The Long Road, Part 5c/?
Continued from Part 5b
The other war wounds on Alan's back are healed-at least, as much as they can be. The regenerator can't wand-away the bruising Clu inflicted, but Alan's content to let time repair what technology can't. Kevin isn't quite so ready to forget.
“I always had talent for collateral damage,” he says.
They help each other re-dress. Alan's just re-knotting Kevin's inner robe when Quorra strolls back in, a small box of parts in her possession. Kevin's forearms clasp Alan's as he relinquishes the last tie. He gets a casual peck on the cheek before Kevin ushers them towards Quorra and the workstation.
Kevin fusses with the controls.
“I haven't asked yet, but I notice Sam didn't come.”
“Oh he wanted to,” Alan says, recalling the argument.
“We needed someone to keep the portal open.” Quorra glances slyly at Alan. “He may have been shocked into submission.”
“Alan,” Kevin drawls, “what did you say to Sam?”
“Nothing he isn't old enough to hear. I told him about us.”
“Us?”
Alan crosses his arms. “Yes, Kevin, us.”
“Oka-yyy.” A brief pause. “He didn't-”
“He'll live.”
“Sam just realized Alan might be his other father,” Quorra says, very amused.
Quorra's humor doesn't quite capture Sam's reaction. On the surface, the younger Flynn had taken the news well, but Alan's known Sam a long time. The kid's got a lot under the hood. He hadn't wanted to look Alan in the eye afterward.
“All done!” Quorra exclaims.
She's been assembling a device into the lower recessed portion of the console. The final piece clicks into place and completes a segmented, metal wheel built into the flat surface.
“Couldn't have done it better myself,” Kevin says, nodding his approval.
“What is it?” Alan asks.
Kevin smirks with a hint of the old Flynn mystery and mischief, drawing his identity disc “Enlightenment.”
The disc is lowered to within an inch of Quorra's contraption when suddenly the console underneath flares. A seemingly invisible hand removes the item from Kevin's grasp. With a whining hum, the disc spins and tilts in a perpetually suspended fall, and muted light expands, intensifying to a shimmering aura. The sum effect is a miniature cosmos brightening the granite-gray walls of their circuit-lined room.
“You haven't touched your disc yet.”
Kevin's off-the-wall comment catches Alan unprepared.
“No,” he says, still intrigued by the display.
“Be careful when you do. You might be in for a surprise.”
Kevin's right hand drifts into the haze of energy, and tiny white fireflies, like stars or comets, swirl around the intrusion.
“The connection to the codestream is weak,” he says. “I won't be able to run the necessary system checks from here. But I can find out what's still safe in the city, and we can work from there.”
The information doesn't filter in right away.
When Alan finally processes what's being said, the effect is a slow-motion dunk in the Southern Ocean. He absorbs the scene with dazed removal: Kevin's far-gone expression, Quorra's approval and confident expectation, the Creator's hand dipping into the world, and-not a revolving disc, no-a stationary disc that isn't moving at all. They-Kevin, Quorra, Alan, the whole room-are rotating around an inanimate object. Alan impacts glacier-fraught waters.
“I didn't realize you'd planned on moving back into the Grid.”
The arctic chill ripples.
“Forgive me for being blunt,” Alan says, “but I came here to recover-so we could make the trip to the portal. Not plan a home in the city. When were you going to inform me of your choice to stay?”
Kevin's hand abruptly withdraws and clenches. The fireflies, which had been condensing into a complex patterned symmetry, collapse.
Quorra gapes at him.
Neither of them have a word for him, which is what really snaps his patience. He can't yell at Quorra-he couldn't work up the righteousness to feed his temper-but with Kevin it's always been easy.
“Cat got your tongue?” he snipes. “In case you didn't notice, you have other people around you. Sam, your son. We were just discussing him; he hasn't had his father in twenty years, remember? And as for me. I put my life on hold for you. My son,”-whom I don't talk to-“my grandson,”-whom I hardly see-“my friends,”-who hardly know me-“my job,”-maybe all I really have left-“are in the real world. Not this one.”
The crazy part is, he could let all that slide for Kevin's sake. But he wants consideration. He wants to be put first like he's put Kevin first; he's embraced Kevin's technological split personality, he's come to this bizarre nightmare, he's gone after Kevin in the labyrinth. Is it too much to ask for something in return? Even an explanation would be a start.
Kevin braces himself against the console and ducks his head, as if buckling under a heavy load. At his side, Quorra goes pale. She circles around, buffering the gap between them.
“Alan, we can't leave. Not until the system is stable.”
“Why not?!”
“Because,” she says urgently, “other people need our help.”
He stares at her dumbly, and when he can't take that, he turns around, pacing and scrubbing his hair in agitation.
“You could do the repairs outside.”
“No,” Kevin says. “I can't.”
Seeing Alan's face, Quorra quickly intervenes. “The programming interface in the real world isn't designed for massive upgrades. We would never finish in time.”
“Then have someone else do it! Tron!”
Kevin shakes his head. “I'm the only one who can.”
“That's absurd.”
“He's the Creator,” Quorra says quietly.
Anger is the jarring hit of an iceberg. Alan's not unbreakable. There are limits, buttons, he has and they won't tolerate being pushed. Hasn't he sacrificed enough? The Grid nearly took Kevin away from him forever-twice!-and now the Grid threatens to swallow their future. Because Kevin's on a mission to save the world and play God.
Explosive, bitter words are a heartbeat away from being volleyed. Anything to free himself of this insanity! But when he finally sees Kevin, he stops. The man hasn't moved. Kevin is still hunched over, looking for all the world like this is exactly what he expected. His face is wrinkled sour with grim defeat and anguish. Again.
Alan can't help his reaction. He walks away.
*
Quorra eventually chases after him. The door closes behind her as she exits the bunker.
Alan's on the ground, propped up against the side of the building. He's not really paying much attention to his surroundings or the passage of time. The vitriol has burned down, and in its place is an emptiness he knows all too well. He's still numb as Quorra occupies the place next to him.
“Are you alright?” she asks.
“Oh, I'll be fine.”
And he will; perseverance is coded into his blood.
“You took a big risk coming to the Grid. When Sam arrived, he nearly died.”
“I didn't think much beyond seeing Kevin home again,” Alan sighs. “This world wasn't part of my plans.”
Quorra nods and looks down.
“I guess it's all or nothing.”
*
Kevin is sitting down behind the workstation. His head is in his hands, but he looks over as Alan takes the chair next to him.
“We'll go, if that's what you want.”
Alan is taken aback.
“What about the Grid?”
“I don't like leaving it behind. Not like this,” Kevin says. “But you're what's important.”
Kevin doesn't mention Tron. Or Yori. Or the lifetime he's spent trying to build a place of his hopes and dreams. He certainly doesn't mention Clu. But without being told, Alan sees them in Kevin's reluctance. In Kevin himself.
Without much conscious thought, Alan's body gravitates towards Kevin. He loops his arms around Kevin's neck and, seeing the dark promise in those eyes, kisses Kevin with all the vitality he'd felt in his indignation. Kevin's left hand smears a path from his rough, unshaven cheek to the back of his neck. The other hand, pressing on the small of Alan's back, completes the tug forward until there's no more space to be had between them. It's heat and friction and everything Alan wants.
Kevin is laving his tongue when Alan backs up and takes firm hold of that bearded chin. He tries to be stern. But even to his own ears, he sounds rather fond and breathless in his exasperation with the man.
“When we're done with the Grid, I want you to come back with me,” he says. “If Sam wants to take back ENCOM, we'll help him. And then you'll give me a very rewarding paid vacation.”
Those gray-blue eyes turn anxious and doubtful. “I don't know how long the repairs will take.”
Alan tangles their fingers together.
“We made a deal in the labyrinth, remember? I go to whatever world you decide to inhabit.”
“Alan-”
“Don't argue with me. Maybe if I'd done better, we'd have been here all along.”
He tries to imagine what such a universe might have been like: building the Grid at Kevin Flynn's side twenty years ago, when they were both young wrath unrestrained, unspoiled by love.
Continued in Part 5d