#tlbtalks

Pre Showdown, dark would have occasional episodes where his code took control. While his usual eyes are white sclera with black pupils, the code switches it to black sclera, red pupils. These episodes usually were in the morning after a bad nightmare, right after/during panic attacks, or they'd come on occasionally if dark's mood dropped heavily

During Showdown, it's his code that's in partial control. Dark doesn't realize it at all, because he's so focused on the fact that Chosen "betrayed" him. His code had been silently creeping up on him while he was working, and when Chosen entered the room to find Dark's virabot, dark's eyes were already switched. That's why Chosen, instead of trying to talk it out (because that never works with the code, it actively wants to kill him), switches to punch first, talk later mode. If dark had never launched the virabot to Alan's PC, and therefore never got CG involed, then the fight would've been one of their normal fights. No biggie, Dark would come back, right?

Well, Showdown happens, he gets laser beamed, and his code takes full control right before he passes out from the blast (yes, he was conscious for a few moments while in the crater in the ground). Dark barely has the conscious to fight against it, and it's too late anyways as his body gives out, or whats left of it anyways.

Chosen visits Dark's "grave", gets traumatized at the sight (because his best friend, who he just fought was sitting there dead and the last words he said to him were negative), and flies away quickly. The virabots find Dark's body a day later, and they use their code to fuse the viraband into dark. Slowly, Dark's body grows into the black w/ red outline goop that we know, and it pieces itself together bit by bit. It takes weeks for him to piece together, the code slowly doing it's thing.

When his body is back together, the code wakes itself up, and while dark is able to observe shit, he cant take control now. He's too weak, unable to think right. The code connects to the virabots, and it uses the old computer to create new code, using the old tech to create a new generation of virabots that were it's virabots, not his. It spends months working on this new generation, perfecting it to be the perfect spy bot.

The thing is, the previous generation was Dark's generation; his magnum opus of killer bots. It was always Dark's goal to destroy the internet, not the Code's. It's only goal is to destroy the chosen one, and after that? Nothing.

The code has no personality, no emotions, no true thoughts. It's lines of code, intelligent, but it's not alive. It's an AI, working silently and reacting, but nothing it makes is original. It uses Dark's knowledge, Dark's intelligence, to create the new virabots. It focuses on stealth, on spying on the Rocket Corps.

Why?

It has no powers. The lines of code it has, the lines of code from the virabands that got merged into itself, that's it's only power. It's missing his power, and while the code hates chosen, it doesn't hate it's host. It cares for him as best as it can, to the best of its knowledge.

The issue is, it never learned how to take care of a stick. Never needed to. The result is that Dark's in horrible shape, barely eating, barely alive, but the code is keeping him together manually. Every breath, every blink, it has to accomodate. It often leaves Dark breathless, unblinking, unmoving. The real Dark fidgeted all the time, but this? This was pure code. There was no tics, no habits, just intelligence.

When the code meets H4CK3R, when it offers it's plan to "bring back mitzi" (it knows it cant, it's created for destruction, but it knows Second can, and it knows how to activate Second's code powers. it's talked to the other code before), H4CK3R nearly gags at the smell. When they return to Rocket Corps, the first thing H4CK3R does is get Dark's walking corps a bath. The code questions it, but goes along, silently taking in the new information, learning. Dark never really learned how to actually take care of himself, and the code never needed to take care of itself. It wasn't needed.

The next thing H4CK3R does is try to get the code to sleep. What he doesnt realize is that the code didn't need to sleep. Hell, H4CK3R doesn't realize that this isnt a stick, it's pure, unadulterated code. He figures it out soon enough when the code comments on how sleep is useless, and only for sticks.

H4CK3R tries to get the code to tell him it's name, but all he gets is "I have no need for a name. I never have. The Dark Lord is my title, not my name." It prompts H4CK3R to try to call it "Dark", but it glares at him and scolds him off. With no other option, he decides to call it "Lord".

"Lord" reacts with facts and intelligence, but no emotion. When Agent tries to joke with Lord, it just stares at him blankly. (It freaks out the Mercs, they're all creeped out at how Lord will stare at them, unblinking, unbreathing. It leads to them making excuses when it comes into the room.) Lord is using H4CK3R for it's own reasons. It saw The Chosen One get renamed to NO ONE, it saw him fall, powerless. It decided then and there that The Chosen One was dead, and it's mission was, while still active, was no longer a duty and could be put on the back burner. That brought back the fact that Lord has none of Dark's powers. It needs Dark's powers. Why? Because otherwise it has no purpose. It's not scared, it can't feel, but there's something akin to that when it coherts about having no task to fulfill.

It's using H4CK3R to gain his powers back. It fails, because it's original plan was to combine with H4CK3R similar to how him and Chosen combined with a handshake, but it only works for a brief spark, a brief moment. It doesn't show it's disappointment process when it discovers that the powers are still turned off.

Their partnership is manipulative, but Lord has the full control in the situation. It lets H4CK3R think that he's manipulating Lord, when in reality its the opposite. Lord uses it's access to Rocket Corps' technology to try and find a solution to it's problem, all while dancing around with H4CK3R's idea that it can bring Mitzi back.