"Ok, CLU. Tonight we check everything in the right hand column."
Kevin Flynn was playing another game on his computer, at least to me at the time it looked like a computer game. But one thing was very odd about Flynn. He seemed to be talking with his computer and it was talking right back to him.
He typed in REQUEST ACCESS TO CLU PROGRAM CODE 6 PASSOWRD TO MEMORY 0222
"Come on, come on!" he egged to computer on. "Where are you? CLU?"
"Yes, sir," the monotone voice responded from the computer. My head shot up at this voice. It was so unreal.
"We don't have much time left to find that file. This is top proirity."
"Yes, sir. I know, sir."
"This isn't just correcting my bank statement or fixing my phone bill problem again. This is a must."
"I understand, sir."
"I wrote you. I told you everything I know about the system."
"Thank you, sir. But I'm not sure-"
"No 'but's' CLU, that's for Users. Now you're the best program that's ever been written. You're doggid and relentless."
"Let me at 'em!" the monotone voice said with determination.
"That's the spirit. Now, keep that tank rolling and I'll try to keep you covered from this end."
CLU sat down in the control chair within the tank I could see on the computer screen. I could see him reach over and grab something which he drank. He looked like a truck driver. When I looked up, Flynn was looking back down at me smiling. I crawled back to the wall and wrapped my arms around my legs.
"Hey, Lil," Flynn said with a pleasent voice. "You can watch if you want, just promise you won't tell anybody. This is top secret stuff right here, man. Come on. You can talk to CLU if you want."
I shook my head. My parents had died in a car crash a few days ago and Kevin Flynn took me in. My parents knew and loved him and trusted him with me. There were other friends of course and some I knew better, but for some reason they chose Flynn. I knew him but not like I knew my parents or like I knew Alan. He was nice and funny, but not really the parental type. I'd tried to escape the last few days so he had to lock me in the same room with him because he would never leave me alone. Not because he was afraid I was going to go through his things or find something I wasn't supposed to find, but just so he could keep an eye on me and make sure I was safe. There was rumor going around that my parents had been run off the road, but there was little to no proof to support that, so until that theory could be proved or disapproved, Flynn had to watch over me very closely.
CLU drove on and came to a memory flow. He pulled to a stop. "Think we can merge into this mem'ry, bit?" CLU asked the bit floating by his head.
Eagerly, the bit responded, "Yes!"
The tank merges with the memory and cruises for a while before it makes a quick left turn. "Now, ol' Flynn said to look over in here...but I don't see what he's looking for."
"Come on, you scuzzy little data, be in there..." Flynn whispered to himself. I crawled on my hands and knees over to him to see what he was doing now. Before I could even react, I find myself being lifted through the air and tickled. Laughing, Flynn sets me in his lap before continuing to work. "Don't just hover next to me while I work. You can be a part of it too." For being only seven, I knew a thing or two about computers, but nothing like what Flynn was trying to do. He typed in REQUEST STATUS REPORT ON MISSING DATA
"Uh, oh...we got company," CLU's monotone voice speaks from the computer screen.
"I don't believe this," Flynn says.
Before I could even ask what, Flynn's fingers began flying over the keys telling CLU what to do next. Red programs began to swarm all around him. The turrett of the tank was aimed at all of them.
"A Recognizer," CLU acknowledged.
The bit repeated eagerly, "Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes!"
CLU took out one of the giant red programs which had morphed into a Recognizer or Reco. This looked an awful lot like the game Space Paranoids which Flynn had in his arcade. The Recos fell like flies, one after another after another, but his quick voice fills my ears and it is full of urgengy. "There's too many of them!" Flynn's hands begin typing faster as he tries finding a way out of the mess he'd just created. CLU's tank continues down the pathway it'd just turned onto.
"What's this?" Flynn sighs above me. The tank turns right and finds another Reco in front of it. CLU fires and hit it, but has to swerve out of the way to avoid the pieces falling down on top of him. He loses control of the tank. A scream comes from the screen and CLU's tank hits a wall.
"Dammit!" Flynn shouts, slamming his fists against the keyboard.
The bit zooms around the wreckage of the tank as CLU pops out of the top. "Get out of here!" CLU shouts losing the monotone sound to his voice. The bit agrees with him as it zooms away.
Three more Recos come down out of the digital sky. The closest one's arms move and form what looks like a giant digital boot. That boot grows closer and closer until a message pops up on the screen. ILLEGAL CODE CLU PROGRAM DETACHED FROM SYSTEM
"Busted again!" Flynn exclaims throwing his hands in the air. Now sighing, "That was my best program." He continues typing, but fails to notice the tears welling in my eyes. REQUEST...ACCESS TO CLU PROGRAM LAST LOCATION: HIGH CLEARANCE MEMORY
"Lil, what's wrong?" he asks me as I sniff and push myself off his lap. He realizes what he's just made me watch; the death of a computer program and he'd driven him right to his virtual death. "I'm...I'm sorry, Lily. I didn't think-Please, come here." I run to the door and pull on the handle. Flynn had locked the door so I couldn't get out, but still I tried opening the door.
Flynn had to pry me away from the door. "I'm sorry," he whispers as he holds me in his arms. "I didn't think. I'm sorry. It won't happen again." Pulling a string of keys from his pocket, he lifts me in his arms, unlocks the door and carries me over to the sofa which was low to the ground. It was there we slept that night. It was there I dreamt of CLU.