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Fanworks: Tron: Fics: Input and Output (From Beta To Release)
Summary
Over the centicycles Tron has managed to reduce this all to just words, concepts...
But with those thrusts against him, he cannot help awakening to the reality that his own body, however controlled and repressed, has been doing and feeling and needing the same.
Ram growls, hips rocking along with his words. "You. Are. Not. Helping."
"Ah, all right, Ram, okay!" Tron gasps for breath, legs clenching around him. "So, you can't transmit the data. Not without the Tower. But, you can release the energy, at least. It's not what your transmitter is made for... but it's... it's enough relief, if there's no other option."
And oh, there isn't, and he needs...
(Ram is new to the ENCOM system. Many things are different here... even how it feels to receive a Call from one's User.)
(There's art at the end! Also by me.)
Input and Output (From Beta To Release)
(Written in the settings/headcanons of my I/O Towerverse)
"Ram. Look at me."
Tron slides his hand down the side of the newcomer's face. Sitting close beside him, now... no room for distance on this narrow bench.
Circuitry pulses brighter and brighter violet-blue at Ram's neck, at the triangular mark below his throat... even glowing through the silvery material of his novice tunic. Brightening the dimness of their cell walls with a play of light like the surface of an energy-spring.
It wasn't an easy decision, whether to start this now or just let Ram sleep. It's rare enough for this new conscript to even power down for a proper sleep cycle, and he must need it.
But there are other things he clearly needs more. And if it's going to happen, this is the time.
Nearby cells are empty at the moment. Security's been low. There have been murmurs about subdividing the cells with forcefields but it's not in the works yet. So, if there is such a thing as a right time for this... it has to be now.
"Can you hear me?" Tron strokes a thumb hard along Ram's angular jawline. "Can you feel this?"
He knows what's going on. He almost curses at the signs of how long this lost little novice has let it go on. Was there nobody in his original system to explain these things to him?
At this point, Tron's not even sure he can make Ram look at him. Or get him to do anything but just rub himself against that hand, in purple-flushed desperation for whatever contact he can get.
But Ram manages to surprise him, just a little. Eyes half-open; half-focus on his face. "Uh. Tron?"
"Good, you remember my name at least. Do you remember your own?"
"Hey!" There's mild reproach in those eyes, even as they slide a hungry look over Tron's circuitry. "No need to be mean."
"I'm not. Just trying to gauge how bad you've let your memory lag get."
"I've let...?" Ram scowls, but still leans hard against Tron's palm. "I haven't done anything, you... Yes I know my name. RAM-JWHJ-0715-oh frag don't stop doing that..." His hands clench to fists against his thighs, every part of him seizing up.
"Mm." Tron grips the side of his face a bit tighter, fingertips digging in. "Do you at least understand what's happening here? Or do I have to..."
"What's happening? You mean, besides that I'm glitching and infected with some sort of virus that's about to derezz me and could you at least not yell like you're mad at me for it and oh I said don't stop..."
Tron sighs, deepening the pressure even more against Ram's cheek, moving to follow as Ram's head tosses back with a harsh groan.
"I haven't stopped. Your processes are just increasing the demand for that input. In a few nanocycles nothing I do is going to be enough. At least-- not there."
Oh yeah. In a few nanocycles Ram's going to be demanding it everywhere. Tron hasn't got enough hands. Not to mention that he'll have to be explaining the whole thing, at the same time...
...delete that glitching MCP straight to the trash bin, who imports new programs to a system without even--
He closes his eyes and counts to 1010. It's true, though, yelling and blaming Ram isn't going to help.
"...Sorry. I'll try and be more patient. This isn't your fault-- and don't worry, it's not a virus and it's not gonna derezz you. We'll get through this. Do you know the name of your User?"
Ram blinks, unfocused, as he leans gasping against the cell wall, hips sliding forward on the bench. "RKleinberg_7. What's that got to do with--"
"Okay. And when's the last time you contacted RKleinberg_7?"
"Contacted? He's my User. I don't have to contact him, he checks in on me whenever he..."
Ram's voice suddenly trails off, a deep uncertainty settling over the expressive features. Face washed pale, lower lip trembling, Ram looks suddenly more lost than ever-- like someone so far from home that he really isn't even sure who he is or where he's from, anymore.
Tron takes a slow breath. "All right. Let's start with that. So-- I don't know how things were done in your old system. But if you'd gone through alpha and beta here, there would've been a coming-of-age ritual when you reached 1.0, and there would've been someone-- probably someone at the Tower-- who's qualified to teach you all this. I'm going to do my best. But..." He trails off, shaking his head. "We'll get through this," he repeats, finally.
Ram looks about to cry. "I... I don't actually remember," he says in a suddenly unsteady voice. "I mean, I remember my old system-- but I don't. Oh, this doesn't make sense..."
"Let me guess," Tron says. "You remember events, facts-- but you don't remember how you felt about them, or what you thought."
"That's it. That's it exactly. I remember actuarial tables. Insurance rates. I remember my task lists, how high-priority each thing was. And when I think about it now, I go... wow, I was helping people plan for the future! What a great feeling!"
He forces a brave smile. "But... that's now. When I try to remember back to then, I... I can't actually remember thinking about helping anyone. Can't remember any feelings about it, good or bad."
And then he hangs his head, shaking all over. "Is this the memory problem you were worried about? Am I losing things from my past now? I'm Ram. I'm Ram. I still remember my name--"
"Hey. Don't worry." Tron reaches up the other hand to massage Ram's shoulder, turning his body a little bit toward him on the bench, their legs brushing together, while the other hand keeps stroking the side of his face in small, circular movements.
"No. You're not gonna forget your name, not at this point. We're on the way to making you better. The stuff you don't remember... well, I've seen it before, in other newly-imported programs. Disorientation. I have my guesses why it happens-- but your mind will probably fill in the gaps later on, as you get used to thinking and feeling in this system. Actually, from what you've said, it sounds like you're on the way there already-- so relax, you're doing fine. It's not dangerous. You're not gonna lose anything more."
Tron doesn't think it's a good idea to go into his theories right now, his speculations on the reason for the memory gaps. Ram is shaken up enough already-- he doesn't need to deal with philosophy that deep.
"So... let's start with why you're feeling this, okay." He turns Ram's face toward him, watches his lips quiver and his pupils dilate.
Ram's staring at him keenly, breath rising and falling, everything in his expression now saying want. Tongue slides over his dry lips. "...'Kay..."
Tron nods. "Okay. In this system, when your User wants to communicate with you... you feel his Call. It's a signal the User sends. It can feel different ways to different programs. But the, um, the way you're feeling it, now... that's very common."
"My User?" A hint of panic crosses through Ram's expression and sets him trembling. "You mean, RKleinberg_7 needs me to answer him?"
Tron continues the rhythmic patterns of touch that he hopes are soothing. "Well, he's trying to get an answer from you. Probably just wants to check in, see where you are and what you're up to. But..." With an increased pressure on his cheek, Tron stops Ram from interrupting. "But that's the hard part. In our system, there's only one way for any communication to happen with the Users, anything beyond just receiving that Call. A real back-and-forth with the User can only happen at the Input/Output Tower."
Ram swallows, holding the eye contact as small twitches flicker around the edges of his face. "How do I get there?"
"Well..." Tron feels an apologetic look tugging at his own features. "You can't. Not while you're locked up in here. I've been trying to find a way out of here, for a while, and... and I promise you, I will. I break out of every cage eventually. When we break out of this one, we'll go straight to the I/O Tower as fast as we can get there, I promise. My User calls me, too, and I won't let anything stop me from answering. But right now, I... don't know how long it'll take."
Ram's eyes narrow, brightening, his throat gasping in a ragged breath. "Then how the frag can I--"
"Shh. Relax." Tron isn't sure what can help calm him down now-- he can only imagine how this feels. He lets both his hands grip for a moment at the sides of Ram's face... watches his eyes close and his neck arch back. "Here," he adds, moving hands slowly up to the sides of the helmet. "Let me. There we go."
He pulls it away from Ram's head and sets it aside... only realizing how much of that desperate energy was running through its connections when the helmet fully disengages from Ram's synapses, and he sees the circuitry fade from vibrant lavender to nothing.
The hair underneath is thick, soft curls. Tron leans in and slides all fingers through it... eliciting a far more pleasured arch of the neck this time, Ram's breath cracking into hints of small whimpers.
Tron isn't good at this, he realizes. It should really be a Tower Guardian, teaching these things. But he's here, and Ram has no one else, and he's going to try.
"Okay. Well, first of all... over time it gets more bearable to endure the Call without answering. It doesn't reach us strongly in here. The walls of the compound dull the signal, and the rations are so inadequate we barely have the energy for reception. I know it feels overwhelming when it's new, even so. But you'll adapt as time goes on. The Call's nowhere near as powerful as it would be if you were fully charged and right in the line of the User's transmission."
Ram moans, eyes shut tight. "That's... really very... not comforting to me right now."
"...Okay. Fair." Tron winces, both his hands still stroking the hair at the back of Ram's neck. "Sorry. Shouldn't have started with that."
Ram opens his eyes and looks at him, an intense look that Tron still can't quite read. Slowly, he reaches up to reciprocate the touch. Fingers teasing under the back of Tron's helmet, and then, fumbling at the edges of it, fast and clumsy, Tron can hear him panting as he wrestles it off of his head, hears it hit the floor with an echoey reverb sound as Ram's fingers slide in to tangle and pull at the short spikes of Tron's hair.
"What should you've started with, then?" He's gasping, lips so close to Tron's face now he can feel it. "Whatever it is, hurry up... it hurts, Tron..."
Shiver after shiver tingles through Tron's circuitry. Those hands in his hair... oh, far too good. It's been much, much too long since anyone... Oh. He can barely think, leaning into the caress, echoing it with his own fingers dragging rough and hard through curls. "Mmhh... H-hurts where?"
Ram bites his lip, pink flush pulsing through every circuit Tron can see, as they sit there hot and gasping, hands clutching the sides of each other's heads. For a few picos Tron gets a strong feeling Ram is holding back from something, fighting with himself...
And then, with a moan of surrender, he gives in. His whole body surges down, pinning Tron to the bench, legs spread astride Tron's thigh, pushing himself down hard.
"There," Ram gasps, fingers still tangled against Tron's scalp as he rocks down into him, again, again. "Right there."
Oh. It takes only a picocycle of that firm, hot pressure on his leg to make Tron achingly aware of how long it's been for him.
He grunts, lightheaded with pleasure, straining to formulate thoughts and words, but he's all Ram has now and he's got to be the one to... "Okay. Yeah, that's, that's very normal... for your... mmh... Tower to be located there. Mine too. All right, then, we can..."
Ram goes tense a moment, chest heaving above Tron. "What... what do you mean. You said the I/O Tower was..."
"Oh. Sorry." Tron shakes his head, then groans at the pull of fingers still in his hair. "Different meanings. The I/O Tower is the building where User-communication happens. Your I/O Tower is... well, that's one of the names for it. I guess a better word is 'transmitter,' or 'receiver'... it does both. All programs have it. Not always in the same place or arranged the same way, but... it's where User-communication happens in your body."
Ram tugs harder at Tron's hair; shoves down against his thigh, harder, harder, impatient. "Then how do I make it do that--"
"Can't," Tron moans, arching back uncontrollably, tense, trembling. "N-not here. It can receive the User's signal, but nothing more detailed, and it... it can't transmit back. Not unless the I/O Tower is there to amplify. Without being there, you'll... y-you'll just keep feeling the buildup of... information, wanting to, ah! ...transmit to your User... and energy, wanting to power the transmission."
Oh, Users. Over the centicycles Tron has managed to reduce this all to just words, concepts, but with those thrusts against him he cannot help awakening to the reality that his own body, however controlled and repressed, has been doing and feeling and needing the same.
Ram growls, hips rocking along with his words. "You. Are. Not. Helping."
"Ah, ah, all right, Ram, okay!" Tron gasps for breath, legs clenching around Ram's. "So... you can't transmit the information. Not without the actual Tower. But you can... release the energy, at least. I mean, it's not ideal, it's not what your transmitter is made for, but it's... it's enough relief, if there's no other option."
And oh, there isn't, and he needs...
"Then..." Ram's quaking on top of him like he's about to shatter into pieces. "So..."
"So-- ah-- " Tron can't help it, he responds, rolling hips up hungrily into the pressure. "...Yes. Okay yeah, good, you've got the right idea already... oh, yeah, we can-- we can keep doing this... this can get us there... "
"Why. Is it. Like this?" Ram groans, grinding back in faster and faster thrusts, voice breaking up rough and breathy. "Why?... For communication? For reporting to our Users, what we're made to do, why all this, so, inefficient, why, why would the Users design this to be how it works?"
"Aahh! D-don't know, go ask RKleinberg_7 after I break us out, I'm not a User, h-how would I know..." And then Tron's vocal processes fail him as he arches up in uncontrollable response, pulled into Ram's rhythm of desperation as they fall into nanocycle after nanocycle of frantic grinding and moaning.
So fast, for so long, that they both begin to run out of strength. Energy bound up in the promise of data-transmission still pleads for release, but the energy driving hips and thighs toward that completion burns away, too fast, into lightheaded weakness.
"Can't," Ram sobs, at last, hips slumping against Tron for a moment, breath catching in exhaustion-- still desperately aroused, but no movement left except trembles. His hands press against Tron's chest, splayed across already-burning circuitry. "N-not enough... Need-- don't know what-- oh, Tron, why, why--"
"I don't know, Ram, just a moment, let's..." Tron, too, is weak from the exhaustion of their movement, yet still hot and desperate for something different, something more. His hands cover Ram's in an attempt to soothe, but the contact only sharpens the ache.
His pent-up Calls from the past centicycle burn in sympathetic response to Ram's... reminding Tron, in pulses of sensation, that enduring them has been very much not the same thing as letting them go.
"We can try some other way," he gasps. "Just a moment, let me catch my breath and--"
"Why," Ram cries out again, writhing against him, hands clutching in frustration. "Why is it so-- the whole design of this is just..."
"I don't know," Tron whispers. "Maybe-- maybe it's not a design so much as a... a connection. Their world to ours. Feels to me, sometimes, like the Users must have something like this of their own. Not the exact same process... not for the exact same purpose... But, the link between our worlds is so strong, we just can't help echoing some of the... the shapes of how some things work there." He pauses, struggling again to catch his breath. "I think. Maybe."
"Very profound. Very philosophical," Ram growls against his neck. "Oh, ye of annoyingly great and powerful faith."
"Irreverent." Tron quivers in response to the feel of Ram's breath. He finds his own voice echoing the growl, rumbling against the circuits of Ram's neck, his mouth desperate to touch and taste. "Disrespectful." He mouths and licks at the hot lines of electricity, then bites, teeth dragging over them until he begins to feel sparks crackle against his tongue. Ram's whole body is quivering, hands moving down from chest and shoulders to grip his upper arms; fingers dig hard into his circuitry and oh, it would hurt enough for Tron to push him away, if arousal weren't already turning nearly every sensation into pleasure...
"Ah, ah--!" Ram gasps, writhing on top of him, neck arching toward the assault of Tron's teeth, his voice more begging than protest. "We can't all be as-- as pious as you, Tron, I'll try, but I've only been in this system for-- oh! OH!"
Tron gasps, taking another moment of uneasy rest. Regaining strength, catching his breath, clearing his mind just a little. "...It's all right," he rumbles through lips against skin. "Wouldn't ask you to. Sometimes being like me... the way I feel about the Users, is... not a thing I'd wish on anyone. Having such high expectations of them... sometimes I think even the Users probably feel I'm... a little too much." He nuzzles Ram's neck, soothing the bites. "I... I don't think I've ever told anyone that before."
"Mmmh. Secret's safe with me." And, even whimpering and squirming from his attention, Ram smiles-- that wide, expressive, playful smile-- which Tron's realizing, now, with a heat deep inside his chest, he hasn't seen nearly enough times in the short time he's known Ram and very, very badly wants to see much more often.
"I mean it though," Ram's saying, moving lower-- his thighs still clenched around Tron's leg but sliding further down it, as he presses that smile to the square marks on Tron's chest. Breath warm on them, painting them hot violet. "I mean it. I do want to learn, to be... like you, at least a little."
His tongue darts out to stroke over the central squares, and Tron arches back and feels his arms reflexively clutching Ram hard against him-- which doesn't stop Ram's voice and the maddening touch of his mouth.
"Want to learn. If... if I were doing this properly. If I were... coming out of beta in the right way, at the Tower, with my User. That ceremony, that rite of passage, whatever. I want to know. Tell me about it."
"Y-you'd approach the dais." Tron finds the words come easily, almost irresistibly, through the haze of pleasure. "It's a... a set of steps, leading up to a platform. A Tower Guardian sits at the top, his whole body enclosed in a ceremonial pod."
"Pod?"
"Like, a sort of... armor, I guess you'd call it. When he's in it, only his head and hands show, he can barely move. It looks... "
And then a laugh surprises Tron as it ripples through him-- scandalizes him, at the irreverence of his own thought, speaking itself aloud before he can hold back. "...Ridiculous. It looks really, truly, honestly ridiculous. I can't imagine why it would ever be designed that way. It... I suppose it must mean something, to the Users."
Ram's laugh is an answering vibration against his chest, the banked fire of their urges still hot behind the moment of respite. "Okay, I... I love this so far. Good work, Tron. You're actually making me want this religious experience."
"Hush, heretic." He nips at Ram's ear, making him whimper in a sudden spike of need, reminding him of what's still only momentarily banked.
"So. The Guardian would ask you things. Your name, your function, the name of your User. Often there are others behind you in line, waiting their turn to see their Users... at least there were, before the MCP, when this could really be done properly...."
"The-- the Tower isn't, um, private?" He feels the heat of Ram's reaction, in the blush of his face, in a sudden twitch against his thigh.
"Oh, it is," he replies, managing for now to regulate his voice. "The chamber where you step into the light, that part you have privacy for. But there's a ritual there at the dais, before the Guardian sends you in. And the ritual can be longer, your first time. Longer and, um... more intimate. Depending on how much you've been taught beforehand. It can include, um. Explanations. And instructions. Sometimes with, ah, hands-on demonstration."
"With-- everyone watching?" And there's a new, sudden sharp increase in the warmth of Ram's skin.
"Oh yes." Tron sighs in response; knows his own circuits are heating up too as the memory comes back. "The energy in that place, Ram, you wouldn't believe it. Like the power of the Users is all through the air. Sometimes everyone waiting in line is just barely in control. Or... or not. Hands on each other, on themselves... oh! It's intense."
"Unnnhhh..." Ram's response to that is unmistakable, in the build of tension through his entire body. "More. Tell me more."
"Y-you stand there on the dais." Tron's voice has to stay very quiet to avoid shaking apart into groans. "The Tower Guardian asks you the questions. If... if all is in order, then he recites some... r-ritual words."
"What words?" Tron can hear the smile in Ram's voice, even through the tense ache of need. "Can you recite them? Do you-- oh, I bet you have them memorized, don't you. Say them for me." Ram rocks himself against Tron's thigh again, once... slow... teasing himself as much as Tron, every press of that hot firmness sending trembles through them both.
Tron chokes on a gasp, but the words still come. "It's... it's not very long. Just: 'All that is visible must grow beyond itself, and extend into the realm of the invisible. You may pass.' And, w-while the Guardian speaks, you have to stand in a certain pose. Both hands clasped over your..."
"Your Tower." Ram begins to laugh again, but it turns into a gasp, his whole body clutching now at Tron. "Oh. OH. I couldn't. I... I wouldn't be able to stand still."
"You would," Tron moans, as his back arches rigid against the sensations. "Y-you'd have to. It's part of the ritual."
Ram's still shaking with dizzy laughter, as he moves hungrily against Tron, rubbing, stroking, clenching. "Ohh, I don't know what would happen, if I pressed both hands to myself there-- in front of a Guardian, and a whole queue of... I don't know what my, ah, Tower would do, Tron. I suppose it might grow beyond itself and extend into the-- nnnnnHHH!"
His mirth rushes away in one breath as Tron wraps both legs around Ram and rolls him over, with a vicious growl, pinning him on his back on the hard surface of the bench-- pushing his legs apart and shoving his hips in between, in a motion that presses the heat of their groins together and draws all sensation instantly to the activation of their transmitters, swelled tight with repressed energy, as hypersensitized as any of the violet-flushed circuits pulsing anywhere else on their skin.
"If you had any difficulty," Tron says, his voice a low rumble, "...if you were too nervous to become ready... or if you released your energy too soon and needed to be brought to readiness again... the Tower Guardian would call others to assist."
Ram's voice is nothing but needy little cries for a few moments, as he rocks up into Tron and wraps his legs around him, whole body vibrating underneath him. "...Other Tower Guardians?" he finally manages to gasp out. "Assist?"
"Yes." Oh, it's so good, all this movement and pressure and heat and Ram's desperate little voice and-- Tron maintains control of his own voice, barely, though he can't hold back his answering thrusts. "They... w-wouldn't be in pods. Could be a Guardian Sentry in a hooded cloak, or a-- a Guardian Priestess in a long golden dress... Sometimes several different ones, standing in two rows..."
"Rows of them?" Ram tightens the grip of his legs, the grip of his hands on Tron's upper arms, and his voice sounds high-pitched and dizzy with wanting. "Lined up waiting to--"
"Not waiting," Tron gasps. "When they stand in rows, it's to channel their power toward one of the energy wall panels. You'd be levitated, moved along the corridor they formed, and then that same force would hold you against the wall--"
"...An energy wall?" Ram goes taut, nearly still, beneath him. "The thing the MCP uses for torture?"
"That's a change that came with the MCP's rule. They're originally calibrated for pleasure, not pain."
"...Oh." Tension transmutes into quivering vibration.
"They'd hold you against that wall," Tron continues through clenched teeth. "Sending wave after wave of stimulation through you from all sides. Monitoring you until they gauged your energy levels were ideal for the task at hand. Only then would you be led into the chamber of light."
The vibration quivers harder, more intensely with each word. "And that's where you..."
"That's where you step into the beam and reach up to your User. If they thought you might have further difficulty, one or two Guardians might accompany you in there as well, with devices to stimulate you if needed."
"Uh. D-devices."
"Handheld logic-probes. Also calibrated for pleasure. But it isn't needed very often."
Ram squirms deliciously beneath him, pulsing hot against him as he presses up, once, then again, harder. "...ahh... S-so, usually, just being there in the, ah, in the light, r-reaching up..."
"Usually, th-that's enough to start the process. Again--ah!-- different programs do it in different ways. Some raise their discs. S-some offer up another form of data storage... it can depend on just what the User needs to do, as well... s-sometimes the communication can happen with your body and nothing else. But, ahhh, it is always an... interface. A sharing of energy and information."
"How... h-how does it feel?"
Tron breathes heavily, a deep rumbling sound against Ram's throat, as he undulates his hips and begins to grind for real, in an intense, deliberate rhythm.
"Like this, Ram. V-very much like this."
Ram bites his lip, arching up in helpless response, legs wrapping tighter around Tron's waist, curling both arms up to clutch around Tron's shoulders from behind and hang on, surrendering any attempt at control as his movements become utter trembling chaos. "Oh, Tron... Oh, oh, oh, my User--"
"Language." Tron bites his neck, sending violet shivers all through him. "There's no User here right now. Just us."
"F-fragging prude," Ram groans. "Were you like this, your first time?"
Tron laughs into Ram's neck. "Hardly. Most nervous, embarrassed little beta you can imagine."
"Gggh--nhhh-- T-tell me. More." And Ram's somehow managing to do that beautiful, addictive smile again, despite his out-of-control hips and his skin lit all over in purple flame, and again it makes Tron absolutely melt inside and he can't even imagine resisting.
"It was busy there," he breathes, trying to keep the words in rhythm with the thrusts, but only making both more erratic. "The sort of time when there's a queue all the way to the door... that's how it used to be sometimes, before the MCP." He sighs against Ram's neck, and Ram gasps, and just that exchange of sensation, that touch of breath is almost unbearable. "Ohhh...Can you imagine it? D-don't even know how long I stood there waiting in line, just shaking, glowing purple, like, like exactly that shade."
Tron slides a hand between them, presses two fingers into one of the darkest-hued lines on Ram's chest and drags them along it, hard. "In public. In front of everyone."
"Oh, noooo!" Ram groans in a voice that definitely sounds like he means "oh yess." Rocking up into the touch, writhing in out-of-control pleasure, he takes a few picocycles to catch his breath before he adds, "I mean, oh no for you, that, that m-must've been, ahhHH! Were they all..."
Tron shakes his head, panting as he finds the words. "Most of them were-- more experienced. All different sorts of meetings with their Users. Some longer, some shorter, I, I don't have very clear memories of any of that..." And he ducks his head down, follows the last circuit again with his tongue, hanging on hard to keep from being thrown off in Ram's bucking. "But there were a- a handful of others like me, novices on their release day. I had to watch, to see them--"
"See the, uh!" Ram twists underneath him, all his circuits pulsing a fierce hot violet, the rhythmic motion of hips speeding up more and more each pico. "Ahh, ahh, th-The novices? Even the, ah! ones getting... in-instructions, and, and hands-on demonstr--
"...Exactly." Tron's groaning the words now through clenched teeth as he returns each thrust harder and harder. "While thinking about how, ohh, m-maybe that was going to be me, too, when it came my turn. And, and feeling so-- so desperate, I was even looking forward to it..."
"NoOOOoo... That's, like... oh, Users --nngh, sorry, I mean-- I would've-- oh, oh, I-- I don't know what I, oh, I think I would have exploded--" The pressure between his legs is hotter, harder every moment.
"Y-yeah," Tron gasps. "I-I know the feeling."
"So, did you need-- uh! Assistance? From the Tower Guardians?"
Tron feels his own face heat in a deep blush. "No. At least not that. By the time I reached the dais I was, ahh, pretty well-prepared for how the ritual would go..."
"Mmm?" And even as he strains beneath Tron in aching desperation, Ram's eyes are bright as they look up at him, that endearing curiosity still sparkling in among the trembles of need. "So--- someone explained things to you? Before?"
"Uhhh." Tron can't take much more of those eyes, that look, that voice. "Not exactly before. It was... I mean, I was there with someone. I mean, someone who wasn't a stranger. Not quite."
"Tell me about..." Hands tighten on his arms, stroke, firm but gentle, down his circuits and...
And Tron groans, then, from deep within his core-- a rush of heat pours through each and every circuit, blushing hot violet everywhere at once, as the half-blocked-out memory comes back to him.
"Yori." It's a choking sob through his throat.
Ram pulses against every spot where his circuits touch Tron's-- he must be able to feel, already, how intense the memory is. But he's gone still, for the moment... and his voice, querying, is low and cautious now. Reverent.
"...That's... the name of who you were with?"
"Yes. She was... ohh. She is..." Tron's voice cracks. Speech fails him. He can't bring adjectives to mind, right now, to describe Yori.
"Wasn't her first time there," he manages to continue, after a moment of inner struggle. The memory fights him trying to pull it into the open... as if it knows how much it will make him ache with its beauty, with the sense of loss at how far away that beauty now is.
"She'd been out of beta a while. But I-- I'd only just met her. Just then, on my way to the Tower."
Ram nods, hot and quivering but holding still, holding the tension of his need at bay. "So, just barely not a stranger then."
"Yes, at that moment." Tron bites his lip, sense after sense of the memory filtering into his processors like individual beams of light. "I'd been so nervous on my way there. No idea what to expect. She said she was on her way to see her User, too. Said she'd go with me, so I wouldn't be so alone my first time. We... we waited together..."
"She was, um... there with you?" Tron can feel one of those light-beams of realization as it cuts through Ram... can feel a gathering vibration of excitement, quivering through him as he fidgets beneath Tron's weight. "While you were waiting for the... and, and watching th-the... everything? And getting all... mmhh..."
Tron's eyes clench shut for a picocycle, and he feels the heat of deep purple blushing across all his skin.
"Just as awkward as you're imagining," he groans. "First twenty nanocycles of that wait, I was... oh. I was trying to pray to my User to derezz me."
"The first twenty, huh." Ram presses up against him, just a little. "And, and, after that?"
Hotter, brighter, more waves of violet. "After that... she, ah..."
"She what?"
"She-- ah!" Tron feels his back arch up, hips shove down, head toss back. "Nnhh, ohh... frag, Ram, don't have to tell you, you can imagine..."
"Oh... OH." Ram moans, legs wrapping tight, spasms of heat shooting through him that Tron can feel now as they press into each other. "She... right there? Waiting in the queue?"
Tron's head thrashes from side to side, words coming out broken, wrecked. "I mean, ahh! Y-you said it yourself, I would've exploded, she, oh! Saved my life, Ram, well I mean ohh that's what it felt like..." He's trembling now, nearly as out of control as Ram is; not totally sure they both aren't about to explode, right now. "She knew, just what I... just how and where to... oh yes, yes, ah, it was so good, so good and I... I... I was, oh, I was so ashamed..."
"Of-- doing all that, out in public, in front of--"
Tron sobs, his body moving totally without his control. Voice echoing the shame of the memory, now. "That I couldn't wait... couldn't save myself for my User..."
And Ram laughs, a high, half-crazed sound that's almost a moan. Tron growls from deep in his chest, and counters with even faster and more forceful thrusts, with strokes of hands down arms and sides, dragging against superheated circuitry at a pressure that would be painful in any other circumstances.
"I know, I know, glitch it. I was pathetic, wasn't I? But, oh, Yori..." It catches in his throat, aching. "That's when she saved my life, really. The, oh, the kindness of her. No one else... no one else could've made me feel not pathetic, right then. The way she held my hand, reassured me, like I wasn't the ridiculous little idiot I was. Promised me my transmission wasn't lost. Promised I could still keep my appointment with Alan-1 and she'd, she'd make sure I was... ready again by the time I got to the front of the line..."
"A-and she did?" Ram's eyes are clenched tight shut now, as his whole body rocks in uncontrolled rhythm, rises up to meet Tron with every breath. "She..."
For a few picocycles Tron is seized so hard by pleasure that he can only nod, emphatically. "She..." He gasps, barely able to find words through the panting. "Ram, she's so amazing you can't imagine, I can't begin to say how she felt, in my arms, my face in her neck, she smelled of oranges..."
Ram's face screws up, confusion and sensation entangled. "...Orange? ...like the color?"
"No, like-- oh! It's... I don't know, just so nice, can't describe it. There aren't words. She said it's the smell of oranges. Something she works with, in the laser domain. Don't know what they are. I mean, yes, she said they're orange, like the color, but besides that... don't even know. But it's, oh, Ram, it's the best ever. Wish I could smell it again... want it so badly, so badly, I'd give anything..."
And Ram's hand is suddenly on the side of Tron's face, achingly gentle as their bodies tremble against one another. "So. Wasn't just that one time, was it. She was... m-more to you than that. Is more to you."
"Yes." Tron's whole back arches into the sobbing cry of that word. "She's... oh, she's everything, Ram. Everything."
And now, with a gasp, Ram's face is pressed suddenly hard into Tron's neck like he's smelling something as wonderful as oranges there, and his voice is tremulous but more coherent than Tron could ever have expected it to be at this stage, with the surge of energy now coiling between them and building up until every micron of their shells is on fire with the tingle of it, churning for relief.
"...'M happy for you, Tron," he groans. "Having... someone like her. I, ohh! I know you'll find her. You'll be with her again. Know it. And, and oh, oh, oh, I'm... nnh! I'm sorry you can't be with her, right now. Or with your User."
And that hitch of breath is definitely a last-ditch effort not to burst out crying. "I'm sorry, Tron, so sorry... s-sorry it's just me..."
And Tron's not sure just why that does what it does to him.
All he knows is he's gathering Ram's whole upper body into a breathtakingly tight embrace, his face nestled against his jaw and gasping words against him like prayers.
"Don't be, Ram. Please, you're... you're so nice, this is good... I'm not sorry. Yori would say so too. She'd love you, I know it. If she knew about this, this right now... Ram, she'd only wish she could be here to help..."
Ram flushes a hundred shades of pink and purple, all over, in places Tron hadn't even imagined were capable of blushing, and his arms reach up to clutch so tight he thinks maybe it'll crush them both. "She... ohh, Tron! ...she would?"
"Yes." He breathes it hard against the circuitry of Ram's neck and shoulder. "Oh, you'd be pressed in between the two of us right now, Ram. She'd be, oh! we would both be all over you. Mouths, hands, everything, everywhere..."
Tron feels a change in Ram's body, shivering, burning beneath him. A threshold being passed, the moment something overheats to the point it all begins to melt apart. "Oh, Tron!"
"Yes. Yes, that's it, Ram. Yeah. That's good, that's it..."
Energy-release is imminent, an electrical storm gathering and sparking between them. The smooth graceful curves of Ram's body become something primally wild as his whole form thrashes underneath Tron, curls tossing from side to side... feeling the build of what he's never felt before but still can't help recognizing.
"I'm. Oh, oh, Tron, I-I'm gonna--"
"Yeah, go on, yeah, that's it, just like that... I've got you, Ram, c'mon, you can let go..."
It's a sympathetic relief as intense as any relief in Tron's own body. To finally, finally feel the skin-burning heat surge and eye-burning flash of Ram's built-up energy, exploding through the last of his broken defenses and rushing free.
It's all for Ram, Tron tells himself, as his own chest throbs with tingles of pleasure at the face Ram makes when he overloads-- the curve of neck and jawline, the lovely mobile mouth quivering in gasps that can't quite become moans.
Tron's pleasure is all for the arch of Ram's supple form in his embrace, as he lifts him all the way up off the bench to hold him close against his chest. Seeing the way both arms stretch out below him in response to Tron's hand gripping around his disc; muscles straining, hands in tight fists, all just stretched out in ecstasy so vibrant he doesn't know what to do.
It's enough just to drink in the spectrum of violet rippling all over the white shell of Ram's skin. And the delicious unrestrained sounds he makes, when the shockwave finally wipes out anything that'd still been holding his voice back. It's enough pleasure for a lifetime, just to delight in watching Ram let go.
And yet-- Tron is still saying the words just as much to himself, he admits, as his right arm clutches Ram hard against his own chest, circuits on circuits, hand tangled in curls at the nape of his neck.
Saying it to himself -- you can let go-- as his left hand pushes in underneath to grip the exquisite texture of Ram's backside and pull him in so close, against Tron's own body, so close and sudden that the fast sharp pressure of that contact alone is what triggers the final bit-shift, setting off the cataclysmic crash of his own release.
Let go. Let the first hot wave shiver out from his I/O circuits-- that bright sharp wet feeling like the energized splash of plunging into a spring of pure power. Let that sensation reverberate, pulsate, until it fades-- then let it hit again-- harder, again-- each wave more intense and throwing him more and more off balance, til he's a fragment tossed in a storm--
And he says it again to himself-- soaring into that terrifying chasm of pleasure-- you can let go-- even if he's spent a centicycle telling himself he can't. Because if he admits that Ram needs and wants and deserves to hear it... then Tron can't call himself the fundamentally honest being that he is, not while denying himself that permission too.
He lets go. Lets the pleasure crush him and wash him away like a sea.
The light fixtures in the cell flicker on and off as their bodies arch rigid, electrified in each other's grasp, throbbing with the sheer voltage of the current between them-- and then, incrementally, float back down from it in spasms and twitches... consciousness breaking up in flashes, shards, glitchy half-images of moments.
Tron fights to stay awake. Because Ram's never done this before. Because Ram's his responsibility, so innocent and curious and confused and scared and Tron needs to be there for him...
But that's just more of Tron's security-program hypervigilance. Because Ram shows none of those feelings, when the light of consciousness finally sparks clear in his eyes for a moment. Just a half-lidded hazy look of peace... lips soft and curled up at the corners, murmuring "ooh... feels like I'm derezzing," but without any timbre of anxiety about it.
"Just a little, don't worry." Tron curls around him, starting to feel it himself. "Normal part of it. Maybe the best part." He lets himself go, again, into this-- letting down his guard.
Letting his visual render begin to shimmer and soften, letting outlines fuzz and blur... letting the energy of self, inside him and Ram, start to merge, flowing together into an afterglow of shared feelings, too soft, too sensory, for rational thought to accompany them.
He doesn't know how long they spend, just being an energy-cloud of feelings together. When something more than feeling finally reasserts itself-- single-bit sparks of conscious thought, yeses and nos assembling themselves one by one into cognitive processes-- Tron spares maybe a picocycle to wonder at himself.
Wonder, that he still doesn't quite care just how much time they passed like that.
Wonder, that he even found enough trust to open himself like that, in the first place.
It doesn't seem like a very security-program thing to do.
But he is more than that function. And, anyway... knowing when to trust is part of the function of any program.
He's not sure of the processing behind this decision of trust. But still, he trusts that processing anyway. It doesn't feel like an error. To let himself merge with Ram like this just felt... right. As right as it ever did with Yori, or in the light chamber with Alan-1. And he's content, right now, to leave it at that.
It's a while later -- again, he doesn't bother counting the time-- when Ram stirs and wakes in his arms. Their forms have re-resolved together, with Tron curled up protectively around Ram from behind, and it feels so right, so perfect, even in the moment when Ram begins to move and stretch against him.
"Whoah," he breathes. Tron watches Ram's mouth shape itself to the sound, still just quietly glorying in every detail of the sight.
"Yeah," he answers, stroking Ram's shoulder in slow lazy motions. "Better?"
"Ohh yeah." A soft shiver, one that Tron can feel. "That was... ohh. You sure our Users didn't catch any of that?"
Tron laughs, leaning in to nuzzle Ram's neck. "Sure? Oh, no, we can never be fully sure. The realm of the invisible works in mysterious ways, my young program."
"Hah." Ram stretches, the soft curls of his hair pressing for a moment against Tron's throat as he arches back. "Well, just in case, still remember to bring me along for the ride whenever you do end up making that trip to the Tower, all right?"
Tron can't help running a hand through those curls again. "It's a promise."
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Fanworks: Tron: Fics: Input and Output (From Beta To Release)
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