#cmdrjanus-2

"Forgive me your excellency, but do you believe it wise to risk potentially loosing our most valuable asset [Rinzler] in an exercise only intended to pacify the masses?"

"The security and pacification of the masses is of utmost importance. Rinzler may be a valuable asset..."

"...but he is expendable if it means maintaining order and control. If there is even a remote possibility that this exercise will aid in that goal, then it must be carried out. Is that clear?"

I was tagged by @cmdrjanus-2 here, thanks!

The smaller program promptly snatched the datapad, studying the screen and listening to what was being told to them.

“This is the 5th time, Janus, was it? Anyways,” Makro outstretched his arm, directing the others attention to the area around them. “You do understand that this sector needs the right amount of energy to function properly, correct? What does Clu need with this energy, hm?”

It was over.

It was finally over. The Occupation was defeated, overthrown. And he had helped make it happen. That had been revealed only a short time ago, when the Renegade and Tron had given their speeches. They used Tron and Radia’s discs and told the truth of Clu’s story, the Admin filling in things they didn’t know. To say the people were shocked was an understatement. There was anger among them. But not toward him. They realized he had been set up even worse than they were, because the Creator’s impossible demands had literally been written into his code.

But that was behind him now. Flynn had been found and forced to edit Clu’s code, ultimately freeing the Admin from Flynn’s hold over him. They had immediately placed him in the System Administrator position that had been rightfully his all along. His first act, though, was to throw a celebration, not of himself, but of the Grid’s people who had endured the dark times under the Occupation. And he refused to seat himself up on a throne or in his ship. There was a concert as part of the celebration, and he was down in the midst of the crowds, down among his people. It was his way of showing that while he was their leader, he was also equal to them in that he was just a person like them at the end of the day.

For Clu, it was a feeling of pure joy to be swept up into the crowd and included as one of them, some asking him to dance, which he obliged. It fellt like he’d had a Recognizer parked on his shoulders and now it had finally lifted off. At last, the people were free. The Grid was free.

Commander Janus:

1. My faith in humans treating the Programs well isn’t high, if that’s what you mean. Our history is long and full of people doing awful things to one another for the stupidest reasons. It’s also full of people’s acts of generosity, kindness, and sacrifice. If anything, humans aren’t predictable, and that’s why we’re dangerous.

2. Superior? No. Programs go up against humans, and you will all die. What I do see is something of a symbiosis; humans are increasingly dependent on Programs and Programs still need humans to create and maintain them. That symbiosis needs to be on terms that benefit both worlds, not just humans seeing Programs as slaves and toys to exploit. 

3. Encom? Maybe when Gibbs held it, it was someplace special. Now? Really? It’s just another tech company, one that’s coasting by on intertia, stock price, and past success. It’s treated my father horribly. It took him away from us - mother and me - as he felt responsible for cleaning up the mess Flynn and Gibbs saddled him with. I stay because I feel I need to keep an eye on my dad, and because of the world inside its systems, but I don’t feel any special loyalty to the likes of McKay.

Half a cycle ago the disc review was to take place; half a cycle ago, Number Four was ankle deep in fizzling cubes. He’d have to explain his absence, an annoyance he’d tolerated plenty of times before, but after the mass reprogramming a number of higher-ups had become problematic. Even Lieutenant Roz, with her abnormal blind spot for him, could justify his actions just a number of times before her own code would begin recalculating his devotion to the cause - to the Luminary. 

The boosted Lightcycle’s whining electric engine was loud in the shortening distance as the Guard sped toward home base, having little concern for civilian traffic. He weaved around the 4-wheelers and slower bikes through the off ramp, and dove down and under the highway toward the facility entrance, its towering geometric pillars wound by glowing ribbons of gold; a small semblance of the overwhelming presence of their tyrannical leader. He shouldn’t have chosen this cycle of all cycles to engulf himself in personal work, but the raid of an unofficial refugee camp had been too tempting to dismiss. He’d pay for that now. 

The Lightcycle’s engine was merely a low, rumbling purr once he reached the base’s entrance, and its rider had barely sat up from it when it it was deactivated, collapsing from its glowing orange grid and then into just a baton. He holstered it quickly, approaching the Commander already waiting for him alongside two senior sentries.