Tron: Sacrifice Script

Episode Two: Sacrifices Part Two

MARA WATCHED AS Tron waited impatiently for the light runner to arrive. They'd made it to the edge of Argon, and Zed had managed to contact them, signaling that he was on his way by sending a calm, rhythmic beep back.

"How is he?" Mara asked as Tron managed to settle down, making himself busy by trying to access Beck's disc.

"I won't know the extent of the damage until we get back," Tron shook his head, reattaching Beck's disc, "but he appears to be stable for the time being."

He attempted to put the palm of his hand against his forehead, but his mask blocked him. He put his head back, looking up at the finally dark, empty sky. At least the Occupation ceased the search for them for now.

"What will happen-" he shook his head again "-what I presume will happen is his systems will start shutting down within the next cycle, if the damage isn't sustained. This time will be critical for him.

"That was some great flying you did back there." Tron said when Mara sat down on the ground and rested her head on her knees, her arms around her legs.

"Heh, thanks." Mara closed her eyes and the memory of the tumbling jet flashed in front of her.

"Tron would have died if you didn't convince me to let you come." Tron stood up again. "It was out of your control. You had no idea a bomb was going to injure him, let alone be activated. This commitment is full of risks. Tron knew what he was involved in."

Mara looked up at him, then looked past him.

Tron saw her eyes focus on something white speeding towards them.

"Zed!" Mara stood up when he was close enough.

Tron attended to Beck, lifting him and stood, waiting calmly for Zed to slow the vehicle enough to set Beck in the seat beside Zed.

"Go!" Tron ordered when Zed looked like he was about to ask what happened.

Tron and Mara took running jumps and activated their light cycles. They took positions on either side of the runner, and Tron pleaded for a safe passage to the mountain.

Beck was critically injured. Tron knew that Beck understood the risks and the following consequences of his actions, but Tron did not anticipate how much that moment costed him. He knew programs were going to be hurt. That fact was inevitable and couldn't be avoided. He knew it was his responsibility to repair the damage.

Zed handed Tron the clearance key and he deactivated his cycle. He swiped the card. As the large door swung open, Tron realized he was going to have to upgrade his security. His closest inner circle would have to log in special codes, and the rest would have the appropriate clearance cards according to their rank. A rank that would be achieved by close observation during training that he would have to oversee.

He decided he would fine tune his ideas later, after a computer generated evaluation scan of Beck's injury.

As Tron entered, he saw everyone turn to watch as Zed parked the runner in the space available. Tron closed the door and walked around the runner to remove Beck. The silence in the lower level was cold as ice, as Tron moved toward the only security locked lift. He repositioned Beck to lay over his shoulder to scan his hand, and press in the appropriate code.

"The lift will be open for one hour. Time enough for everyone to relocate to Observation Deck, level one." Tron stepped into the lift and Mara and Zed joined him at his beckoning.

The lift stopped and opened to an enclosed deck. Mara and Zed walked after Tron.

The room was a clinic.

An examination table rose from the floor, and Tron laid Beck face down on it. Tron, again, tried to access Beck's disc, trying not to look at the blue and black pixels that had been scrambled by the blast. Zed watched awkwardly, and Mara stared at Beck's disfigured back.

Missing pixels, Beck's back was a light blue and black mass of twisted circuitry. His digital code was scrambled, and Tron knew it. He was amazed that it was just his back that was damaged.

Tron was denied access again, and again, and reattached Beck's disc in frustration. He went to the plasma tank, the same tank which Beck destroyed in trying to heal him.

"If Tron's disc was undamaged, I could fix his code no problem." Tron looked at Mara and Zed. "Maybe, if you repair this tank..."

"On it." Mara and Zed moved to the tank to observe the damage.

They worked diligently, talking among themselves and assessing the damage together, as Tron observed. Zed placed a recoder into the tank's main conduit. An invisible screen extended in front of Zed, and he began to fiddle with the tank's inner workings, until he found what was wrong.

"Plasma overload." Zed reported to Mara.

"Yeah," She replied pulling her hand out of her own recoder screen. "The whole tank is coated in it."

She proceeded to clean out the tank's computer system, and Zed set out to repair the tank's protective screening. Within seconds the screen was mended, and Zed helped Mara with the computer.

Tron smiled thoughtfully behind his mask. Beck's friends would do well as Chief Mechanics here. He was sure they would be thrilled to have their own team, but something still wasn't right. Mara could be useful as a partner for Beck, a fellow Renegade. Beck made his way through some tight spots, being stuck between a rock and a hard place. Being a fierce program, Mara would even some of the odds Beck faced.

At last the tank was repaired, and Tron placed Beck in the tank, already filled with plasma. Tron activated the tank with a touch of a gloved finger on the conduit.

Tron froze waiting for the computer to announce a warning, but it only stated: "Commencing Plasma Reconstruction sequence" and remained silent. He set a timer on the translucent screen, and watched for a moment as it began counting down from three cycles. He observed the scans with a studious eye, as the computer started a series of critical, probing scans. Satisfied that Beck's system was stable at the moment, Tron entered the lift with Mara and Zed.

Stepping off the lift, Tron saw the view of Argon was quiet. It matched the same silence as the mechanics exhibited. They watched him make his way to the strong, reconstructed glass. Argon was quiet. Too quiet.

"I'm going to ask you all not to part from this facility." Tron said softly. "As long as CLU resides in Argon, he will continue to search for anyone who can be linked to Tron, the Garage, and to me."

"And Tron?" Mara asked timidly.

"Tron needs all the possible help he can receive." Tron turned. "We need a new security system. One that not even CLU's most advanced tech-programmers can break through. You are all mechanics. We can work together, and design the perfect system. We need to build new lifts, we need to make the clearance keys, and come up with new codes.

"Some of you may not want to be here, and let me apologize for saving you from deresolution. But you're here now, and I can protect you from CLU." Tron walked through the crowd of programs. "I need to know who the best mechanics are. I'll need to know who the best circuitry builders are, and if you don't know how to accomplish these things, I will teach you how. We are all going to help out here. If you want to be safe, if you want to defeat CLU, and remove the threat of his forces; if you support Tron, help him now by doing your part here."

Mara nodded and stepped forward, but she was alone. She turned her head and glared fiercely at her fellow mechanics. Then Zed stepped forward. Slowly everyone had joined in, and Tron smiled behind his mask.

"We should find Beck." Zed said. "He was for the Renegade one hundred percent from the beginning. He'd want to join."

"If Beck is as smart as he sounds," Tron said, "he'd have gone underground when he found the Garage was abandoned. I will look for him, but first we have to find someone who can help heal Tron."

Tron went to his computer and searched the data base. It ran through the usual programs who were in medical units, who acted as healing programs for the Occupation. Then he noticed something was missing from the data base. He stopped the computer's search and started a new more specific search of the former medical unit programs that had worked for the Occupation.

Tron smiled as the computer stopped on a program's status that had changed, and most recently. The program had previously been a Medical clinic officer before their devoted service to the Occupation, a service that seemed no longer to have a value.


Paige walked down the dark street, her heels hardly making any sound. She distrusted the dark silence. It was like a deep breath that at any moment, would expel a full, anger-fed, and violent riot. The tension, even in the empty streets, was almost palpable. The same anger filled her code, and then, she, too, could taste it.

She saw Tron and the Renegade together. The Renegade... Who was he?

She searched the dark streets of Argon, not for anything specific. She just need one little piece of proof that Tron was injured.

'Injured again?' Her mind pondered as she remembered what Tron had said to her:

"I am healed." and "CLU didn't let you and Tesler in on his secret plan?"

'Lies!' Part of her subconscious exclaimed. 'Tron is only an image, which one rogue program manipulated to confuse civilian programs and defy the Occupation!'

An image? Tron didn't look like an image today. What of the thing crashed by Able's Garage? What was it for? What happened that it failed and was destroyed?

Her search lead her to the Garage, and she laid her eyes once again on the black mass of rubble. She noted how this part of the district was dead silent, abandoned by all who had lived here from fear.

She stepped forward cautiously, fully aware if she made even the softest of sounds, she'd alert anyone who lurked here of her presents. She turned off her circuitry color, and she walked on. She quietly dashed to the wreckage, and once hidden by their bulk, she turned her light to the lowest level available and began to search.

She maneuvered through the maze of twisted Grid metals and circuitry, until she heard a noise. A soft thump, like marginal weight landing on metal from an easy jumping distance. She accessed her disc and turned her light off and stood frozen, her ears and frame alert to any sound. As she continued to simply stand there hiding in the dark, and she continued to hear nothing, Paige concluded that the beast of machinery around her must still settling. She mentally scoffed at her foolish paranoia, and turned her search light back on.

A slender, white figure appeared with the beam of light in front of her.

It took all of her trained memory not to be shocked and startled at the sight, but the hesitation of surprise gave Tron all the opportunity he needed.

He tossed an electrical pulse grenade at her as she reached for her disc. She saw it activate and felt the electricity surge into her digital being. She cried out and the force of the surge sent her backward into the rubble. She slide down into a heap, and some small, dislodged debris fell on top of her.

Tron stood over her, as Mara came out from hiding.

"How did you know she'd be here?"

"She's been discharged." Tron said as he kicked the rubble off of Paige's unconscious form, and cuffed her hands behind her back. "She saw Tron, and probably reported his existence to her commanders. CLU has been praising the presumed death for far too many xilacycles now, and wouldn't appreciate a program going around telling Argon CLU lied. So he dismissed her, probably discredited her along the way. It's really a wonder she's not derezzed."

"How could she possibly help Tron?" Mara said skeptically. "She is the enemy; part of the Occupation."

"True, she may not want to offer her assistance in our cause," Tron said lifting Paige onto his shoulder, "but do not forget if we give her the proof that Tron is alive, she may recognize CLU lied and may also be easier to bend to our cause."

The corner of Mara's mouth twitched, as she nodded. She let Tron lead the way out of the wreckage.

They walked to Able's Garage. Mara brought a pack with her and began filling it with necessary tools and materials. Mara designed the pack to temporarily dissolve the tools, enabling her to fit anything inside and the pack would still be light enough to carry easily. She went to everyone's locker tossing the contents in the pack until she came to Able's.

Mara paused, holding her hand on the locker door before pushing it open to find it empty.

Tron noticed her hesitation.

"We need to hurry." He whispered urgently.

"Able's locker." Mara turned her head to look at Tron's masked face. "It's empty."

"Your friend," Tron started to tactfully convince her to move on, "Beck. Maybe he came by earlier and emptied the locker."

"Maybe." Mara sounded crestfallen. "I just wish we could find him. He was hardly around before, and now when we need him most he is hiding."

Tron looked down at his feet. "I'm sure he can take care of himself."

"Yeah," Mara smiled slightly. "I just wish he was here. This would be easier with Beck."

Mara closed the locker and closed her pack.

"Okay." Mara hoisted her pack over her shoulder. "Let's go."


Tron read through the scans on Beck's evaluation. He was alone and unmasked. His brow was furrowed in frustration.

The results read critical, as Tron suspected. He entered Beck's scans into the computer and ran a simulation. The screen showed a model of Beck's being. Areas unharmed showed the light blue color of his secondary circuitry, and damaged areas showed a deep red. Tron began the simulation, and watched as the cycles counted off and the red spread across the computer generated Beck. When the whole model was red, the simulation ended, the time count stopped.

Beck had at most eight cycles left before his digital code deteriorated.

He shook his head and looked at Beck. He was still in the tank, which was the best place for him at the moment.

"Come on, Beck." Tron said as he entered new codes into the computer's simulation.

Tron watched in anxiety as the simulation went badly, cutting the time Beck had left by half.

Tron put his hand on his forehead. How can he do this alone?

Then the computer started beeping.

"Subject deresolution." The computer announced.

Beck's code was deteriorating.

Tron rushed to the tank's conduit and adjusted the plasma pressure inside the tank.

"Come on, Beck! Fight it!"

Tron watched as the scan brought up a new evaluation of Beck's system, and entered the new data. He saw Beck's simulation turn red, and looked at the time estimate.

Beck had less than seven cycles.

The tank's computer system alarm was still blinking at Tron.

The only way he could save Beck was to repair his disc. But how?

Tron directed the computer to isolate its probes on Beck's disc. The model appeared on the screen, and Tron's eyes widened in shock.

Half of Beck's disc was derezzed. There was no way he could repair the disc himself without doing Beck harm. If his disc was corrected the slightest bit differently than originally programed, Beck's code would change and he would never be the same. So many risks were present to happen if anything went wrong, and Tron knew too little to repair a damaged disc. He rubbed his forehead, wondering how in the history of the grid, he could feel this helpless.

Then Tron looked up from his palm. "Flynn."

He left the computer console, and stepped into the lift. His mask enclosed his face as he shot up to the Observation deck. Once the lift opened, he raced out to the main computer. Several programs dashed out of his path as he ran through the crowded level. He stopped at the computer's screen and began pulling data out of the computer's main storage files on his continuous search for his friend.

"What are you doing?" Mara rushed by to see what the brouhaha was about, with Zed close behind her. "Is it Tron?"

"I may have found a way to heal Tron." He gestured at the immense, ever-flowing data filling the screen. "Ever since CLU betrayed Kevin Flynn, Tron has lived here after escaping CLU's rule and torture. Flynn has been missing, and wasn't heard from since. All of this is Tron's research on finding Flynn's whereabouts."

"Kevin Flynn...the Creator." Mara's eyes dilated.

"Tron's disc is too critically damaged, and I have no extensive training to guide me to even attempt to reverse the harm to his code." Tron was taping at the screen so quickly, he forced himself to slow his pace to take in the most recent information he collected. "As the Creator of the Grid, Flynn may be able to help us, but here's the problem: We need to track down Flynn before it is too late."

"What do we have to do?" Mara asked confidently.

"You two can help isolate Flynn's suspected appearances," Tron backed away, still starting at the screen. "I'll see if I can persuade our guest to help slow Tron's deresolation."

As Tron headed to the lift once again, he wished he didn't have to keep up this act. He decided that when they found Flynn and healed Beck, they'd tell Mara and Zed who he really was. They were proving themselves loyal to Tron, his cause, and now helping Beck without knowledge of it.


Paige knelt on the floor in a dark room; a single light shining above her. Her hands cuffed behind her back and her disc was missing.

Slowly, lights were beginning to turn on and she saw him.

Tron walked toward her. She felt a sense of confidence radiate off of him, but not in a pompous, ruling manner.

As his feet hit the floor, ripples emitted across the surface of the holofloor.

"You're not Tron." Paige spat his name, as she tested her cuffs. "I injured him."

At once, Tron face was revealed to her as his mask retracted, and she fell silent. She started at him in disbelieve, and her hands and arms relaxed in their confinement.

"You managed to injure the Renegade." Tron said, his voice betraying a little emotion from knowing who had caused Beck's slow death.

"The Renegade?" Paige was shocked dumb.

"The Renegade was the means to the Uprising. I have a story to tell you about him." Tron circled Paige. "In fact, I'll show you."

The holodeck was activated, and Paige saw the statue of CLU being destroyed. She guiltily felt a strange joy at seeing the metal explode, then a surge of annoyance.

"I've already seen this footage." Paige turned her head to follow Tron as he walked behind her. "I've been hunting the Renegade since the beginning. I had to study him enough."

"Watch." Tron nodded at the scene change around them.

Paige's eyes widened as she saw a program on a cycle racing against the drill explosion. This was from the point of view of the Renegade, as he reached to take her image on his bike. He'd rescued her then.

The scene changed again.

Paige watched as she was hanging for dear life from a cliff of the degenerating island after a wild, dangerous chase after the Renegade. His arm extended and retracted, as he went away from the cliff. She saw he was trying to fix the light jet, hurrying with his recoder to repair the damage as the island quaked again. He turned around and saw her hand slip.

Paige looked away.

"No," Tron said softly. "Look again."

She did, and she saw the Renegade rescue her from the Games.

"Making me feel guilty isn't going to get you want you want."

"I wasn't going for guilty." Tron said as the holodeck deactivated. "Look again."

Beck's face appeared at every angle of the holodeck, as if she could not escape him even if she tried.

"He is the Renegade?" Paige almost laughed.

"You should not judge and doubt him so quickly; so harshly," Tron said. "You don't know his story. Didn't you ever wonder why the Renegade came into existence?"

"Of course, I-"

"Did General Tesler tell you he was just a one rogue program that needed a reminder that I was dead?"

Paige remained silent.

"Little did you know that he accidentally found me." Tron said. "He even thought he could get away with what he did to CLU's statue, and just end what he started.

"Did he ever tell you about his friend Bodhi?"

Paige silently turned her head to look at Tron over her shoulder.

"When General Tesler came to Argon Square, he interrupted the competition disc games being played there among the locals." Tron walked around to face her, kneeling down a few steps away from her. "Bodhi was Tesler's first murder in Argon, followed by countless other programs later in the Games and otherwise. Beck's best friend was derezzed before his eyes.

"Beck was angry, and his reason was blinded by his loss." Tron looked Paige straight in the eye. "And you know the rest."

Paige broke Tron's gaze, and fixed her own on the floor. Before the silence became stale between them, Tron got to his feet and went behind her. She felt his deft fingers release her hands from the cuffs, and Tron remembered how Beck somehow manage to break through those cuffs the first time.

She looked around in surprise, and rubbed her wrists.

"I need your help, Paige." Tron said to her. "Beck needs your help."

She just started at Tron, still dazed at his dedication to Beck. She wondered if Tesler ever had such dedication to her.

"Come with me. I want to show you something." He already had cleared the lift before Paige was off the holofloor.

She stepped into the lift and it only took a few moments before it opened to the clinic. Tron showed her in first.

Paige opened her mouth in surprise. A full-fledged clinic was before her. Her eyes traveled along the white metal flooring, to the tiles of the rising emergency tables, and like a magnetic force, her eyes gravitated to the tank. Still inside was Beck.

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