even though the sound of it is something quite atrocious;

[a_perfect_end]

Who: Alan Bradley and Clu
When: After Rinzler is incapacitated and discovered (floating point between Stardate 11.12 and 11.15.)
Where: Seriously, Alan; you need to invent or encode a Program-proof perimeter fence.
What: Clu Does Not Want (but absolutely needs) User supervision.
Warnings: Discussion of dismemberment, violence, abuse, and similar unpleasant dynamics; are Programs people; the usual fun and games



Now, now Rinzler's refusal to report in makes horrible, sickening sense. His enforcer hadn't been defying him, wasn't in hiding, and hadn't done this in some frightening ludicrous attempt to parameter: colloquialism: express himself or keep yet another secret.

Rinzler hadn't been off sulking. He'd been defeated. He'd been betrayed.

By Nihlus. By the very person--the User he'd entrusted with his very being--the one he'd chosen, over and above Clu himself, to rely on for safekeeping.

And Clu?

Clu had allowed it to happen. He allowed it to happen, and then he allowed it to continue. Of course it's his fault: it's always his fault.

He wastes a fistful of micros considering that, turning it over, flagging it maudlin and irrelevant, but keeping it in the queue--he'll have only himself to blame, if they should fail.

Alan should know by now that he never calls with good news.

Comments

[a_perfect_end]

[Irritation sizzles to the fore; he does nothing to suppress it.]


My data are accurate! I don't miscalculate, and when I wanna lie to you it'll involve the words Kevin and Flynn.


[They’re not even on the right deck; they'll have to take the glitching elevator and if they end up anywhere other than medical, he has already determined the needed mechanical torsion factors to kick a hole in the ship.]


It's Nihlus. His own Commander told me, because she was there and I--


[Was not, isn't said;was letting him do his own thing, isn't said, responsibility that scalds his pride and puts acid on his tongue.]


Your legs are old and I'm not stopping for you.

[alan_1]

[Irritation is mutual. Alan ignores the jab, keeping up as best he can while also trying to refocus the admin’s attention on the question he had asked before.]

The disk, Clu. Do you know who has it?

[If he doesn’t, it won’t matter how quickly they get to the medbay. Neither of them are of any use without the source of Rinzler’s code in-hand.]

[a_perfect_end]

[From the binary, a hard click that proves he can pronounce !!!...]

I was insufficiently precise.

...Shepard has it. May or may not guard it; forty-eight percent against. In this circumstance it will be nearby him.

His friends [bitter, bitter word, a nasty little syllable he doesn't like the taste of] know it's important.

feel free to have them get to the medbay next tag

[alan_1]

[Under normal circumstances, Clu’s words might have brought some small measure of relief. Now, Alan knows Shepard as an associate of Nihlus and that could mean anything. Had Nihlus acted alone? Or did he have help, like Peter had? A familiar twinge starts to set in between Alan’s eyes as the possibilities rush in. He still only knows what Clu deigns to tell him and he doesn’t even know if that much is true. All he can do is wait and see, and that isn’t nearly good enough when the life of one of his programs is on the line.

Still, he doesn’t have much choice. The elevator looms at the end of the hall ahead of them.]

Let’s just hope she’ll hand it over willingly.

AND HERE THEY ARE, THEN.

[a_perfect_end]

He does not spend time correcting the User; hope is an abstraction. Hope has no value. Results have value, and the only result they'll have is failure unless they make haste.

Their transit is a blur of junk flags and a grating, infinite test of his will; he waited a thousand cycles to capture the master key, but Rinzler is his. Rinzler is his.

It bubbles up from somewhere deep--backfile hash, very, very old. You are responsible forever for what you make.

The medbay doors whisper apart with sleek, mechanical efficiency, infinitely slowly. The attendants are rather more kinetic, practically flying out of their way, gabbling irrelevancies and clutching equipment to avoid being toppled. He shoulders through without hearing or seeing them--notes them as grey proximal impact flags; damage he can absorb without care, obstacles he could easily smash aside--and pings Shepard's MID.

Text. That's all. No games, no prelude, no greetings and twiddling about. There is no trap here to bait, only necessity.

Alan-1 can make the exchange if you prefer to deal with your own kind, but medics are useless here. Rinzler urgently needs help they cannot give him.

No please, never, ever, ever. Thank you can come, backhanded, when Rinzler is well and whole.

(...IF. his processor murmurs, treacherous.)

Now, to hope.