Tron: Deliverance

<RETURN TO SENDER>

"Im feeling alright all things considered. That jerk just shorted me out for a second i guess"

"I wasnt aware Users were vulnerable to electric overload?" Tron's implied question almost an accusation.

The User rubbed his head "Yeah, it doesnt quite affect us the way it does programs. But too much electric charge can cause a uh...Well it can cause a heart attack"

Tron was frozen for a moment. Icy concern settled in Mara's core. Watching Alan-One collapse had been truly unsettling. Had the User been that close to dying when the head Mod had tased him?

"I...see" Tron answered. An understatement judging by the tension in his frame.

Sensing the stress he had just caused in the programs around him, the User threw up his hands in a placating gesture. "It takes a lot more than a taser charge to put us down permanently. But yeah. We try to avoid massive electric shocks

"Looks like Users are more delicate than I always thought" Paige said mildly.

Sam Flynn smirked "Maybe, but I have taken an entire disc to the back and kept going" he pointed at Tron "I fought this guy hand-to-hand when he was repurposed and survived"

Tron grunted "Rinzler LET you live. But point taken. Ill grant Ive seen Users survive things that would have killed a program ten times over"

"But that doesn't mean we cant be hurt. Getting hit back there was my mistake. I misjudged that Mod gang leader. He seemed, reluctant to actually fight us. I was kind of hoping to talk him down"

At the reminder of the Mod leader Mara pulled out the stolen light cycle. It seemed so familiar. The packaged vehicle signature hauntingly so.

"I picked this up when that program left it. When he dropped his helmet. I couldn't really see well through the ice, but it looked like..." She couldn't speak the name. Hope after all this time would hurt more than it was worth.

Becks suddenly very small voice broke through her chaotic thoughts "Like Able right? I saw it too" Mara's face shot upward.

"You did too! Ha! I thought I was going crazy from that Mod smashing my head on the ground"

Beck moved towards her, his eyes on the light-cycle baton.

"If you're crazy then I am too. Cause to me, that looks like an Encom 786"

"Just like Able's!"

"Only one way to find out" Beck took the baton and cracked it, tossing it outward to let it rez.

The sleek lines of a familiar light-cycle formed. Mara gasped, sadness, recognition and hope so strong it hurt, flared to life.

"Hey, that looks just like my dad's old bike" Sam Flynn commented.

Tron moved forward soundlessly and knelt by the cycle, resting a hand on its side like it was an old friend.

"I hate to squash the hope you two seem to be building up. But I need to remind you that Able is gone. Yes, he had one of these old Encom models in his collection. But, remember those thieves we ran into outside Argon? They were stealing light cycles and discs. Its far more likely that this cycle was stolen at some point and acquired by that modded program" Tron said with grim finality.

Beck was having none of his mentor's dismissive attitude " Able was riding his Encom 786 when I last saw him. It was the cycle we had on him when he died. How many of these things could possibly be left?"