Outer Limits
Chapter Four

By Nan00k

Wow, thank you for all the wonderful comments! :) Here is the next chapter, complete with Rinzler being, well, two people at once. Ouch. Apologies for the trippiness; he's had a rough journey from Point A to Point B.

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Warnings: descriptive violence, mild language, alternative coupling, original characters, dark themes, SPOILERS for Tron: Legacy.
Disclaimer
: Tron © Disney. I only write this mess.'


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Everything was pain. It hurt. Oh, it hurt to exist. Everything burned. Everything was white hot coding, a mess, a disaster—

Abomination.

"I can make you perfect, too, friend. Why don't you let me? Don't you want perfection?"

He was no one's friend. No one's perfection. He was…

He didn't know who he was.

The moment in the Sea became a faded memory file in the back of his processes. The pain swamped everything else. Pieces had been left behind, that were slowly reassembling. He didn't know why. He didn't know why he was still alive.

He didn't even know how he had gotten here… wherever here was.

An alien system. Not the Grid. The moment he had reached for the light inside of the Sea of Simulation, he had vanished, as if he had been wiped clean from the Grid. He had been glad, if a program could feel such things. He did not want to exist, not as he was. He did not deserve life.

"Why bother fighting, Tron? Isn't this what you wanted?"

He deserved the cold hand of deactivation, of deresolution, not to reappear here. That is what he wanted. What he deserved.

He was not Tron.

"My name is Talbot. Who are you?"

A voice. A voice of God. Rinzler didn't know if he was glad or agonized. Both, most likely. He had not heard the voice of a User… since… he didn't remember.

He didn't remember a lot… but he remembered the worst. Always the worst.

He remembered the betrayal. The loss of the Grid to C.L.U.'s madness. To… perfection. He had lost more than just his freedom. He had lost Flynn, his friend, his new User. He had lost everything that had ever mattered.

His purpose.

What was it now?

He followed the voices—the new voices—for cycles and cycles. He didn't know what they wanted of him. Just questions.

He wished he had answers.

He wished he could remember his name.

"How are you today, Rinz

ztTTTTrrrron?"

Tron hadn't been online in megacycles. To feel the warmth of another User—

No. Alan-1?

"I wanted to ask you questions. Is that okay, Rinzler?"

Tron didn't know who Rinzler was. He felt like he should have, so he responded as if he were.

Alan-1. He had missed him. He missed him so much. He had given Tron life, given him a purpose.

Flynn had too. Given him a new one, that is. He loved his User. He loved the world of the Users. He had loved Flynn.

They had been friends.

Friends.

Tron had friends. He did. He remembered them, their faces, their laughter, their world—

And then, he remembered. Everything else.

"You're going to help me build the perfect system, Tron. You and me… because Flynn has betrayed us."

No… he hadn't.

"You will help me, Tron."

No…

"You aren't going to be 'Tron' any more, are you? Tron is imperfect. You… you will be perfect. Just like you always wanted."

He did not want perfection. He did not want this! He was not—

"Your name is Rinzler."

Yes.

"Who are you?"

I am Rinzler.

He was the Chief Protector. He was the Grid Master. He was the defender of perfection—

"To protect the Users."

…He was supposed to protect the Users. That was his purpose. That… that was his purpose.

Not perfection. The Users. The Users. The Users.

"My name's Tom. Amy told me all about you."

Alan. Alan. He missed his voice, his presence.

Where was Flynn?

Flynn. Dead.

Flynn was dead. The Creator was dead.

I missed you, Alan-1.

"My name isn't Alan. I'm Amy. Remember?"

I have failed the purpose you gave me. I am sorry.

"No, it's okay. I'm not Alan. Are you okay?"

He wasn't. Oh, he wasn't. He wanted to go back. He had never felt regret before. Emotion belonged to the Users. Flynn talked of hearts and feelings—

RINZLER.

That was his name, his purpose, his destiny—

He was Tron. He had to be. He had always been. That was what he was made to be.

"It's okay, Rinzler. Why don't you tell me about what happened?"

He couldn't think. He couldn't process what had happened. Everything was a blur, in fragments, in pieces inside his own mind. His errors leached out into the system he was inside of.

The virus of the Sea. It was spreading here. His fault.

System not sufficient. It would consume him as it had the other programs here, all minor, but not deserving of their fate.

"What can I do?"

Nothing.

Let me die.

"Do you need to go back to the Grid?"

No. Not there. Never… there. Again.

"Where is the Grid located? Within ENCOM?"

No. It was Flynn's. Only Flynn's. They were all… Flynn's.

He faded out too much now. He couldn't maintain the power source the new system provided. It was breaking down, corrupted by his own corruption.

Let me die.

"No. You don't deserve to die."

He did. He deserved far worse.

Are you disappointed in me, Alan-1?

"…No, Rinzler, I'm not."

I… I am glad.

"If I got you back to the Grid, would you survive?"

I don't know. I don't know anything about it now.

"Don't worry. I'll save you."

He didn't deserve the mercy of a God, of a User. Rinzler wailed in defeat. Tron felt himself falling to pieces, and not from the virus.

He did not deserve to be alive… after all he had done.

Rinzler.

Thank you, Amy.

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Tom pushed the door open with his food, balancing an arm full of grocery bags in his arms, plus his workbag. He didn't mind their apartment, considering it was very close to his office, but he could have lived without the four flights of stairs. He hated elevators. So much.

"I'm home!" he called, shutting the door. Walking the short distance down the hallway, he found Amy already at the kitchen bar.

She looked up with a smile. "Hey, you're back!" she exclaimed, grinning.

Tom dropped the bags on the table and embraced her with a hug and a kiss. "Yup." He smiled back at her as she took the bags and began to sort them. "How was work?" he asked, sitting down at their table.

"Very dull," Amy replied, snorting. She began to shove the cold items into the fridge. "A ridiculous amount of tech assistant requests and all of them were problems a stupid little kid could have solved. You?"

Chuckling, Tom worked on getting his shoes off. Oh, man, what a day. "Average day," he lied. He had actually been walking all over the city for his own errands during his lunch hour. "So… how's our basket case?" he asked.

It was a joke, but not, all at the same time. Amy paused in her sorting and Tom looked away, awkward. She disapproved of the nickname he had made up for their newest, ah, resident who spent most of his time rambling and speaking incoherently.

"Ha," Amy laughed at last, continuing the unpacking with a smile, though she did seem a bit unnerved. "Was just talking to him actually."

"Oh? Say anything interesting?" Tom asked, flinging off a shoe. He wasn't sure if he was actually interested, or he was just trying to pretend to be. He personally didn't want to talk to the computer program, if he was that, all the time. Rinzler disturbed him, greatly.

Amy sighed. "He keeps talking about C.L.U. lately. I'm beginning to think that he wasn't a User. I think he was another program. Apparently he saw Mr. Flynn as a Creator too, so… yeah."

Tom grimaced. "Great," he said, sarcastic. "A psychotic program who murdered a human being. Sounds great."

It sounded like it had come right out of a science fiction thriller, to be honest, but he had seen the conversations himself, having initiated a lot of them. Rinzler, if a prank, was sophisticated beyond anything he had ever witnessed. If real…

Tom didn't really want to think about it.

Moving away from the kitchen, both collapsed on the couch, their enthusiasm from earlier drained away. They sat there, two exhausted programmers, dwelling on a topic Tom could barely believe they actually had to worry about.

"I really just want to learn more about Rinzler right now, honestly," Amy admitted, sounding distraught. "He's so… corrupted. I wonder if we'll ever know anything for sure."

Tom stared out, thinking. "You should just dump the whole computer, Amy," he said gently. "This isn't normal."

It was downright creepy, but Amy was never one to drop a project they had just started. He wasn't that surprised, then, when she sat up, turning to face him with a desperate look.

"But it's…" she began, but then stopped. She sighed. "Tom, come on. This is probably the coolest thing we've ever seen. It's beyond anything I've ever seen. Either we're the victims of the best cyber prank ever, or we just discovered one of ENCOM's dirtiest secrets."

"Secret?" Tom repeated, pulling away, frowning. This was not some kind of conspiracy. He didn't believe in those.

Amy scowled. "A computer program that can think," she bit out, sarcastically highlighting the ending word.

"Amy, it doesn't think," Tom replied with a glare of his own.

"Rinzler can," the woman exclaimed, exasperated. "You've talked to him!"

Leaning forward, Tom stared directly into her eyes, firm. "IT, Amy," he said sternly. "It is an IT, not a he."

"Oh, come on," Amy cried, as he stood up. He had had enough of this talk.

"You are getting way too into this," he complained, motioning at their bedroom door, where the infected computer lay. "It's just… it has to be a prank."

Amy crossed her arms against her chest, looking up at him. "Two weeks of talking with a prankster. I don't think so," she replied, shaking her head.

Tom made a frustrated sound. "What the hell else could it be? !" he demanded. It couldn't be a real program. It couldn't… because…

Programs couldn't think.

"A program. He's a program, Tom," Amy replied, standing up as well. She sounded firm in her belief. Tom just shook his head. "H-he keeps talking about Users and programs and—and that Grid place." Amy gripped the side of her head, suddenly looking awed. "This is huge. Whatever it is."

"ENCOM isn't like some evil terroristic subvert company, Amy," Tom said, now exasperated himself. "It—it makes video games. And OS systems. It—it doesn't…"

Amy saw his hesitation, scowling. "What? Play God?" she challenged. Tom looked away. She sighed heavily. "This is the biggest technological achievement. Ever. If Rinzler actually can think? Jesus, Tom… that… that would change everything."

Tom wouldn't just buy into his sentience that easily. He couldn't just believe in some conspiracy theory at the drop of a hat. They had a strange and disturbing clue to work through, but they couldn't just jump to conclusions, not yet.

"Rinzler… doesn't have any proof," he said, knowing he sounded lame. "All it does is ramble and mention things we don't even know."

"I think we're getting somewhere with him, though," Amy replied, suddenly enthused again. She smiled, optimistic. "He's kind of making more sense now that I know how to ask him the right questions. I think if I keep him talking for a while, we'll find out more."

Tom rolled his eyes. "Find out what? That he's sentient?" he asked. "I mean, I know that's a huge deal technology wise… but, Amy, what good is this for anyone else? We'll never be able to get a concise answer form ENCOM, that's for sure. We can't even tell other people about this. We stole Rinzler, remember?"

That, if anything, immediately dampened Amy's good mood. She deflated, at least granting Tom one moment of victory in this debate. They couldn't just point out discrepancies in a stolen object, not to the public.

"Yeah…" she said, sounding glum. She looked toward the bedroom, frowning. "I'm just hoping he'll explain himself more soon. I want to know."

Tom understood that. He wanted answers too, if only to move on from the whole incident.

"Don't burn yourself out on this, Amy," he said, smiling gently. He walked over and hugged her from behind. "If you find out, you find out."

Amy made a noncommittal sound and moved away, back toward the kitchen. Tom sighed as she continued to unpack the nonperishables, plotting their evening meal. He wanted nothing more than to take a quick nap.

But Rinzler was in the bedroom. Tom shivered slightly; why did a mere computer made him feel uneasy? How had it come to this?

He was never, ever accepting a drunken dare again. Ever.

"What's that?" Amy suddenly asked, calling out from the dining room. Tom saw her looking at a bundle of papers that was sticking out of his work bag.

Nervously, he walked over to the table, reaching out. "Job hunting," he replied carefully. He took the papers from her, trying not to seem too panicked.

Amy frowned. "Oh." A suspicious look came to her eyes. "You never told me you quit working at Michael's," she began.

Tom shrugged. "I didn't. Not yet." He wanted a better paying job, really. He liked his current job location, but there were better places, he knew it. "Just wanna keep my options open, you know?"

With a sigh, Amy turned around. "Okay." She hesitated at the kitchen entry and turned to face him. She smiled gently. "Baby, I really think that we're going to find something amazing here. Even if it's just between you and me."

Her optimism was sometimes foolhardy, but it was honest. He loved that about her. "…Yeah. I know we will." He smiled, kissing her, before he pulled back. "I'll help with dinner in a few minutes."

Tom walked over to the bedroom, loosening his tie. He saw the monitor screen was still on, blaringly white with black text strewn all over. He didn't want to read what it said. Reaching for the basket of laundry on a dresser, he flung a towel over the monitor, shielding him from the invisible eyes his paranoia told him was there.

Sentient machine or no, he was taking a nap in his own goddamn bedroom.

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End Chapter Four.


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Next, Quorra meets some doctors.

A/Ns:
-"Virus of the Sea" – reference to Tron: Betrayal, the prequel comic between Tron and Tron: Legacy. Basically, C.L.U. poisoned the Sea of Simulation with a virus that targeted the ISOs, preventing anymore from being born there.