Tron Legacy - It's Your Call - Initiate Sequence (6 page)
Read Tron Legacy - It's Your Call - Initiate Sequence Online
Authors: Carla Jablonski
Tags: #Fiction - Young Adult
A
sudden lurch bangs you into the half-faced man. You recoil and regain your balance. The Recognizer has docked.
“Where are we?” you ask the young guy.
“The gaming complex,” the kid replies. The nervous dude beside him amps up his muttering.
A ramp descends, and Sentries escort everyone in the hold onto the landing platform outside a gleaming superstructure. There are more Sentries waiting here, watching you all expectantly.
Your group is lined up roughly and a Sentry strolls in front of you. He nods at the kid. “Rectifier.” He moves down the line. “Games,” he announces in front of the muttering dude.
“Noooo,” the nervous dude moans. He suddenly makes a break for it. As Sentries close in he reaches an air shaft. Without even breaking stride, he leaps into the pit. You hear his scream all the way down.
Your group is rattled, but no one says a word. The Sentries just go back to their assessment. They stop in front of you.
“Look, I know you probably get this a lot,” you say, “but there's been a mistake.”
The Sentry looks you up and down, then announces, “Games.”
W
e need to strike now,” Bartik insists. “Zuse can unite the factions.”
“Of course Zuse can do these things.” Castor waves his hand dismissively. “But does he want to? We shall seeâ¦.”
You hear no more because at that moment Gem strides to Castor's booth. She whispers into his ear. His eyes fix on you.
“Excuse me,” Castor tells Bartik. “I have to attend to something.” He slides out of the booth and approaches you.
“Come!” he declares, a huge grin on his face. “Away from these primitive functions.” He slides his arm over your shoulder, and slips his other arm around Gem. He escorts you through the club.
“The Son of Flynn,” he says softly. “Of all the possibilitiesâ¦and he walks into mine.”
He snakes you through the dance floor and releases you. “Castor,” he says, extending his hand. “Your host. Provider of any and all entertainments.”
“I'm looking for Zuse,” you say, not bothering to shake the guy's hand. There's something oily about him.
“This, good sir, is a conversation best had behind closed doors.” He once again wraps an arm around your shoulder and drags you away.
“Change the lights,” Castor orders his DJ. Instantly, the lights shift, the colors becoming even more brilliant. The rays radiate across the sky.
Y
ou leap at Zuse and knock his cane out of his hands. The momentum makes him stumble, which gives you a chance to get behind him and wrap your arm around his throat.
The Black Guard crash through the skylight.
“Back off,” you snarl, “or I'll happily derezz him right now.”
You hope they care.
They
may not, but Zuse certainly does. “False alarm!” he cries. “Terrible mistake. So sorry to have troubled you!”
They stop moving closer. But you don't know if that will last.
“Activate the stairway,” you hiss into Zuse's ear. You tighten your hold for emphasis.
You drag Zuse down into the pulsating club, never releasing your grip no matter how much he squirms.
How will you get this guy to help you reach the Portal?
Well, no point standing here trying to come up with a plan.
You've got to get out of thereâpronto!
F
ocus, Sam, you tell yourself. You have to learn the rules of this game and fast! A commotion on an adjacent platform distracts you. There are players battling all around you on the multiple platforms. Crazy!
A bearded man on a nearby platform throws a disc at another player. It's a hit! The struck player's body shatters into thousands of tiny cubes that scatter across the court like shards of glass.
You should have known! They're not people! They're computer programs. And to die here is to pixilateâlose resolution. They derezz!
In this game, if you lose, you die. It's that simple.
You struggle to remove the disc from the sheath in your armor. Your combatant flings his disc again. It looks wildly off trackâphew! But, no! It strikes a rear embankment and caroms wickedly back toward you! You drop and somersault out of its path.
Is there any hope of surviving this battle?
If you try to stop the action by explaining you're not a program,
TURN TO PAGE 6
.If you yank out your disc to fire back,
Y
ou don't feel ready to hit the cityâyou want to get a better sense of where you are and of what you can expect first. “Let's check out the light show,” you tell Alex. “Awesome!” He dashes ahead and you have to jog to keep up with him.
It takes you a while to reach your destination. When you do arrive you see vibrantly colored energy that rises and falls like the waves of the ocean. No wonder it's listed on the map as the Sea of Simulationâit looks just like water. You and Alex travel along something resembling a shoreline, watching the violet and turquoise bursts.
Alex stops suddenly and kicks off his sneakers.
“What are you doing?” you ask.
“Wading!” he cries and runs toward the undulating waves of light.
You're not sure this is a good idea. What if the kid gets electrocuted or something by hurling himself into all that energy? “Alex, get back here!” you call.
Alex stops, turns, and sticks out his tongue at you.
But before he can turn back around, a shaft of light shoots down from the sky directly onto him. He's lifted off the ground and pulled up inside what looks like a giant spaceship.
It all happens so quickly, you don't have a chance to move, to gasp, or to do anything at all to save him!
T
his is my chance, you think. I'll show Jax how good I am! Then you're sure she'll find someone else to run her errands.
You pull on the helmet, making your disguise complete, and put the bike in gear. It growls to life. You pull up alongside the parked stunt car.
“CUT!” someone cries.
Uh-oh. You have a bad feeling you just made a big mistake.
“Who's the idiot who just rode into the shot?” a large man bellows through a megaphone.
You feel a pair of hands yank you off the bike. “What do you think you're doing?” the stunt rider shouts. “Why do you think I needed someone to watch the bike? So jerks like you don't ride it!”
You hang your head. “Sorry, man, I just wantedâ”
Jax stalks up to you. “Off the set. Now!” she shrieks.
You stare at her. “Can't you give me one moreâ”
“Security!” she barks into her walkie-talkie. She glares at you. “I run a safe set. People who don't follow orders get people hurt. You're never going to work in this field. I'll make sure of it.” Great. You're first day as a movie stunt driver is also your last. For weeks you try to find a job, with no success. Finally you find something that matches your skills. You're a fast-food delivery person. At least you get to ride every dayâ¦.
THE END
A
lab,” you murmur. You gaze around a room frozen in time. A jacket slung casually over a sofa. An open soda can. You move deeper into the room and pick up a framed photo from the desk: you and your dad at a baseball game. This must be your father's secret lab.
You put the photo back on the desk and notice a large map on the wall. the grid is written across the top. “The Grid,” you murmur. That's what your dad called the world inside the server he created.
You take a seat at the desk and wipe off the thick dust. This reveals multicolored glowing graphics. The desk itself is a tabletop computer!
You tap the on button and the screen fills with code. Suddenly, all the gobbledygook on the screen rewrites itself into a very simple question: tron projectâ“initiate sequence?” y/n?
Good question.
If you hit Yes,
TURN TO PAGE 57
.If you hit No,
TURN TO PAGE 12
.If you do nothing,
TURN TO PAGE 48
.
