Warning for graphic descriptions of injury in this chapter, though they are programs.
Clu is a flawless being who knows he is flawless.
It's something he takes pride in- and rightfully so. His path to perfection has not been easy, and where's the fun in being perfect if you can't brag about it every once in a while?
The problem, Jarvis thinks, is that Rinzler is not the program Clu should be bragging to.
Make no mistake, Tron's reprogramming is a work of art. It seems no program has been rectified so completely- had their directives so utterly warped and yet followed them with such ease. That reprogramming has held without fail for hundreds of cycles, but now, for reasons Jarvis cannot fathom, Clu seems to be testing it.
"I'm going to have to visit our friend Yori again soon." Clu radiates something like smugness as he walks a slow circle around his Enforcer, watching for some kind of reaction. "I have a very special job for her."
Behind the darkness of his helmet, Rinzler looks back at Clu, impossible to read.
Jarvis knows there must be a practical reason for Rinzler's helmet, but sometimes he thinks that imagining the program's face might be worse than actually seeing it. When the air feels charged like this, and Rinzler is so still that the only indication he's running is that grating purr, it seems dangerous to have no indication what a program designed for murder is thinking.
Behind his helmet, anger and confusion build in Rinzler's mind in equal measures. Clu is the Luminary. He can go wherever he wants, say whatever he wants to whomever he wants. Why, then, does something in his programming scream that he needs to stay away from this-
Yori.
"You remember Yori, don't you Rinzler?" Clu gives the program an innocent smile that steadily becomes less innocent. "A face that pretty is hard to forget- even if she is a little old for me. She still looks stunning in red."
Something in Rinzler's code snaps. His discs are pointed at Clu's throat before even he can process what's happening. In an instant the two of them are surrounded by members of the Black Guard. Jarvis watches all of this from the relative safety of his new location on the other side of the room.
Rinzler's purr skips brokenly; his light-lines flicker frantically from orange to blue. His code feels like it's going to tear itself in half.
What is happening to him? What is he doing? Why is he doing this? Where is he?
Where's Flynn?
Clu's face is a mockery of his creator's. He smiles pleasantly, watches Rinzler's display without looking alarmed in the slightest.
"Hello, Tron."
Tron.
At that his light-lines hold blue, and for an instant he is struck with total, crushing clarity. With the return of his true designation comes his function and his User- what he is supposed to be and the terror Clu has made him instead.
"Clu," The word is a growl, still shaky and so low it's almost unintelligible, but for the first time in cycles Tron's voice is his own.
"You don't sound happy to see me," Clu's expression shifts to something more disapproving as he folds his arm behind his back.
Tron could care less.
Yori.
"What did you do to her?"
He's so broken he can't remember what happened. In the last memory he can find of Yori, she's unhappy but safe. That doesn't mean anything, though. Far too many of his recent memories end with voxels and screams- innocent programs (he was supposed to protect) he derezzed at the orders of-
"Me? Nothing!" Clu presses his hands to his core, feigning insult. "Why, you didn't think I would hurt her, did you?" Rinzler's growl returns, and for the briefest of moments the smugness in Clu's eyes flickers. He'd better be thankful for the helmet Tron wears; his glare alone could reduce him to voxels. "I couldn't find her for the longest time, and then she just appeared out of nowhere. So sweet and complicit. I have to admit, I can see what you saw in her. I know deep down you like controlling things just as much as I do. And Yori is very easy to control."
Maybe it's because he's half hysterical, but part of Tron wants to laugh at that. He thinks better of it. If Yori has managed to stay alive- to stay herself- it's because she's outsmarted Clu. Let him think that she isn't a threat; see where it gets him.
"Really, Clu, I don't think you want your last words to be insults towards Yori."
"You want to derez me?" The Administrator blinks, as if the discs at his throat weren't an indication of that. "You're welcome to try."
By all means, Tron thinks, and for an instant he is the System Monitor again; his true programming targets Clu and he moves on instinct to terminate him like any other petty threat to the Grid (he will protect).
Then his systems are shot through with agony.
"I should warn you, though," Clu takes a step back, watches idly as Tron folds under his own momentum and curls in on himself instead of striking. "You'll find that Tron's pain receptors are much more sensitive than Rinzler's."
Somehow Tron manages to stay standing instead of falling to his knees. He bows his head as he sucks in a breath and holds it, and wonders if he's going to derez right then and there.
It feels like his frame is caving in on itself. Sections of his code are corrupting, dissolving into cubes in massive gouges under his armor. His systems are flooded with warnings and pain as energy leaks from wounds into wounds; he's blinded in one eye as a line of code splits across his face. His code is on fire- he's literally falling apart- but he grits his teeth and doesn't scream. He won't give Clu the satisfaction.
And, to his credit, Clu doesn't look satisfied. He looks disappointed.
"That's another little gift from Dyson. When you fight against your reprogramming your old scars act up. To put it mildly."
Somehow Tron raises his weapon again, and his voice is only slightly more intact than the rest of him.
"When I get my hands on you—"
"I don't think you'll have much luck with that. Besides, there's no point."
Clu observes with something between admiration and annoyance as Tron stays standing. Loyal to the end, hm?
He can fix that.
"You know, I never really understood your devotion to users until I saw your code. Your user might have been the only one worth praising. He knew what he was doing. You were very hard to break." Tron's hand trembles with anger and grief. "And yet, in his flawless user logic, he threw you away. I wonder what that says about you?"
Another flash of pain and systems compromised failure-
"Tell me Tron, what is your directive?"
"Fight for the Users. Defend the Grid. Protect its programs."
His response is automatic, a product of both the old Tron and Rinzler. Tron had been proud of his directives (they were important and he was very good at fulfilling them) and Rinzler was all too willing to comply with Clu's requests. Now the words leave him feeling bitter; it's a mockery for him to even say such things. Clu's pitying smile is an acknowledgment of this.
"Like you protected Beck?"
Beck.
A young program from Argon. Filled with energy, eager to fight, to protect his friends. Tron remembers him for the first time in cycles, and everything within him fills with dread.
"He was just a beta. Your only friend. Practically your family. And you derezzed him ruthlessly. You weren't strong enough to stop yourself— to save him."
"No. No! I would never—"
"But you did."
He did.
The memory is there, and it's all too clear; Beck trying to outrun him and failing. Beck trying to fight, trying to save himself without badly hurting his mentor. The fear and pain in the younger program's eyes when he tried to reason with Tron and was met with Rinzler. Tron can still hear his frantic pleas of 'Fight it, Tron!' and 'Please, I can't lose you too!'
Was it Clu's reprogramming or his own code that had burned with such hatred when he saw the emblem on Beck's chest- a last reminder of everything that Tron was supposed to be and failed. Wherever it had come from, that viral, raw anger pushed him to shatter the symbol and the program attached to it into a thousand voxels, and he had enjoyed it.
Distantly Tron registers that he is on the floor, now, and he lets the discs fall from his hands as if he's been burned. He didn't have two identity discs in that memory, but he has never been without two since. What a wonderful way to honor the memory of his friend who he murdered— by derezzing innocents with what's left of him.
Jarvis and the Guards watch as Clu stands over a despondent Tron, perfectly calm and pleased. His voice is soft, almost gentle, and they know that what he says now is not meant to disarm the program in front of him but make sure he never rises again.
"You see, Tron, returning to your former self isn't as simple as derezzing me. Do you really think that the programs of the Grid will welcome you back as System Monitor with open arms after you've killed so many of them? You think they'll ever trust you to protect them again?" He gives a disapproving little click. "Even if you escaped from this room alive, there's nowhere for you to go. No one you could go to."
Then, in a move that makes even the Guards nervous, he grabs Tron by the helmet, twisting his head until he's hissing in his ear.
"Not even Yori would want you now. She's on my side."
"Liar!" Tron roars, but the fury in his eyes is gone the instant another memory clicks into place; Yori in red light-lines, smiling, bowing before Clu.
Something in his core gives; his blue light-lines flicker.
"You have no User. No friends. No one left to fight for." Clu's hands settle on Tron's shoulders in a poor imitation of a comforting gesture. It's still the closest thing to comfort he may ever experience again. "It's alright, Tron. You can go back to sleep. I won't judge you."
"No,"
Alan-One, please.
"We both know it's better this way."
Clu squeezes Tron's shoulder, and the pathetic, broken noise he makes at the pain is so much better than any scream.
Tron doesn't last much longer, after that. His blue-white light fades to nothing, and the deep orange of Rinzler returns along with a broken, skipping purr.
Clu feels far too satisfied as the soldier is removed from his sight, and he thinks about the one thing that may have broken his reprogramming for good.
He's going to trap and kill Tron's user— invade the user world— and Yori is going to help him do it.