I remember screaming. I remember pain. I remember the way the foreign code and the powerful overrides felt as they scorched my system. I remember being awake for the entire process, filled with that unrelenting agony. I remember being held there in that sterile room they brought me to, a slave to the disc on my back through which Clu accessed everything that made me who I am. I remember Rinzler, watching, silent and still, left there by his master in order to remind me of what I was to become; immune to what he was witnessing.
Clu told me over and over not to resist. He would his fingers through my hair, pulling it loose, and tell me that I was only making it worse for myself. My struggles only increased. The pain did too.
And then I would scream some more. I didn't have the physical strength to both resist and be silent.
Usually, I would shout my name and purpose, creating a mantra to fend off his lies. But as my future grew darker, I began shouting other things. I would tell myself stories between groans and gasps; stories of my work for Lora, and of the old system. Stories of the early days of the grid, and of Tron.
But the overrides, they were just like what the MCP had used. It hurt while they were installed, however long that took, and then you felt nothing. You found yourself brainwashed, able to perform anything besides your basic functions, as required, when ordered.
Clu was making me into a shadow of myself, just a Yori shaped mass of code. No thought. No real emotions. Just data.
Just a drone.
I remember the way my circuits flashed; the way blue looked just before it turned to orange. And then the memories stop, and there's nothing for a long, long while.