Tron: Deliverance

COUNTDOWN.......

"Ah, just need to send a feeler out to my disc...Hello my little friend" he hummed "Then I gotta do a quick scan for misspeculation floating around anddddd" he drummed his fingers above the terminal in triumph "Here we are! Come to me passcodes!"

"You're pretty fragged" Able observed evenly.

"Eh maybe, but I'm pretty damn good at what I do. Not to rant or anything but Cyrus is working on cybersecurity logic from the 90's and we've come a looong way since then. My dude didn't even try to lock down his junk data. To his doom" Cyrus let out an unhinged laugh, then got back to his work.

"What good does junk data do us? Its junk" Paige cut in, giving Jet's back a hard stare.

Jet held up a finger but didn't turn to look at her "Oh Paige my sweet summer child. You weren't there for the Spectre meltdown so you can't be blamed for your naiveté"

"I don't know what 'summer child' means but if you call me that again I will hit you"

"So violent today. But, you'll be feeling less so when you see that.... I'm in" He expanded the screen, showing off the breadth of the system running through the hub.

Paige let out a surprised scoff, but refrained from further comment.

Jet stretched out his fingers, they made an unsettling popping noise that set her teeth on edge. What was THAT?"

"Now to figure out what this dude's REAL plan is"

"Isnt it obvious?" Able asked "He's crazy. He's probably gonna blow us all up with all the energy he's been stealing"

"I have to concur with the mechanic on this one Jet" Paige said "Cyrus has been fragged since Argon. He's three bits short of a full line"

"Hmmmmm maybe, maybe" Jet said, creeping deeper into the system.

After a long few nanos he let out a small gasp. His face went hard, uncharacteristically so. Lines appearing she hadn't seen before.

"Ah, now that makes sense. That makes a lot more sense" he muttered.

"What!?" Able demanded, sick of the silence.

"I guessed he needed a User disc. Final passcode to break down the Grid itself. But he needs more than that. He needs abstraction"

"Start making sense" Paige commanded.

"YES" the bit seconded.

Jet ran a hand through his hair, suddenly far less animated "Ugh how do I even explain it? He needs the human factor? The numbers between 0 and 1? The concept of infinity?" He let out a harsh laugh "Of course, it's the one thing he wouldn't be able to yank out of the Grid itself"

"I'm waiting"

"Basically he doesn't just need a User disc. He let us in to the city. He's got sensors and scanners going out a long ways. Reports form pirates and scavengers. He's had his eyes on us since we got here. To complete his plan he needs a User, a whole one. Apparently he was looking for Flynn for a long time. Never found him. Then he switched focus to my dad and Sam"

"Not you?" Able asked in a skeptical voice

"No and I'm trying not to be offended about that. How am I not even a target? I don't even get my picture on his digital murder wall?"

"Probably because you're fragged" Able supplied.

"Or he doesn't see you as a threat" Paige suggested. Half a smirk curling on her face. It was a bit funny honestly. Not even Cyrus saw Jet as a real User it seemed.

Jet tapped the terminal in thought "Now he has everything he needs. Three Users plus discs. Well, one's kind of an ISO. Probably explains why he wasn't after Quorra specifically either" he kept scrolling going deeper into the system "I need to get a message out, once I release all this energy it will stop him cold. He won't be able to run any of this stuff he's got set up. But I need a safe way to disperse it. I NEED to talk to my mom"

"You cant talk to the Users outside?" Paige asked, alarm shooting through her core.

"Nope, we got cut off when we walked in the building. Cyrus is jamming us" He slapped the wall "Bastard is smart I'll give him that. I can't cut off the jamming from here" He pulled up a schematic of the hub.

"To actually disperse all that energy I'd need to get into the central node. Here" He pointed to a room at the center of the mass of machinery and energy conduits. "But, to get a message out to the rest of the team and disperse the energy safely I'd need to cut off the jammer up here" He pointed to the communication arrays near the top of the hub"

"And I got to do all that inside the next hour or so. He's nearing the end of his countdown"

"Countdown? He already started the countdown?" Able squawked.

"The countdown to Zero Cycle" Jet muttered, almost too low to hear.

"You wont make that in time" Able said grimly.

Paige drew back her shoulders "Not if we split up. I can go to the communication array. You go to the central hub"

"It'll be crawling with guards. Cyrus is probably there too" Able interjected.

Jet turned away from the terminal, hand on his jaw as he thought "I need a way in. Something quiet, something...."

He looked down at the discarded cloak, the one that hadn't derezzed. "Bingo" he said.

Paige did not ask what a bingo was. Getting him off track explaining User vernacular could literally get them all killed.

Jet rushed to the cloak and threw it around his shoulders "Here's the plan, and I think you'll like it" 

Paige didn't like the plan, didn't like anything about this.

But they were out of time, options, and nearly out of luck.

"Users" Able sighed, as if that summed up his frustrations. It summed her's up too.

"Oh voxels! Fine, lets do it"