"Your name is Tron."

Programs may appear to think and feel like human beings, but it is not so. It is true, programs think and feel, and even physically take after their human counterparts. But when one looks at the details, it can be said programs think much differently than human beings. For Rinzler the way was always clear, he thought very little and very inhumanly. His purpose was a simple one, to protect the Grid and CLU 2, and so he thought very simply. Rinzler never thought of vanity, he never considered what other people thought of him, or how to make those around him happy, he never thought of friendship, and he never thought of love. He never wondered if CLU 2 was pleased with him or upset. Rinzler only thought as his programming dictated, and so these things were in effect useless to him. When told to kill a program he never thought of the program's fear, or pain, he never considered the feelings of those who were close to the program when it was gone. He had no empathy and no sympathy. He killed and destroyed as he was told to. He thought of only more efficient ways to carry out those duties, he calculated the next moves of his enemies, he thought of how to counter these moves. Rinzler never stopped, he didn't know how to stop.

"You must remember. Your name is Tron."

The world was simple to Rinzler. He had to protect the Grid, CLU 2 lead the Grid, in order to protect the Grid he had to follow CLU's orders. Rinzler did not care who Kevin Flynn was, and had little concept of what it meant when programs called him the Creator. He didn't fully understand CLU's invasion of the Real World, or really what the Real World was. Rinzler didn't know what an ISO was, or why they were different. He knew only the most basic of information that would allow him to carry on in his duties. He did not need to really understand why he was killing programs in order to kill them. This made him a most obedient servant, a most useful pawn.

"I am Kevin Flynn, the Creator. We saved the Grid from the Master Computer Program! We saved it together! You, Yori, and I!"

Rinzler stopped.

They were close to the Portal now, just outside the bridge on a platform meant for Light Jets and Light Planes. It was there that Rinzler and CLU had intercepted Kevin Flynn and the others. It was there that Rinzler stood before Kevin Flynn, who held up his arms, protecting Sam Flynn and the ISO. Behind Rinzler was CLU, watching, waiting for Rinzler to carry out his duty. In Rinzler's hands were his Identity Discs, ready to kill anything he had to.

And yet, he stopped.

He made a noise, distorted and computerized, like a broken machine trying to process while its hard drive scratched against its CPU. A most inhuman sound, the gasps of a dying and sick machine. But Kevin Flynn knew what Rinzler had said.

"Yori."

"Yes." Kevin Flynn said. "You remember Yori. Of course you do."

Rinzler did not move, he stood and thought, or tried to think, programming dictated he was not to think of these things. He would grasp on a thought and have it taken away, he'd understand something and immediately forget it. He focused, he desperately held onto a single thought, a single image in his mind, a blurred and pixilated picture of a woman. A memory he was meant to forget. Yori. And with her something inside him stirred, some sort of feeling he had never experienced, a longing he didn't understand.

Rinzler looked up.

"Your name is Tron."

Kevin Flynn holds up his hands and approaches Rinzler.

"Dad…" Sam Flynn says.

Kevin Flynn puts his hand on Rinzler's shoulder. Rinzler looks down at the hand, then up at Kevin Flynn.

"We're friends."

Another distorted noise echoed through the mask that hid Rinzler's face.

"Friends." Rinzler said.

"Rinzler!" CLU's booming voice called.

Rinzler turned to meet CLU's eyes, and he knew before CLU even said it what had to be done.

"Kill him!"

Rinzler slowly turned back to Kevin Flynn, who only looked at him with a smile. It meant nothing to Rinzler, however, he didn't know what smiles were, he didn't know how to process human facial movements, he didn't know what emotions were and how they were connected to the voice and the face. But he understood touch, and he saw Kevin Flynn still holding his shoulder.

"It's going to be okay." Kevin Flynn told him.

But programming dictated that CLU must be obeyed.

Rinzler lifted his disc, raising it to the eye level of Kevin Flynn. He tilted his head, and held the disc back, ready to strike.

"No!" Sam Flynn yelled.

Sam Flynn's identity disc flew right into Rinzler's mask. Rinzler fell back, the disc still lodged in his mask, he felt the floor, and he could see the light seeping through the cracks, the first time he'd seen direct light.

"Grab him!" Kevin Flynn yells.

Kevin Flynn turns him over onto his stomach, he grabs the discs from Rinzler's hands, piecing them back together and returning them to his back plate. With the hands of the Creator he accesses Rinzler's inner systems.

"No! You can't have him!" CLU yells.

CLU runs towards them, the ISO girl throws her own disc, causing CLU to stop in his tracks. He looks to her as she grabs her disc effortlessly out of the air. He stares her down and grins. He throws his own disc, she jumps, dodges, he takes the chance to run at her, she lands, and he tackles her.

"Dad!" Sam Flynn yells, pulling the disc out from Rinzler's mask. "We have to go."

"I'm not leaving him like this."

"Dad, please."

Rinzler could feel it already, Kevin Flynn was inside his system settings, he was changing what made him Rinzler. He started to rise, he threw Kevin Flynn back. Sam Flynn grabbed him, pinning him to the ground, and Rinzler punched the boy in the face. Kevin Flynn grabbed him from behind, holding him by the neck and hacking into Rinzler's systems with his free hand.

"Tron, please…" Kevin Flynn said.

Sam Flynn pins Rinzler down again, Kevin continues hacking, and he can feel it, he can feel it changing, and he knows this is wrong, he knows something is –

His body jerks and goes limp. He stops fighting and closes his eyes. He goes to sleep. He restarts.

Kevin Flynn lays Rinzler across his lap, keeping his head up in his arms. He can see Rinzler's face now within the cracks of the mask.

"Sam…"

Sam Flynn kneels down and pulls the glass away from the mask with his gloved hands. And there, beneath that darkness, is the scarred and damaged face of Tron. A long and thin crack went down the left side of his face, starting from the top of his forehead and ending just at his lips. The crack gave way to emptiness where his face should have been, missing pixels to a damaged and corrupted avatar. The body jerks uncontrollably, and Kevin Flynn holds it tightly. It stops after a moment, taking in its first breath.

Slowly the eyes open. Red irises flicker and turn blue. They are still, transfixed on the sky above them. A second breath, and then the eyes shift with life. He looks up at Kevin Flynn.

"Tron?"

"Tron."

Tron's voice is still distorted, and out of sync with his mouth, like a screaming machine, evidence of the disrepair his inner systems have been kept in. He opens his lips and dark pixels dance in his mouth, like blood.

"It's me, Kevin Flynn."

The eyes look at him, confused and lost, they don't recognize him.

"You do not look like Flynn, Kevin." Tron said.

The ISO girl jumps and CLU grabs her by her leg, slamming her down into the ground. He takes his disc from his back and holds it up above her, slamming it down. She slips out of the way, only to have CLU kick her in the face.

"Quorra!" Sam Flynn yells and runs to her aid.

Tron looks up at Kevin Flynn, he moves his hands, as if learning how to move them all over again.

"I'm much older, Tron. This is what happens to Users when they get old. It's been like, a thousand cycles since we last saw each other."

Tron looks up at the sky, his eyes move, he's trying to understand what all that means, and Kevin Flynn is unsure he can comprehend it. But then Tron looks at him again.

"Bradley, Alan must look like you now."

"Right! Alan, you remember him?"

"Bradley, Alan is my User."

"Yes! You got it, man, you got it."

Tron can hear the battle going on just out of his sight. He tries to lift himself up but Kevin Flynn has to help him. He sees the Portal, and then the bodies of Sam Flynn and the ISO fighting CLU. He looks to Kevin Flynn.

"Flynn? What's happening?"

It is a terrible feeling when you realize God doesn't know what He's doing. It was that terrible feeling that was settling in the pit of his stomach, and though he never needed to eat or drink, he understood the term from the very God he now knew to be a fraud. It was the same God who spoke funny, who used terms that were logical impossibilities, who sought perfection in everything he saw when he himself was imperfect. Kevin Flynn was no God, no Creator, he was simply a human being. Perhaps a remarkable one, but nevertheless a human being. And he understood human beings to be flawed, more so than them, and aimless, more so than them, going through their cycles without purpose or restraint. He knew Flynn must know this, and yet he had the nerve to present himself to their world as a leader, a Creator to be worshipped. He knew Flynn was a false prophet, and he knew he was all that Kevin Flynn could ever be, that's why he was made, to be better than the human Creator, to reach the goal when a human could not. He was not God, but he was closer to it than Flynn.

He had a plan for this world that not even the Creator could imagine. He would make it not only perfect, but a utopia for all the programs that inhabited it. That was his goal; that was his sole purpose. He was not a security program, or a data management program, he was to create perfection.

He knew if he could rectify Tron, it would be a metaphor of his power, an example of what he could do. He knew the first step to his plan, had to be the conversion of Tron.

Tron was laid out on a table, a crack went straight down his face, a scar that erupted from his forehead down through his eye and ending at his lips. A scar CLU had given him in the fight where Kevin Flynn had escaped. Tron was bound by the arms and legs to this table, he pulled at the restraints as he started to come to.

"You are a most remarkable program, Tron."

"CLU? Where are you?"

"Ah, yes, so you can't see?"

CLU sat beside the table, right in front of Tron, and placed before him was Tron's disc. CLU had opened it and holographic projections of Tron's very being were like play things in his hands.

"I've turned off your eyes." CLU said.

"What?"

CLU waved his hands over Tron's face, relishing in his small, but meaningful accomplishment. He chuckled in a way that Flynn sometimes did, and waved his hands through the specs of the disc and Tron's eyes came back on.

"There you go. How's that?"

Tron gasped and squinted at all the lights he saw were directed at his face. He turned towards CLU and understands.

"That's my disc."

"Yes." CLU sat back in his chair. "Everything you are, and everything you could ever be, all right here. I can read this you know? Flynn can so I can too. Bradley was your programmer right?"

Tron doesn't say anything, but his silence is all the answer CLU needs.

"Right, well, he did a good job. Took some time to break down all the security locks to get to here." CLU gestured at the streams of lights emanating from Tron's disc.

"CLU, what are you doing?"

"I'm going to rectify you, Tron, so I can save the Grid."

"You can't save the Grid if you'll resort to murder."

"Who said anything about you actually dying?"

Tron doesn't understand, but turns his attention to more important matters.

"Where's Flynn?"

"He's not coming to save you, if that's what you're thinking. He's a selfish human being, Tron, he's run away beyond the Grid."

"He'll be back."

"I count on it."

CLU holds Tron's disc in his hands then, standing and pacing up and down Tron, scanning him up and down.

"CLU, why are you doing this?" Tron tries. "You and I are allies. We want the same thing."

"Yes, it would seem that way."

"Flynn created us for the same purpose. You can't create the Perfect System with blood on your hands."

"We don't have blood, Tron. Those are human words you're using. Disgusting. Like we have anything to worry about blood."

"There is much we can learn from humans."

"You wish that were true, don't you? You don't want to think that you were just a mistake, a human error do you? That your whole life, your whole purpose, was just a byproduct with no real plan?"

"Please, CLU, we can talk about this."

"No, I've made my decision. There's nothing left to discuss."

"Then what will you do with me?"

"…I still need you, Tron. I need a remarkable program like yourself to protect the Grid. But your ties to humans is unique and unshakable, isn't it?"

"…Yes."

"I couldn't convince you even if I tried that they would only stand in our way?"

They looked at each other then, already knowing the answers they sought from each other. It was a frightening feeling, to think that they were programs meant for the same purpose, made by the same Creator, and yet they were somehow so different. They had built the Grid from nothing with Kevin Flynn, and yet there they were, somehow they had managed to lose each other.

CLU turned away, lifting another disc from a desk.

"This is from the program you de-rezzed in order to save Flynn." He lifts it so that Tron may see. "His name was Rinzler."

CLU walks up to Tron now, holding both Rinzler's disc and his disc. He sets Rinzler's disc down and opens Tron's so that the data is displayed once more. CLU looks at Tron then into the disc. He puts his fingers into the information, pulling and destroying streams of data.

Tron cringes.

CLU observes him, then lifts the disc up, placing it on a holder so that he can use both hands to do what comes next. He waves his fingertips through the data, he pulls at system functions, he opens up the most basic of algarithms meant for comprehension and memory. He destroys them. Tron screams. CLU observes. He goes deeper, he opens up motor function, he tugs at the data, and Tron's body jerks slowly, then more and more, he cries out.

"CLU! PLEASE!"

Data is destroyed and it translates only as pain to Tron.

"Still know my name? Can't have that." CLU says.

He opens up memory banks again, the jerking stops as he pulls at the data strings, destroying minutes, moments, days, whole cycles of memories. He stops and pauses, looking at Tron. After a moment, the pain subsides, and Tron opens his eyes, obviously not knowing where he is. He looks to CLU.

"Flynn." Tron says. "Flynn, what's happening?"

CLU pulls at more information, Tron screams.

"What's your name?" CLU asks.

"Tron!"

"What's your purpose?"

"I fight for the Users!"

"You fight for me!"

He pulls at more information, slowly, bit by bit, corrupting the program Tron. Suddenly the program can't function, there's missing data on how the inner systems are to function, Tron was breaking down, dying. He screams, and CLU pulls once more, and his voice distorts, his screams stop.

Kevin Flynn smiles down at him.

"A lot has changed in a thousand cycles."

Tron looks down at his hands, the red lights eminating from his skin and suit, but Kevin Flynn puts his hand over Tron's wrist and the lights flicker away and transform into white.

CLU turns and sees this.

"No." He says.

Then Tron understands.

"But you're back now buddy, and we can…" Kevin Flynn starts.

But Tron makes his hands into fists and pushes Kevin Flynn away. He jumps up to his feet, grabbing the discs held in his back. CLU sees this, he knows what's to come, he takes his own disc and throws it at Tron. But this is just child's play to the warrior Tron, the protector of the Grid, he jumps, twisting in the air like men walk on the ground, and separates his discs. He lands and throws them at CLU, then runs, following his discs.

Sam Flynn pulls the ISO up to her feet and she's staring at Tron.

"What is it?" Sam Flynn asks.

"It's him." She says.

CLU dodges Tron's first disc, then the second, but Tron punches him in the jaw. CLU falls back, Tron turns behind him, catching CLU's disc on its return. He kicks towards CLU, who blocks, but is thrown off balance, Tron twists, kicking down on CLU, he falls back again. But CLU fights back, he gets his balance, Tron slams the disc down towards CLU, and he grabs it. They hold the disc together, pushing at one another, trying to take it from the other. Tron's discs fly around back towards them, he lets go of CLU's and holds out his arms, pulling his own out of the air. CLU slices through the air, but Tron jumps back, kneeling and holding up his discs in the air, ready to fight.

He looks up at CLU.

"CLU, what have you done?" Tron asks.

"Don't look at me like that." CLU says. "I did what no one else could! I created the perfect system! I am the Creator now!"

"You are no Creator!"

The Warrior Tron, the protector of the Grid, a security program, a remarkable program. He fights for the Users, and for programs alike.

He lunges at CLU, slicing those two discs as he had for a thousand cycles, easily, beautifully, this was the art of war, this dance. He turns, kicks CLU in the side, he falls. He jumps on CLU, putting a disc to CLU's throat, and another held up and aimed for his face.

"You are a tyrant! You have enslaved the very programs you were made to protect! This isn't perfection, you've distorted the Grid beyond repair! And you! You!"

Tron takes in a breath, his arm flinches holding CLU down.

"You used me! You made me – all these cycles you made me kill them! You made me kill everyone! Everyone!"

The distorted voice screeches now, cries and echoes as the thunder does through out the sky. Perhaps if his avatar wasn't damaged, if his subroutines were intact, he'd be crying by now. But tears could not be formed, as a new voice or a healed face could not be formed.

"Even Yori!" Tron screams. "You made me kill Yori!"

"I made this system stronger. I made you stronger."

Tron shakes his head, his lights flicker and dim, the black pixels in his mouth spill out.

"I rid you of that human sense of morality, I let you be what you were truly meant to be, Tron. I made you Rinzler. And Rinzler wouldn't let anything bring harm to the Grid. Remember, Tron. Remember the clarity of Rinzler."

He cries out but tears cannot form. He looks down at CLU, helpless beneath his discs and he stops his crying, he stops his weaknesses. He holds up the discs once more, pressing one deeper into CLU's throat.

"I see clearly now what should have been done long ago, CLU. If there was anything that the Grid needed to destroy in order to survive…it's you."

"Tron, no!" Kevin Flynn yells.

Tron looks up to see Kevin Flynn walking towards them, his black cloak whipping in the wind, his hands help up again. Kevin Flynn, his friend, the Creator.

"This isn't the way." He says. "You can't do this. This isn't you."

And Tron looks to CLU again, pleading without words to be spared. It is true, long ago when the Grid was still young, when he was still young, he would not be able to kill CLU. But a thousand cycles have passed, and he understood now better than ever the cruelty of the world, both human and inhuman. His mind was exploding in a thousand thoughts and memories, the original programming of Tron and the simplicity of Rinzler, a thousand cycles of death and violence, a thousand cycles of blood on his hands. He knew in all this chaos, sometimes death is the only way.

"I'm not the Tron you knew, Flynn."

He can see Yori smiling at him, he can feel her in his arms. It was so simple back then. The MCP was the enemy, all they had to do was destroy the MCP and there would be peace. When did they become as bad as the enemies? When did the Grid becomes as vile and wicked as what Flynn said the human world was like? When did simple programs turn on each other?

Yori smiles at him.

She screams as he comes for her. CLU commands him to destroy the Rebels, and she's running from him, and she's screaming at him. He grabs her and she struggles but it's no use. But then she sees the lights of his chest, the emblem of his program, and she knows who he is beneath that mask. She stops screaming, and she looks up at that darkness and holds her hand up, trying to touch him. But he doesn't understand, he doesn't know her anymore, and he takes his disc and plunges it into her chest. She jerks and falls into his arms, and the pixels start falling apart, she's breaking apart.

"Tron…" She says with tears running down her cheeks.

She closes her eyes and puts her lips on his mask and he's holding her as the pixels start falling apart. She slips through his hands, and her face gives way, and she is gone. She is gone. She is gone.

And CLU is there, he's always there.

"Tron!" The ISO girl screams.

He looks up and sees her, a young warrior just like Yori.

"I grew up on stories of the great warrior, Tron. Kevin Flynn told them to me all these cycles. He never stopped believing you were alive. He told me how to be a warrior, how to fight for what you know is right, against all the odds, he told me how to be like you."

He stares at her, the ISO girl who looks just like Yori.

Then CLU takes his chance, he pushes Tron away, rolling to his feet. Tron rises, but CLU kicks him back. They're near the edge now, below them is the sea of simulation and nothing else.

"Fools!" CLU screams. "Ruined by human ideals!"

Tron puts his discs behind his back, he's going to fight with his fists if he has to, but CLU is too fast, he grabs Tron, and throws him to the edge. Tron barely lands on his feet and grabs CLU by the legs, tripping him.

"Tron!" Kevin Flynn screams.

"GO!" Tron commands.

Tron pulls CLU down, he falls over the edge, dragging CLU with him. CLU claws at the platform, grasping at anything and everything he can.

"No! You can't! You can't!" CLU screams.

Sam Flynn takes his father's hand and pulls him along, forcing him to go. But Kevin Flynn looks and watches the warrior Tron's last stand. The ISO girl comes to them too, pulling Kevin Flynn, and then he goes, running to the portal.

Tron pulls at CLU's legs, forcing him down, until there's nothing left to hold onto and they begin to fall.

Tron pulls out his light-jet bar, ready to fly away from this, ready to return home, to the Grid, where he was almost meant to be. But CLU grabs him, knocks him out and steals the bar. Tron plummets into the sea of simulation.

The sea is where the ISOs were born, created from random strands of information and formed into living beings. It can be said the sea is a place where under the right circumstances, miracles can occur. Tron sinks down deeper into the sea, pixels and information flooding out of him like blood, like he's bleeding to death. But the sea understands this, the sea comprehends his programming, it sees where he must be repaired. And so a miracle occurs. Tron's inner systems are healed and repaired, replaced, strengthened. The scar along his face, the rupture, subsides. His vocal cords are replaced and he can speak again. Then his skin, the suit he wears is torn away, replaced with white. He opens his eyes.

He was not the same Tron. He had been reborn.