TRON 2.0: Debugging

By C. Mage

Nicholas stumbled as the hulks with the glowing red armor shoved him into a cube with the homey touches of a jail cell, punctuated by the sight of a blue energy field rising between him and the rest of the chamber. He stood up and would've dusted himself off, if it wasn't for the fact that dust was apparently a foreign concept to this place. "HEY!"

"Silence, Program. The Kernal wants to talk with you."

"Colonel? What is this, a military operation? Where am I and who are you?"

"You're in Program." The red-armored guard, male from the look of him, looked at Nicholas impassively. "State your name, function and User. Make it easy for yourself, because the Kernal isn't as nice as I am."

"I don't know what you're talking about." Stall. Stall until you can learn something. "I don't know where I am."

"Where you are, conscript, is in deep trouble." A deep voice accompanied a large, imposing figure. He was humanoid, but his face wasn't structured like a human's face...it was more like a robot's face, a blank face except for two slits for eyes. He walked over to the two red guards, towering over them. "You're in a highly restricted area. Immediately after you arrive in that sector, programs are de-rezzed left and right. Evidence of viral weaponry is found on the victims. All of them fall around you."

"It's not me! Someone's after me!"

"Oh? And why did they shoot every script around you with unerring accuracy, missing you by a megahertz?"

"I don't know! He sent me an e-mail telling me he was trying to ki...er, de-rezz me."

"And yet he kept you alive. Your assassin must be a real bit-brain, or you must think I am. Don't try any fuzzy logic on me, conscript!" he said suddenly, taking a menacing step towards Nicholas. "You are a picocycle away from finding out how much room the Recycle Bin has...!"

"Kernal?" asked a smaller script from behind the red-haloed humanoid. The Kernal turned, his optics centered on the smaller program expectantly. "I have an e-mail from Alan-One."

Alan-One...Alan Bradley! I'm saved! Nicholas thought, relieved.

The Kernal frowned, sensing a reprieve. "Is it about this suspicious conscript?"

"Yes, Kernal. Alan-One's instructions are explicit regarding this program."

The shields around Nicholas' holding cell fizzled out and Nicholas smiled as he stepped forward.

"Alan-One instructs us to re-assign him to the Game Grid in Sector 18."

The sides of the Kernal's mouth turned upwards in what Nicholas feared was a smile. His fears were proven true as he felt his arms seized. "Conscript, Sector 18 is where all the deathmatches take place. Soon, you're going to wish I'd tortured you. Get him out of my sight!"

What the hell is going on? Has Alan gone nuts? Is he the one trying to kill me? Nicholas' mind raced as he realized what would happen. If he died in here, there'd be no body...the perfect crime. Nobody would believe he'd been killed by a video game! "Hey, you can't do this! Hey! HEYYY!" he yelled as he was dragged away towards the transport.

"Schedule me a vidscreen when his first match begins," the Kernal said with the hint of a grin.

"Come on, guys...look, do I look like a dangerous criminal to you? Huh?" Nicholas cajoled, his mind still whirling. "I don't even belong here."

"You're telling us," the guards said in unison. They escorted him to the platform leading to the Recognizer transport and Nicholas looked around.

Well, I guess there are uglier places to die...

As they waited to be lifted up, a female script hustled towards the platform. The guards looked her over approvingly as she approached, the same red glow coming off her own body as the guards. "Wait! Hold on!"

"What can we do for you?" one of the guards said good-naturedly, as if talking to a non-debugged scriptlet.

She stopped and held up two orange orbs. "Here. These are for you two."

The guards released Nicholas and held up the balls, looking at them carefully. "These aren't upgrades..." one of them said just before the balls opened, surrounding the guards in blue electricity. As they convulsed in pain, the female script grabbed Nicholas' arm.

"Come on! Those won't hold them for long!"

"Who are you?" Nicholas asked as he followed her out of the room into a vast hallway, large enough to accommodate a medium-sized vehicle. Programs were moving back and forth through the hallway, mostly red, but other colors as well.

"Later! We've got to get your disc and get you out of here before they activate the security protocols. If that happens, we'll be up to our necks in ICPs!" She hustled him down the hall as the other programs looked at them in mild interest.

"Where are we going?"

"You've got to hop a transport out of this node. Come on."

Nicholas followed along, finding it harder and harder to relate to her as if she was just a program. Her facial expressions, body language and attitude made that impossible. Are all programs like that? He shook his head. I hope I have enough time to ask her some questions... It also made him a little nervous. She may have been a program, but she was a rather attractive one, with red "hair" and blue highlights over her form, which was athletic, but quite feminine by human standards.

They hustled through a hallway and up an incline to reach a high platform. Nicholas stopped, staring at the transport. He's seen all sorts of exotic spacecraft on assorted science-fiction movies, but the ship before him was a work of art. It was made of a cylindrical structure suspended within three concentric rings that passed from the front of the ship to the rear, passing within a few inches of each other as they moved. Nicholas caught himself staring as the female pulled him forward. "Come on, bit-head...you act like you've never seen a Firewall Upgrade Patch before."

"Uhm...yeah. Right." Nicholas kept looking at the outside, however, as he was guided into the craft through an access port and brought into a confined area. His companion hid him in the back, behind some boxes, and crouched next to him.

"We'll be safe here."

Nicholas nodded. "Who are you? What's your name?"

She smiled at him. "I'm Isis21. You're Nicholas One."

"How did you know?"

"I was in the Archival Route next to the Kernal's office. I heard everything. I don't know a lot about you, but I know you're not a virus and I know you didn't de-rezz all those scripts. Someone's trying to frame you."

"Why?" Then he remembered the e-mail he'd gotten. "Know a program named AvengingAngel?"

"Doesn't sound like a filename I know. Why?"

"She sent me an e-mail...she wants me dead for erasing another program. She must've really cared about him, because she blames me for the erasure...but I don't remember erasing any programs like the one she described. I didn't even know programs could feel and think."

"Then you had better figure it out, Nicholas One. Maybe you'll feel better once you get your identity disc."

"What is that?"

Isis21 turned to stare at him. "You don't...well, it seems that you're more of a newb than I first thought. An identity disc is always issued to FRPs when they are created."

"FRPs?"

"Free-Roaming Programs. You see, most programs are only active after receiving instructions from their Users to perform a task. Once that task is complete, they retun to their point of origin and go idle. Then there are the background programs, programs that remain active for long periods of time without actually being given a task. They only perform certain tasks in response to a 'tag' that let's them know they need to react to their tag as designed, then can go back to their standby status. Then there are the system programs, programs that aren't limited to a single function or command, nor are they subject to the normal boundaries. Most of these are Net programs, or ICPs like the ones you encountered. As their potential functions increase, so do their complexity and range. Finally, there are the Game Programs. These are the most complex of all, and as such, they have the ability to alter their own subroutines to match their environment. Other programs can do this, but they are limited in the number of subroutines they can carry. FRPs can also add other functions, even use optimized functions. With me so far?"

"I think so."

"Now, to be able to maintain their integrity and identity in such changing conditions, they have to have an identity disc. Also, because most games are combat oriented, their discs can be used for combat, for attack or defense. ICPs have similar discs since they can be used to battle viruses or hostile programs."

"Great."

"If you can get your disc, it'll give you the chance to defend yourself until you find the answers you seek."

"If that's the case, then why didn't I get issued my disc when I showed up?"

"You probably did...it was just taken as soon as it rezzed. You never got the chance to initialize it."

"Makes perfect sense..." ...not! "So where would they have taken it?"

"There's a storage area where useless data or packets are kept, scheduled for classification at a later time. I managed to find where yours is located." She held up a small glowing ball. "Here."

"What is it?"

"It's a permission. It will allow you to access that particular storage unit."

"You make it sound like I'm going in there alone."

"Unfortunately, Nicholas One, you have to. I'm not allowed out of this particular area and my User calls me back. I belong to a Game and if I don't get back to compile..."

"I get the idea...I think." He stopped and looked at her. "I don't know how to thank you. Will I ever see you again?"

"I think we'll see each other again, Nicholas One. It's not that big a Net. Here," she said, handing Nicholas a small triangular icon. "You can use this at any I/O port. I'll get the message."

"Thanks...for everything. Wish me luck!" He smiled and hugged her close, then ran off down the hall towards the Packet Buffer Unit. As he did, Isis21 watched him go, her mind a little overwhelmed by the contact. She'd never met a User up close, particularly this one. He seemed like any other program, but there was an intensity, and yet, an innocence.

No. NOT innocent. He de-rezzed him and Nicholas One is going to suffer the same fate, but not until he feels what it means to be afraid of de-resolution.

Isis21 nodded, then took out her Rod Primitive. I'll give him 10 microcycles…then I'll hunt him down in the Search Engine. We'll see how far across the partitions he can go by then. She walked over to an I/O port and contacted the Byte on her craft. "Prepare to depart."

"What is our destination?"

"We're going to go visit one of the other mainframes. I'll give you the address when I get there." She smiled, but a part of her was troubled by the contact she'd had with him. He pictured him as more…menacing. It'll be fine…as soon as I remove him from the system forever.

Nicholas stopped and leaned against a wall, panting. I've been running for hours…I gotta rest. He was amazed at the stamina this body had, but even this body had limitations. He couldn't run without building up fatigue.

Hard to believe...a while ago, I was running programs...now, programs are running me...running me ragged, that is. He stopped and leaned against one of the walls. One of the discoveries he'd made during his travels was that although the system was, in many ways, like a city, it wasn't exactly overpopulated. There weren't any scripts that looked younger than twenty by human standards, and they all tended towards human-looking, until you started looking at the security programs. They were humanoid for the most part, but there were other type of programs out there that didn't look human, but showed distinct intelliegence.

The Bits and Bytes were common enough, either acting as part of control systems or, in a few cases, accompanying other programs, ones that looked more sophisticated. Then there were the finders, constructs that looked like large medicine capsules, until they sensed something they didn't like. Then they opened up like a flower, revealing a weapon of some kind that fired painful bursts of energy. Luckily for Nicholas, they were better guard dogs than they were bloodhounds, easy to run away from in dense surroundings.

As he sat down, he looked around at his environment. It appeared as if he'd stopped in an area that was designed as some sort of control center. Three large platforms, accessable only by smaller platforms, towered over the ground level. Stairs connected the ground level with another sub-level, revealing control panels all around the inner hub of the sub-level. The area was empty now of any life. Not even the finders floated around. Maybe I can rest here for a while.

He found a niche to sit in that shielded him from view and closed his eyes. There was no real way to tell time; the world literally lit itself. Every object, construct, vehicle and program gave off its own light, so there was no day, no night. As he leaned back, something caught his attention and he opened his eyes fully.

Off to his left was a small canal with something that flowed like water within it.

Nicholas stood up, walking over to the liquid and dipping his hand into it. He didn't feel thirsty, but the warm sensation he received from touching it drew him closer. Nicholas leaned over just a little more...

"Who are you and what are you doing here?"

SPLASH!

Nicholas broke the surface of the water after being startled into the water by the new voice just over his head. He sputtered, then stopped as he realized the "water" didn't cling to him like regular water would. He slowly looked up, expecting a troop of ICPs hovering over him, combat subroutines at the ready.

What he actually saw was a glowing multi-faceted spheroid about the size of a softball. It hovered there silently, and Nicholas got the distinct impression it was looking right at him.

"Uhm...hi. I'm Nicholas, but my friends call me Nick. I'm kind of lost. Where am I?"

"You are in an inactive Shell program. This Shell has not been active for hundreds of nanocycles. It is scheduled for deresolution."

"Is that bad?"

"It is not bad, it is not good. It just is. What type of program are you?"

"Well, I guess I'm an FRP."

"Curious. Very curious. I am the primary byte for this Shell. It was once a Command Shell, but it is now obsolete."

"Well, what are you going to do?"

"Do? I do not understand the question."

"Aren't you worried about being erased?"

"It is not my decision to make."

Nicholas blinked; the accepting nature of programs was something he was still getting used to. "Well, if you had the choice, do you want to continue to exist?"

"Of course. But that would require me leaving my post and linking to another program. Also, I would need a purpose."

"Well, I am having a lot of trouble getting around and understanding how things work in this system. Can you help me?"

The Byte hovered there, pondering, then it dipped to eye level. "Agreed, Nicholas."

"Call me Nick."

"Nick it is. Please hold perfectly still while I merge my functions to yours." The Byte hummed for a few minutes, completely stationary. He expected some sort of reaction, but he didn't feel a thing.

"How long does it take?"

The Byte didn't say anything for a few moments, then it said, "It is complete."

"Okay. Hnh, didn't feel anything."

"You are not supposed to. Well, Nick, what is the current executable?"

"Before I go into it, I need a few things answered. First off, can I give you a name other than 'Byte'?"

"You do have that function."

"Alright...from now on, you have the designation 'Codec'."

"Agreed."

Nicholas smiled. "Nice to meet you, Codec. Okay, second, do you have the means to get the layout of this System?"

"I have that capability, once I obtain the required permissions."

"Beautiful. Alright, third...third...ah, I got it. Can you locate other resources in the surrounding area, identify them and show me what I need to go to get them?"

"That is one of my primary functions, information retrieval."

"Good. Let's get to work. I need to have any and all subroutines this place can offer. We're not going to be staying long."

"You got it," Codec said with a happy tone in his voice, and it streaked off to locate the data Nicholas needed. Codec wasn't just casually cheerful; he'd been without a program or station for thousands of cycles and Nicholas' arrival was a welcome event. Bytes like Codec needed to be useful, and weren't truly happy unless they knew that other programs needed them.

Codec would've smiled if he'd had a mouth.

Isis21 slid down the ramp and shed her "System Resource" disguise, returning to her native color, a mixture of blues and purples over her body and blue skin, with fiery red hair, spiked like frozen flames. She moved down through the corridors to the platforms below, avoiding the crumbling blocks to her ship, the B-SoD.

The B-SoD had started out as a simple data recovery construct, but Isis21 had heavily modified it to do a lot more than simple data searching. She'd taken subroutines from various search engines and incorporated them into the construct, making it faster, sleeker, and arming it with anti-construct and anti-viral weaponry. It could turn rings around Recognizers and easily de-rezz ground and aerial targets, but its most powerful function was its stealth mode. While activated, the ship was completely and totally undetectable by any program or virus.

Isis21 walked across the lightbridge to the port and entered the arrowhead-shaped craft, closing the port and disengaging the light bridge. She walked into the cockpit, a circular chamber with three seats behind a column of light that was currently displaying a three-dimensional image of the ship and the area around it. Isis21 sat down in the middle seat. "Status?"

A Byte colored a dark blue lowered from a hole in the ceiling, moving over to Isis21 and hovering off to her right. "#All systems functioning at 100. Standing by for your orders,#" the Byte replied in a feminine voice.

"Disembark and activate the search routines. We're looking for a program called 'Nicholas One'. Priority One."

"# Mission?#"

Isis 21 smiled. "Search and destroy."

"#Compliance. Importance of target?#" the Byte asked.

"This is the one, Byte. This is the one who killed him."

Byte didn't respond. She knew whom Isis21 was referring to all too well. "#Beginning orientation. Search routines initiated.#"

The BSoD detached the mooring clamps and it rose into the air, moving higher to clear the edge of the platform. Byte manipulated the control Bits to turn the ship towards a different sector in the system. As she did, Isis21 began to scan the search results. "No...no...definitely not..."

"#I have a result.#"

"YES…" Isis21 turned in her chair. "Where?"

"#Shell 499 in Sector 195430.#"

Isis21 blinked in surprise. "How did he get that far is such a short time?"

"#Perhaps he used a shortcut,#" Byte suggested.

"A shortcut? To an inactive shell?" Isis21 frowned. "I don't like the sound of that. I've heard about what Alan Two did when he was here, and I've seen the files on the one known as Flynn while looking through the Archive Bin. I planned for their capabilities, but this wasn't expected. Not at all. Step up the search. We have to lock him down before he moves again, or does anything else unexpected. Move at full speed to that sector."

"#Executing.#" Byte moved to the navigation dock and settled in, maneuvering the craft towards that sector, locating the closest link. Normally the links were used by Recognizers for file and packet transfers, but the BSoD had picked up a few illegal functions, thanks to Isis21's acquisitions. The craft was now so heavily modified, it wouldn't run on anything slower than a mainframe without being detected. It was outfitted with anti-construct weapons and hardened shielding, capable of withstanding several direct hits from Game Tanks and other heavy weaponry.

Now, it was "borrowing" a transfer link across the Game Sea. The BSoD would reach the sector in a very short time, but not soon enough for Isis21, and Byte knew it.

Isis21 was in the mood to delete, and Byte knew that if Isis21 thought formatting a sector or two would do the job, she wouldn't hesitate at all. +Let's hope she doesn't make this a suicide mission.+

ASSEMBLING TIME:

COMPLETED: 96

ELAPSED TIME: 22 years, 1 month, 5 days, 14 hours, 19 minutes, 55 seconds

ESTIMATED TIME TO COMPILE MISSING PROGRAM FRAGMENTS: 4 hours, 47 minutes, 7 seconds

PROGRAM NAME: M.C.P.

TO BE CONTINUED…