Flynn avoided a second attempt by his opponent to kill him. He found himself screaming straight at the arena wall where the first Red Warrior had smashed up. The gap left by that impact had not yet rezzed back up; an opening in the wall remained, narrow and jagged-edged. Kevin Flynn, with no idea what might obstruct him in the gap, or what might lie beyond, nevertheless saw any opportunity for escape as a good one. The only certain way to die would be to remain prisoner in the Training Complex. Given that, Flynn was willing to risk just about anything, including the possibility of frying himself like a bug in another of those force fields.
“This is it!” he shouted into his communicator. Ram and Tron heard, but couldn’t comprehend. “Come on!” Flynn urged, aiming for the opening, leaving a curtain of red light behind him as he went. An Elite swooped in at him for the kill, and Ram and Tron headed his way to see what his plan was.
The arena wall sped at Flynn and his enemy, the gap growing. The Red finally saw that Flynn had no intention of turning, and made a last-second attempt to save himself. But he’d waited too long, and hit the wall with terrific velocity just as Flynn shot the gap in the arena’s side. The impact de-rezzed more of the wall.
Sark, watching from above, ranted, outraged. He’d thought to see the User perish in collision with the wall, ridding him of that problem for good. But this: escape! Unthinkable; unprecedented! Sark hammered a fist on the panel before him, calling down his Recognizers.
Below, Tron and Ram still dueled the remaining Red. Tron had seen Flynn’s exit and been shocked by it. The MCP, he decided, must be hoarding more of the System’s power than ever, so much so that even the re-rezzing of the Grid had been impaired. And, thrilling to the idea of freedom, he asked himself, Why not?
Ram had seen and heard too, and now he swung his machine hard, boxing the last Warrior, forcing him to hold a grid line. The Warrior hit a red barrier at full speed, evaporating in a caldronous de-rezzing.
Ram changed course, swung in parallel to Tron, and then they shot along side by side. “What do you think?” Ram asked over the communicator, terse with hope.
Tron knew exuberance, the chance to run freely and independently once more. “Do it!” he yelled into his mike. The pair made for the gap.
Sirens rent the air of the Training Complex. A gargantuan voice echoed across it, “WARRIORS MUST STAY WITHIN THEIR UNITS. REPEAT: ALL WARRIORS MUST STAY WITHIN THEIR UNITS. WARNING. WARNING.” It became muted with distance as they ignored it and roared on.
Sark uttered a taut exclamation. The programs were emulating the User! His worst fears had been made real; not only had the User defied traditional constraints, but he’d gotten other programs to follow his lead. And worst of all, Tron was among them. Once more, Sark exhorted his Recognizers.
The Recos swooped in as Ram and Tron blurred toward the waiting gap. One descended on them with pincers together to form a huge pile driver. The pile driver slammed down just as the two shot the jagged opening, missing them by a hair’s breadth, making the Grid shake. Then the Reco rose from the small opening to fly over the arena walls and resume the chase.
In a narrow conduit outside the arena, Ram and Tron caught up with Flynn, who’d slowed to wait for them. The force of the original de-rezzing had been channeled along the conduit; another zigzag notch at its far end gave them a way out. Here, outside the Grid, the light-cycles no longer threw up their barriers.
They emerged from the broached wall into an enormous corridor and set off at high speed. Aboard his Carrier, Sark lashed out, batting aside and flooring a guard who’d had the misfortune to be nearby. Overhead, a control overseer worked furiously in his monitoring bucket. Sark opened a general communications channel. “Get them!” he shrieked. “Send out every Game Tank on the Grid!” His choler peaked, in a bellow that threw fear into every program in the Complex. “GET THEM!”
The light-cycles emerged single file into an open area. Scores of depressions the size of city blocks were arranged in precise ranks and files to either side, divided by the squares of roadway. Two Recos swooped like hawks upon the fugitives, pincers spread wide to grasp or fire. The escapees raced for the resumption of the narrow corridor at the far end of the open area.
They did not reach it with any time to spare. The lead Reco slammed against the wall over them as they entered the little opening. As the first Reco rebounded, the second collided with it. The two machines hung there, stymied. Tron, Ram, and Flynn swept in tight formation through a long, narrow room, flanked on either side by rows of missiles poised on parked mobile launchers. In the next part of the vast arsenal, silent tanks waited, side by side to the right and left.
The tanks were dark, inactive, but not all were unmanned. As the fleeing conscripts raced along, vehicles to either side suddenly rezzed brighter and charged out at them. Tron and Flynn made it in a flash of yellow and orange, as the tanks’ prows closed in on them. But Ram had to slew his cycle to the left to avoid one, then right to miss a second. He thought for an instant that he would die under the light-treads of a third, but made it by—without room to spare.
The tanks wheeled to pursue. The lead vehicle’s gunner tracked them on his targeting scope, trying to bracket them for a shot. “Fire!” yelled the gunner. The long cannon spat its blinding chevron, but the round went wide. Three figures, hugged close to their cycles, sped out of his line of fire. “Missed,” he gritted.
The trio raced down a ramp laid out in squares delineated by light. Salvos of tank cannonfire blossomed to the sides and behind them. The white V’s of the cannonade sent rings of multichrome energy expanding from their impact. The escapees focused on their only possible salvation, high-speed flight. The sleek Game Tanks increased speed, raising commo with other contingents to try to block the way ahead. The unit leader relayed his situation report to Sark.
“Units exiting the Defensive Zone.” There could be no more ambushes now; only pursuit.
Outside the Game Grid for the first time, Flynn found himself riding for his life through a fantastic landscape of glowing walls, modular shapes, and darting vector lines. He was not unhappy. The three sped past huge cipher panels and rows of gleaming, angular buttresses. A tank unit fell in behind, and the three rode at maximum speed, weaving back and forth and rounding turn after turn, leaning close to the floor-ground, denying the tankers a clear shot.
They flashed out onto a wide landing, a sort of turning bay at the brink of an overhang. Tron barely slid to a side-on stop, the half of one wheel of his gold light-cycle over the very edge of the landing. Hundreds of feet below was a gridded canyon floor. The turning bay overlooked a terrain of tremendous cylinders, piled megaforms, slotted towers, ledge-roadways, and stark bridgespans. The entire vista was luminous with the brilliant light surfaces and demarcations of the Electronic World.