5Chapter 1 – Discovery
Kevin Flynn's POV
He sat down at his desk in the basement of his arcade and started typing into the keyboard.
$login: -flynn
#bin/LLLSDLaserControl-ok
Kevin hit the enter key and a message box popped up as he heard the digitizer turn on with a hum.
Aperture clear?
Yes No
He hit and 'y' key and the laser activated. In the blink of an eye, he was inside the Grid-version of his arcade basement.
Kevin Flynn stood up and walked out the doors of the building. He was greeted with Tron and Clu – as usual. It's been almost a few HiloCycles since the ISOs had been discovered. Since then, Clu's project to create and maintain the perfect system had to be put off so these Isomorphic Algorithms could be situated.
It was a bit awkward at first – Clu was noticeably uncomfortable around these new Programs and the Basics had little to no knowledge of how they should've dealt with it. However, Flynn made sure to set the example of welcoming these new Programs.
Kevin turned to Tron. "How are things, Tron? Any recent trouble?"
Tron hesitated. "Um, well, everything's fine regarding the ISOs but…well…the gang problems are getting worse."
"We'll talk more about that later. Clu?" Flynn turned to face his digital copy. "Anything new?"
Clu opened his mouth to answer when a security Program quickly approached.
"Tron, Flynn, the…*pant pant*…unknown activity in the Outlands. It's getting weirder."
Tron turned to the Program. "What kind of activity?"
Kevin subtly raised an eyebrow. He'd heard nothing about activity in the Outlands.
"Movement, sir," The Program straightened up. "I…think there're Programs in the boundaries."
"Then get them out." Clu said simply. "Bring them into the City and we'll take care of the rest."
The Program hesitated to reply. "…There's at least a few dozen out there."
"Gangs?" Flynn asked.
"I…I don't think so." The soldier's communicator beeped and he checked it. "Here's an update: They appear to be wandering aimlessly. Not a single one has a disk." He looked up at Tron. "Requesting permission to investigate at a closer distance."
"Negative." Tron answered. "I'll check it out."
"Chill, Tron, we'll all go together." Flynn replied easily, pulling out his Encom 786 baton. "It'll be fun! Like old times."
"I certainly hope not." Tron muttered. That Program, he was too much like Alan. He never thought Kevin's ideas of fun were…fun.
Clu said nothing and followed them in silence.
"I have the locations where the closest Programs were last seen." Tron reported, "This is very unusual. I don't think these are ISOs – this is nowhere near the Sea of Simulation."
"Maybe they wandered away from the Sea undetected." Clu suggested. "It's happened before."
Flynn glanced at Clu curiously. "It has?"
"It wasn't important." Tron answered quickly. "No one got hurt."
The System Monitor pulled the brake on his bike and derezzed it back into a baton, pocketing the stick. "This is the last location of one of the Programs but I don't see anyone."
"We'll split up and look around." Flynn grinned. "This is fun. It's like hide and seek."
He could clearly see on Tron's face that he wanted to say, as usual, 'This is serious, Flynn. We don't know what we're dealing with.' But he kept his mouth shut this time.
They all knew though, they really didn't know what they were dealing with.
Flynn trudged off in his own direction and glanced around the different sized rocks. He whirled around to face Tron when he heard the Monitor say, "I've got footprints."
Tron had his hand on the ground and he was catching traces of glowing red footprints. Clu took the lead and pulled out his disk as he followed the trail. The blade lit up with that usual hum as he stalked towards a large rock where the footprints stopped.
Without warning, something jumped out from behind the rock and tackled Clu to the ground. Flynn's digital copy started wrestling with whatever the thing was and they rolled around.
Whatever it was, it didn't seem to be inflicting any harm towards Clu; they were just wrestling each other. The User started laughing at the sight. Tron stood up and furrowed his brows at the two Programs on the ground.
The unknown Program was clearly stronger than Clu, as he eventually pinned the System Administrator down. Clu's disk lay abandoned far out of his reach. The Program on top of Clu leaned forward and growled at the mask.
Tron cautiously approached the Program unarmed. "Identify." He commanded quietly.
The unknown Program immediately responded to the words and turned towards the Monitor. He said nothing but kept his eyes trained on Tron, clearly trying to figure out if he was a threat as well.
This time, Flynn took the initiative and stepped forward with an amused grin…unarmed, of course. "As much as I enjoy watching Clu get his ass handed to him, I'd kindly ask you to get off my digital copy. I promise he won't hurt you."
The Program hesitated for a few nanos but eventually complied. Flynn took that as a good sign. "What's your designation?"
The unknown Program responded a little faster this time. "Identification: Shaun. Programmed to be an architect and soldier."
Clu grunted and sat up, removing his mask. "Two Programmings? That seems a bit unusual." He grabbed his disk and stood up.
Shaun whirled around, ready to knock Clu down again but Tron put a hand on his shoulder. Clu put his disk back and walked away, grumbling something along the lines of 'how was this supposed to be fun' and 'I'm going back to my room for a drink.'
Kevin looked at Shaun's back. "You don't have a disk," He observed. "Did you have one previously?"
Shaun shook his head. "I've been walking around here ever since I was created."
"Who created you?" Tron asked.
"I know I didn't," Kevin interjected. "I think we have another type of Program now. This should be fun. Looks like we have another race created by the Grid." He cocked his head and looked at Shaun again. "Are there more like you?"
Shaun nodded slowly. "Y-Yeah. They're just…walking around like I was."
Kevin looked thoughtful. "Well, how would you like to live in a City with other Programs?"
Shaun frowned. "Are they going to attack me?"
He had to suppress a laugh. "No, they're friendly. They've recently welcomed another typed of Program into their City. It's very peaceful around there."
It didn't take long for Shaun to consider it. "Okay."
"Flynn," Tron's voice sounded quiet but full of awe. "You need to look at this." He had a pair of binoculars and was looking around with them. His jaw was slack.
Kevin took the binoculars and held back a gasp. He could see dozens of diskless Programs wandering around. Some were alone, others were in groups. They weren't lined up and walking in one direction like the ISOs when they crawled out of the Sea but…
"They're scattered." He observed. "This is interesting." He turned to Tron. "Arrange to have search parties sent out to round up these Programs and brought back." He rubbed his forehead and handed Tron back the binoculars. "The next few cycles should be interesting."
"I haven't seen anything like this before." Tron said, pocketing the binoculars. "Then again, there are a lot of things I haven't seen in my lifetime."
Flynn nodded. "You and me both." Flynn pulled out his baton. "Oh, and Tron," The Monitor turned towards the Creator again. "You should probably also inform your teams to approach these guys unarmed, heh?"
Flynn rezzed his bike and invited Shaun to sit behind him, which the Program reluctantly did, holding on tightly even before they started moving.
"Flynn?" Tron asked. "Should this event go in the archives?"
Kevin laughed. "Are you kidding? Yes! Let it be known that a new Program knocked Clu flat in less than 10 nanos!" He got serious again. "All joking aside though, this is yet another discovery we've made here in this digital frontier. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if there were other new things out there waiting to be found."
Tron pulled out his baton and rezzed his bike. "Yes, sir. But we may need to proceed with caution from here on out."
Kevin Flynn nodded. "I couldn't agree more. There's no telling what could happen here. Even I wouldn't know. You be careful too, Tron."
Tron and the Creator parted ways. "I'll try." He said quietly. "But I'm more worried about you."
Okay, that's the first chap. I DO have plans to add detail to or write little short stories in here regarding the Tron: The Revolution Begins trilogy I've finished. However, I am inviting any and all people reading this to make requests of where and when in the story timeline you'd want me to work on (if there were possibly loose ends that were never tied up and such or if you want more detail from certain events). Otherwise, I'm going to write a couple short stories of my own ideas about some events that I think would be fun to help define some of the personalities of the characters I wrote.
I also figured it best to bring this up: I'm going to try and post little chapters in timeline order as much as possible so it'd help me a lot if requests are made soon. Just sayin', I don't bite ;)
TRON LIVES! Toodles.