One year gone
Flynn watched the clouds gathering from the window of house he shared with Alan, and occasionally the kids, and the programs, and other friends. The house which was alive, even more so than he, and he'd come far, himself.
A year ago.
One year ago - this-place year, actual year, the time it took the Earth to complete a revolution around the Sun, not a subjective year or a Cycle, inside - he'd been kneeling in his and Quorra's hideout in the Outlands, alone and hopeless, watching clouds which had nothing to do with actual water or evaporation gather in a storm which wasn't actually involving discharge of static electricity, because that would mess things up inside the sensitive tech innards of a computer. But it had looked somewhat alike to this, anyway, or what this would look like once the sun had set - there had been no sun for him for over a thousand years.
No sun. Nor hope. Even with Quorra's presence by his side, with her almost unlimited store of hope, he'd had none, all until Sam had appeared... no. Until Quorra had brought Sam to him. A year ago. And everything had changed. It had hurt, at first. Using a muscle that should have by all rights atrophied. Hope. Look to the future, not as something that would come inevitably but as something to bring about, to make happen, to shape, even, though by his hands, it would have come misshapen anyway. Nothing came out right from his hands, no matter how hard he tried.
Even as the hope flared with the brightness he hadn't known for so long, he knew that harm was coming from him too those he cared for again. No matter which way things played, he wasn't coming out with them. He was not planning on destroying himself, so maybe the might be able to return to him; but he wasn't planning on leaving either of them behind for the sake of feeling wind against his cheeks again.
But misshapen his efforts' results had come, and he'd pulled Clu into reintegration, feeling the moment of unity, of all that pain just for an instant, before the reconnection exploded with the kind of energy the system hadn't known before.
He shouldn't have survived it. He had assumed he wouldn't survive it; perhaps if it had been another moment during his long wait, he wouldn't have; as things were, he did, and he got to watch the damage he had caused, for so, so very long, open up to adjust to the change of having him there again. Scarred or scabbed over... it was bad to watch it reopen and bleed again; they all bled. Amber possibly less than the rest, on his account at least; Sam and Clu - and possibly Quorra and Tron - most, which was in no way discounting the pain of Alan or Roy or anyone else.
And it was all his fault. Exclusively and entirely. Oh, it may have been others' hands which had done the deeds sometimes; but the blame lay on him. The actions which he could have chosen, as easily as the one he had, had been his to take, and he had ignored them. He had been so proud and arrogant and stupid, and then he had been simply... missing. Those he loved most, deprived of his trust, of his presence, of his love, and having to deal with that.
Some had had a chance to build something around that him-shaped hole. Others had been too much dependent on him to get away from it so easily.
And he had wronged them all so much. Wrong assumptions. Wrong words. Wrong deeds. All of his mistakes, like those clouds, covering the sun, the stars, the possibility of things being right.
Was he doing at all better now? Could he do at all better?
He doubted it. Some days the potential of what yet could be made that doubt curl in and wither; other days, causing Sam's wondering, beautiful smile by something good vanquished the doubt; but it always returned.
Wouldn't it have been better if he had died that night, a year ago?
Not ever would he voice that question to anyone here. Not even think it too hard when they could read it on his face, in his eyes, however they could read him. Because even the question was not fair to them, not after how hard and long they had fought to have him back.
And not that he wasn't grateful to have a chance to be back; this was more than he had allowed himself to wish for, but he had wanted it, every damned millicycle. To be back.
It didn't undo the mistakes he had made, though. Didn't fix the lives he had broken, nor return the lives which had been lost because of him. And yet there he was, reminding to everybody that while they suffered, he was still standing. His presence and his age, implacable and impossible to throw away, weighing on exactly the weakest parts of everybody's mind.
It wasn't right. It couldn't be right. He couldn't make it right.
Did he even have the right to be trying?
But he couldn't take himself away now; that would have been wrong.
He only wondered if they wouldn't have had a better chance of moving forward if that night, he had perished.
At least he wouldn't be making any more mistakes.
A year ago.
One year ago - this-place year, actual year, the time it took the Earth to complete a revolution around the Sun, not a subjective year or a Cycle, inside - he'd been kneeling in his and Quorra's hideout in the Outlands, alone and hopeless, watching clouds which had nothing to do with actual water or evaporation gather in a storm which wasn't actually involving discharge of static electricity, because that would mess things up inside the sensitive tech innards of a computer. But it had looked somewhat alike to this, anyway, or what this would look like once the sun had set - there had been no sun for him for over a thousand years.
No sun. Nor hope. Even with Quorra's presence by his side, with her almost unlimited store of hope, he'd had none, all until Sam had appeared... no. Until Quorra had brought Sam to him. A year ago. And everything had changed. It had hurt, at first. Using a muscle that should have by all rights atrophied. Hope. Look to the future, not as something that would come inevitably but as something to bring about, to make happen, to shape, even, though by his hands, it would have come misshapen anyway. Nothing came out right from his hands, no matter how hard he tried.
Even as the hope flared with the brightness he hadn't known for so long, he knew that harm was coming from him too those he cared for again. No matter which way things played, he wasn't coming out with them. He was not planning on destroying himself, so maybe the might be able to return to him; but he wasn't planning on leaving either of them behind for the sake of feeling wind against his cheeks again.
But misshapen his efforts' results had come, and he'd pulled Clu into reintegration, feeling the moment of unity, of all that pain just for an instant, before the reconnection exploded with the kind of energy the system hadn't known before.
He shouldn't have survived it. He had assumed he wouldn't survive it; perhaps if it had been another moment during his long wait, he wouldn't have; as things were, he did, and he got to watch the damage he had caused, for so, so very long, open up to adjust to the change of having him there again. Scarred or scabbed over... it was bad to watch it reopen and bleed again; they all bled. Amber possibly less than the rest, on his account at least; Sam and Clu - and possibly Quorra and Tron - most, which was in no way discounting the pain of Alan or Roy or anyone else.
And it was all his fault. Exclusively and entirely. Oh, it may have been others' hands which had done the deeds sometimes; but the blame lay on him. The actions which he could have chosen, as easily as the one he had, had been his to take, and he had ignored them. He had been so proud and arrogant and stupid, and then he had been simply... missing. Those he loved most, deprived of his trust, of his presence, of his love, and having to deal with that.
Some had had a chance to build something around that him-shaped hole. Others had been too much dependent on him to get away from it so easily.
And he had wronged them all so much. Wrong assumptions. Wrong words. Wrong deeds. All of his mistakes, like those clouds, covering the sun, the stars, the possibility of things being right.
Was he doing at all better now? Could he do at all better?
He doubted it. Some days the potential of what yet could be made that doubt curl in and wither; other days, causing Sam's wondering, beautiful smile by something good vanquished the doubt; but it always returned.
Wouldn't it have been better if he had died that night, a year ago?
Not ever would he voice that question to anyone here. Not even think it too hard when they could read it on his face, in his eyes, however they could read him. Because even the question was not fair to them, not after how hard and long they had fought to have him back.
And not that he wasn't grateful to have a chance to be back; this was more than he had allowed himself to wish for, but he had wanted it, every damned millicycle. To be back.
It didn't undo the mistakes he had made, though. Didn't fix the lives he had broken, nor return the lives which had been lost because of him. And yet there he was, reminding to everybody that while they suffered, he was still standing. His presence and his age, implacable and impossible to throw away, weighing on exactly the weakest parts of everybody's mind.
It wasn't right. It couldn't be right. He couldn't make it right.
Did he even have the right to be trying?
But he couldn't take himself away now; that would have been wrong.
He only wondered if they wouldn't have had a better chance of moving forward if that night, he had perished.
At least he wouldn't be making any more mistakes.