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Fanworks: Fics: Tron: Who Uses the User?
Who Uses the User?
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"What?" Sark's head turns up sharply from the reports on his desk. "What did you say?"
She stands there, silent a moment, visibly trembling.
Sark's voice softens. "My apologies, Mayertis. I only mean... I was distracted for a moment, and missed the last thing you said. Will you repeat it, please?"
"I... I was saying, it's not only that I respect you as the Commander, and for being a great warrior, and a kind man..."
There it is again. Sark has heard correctly. And it is just as baffling this time.
A kind man.
He cannot remember, in the entirety of his runtime, ever being called "kind" before. He is aware, abstractly, of the idea of kindness. But under the MCP it is never mentioned as a compliment or a description of virtue.
Nor would anyone Sark knows ever call it an accurate description of him. Sark who delights in the Games; who takes pleasure in hand-to-hand combat ending in the deresolution of Blue enemies of greater and greater prowess, relishing in a constant increase of challenge. Sark, who will derezz his own Red subordinates just as eagerly if the situation calls for it, without a moment of hesitation before or regret after.
Brutal, sadistic... these are things he is called sometimes, in admiration from his subordinates and in praise from his superiors. He cannot imagine why someone would call him "kind."
But as his eyes turn back to Mayertis, the realization sinks in.
From her perspective... her very unique viewpoint... the descriptor could, perhaps, be seen as apt. There are very few beings in existence to whom his behavior could be called "kind." But Mayertis, indeed, is one of them.
She has paused again, at seeing his face change in response to the words. Still fearful of offending him. "Commander Sark?"
This routine of kindness does not come easily enough to forestall his automatic facial expressions, sometimes. And there are certainly some stimuli that set his face into what looks initially like a mask of rage.
But with her... oh, with Mayertis... there is something stronger at work, something within him that works slowly against the rage; urges kindness to the surface, guiding it into place where rage sits by default.
"Yes?" he says at last, softly, kindly. "Go on."
"It's not only that," she continues. "But also... well, I... I'm sorry, I don't mean to be indecent... it's just that... well, you are also a very handsome man, and..."
Oh.
His eyes pass over her once more, examining her in the newly realized context.
She is wearing her usual short dress, white with red trim to match the color of her shell and circuitry underneath. Her circuits are still, of course, red, signalling her unwavering allegiance. But around the edges of those crimson lines, flickering like residual electric charge, Sark now sees the irrepressible sparkles of violet.
Oh.
Of course, he thinks. She has been here, serving him as his assistant, for a long time now. He does not know of anyone else she's become close to, in that time.
Programs.... and Users too, he supposes... do have needs.
It's been a long time for him, too.
He cannot deny that he has... looked at Mayertis, before. Thought of her, in such a way.
And he barely holds back a gasp-- represses it to just a sharp inhalation through his nose-- as his body responds to this closeness with startling intensity. Purple chasing his own circuitry. The activation of functions lower down. Heating, hardening, becoming ready for interface, far more rapidly than he could ever have planned for...
He quells the tremble of his thighs, enough to rise from his desk and approach her.
The difference in their heights becomes so clear as he draws closer; he towers over her petite form. It would be easy, almost, to imagine that he is too strong for this to be an equal encounter.
Sark does prefer his encounters as close to equal as he can get them, in both love and war. There is no satisfaction in taking pleasure from one who's too weak to withhold it-- whether that's the pleasure of climax, or the pleasure of victory in combat.
It would be easy to feel that he'd be taking advantage, if he were to accept Mayertis now. Easy to fear that he would be taking what she has no real power to offer or withdraw freely.
Easy to imagine that he would be simply using her.
That is, after all, the default dynamic between programs of all kinds, here under the rule of the MCP. And he is, after all, her superior, in so many ways.
Nearly every way.
But there is that form of power Mayertis does have, which ...quite definitely balances it out.
He allows this strange force within him-- this kindness-- to take over. To soften his eyes, his smile, as he draws closer and closer to her, close enough to feel the electric charge of her body.
Struggling to hide what it does to him; to his own reactions, which feel perilously out of his control.
"You need not be ashamed of your desires," he says, in a low and seductive voice that almost does not feel like his own.
She flares hotter, deeper violet, as she tips her head back to look up at him.
Oh, she knows him. She knows how ruthless he can be, how violent. She knows that his kindness, when it emerges, is only for her. And she is still not afraid.
The feeling echoes within him.
He, too, has seen the side of her that is to be feared. And yet knows that side is not, is never, aimed at him.
He is... perhaps still a little afraid.
But not enough to back away from her now, as she looks up at him, flushed with arousal, sweetly offering and asking.
It is very near to overheating all his processes, already. He fights to retain self-control.
"I... would like to take you into my private chamber," he whispers.
"Yes," she breathes. "Please, commander, I would-- I'd like that, very much. It is truly private in there. I can tell."
He gives her a curious smile, trembling beneath the surface, as he guides her, hand on her shoulder, drawing on the strange reserves of kindness that her presence permits him to find within himself. "Yes. Of course, my sweet-core. Come with me."
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*****
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The Master Control Program has been in a storm of fluctuating moods, lately. Sark suspects that it is because of the presence of Mayertis aboard the Carrier, serving at Sark's side.
The moods were worse in the first millicycles after he took her in. As she was a foundling with no memories, and no public record in the system, Master Control had initially thought her a useless stray program, not worthy of any effort either to help or to harm.
But soon, when her powers began to show... then, the MCP took an interest that began to seem like highly unstable insanity.
Back then, Mayertis would be struck so suddenly with attacks of anger or fear, wrestling with that alien strength within her. Programs, even some of the strongest and most well-trained guards, would be found drained empty of their energy... with the aftermath of what looked like explosions nearby, doors and walls disintegrated. She would huddle in horror beside the evidence of what she had done, unable to explain how or why.
And the MCP reacted in ever-shifting panic: sometimes locking down everything with tighter and tighter security; other times recalling guards and leaving whole sectors unmonitored, as if trying to remove his own presence from her vicinity as much as he could.
Which is not so unexpected, really. The MCP undoubtedly knows the same things that Sark has found out about Mayertis, over time.
Especially the biggest, most dangerous thing.
The thing that Mayertis, with her blocked memory, does not even know... and cannot be permitted to know... because for all anyone can tell, that knowledge might be the trigger to turn her barely-controlled power into an uncontrolled doomsday weapon.
Her origin, and the reason for her chaotic abilities: that she is, in fact, a User. A human from the outside world. Scanned into the ENCOM system as part of an early experiment known to very, very few. Her original body almost useless; her mind preserved only through the digitization... and her User-powers still very, very viable.
Of course this sends the MCP into instability, into tantrums and panic attacks. To have a User inside the system, under no one's full control? That reaction should be no surprise.
But over the past cycle... as Sark has struggled to teach Mayertis to master her abilities (neither of them really knowing how, both of them just figuring out the workings of her power alongside each other)...
In that time, the MCP's response has reached its current state. A state of tense balance, keeping cautious watch on Mayertis, but from a certain... distance.
Sark's chambers and offices, all the places Mayertis may actually be present, are secured, their entrances and exits watched... but internally unmonitored.
This may change at any time, of course. MCP is always unstable. But Mayertis is so sensitive to energy; to its strength and presence, and where it is being allocated. She can tell when power to surveillance is shut off, and when a room is truly private.
Which she is doing now, nodding affirmation at Sark through her blushing nervousness, as he leads her to his most private chamber.
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*****
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It is a simple room, lit in shades of red. There is only the one piece of furniture, the bed on which he rests during his reboot cycles. Simple... but large, comfortable. Designed, certainly, with intimate pleasure among the purposes in mind.
Her hand feels very small in his. Warm, quivering, as he leads her to the bed. He stands beside her, both of them looking down at the soft red sheets, for a moment before he decides on the next move: sitting down on it, looking up to face her.
Even sitting, he is almost as tall as she is standing. He watches the trembles and flashes of purple become quicker, more widespread across her form.
"Have you done this before?" His own voice is calm, only through a supreme effort of self-control.
"No," she answers without hesitation. "But I would like to. Very much."
"I see." And now, at last, his voice has softened-- almost relaxed-- without real effort on his part. The kindness has taken it over. "...Are you afraid?"
"A little," she admits. "I have learned some... observed some... but I don't know everything about it."
"You trust me?" Sark's voice is still soft, kind, all on its own. Looking at her like this... she melts him. His hands, his skin everywhere, tingle with the urge to take her in his arms.
"Of course," she says. "Always. You are the only one. I would not trust anyone else with this."
"That is wise." His voice can barely manage more than breath. "I trust you too, Mayertis."
The calm here, in his words, his eyes, his hands... it belies the flame building elsewhere. His arousal is urgent. Insistent, hard, burning. He aches to claim her, to take her, with a similar ache to the bloodlust in a battle.
It is a deeply strange feeling, how kindness now still seems powerful enough to hold that fire in check.
He thinks of asking her to begin undressing. Or perhaps, of reaching to undress her himself. But it occurs to him that perhaps the better show of his trust would be to uncover himself first.
Slowly, he lifts the helmet off his head and sets it on the floor. Undoes the gauntlets and the shoulder pauldrons, too; finally the boots, and lays them all together. He feels nearly naked already, stripped to the base layer of his armor.
"How do you want to begin?" he asks her.
Her chest rises and falls as she looks at him, desire still pulsing purple in the lines of her circuitry. "I... I want you to show me how."
A pulse of his own desire answers her, so sudden, straining hard against the material of his armor that he almost cries out aloud.
Instead he smiles, gentle, kind, and reaches his arms out to her. "Come here, then. Lie down beside me."
And she falls into his arms with a gasp, as if desire suddenly took away the ability to stand... and as if it feels to her like a relief.
He guides her fully onto the bed until they are lying together, on their sides, facing each other. His hands can't hold back now, not completely, he can't stop caressing her, stroking up and down the glowing lines of her arms, her sides... "I'm going to undress you."
She arches back with a moan. "Please. Yes." And when his hands move to the back of her dress, fumbling with the subroutines needed to derezz it, she remembers better than he does. It is with her help that the material finally dissolves away.
And she is twisting and moaning with abandon, now, as his hands slide up and down her sides directly on her shell circuitry, embracing her, pulling her against him. Contact of skin on skin, circuits on circuits, pressing and multiplying sensation until they are both making sounds that threaten total loss of control--
"This is-- so good," she manages to gasp out through the moans. "Yes-- oh-- oh I need--" And her eyes focus, suddenly, bright, burning into his. "How do you need to be touched?"
"Oh." He's not able to hold back a desperate little sound, and a stuttering thrust against her. "I-I will show you."
His fingers entangle with hers as he pulls her hand to him. Presses it against the V-pattern of his lower abdomen. "There. And... and lower. Slowly."
She nods, and her fingers are gentle as she traces the crimson shape there. Watching in fascination as the red shifts through the color spectrum, glows bright violet wherever her fingers press. He knows she can feel him tensing, trembling, under her touch, and it has been so very, very long since anyone has seen him so vulnerable and--
"Lower. Now," he urges. "Please."
She nods, meeting his eyes with a small bright smile that is all the warning he gets before her hand glides all the way to the lower point of the V, and then from there straight down, in a direct line to exactly where he needs her, cupping, stroking... so gentle, so kind...
"This comes off, then? Like my dress?"
"Yes. The same way--" And oh, yes, now she's figured it out already. A small deviation of energy toward the right subroutine (that is her gift, after all, he would be wise not to forget that). And the material of his suit begins to derezz, breaking up and vanishing, the disintegration spreading like a wave, out in every direction from her cupping hand between his legs.
He is naked beside her now, all over-- the circuit-patterns on his skin even more bright and sensitive than they were through his clothing.
And he is exposed-- the most sensitive, needy parts of him, hard and aching and vulnerable in the palm of her hand.
He so very rarely removes his whole armor. To be like this... it is a confusing feeling for Sark, and he has never been quite sure if he likes it or fears it. The sense of weakness clashes strangely with a sense of power. To bare himself down to this base form makes him feel frighteningly vulnerable to his fellow Programs-- and somehow also makes him feel that he is closer, in such moments, to being like the Users.
He is not sure why. Under the MCP's rule, one does not have easy access to many datasets about the User world. Thus far, Sark has never felt any need to seek out knowledge on the physical workings of User bodies... if such knowledge even exists.
He knows Program anatomy, of course. He knows there are many models of programs, with great variation in appearance. Some have an exceedingly simple layout in that area: just some circuitry on the thighs and backside, around a cluster of hidden, internal sensors related to I/O Tower signalling. Sensitive, of course... capable of pleasure in response to either physical touch, or to a User's Call. A pleasure response based primarily around the User-driven functions of a Program.
His own arrangement is... different from that. More complex, with less hint at any purpose.
At least, no purpose that he can think of here... on the body of a Program, within a computer system.
Which has always led him to suspect that the programs with his shape are formed by echoes from the other world. A mirroring of the same type of equipment found on Users themselves.
He has never been sure how to feel about that-- proud, or ashamed? In the context of the MCP-ruled system, nothing about the Users is valued. But is it worse to have a body resembling theirs? Or a pleasure drive that's devoted to their Call, their contact?
He is fairly sure that it is better to be shaped like this-- to be on equal footing with the Users, and not dependent upon them, not needy for their attentions.
...If that need, that dependency, even has anything to do with his physical form.
Which... he is not sure it does.
Because, even in this shape, this body that he imagines resembling a User-- Sark is still not free of the urge to seek out their touch, to answer their call.
And the most undeniable proof of that is... right here. In the way he now responds, helpless, desperate, to the touch of this User, here and now.
She lies close against him, her breath fast and warm against the circuits of his chest, as both her hands caress him... awed, loving. Careful.
One hand wrapped around the thickness of his shaft, sliding so slowly, so gently, toward the tip where it's the most desperately sensitive. The other cupping below, so very conscious of how vulnerable the sac and balls are.
"You can..." He gasps, takes a few moments in struggle to bring his responses under control. "You can press a little harder. It's... delicate there, but not that delicate. You won't hurt me."
She nods, though there's a glint of fear in her eyes. She knows, far too well, that she has the ability to hurt him. His trust in her-- that she won't, that she would never choose to cause him harm, and that she will be able to figure out the right amount of force to apply without going too far-- must seem a heavy burden to her.
She strengthens her grip slowly, cautiously, watching him for any sign of response, good or bad.
Her eyes, oh her eyes, so bright, so adoring.
But he cannot keep his own eyes open long enough to appreciate that gaze in full. Her touch is overwhelming-- the hand stroking up and down his erection tighter, faster-- the caress on his balls providing more pressure, more motion--
His head falls back, his eyes close, and a tension builds and builds in his chest, his abdomen, collecting tight and tingling in his thighs and---
He opens his mouth, enduring the humiliation of the utterly wrecked, desperate groan that escapes the moment his lips part-- because he has to tell her that he's already almost-- oh, that is humiliating too, he should be able to last longer, even though it has been too long since--
"You-- you'll have to stop a moment," he gasps through trembling lips. "If you don't want me to-- finish right now."
"Finish?" There's a playful cadence in her voice, as if she delights, on some level, in making him explain further.
"...Climax. Overload. I am almost..." He loses control of his voice, a long wavering groan. "If you keep doing that, I..."
She hums softly, her mouth so close to him that he can still feel her breath on the circuitry at his throat. "And what if I want that?"
"Oh." Those words bring her their own answer. The sound of her saying that, the feeling-- that, finally, is all it takes.
His hips rise up, his thighs spread wide-- like a wanton youth, like a novice just out of beta, too desperate to hold back. Almost as if she were the one deflowering him. Oh-- he moans in near-agony, feeling release surge up through him in hot shivering waves, his will and his muscles powerless to contain it--
Her hands learn so quickly. Tightening, speeding up the strokes as the storm gathers-- all he is aware of now is hot electric shudders of sensation, back arching on the sheets, and his whole form locking completely motionless except for the flood of his release. Fiery jets of liquid energy shooting through him, ripping violent pleasure from every pixel of his flesh, as he surrenders to her irresistible touch and comes.
His eyes are clenched tight shut, so he can only imagine how much he's spilled and where. He cannot see her face reacting to the sight and feel of it, the sudden explosion of fluid. All he knows of her response is the sound...
And it's breathy, pleasured, fascinated. A gasp of utter awe.
He fights to regulate his processes, to stay online, not to crash. It goes shakily for a moment, but at last his tremors calm and he opens his eyes.
She still lies at his side, resting on one elbow, examining the energy discharge that she's mostly managed to catch in her hands, save for a few spatters of it across her forearms. Clearly enthralled by the feel of it-- by the exploratory taste she's venturing now, with a tentative touch of her tongue.
"Liquid energy," she says, voice soft and reverent.
"Yes." He nods, shaky. "That is one of the effects of an overload-- release of excess energy. Some programs release it mainly as heat, light, motion. For others, it takes this form."
"I like this," she says. Clearly she does. What she hasn't licked up already is beginning to vanish from sight, absorbing into her skin.
Of course. It is the main way that her User-power manifests. Absorbing energy. Manipulating energy. Redirecting, amplifying, using....
Oh, this will be... interesting to see. How she will approach intimate pleasure, with that among her instincts. Her circuits are brightening already with the energy she's taken in. Throbs of violet, fire-bright and needy.
"Come here," he murmurs, stroking up and down her sides, around her waist, her lower back. "It will be a while before I can be ready for that again. But you're all on fire, aren't you? I won't make you wait, sweet girl. Let me take care of you with my hands, maybe my mouth."
"Oh!" She flickers all over with delightful shades of purple-- and throws one leg over him, suddenly, hot and startlingly wet against his thigh.
"Ohhh." His own voice echoes her, deep and needy, trailing into a groan. His hands, still stroking her sides, gain some focus toward their destination, and trail downward toward the juncture between her legs.
She is simple down there, he finds. Nothing approaching the... external complexity of his own organs. And... he wonders if that means he's been wrong, about his own anatomy being User-style. Because surely Mayertis, being a genuine User herself, would be rendered the same as they are in their world?
She is most definitely different from him. But... she is also different from any other program he has ever touched.
The wetness is the first sign. He is sure she hasn't reached overload already, and yet liquid energy is sliding down her thighs, from... where? Mayertis sprawls on her back as he leans over to explore her. She arches, spreads her legs wide, crying out, while his hand follows the streams to their source.
Ah. His fingers reach the warm recess they've been seeking. There. She is one of those equipped with an opening, an input port.
He has felt that before, but... not like this. This texture is like nothing else in his experience.
His index finger slides through soft external folds... flexible, slippery with her fluid. Smooth, thick, lubricating.
Oh.
And he does not know if it's just the feel of what he's touching, and the growing awareness of its purpose... or if, perhaps, she is manipulating his energy already, through this contact with hers.
He does not know why or how his own anatomy is managing to react like this-- just moments after he's spilled himself.
Hard again, so hard. Aching, so sudden it takes his breath away.
His finger has slid into her smooth slickness as deep as it will go, and she is clenching around him, thrashing, head tossing side to side, and the cries from her throat are hot pleasure mixed with begging. He pulls the finger out, almost to the tip, and then slides so very gently back inside, accompanied by the middle finger now.
Her thighs strain and part wider, her hips rise and her hands clench in the sheets and she screams.
It's absolutely a scream of pleasure. She is tight, so very tight, no one has ever passed through this channel before, but even so she feels adaptable, flexible, stretching to welcome his touch. Flooding with more wetness... slick-textured, clearly made for easing his entry.
Divine revelation. He is almost certain he is learning something, now, about how Users function when seeking pleasure from each other in their own world.
Clearly there are different models of Users, as well. Some for input, and some for output.
There are analogues to this among Programs, yes, but those now feel like pale imitations. His arousal is answering deliriously to the call of this User... certain, now, beyond all doubt, that whatever divine force shaped his own body has shaped it to connect with one exactly like hers.
Perhaps it is fated.
"Are you still all right, my dear?" He breathes it against her neck and oh, the flush of violet all down her side, the twist of her back and the desperate noise of pleasure tells him exactly how well she is doing.
Almost reluctantly, he pulls his fingers out, tingling with her essence. Bites his lip as he wraps that slickened hand around his own length and strokes, so slow, so careful.... once, twice. His legs are straining and trembling already by the second stroke.
"Do it," Mayertis moans. "Now."
"Yes." His own voice is rough, thick. Almost unrecognizable. "Just tell me what you want. I can lie on top of you... Or you may mount me and I can... enter you from below--" and just the words, the mental image of either position, will push him right to the edge if he dwells on the thought longer.
"Take me. Now. Like this--" and she arches back again, legs wider-- one hand tangled in the sheet, the other clenched on his arm as if she is trying to pull him onto her by sheer muscle strength alone. "Please!"
And-- he surrenders, rolls over on top of her, with a wave of purple glow and a deep, purring groan.
The heat of Mayertis, the pulse of her movements, it is... otherworldly. Oh, yes, she is nothing like any Program-- he is drawn into her arms, between her legs, between her energy-slicked folds as surely as being called to the I/O Tower.
He's hard enough that it hurts to hold back, but he's swollen much thicker than the two fingers that have already entered her, and he has to wait, to move slowly, to hold back from hurting her. He knows his strength could cause her pain-- but just as he trusted her when he was vulnerable in her hands, he knows that he cannot allow himself to harm her. It is a newly-discovered core directive. His will cannot permit it. His intuition will seek out and find certainty, before allowing him even a chance of hurting her.
Kindness. As alien as it may sometimes feel... when he is with Mayertis, kindness is the force that holds mastery of him.
"You do not have to be so careful," she gasps, and hooks both legs around his, and pushes upward, hungry for him--
-- and with a helpless wavering moan, he gives in to her and begins to sink inside.
Tight, so tight, but she has more control of her own energies than he expected-- both the flow of her fluids and the force exerted by her inner muscles. She relaxes, stretches to welcome him at the same time her tight channel floods again with the tingle of liquid energy to slide him deeper. The shift of textures within her, softness and tension, flexing and firm... oh, yes, she is of another world. He extends further, into the realm of the invisible.
The bliss of this new and alien interface takes him over, so completely. He moves, answers the roll of her hips with his own, seeking rhythm. Her thighs open as wide as possible, ankles locking together at the small of his back to pull him in.
"Yes," she cries. "More--" and her hands clutch at him, digging into the sensitized glow of circuits at his shoulders and sides and lower back, moving as if she cannot touch enough of him. "Please!" Her hips push upward, again, again, taking him in almost faster than his own movements can keep up.
He is panting so hard against her neck that he feels dizzy. His left hand clasps her backside and pulls her tight against him, while his right hand slides between their bodies, torturous pressure across the circuits that flash and spark over the tensing muscles of both their lower bellies-- until, in the heated press of flesh on flesh, he finds where they connect in that most intimate way. His hand traces around where his body enters hers, fingers sliding through wet energy and stroking along soft, sensitive folds and--
And in the juncture of those folds, his touch must now have found an especially powerful node of sensory input.
Her voice rises to a roaring scream, and she shoves herself against him, hard and hungry-- clenches and writhes against his touch inside her and out. Another rush of hot wet energy pours from her, slicking their thighs as it streams around his shaft and his hand and she rocks up to him again, again, sobbing out in ecstasy.
The charge is building in her so fast and so electric that he feels it too. Grounding in him, making a conduit of their bodies. As the power approaches critical load he gasps and groans into her neck, licking until sparks burst along her circuitry-- catching the same soft curve of skin in his teeth and biting-- softly, gently--
--because even now, even as he feels them both start to break apart and disintegrate in this overwhelming lightning flash-- even as all control burns off in shuddering jolt after jolt of overload-- even now, he cannot help being kind.
He lets himself crash, this time. Lets his processes go offline along with hers, both of them burnt out entirely by the power surge, half-derezzing into their afterglow.
All he is aware of, for the next few nanocycles, is that Mayertis stays uncommonly warm in his arms, circuits glowing hot for a long, long time after the initial flare of power has taken her.
He imagines those circuits still powered from his own energy transfer-- imagines her absorbing his emission from the inside, transmuting the liquid flow of his energy into heat and light and whatever power she may need it for. Grateful, satisfied, glowing in relief in his arms, already using the gift he has given her.
Oh yes. Her abilities awe him, as much as anything about him could ever awe her. No one could take advantage of Mayertis. No one could ever presume to use her powers... no one except the User herself.
It is wise, he knows, to keep following his instinct toward her, the directive deep within his core that tells him how Mayertis is to be treated.
It is wise, as well as pleasurable, to cherish this one.
To keep on being kind.
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*****
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END OF LINE
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*****
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Fanworks: Fics: Tron: Who Uses the User?
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