the Sea itself to draw in and release energy erratically, causing the power spikes that had been reported.

They took a small flyer to the location; Sam, much against Tron's better judgement, piloting. While Sam was often quiet and shy when he was alone with Tron; in all other respects, he was a daredevil and adrenaline junkie. It could make Tron wild with worry sometimes at how quick Sam was to risk himself. Tron was the security program; if anyone should be risking themselves, he argued, it should be him. Not Sam.

It was not long after they had landed and began searching the shoreline that they found the source of the power spikes.

Laying facedown on the wet, black sand was a program, its helmeted head turned away from them. The waves continued to roll in, lapping around the program; tugging greedily at it as if trying to pull it back into the dark waters, unwilling to relenquish its prize. Sam began to move towards the apparently injured program, only to be pulled up short by Tron's hand gripping his arm.

"What do you think you are doing?" he asked, frustrated. "He needs our help."

"You don't know that yet,"Tron cautioned. "We don't know who that is or what he is doing here, yet. It isn't safe to just run up to an unknown program without being ready to defend ourselves."

"Seriously? Look at him, man! Those circuits are so pale, you can barely see them!" Sam said, pointing at the still figure lying on the shore before them.

"Sam, if I were conscious and wanted to injure someone, even with my circuits that pale, I could find a way to do it. Especially if that person came up to me unprepared to defend themselves. I'm a security program. I'm supposed to protect this system and its inhabitants. That includes you." The tall security program looked at him, frustrated. "Will you please just let me do my job?"

Sam looked at Tron, his eyes softening slightly as he did so.

"You're right," he said. "I do make it hard for you sometimes, don't I? Honestly, though, I think you are worrying way too much. Go ahead and check him out, if you really feel like you need to; but hurry, I don't think he can last much longer without help."

Tron nodded his head and moved closer to the motionless program, pulling his disc from its dock as he did so. A quick scan of the program as soon as he was in close enough proximity proved that the program really was unconscious; and he rapidly waved to Sam to call him over, redocking his disc at the same time. Tron carefully turned the program over, revealing that he was actually she. He pulled her further up on the shore, out of the water's edge.

Sam ran to where Tron knelt in the sand near the program, slowing his pace as he grew close enough to see the minimal circuitry patterns that highlighted their gridsuit.

"Oh, man," he said nervously. "She's one of CLU's top warrior programs."

Tron frowned. "You know this program?" he asked, leaning back from her slightly.

Sam shrugged noncommitally.

"Well, kinda," he answered. "She busted onto the Game Grid when I was fighting...Rinzler..." Sam hated seeing the flinch that Tron gave at the name, "and then she almost caught us at the End of Line. Dad managed to knock her out and took her with us on the Solar Sailer."

"She's called 'Feral'," he told Tron. "CLU seemed to use her much like he did Rinzler," seeing again the subtle flinch at the name. "She only talked to me for a few moments, but she did talk to Dad for a little longer. It was weird, though. I think her vocal processes had been disabled. Dad had to enable them on her disc for her to be able to speak. He said that it looked like CLU had put some sort of...block.. on them."

Tron looked at the unconscious program at their feet. Without accessing the 'Rinzler' memory files, he had no way of knowing if the program-Feral-Sam had called her, was a risk to them. She apparently had previous contact with his other programming code overlay; however, Tron had no recollection of her from before the coup.

Although the pattern of her circuitry did set off a niggling feeling of recognition in him.

He didn't like not knowing; however, he would let Sam decide what to do with her.

"It's your call, Sam," he said. "I don't know her. What do you think we should do?"

Sam ran a hand through his hair and blew out a deep breath. He looked over, noting the unhappy look on Tron's face. Tron really hated not knowing how a potential threat should be handled.

"Let's get some energy into her, so she doesn't derezz if we try to move her; and then get her into the flyer. We'll take her back and decide what's to be done with her when she's awake and can answer some questions." He turned his gaze back down to the currently harmless figure on the sand. "You should probably restrain her, first. She's a good fighter, and she doesn't hold back to avoid getting hurt."

After Tron bound her hands behind her back with energy cuffs, Sam derezzed her helmet and tried to give the unconscious program some energy. He managed to get a little into her without causing her to choke, and was rewarded by her circuits brightening a little-enough that the color of her circuitry was identifiable. It was unmistakably the same deep red-orange hue that Rinzler's had been.

Sam wasn't sure about this. Feral had stopped Rinzler in the Games arena, only to join him in trying to stop Quorra from helping Sam escape from the lightcycle match. The next time he had seen her, she had ridden the falling elevator down from the End of Line club to attempt to capture the three of them-himself, his dad, and Quorra.

Even when his father had restrained her with his User skills and abilities, she had been unnerving. Dad had never told Sam or Quorra exactly what the program had said to him, but it had left the older man shaken and unsettled as he went to 'knock on the sky'.

And now he had told Tron that they should take her with them. He hoped that without CLU around to give her orders, she would at least listen and make up her own mind as to how she felt about Users. The thought of saving someone only to have to derezz them later was an uncomfortable one. They would put her in quarrantine when they reached the building that was being used as the administration center. If she proved to be too dangerous to them and the system, he would delete her when he was out of the Grid. Sam didn't like the idea; however, security program or not, he didn't think that he would ever be able to send Tron in to coldly derezz a program without feeling like CLU. And, he suspected, without making Tron feel like Rinzler.

The tall security program reached down and scooped the slight, limp figure into his arms, lifting her easily. He waited for Sam to begin walking towards the flyer that they had arrived in before speaking.

"She's missing her disc," he said.

Sam glanced over at Tron. No disc meant that backups of her programming and memories were not available to her the next time she tried to reboot. Depending on how long ago she had lost her disc, she might not remember anything, including her name. Maybe this would be easier than he thought. If she met them, talked to them before they gave her a replacement disc-a backup from the system archives-maybe she would be on their side. Maybe. Of course, that was assuming that they could make her a replacement disc. If they couldn't, it would be like dealing with someone who had permanently lost their memory after some sort of head trauma. He would need to give her a new directive, possibly new programming, while they waited for her to learn what her personality was. Sam sighed quietly to himself. Nothing about that would be easy. Easier, in some ways; however, still not easy.

He had needed to make replacement discs for Tron, when he found him. Perhaps it had been easier for him to do it that way, working from the other side of the screen. Quorra had refused to let him use the laser to enter the Grid until he could show her that Tron was freed from the Rinzler coding that he had been recoded with. It had been tedious; getting copies of Tron's original coding from Alan, and then carefully picking through the scrambled coding one line at a painstaking time.

It had been worth every moment, he thought to himself, looking at the tall, strong figure of the man next to him. While he had removed the overlaid coding that had reprogrammed Tron into Rinzler, he knew that Tron still carried Rinzler's memory files partitioned away inside of himself. Tron had not been able to bring himself to view them yet, having learned just a few of the things that Rinzler had been ordered to do by CLU. He kept them anyway, however, in a sort of self-imposed penance. When Tron had learned of Rinzler's role in the final Purge of the ISOs; he had come to Sam and begged him, his voice shaking as he did so, to delete him from the Grid.

"I was programmed to be security, Sam Flynn," he had said, his face slightly crumpled-looking, as though Tron was fighting back tears. "What kind of protector acts in such a way with its charges? I failed-I failed this system, its programs, your father..." A look of horror had come over his face just before he said, "I have failed my Creator, Alan-1. I..I shouldn't-can't-be allowed to function after having done this."

It had taken quite some time before Tron accepted that Sam didn't hold him responsible for what he had done while under CLU's control.

Most of the time, Sam wondered if Tron would ever feel the same.

They loaded the limp figure into the flyer, Tron securing her restraints to the flyer itself, and headed back to the city.