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seriousficTitle: Happy birthday, Kevin Flynn
Fandom: Tron: Legacy
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: 2,090
Characters/Pairings: Sam Flynn, Quorra, Ed Dillinger
Previous: Happy Valentine's Day
Next: 2/2
Summary: Sam lived for twenty-seven years without Quorra in his life. It's amazing how he can't do it anymore.
There was a month after Sam's father left—was taken—when Sam was sure he was coming back. Whole weeks passed with Sam being tightened with frustration. Not with his father, no, with everyone else. Everyone trying to comfort him when his Dad wasn't dead. That was what he remembered most about his father's disappearance. The doomed certainty that they would be reunited.
It was what he dreamed of without Quorra.
He hadn't wanted to deprive Quorra of the apartment—she was sheltered there—so Sam had moved back into the garage. Crashing on the couch had been like coming up for air. Otherwise, he threw himself into work, glad-handing, ass-kissing, even programming a little. The stocks were building again. It didn't relieve him. He had the persistent feeling that Encom was about to crash and burn.
When he got out of the shower, the lukewarm water having loosened him just enough to walk, he smelled maple syrup and heard the scrape of a bowl as pancake batter was made. Quorra had descended on his kitchenette, and a counter had been emptied of dirty dishes and filled with breakfast things.
She was snitching some of the batter when she saw him. "Oh. You're wearing the bathrobe I got you."
He almost took it off, but that seemed like it would give the wrong impression. "What are you doing here?"
Quorra set the bowl down. "I know what today is. I thought you shouldn't be alone."
Sam stepped past her and her cooking to get to the coffeemaker. It was all the breakfast he needed. "I'm pretty used to being alone on my dad's birthday."
"But you don't have to be anymore!" Before he could meet her gaze, she turned back to the stove. "We can talk about it or not talk about it—I can make pancakes or waffles or French toast. I know genre conventions would dictate me being comically inept at cooking, but I've actually gotten pretty good. Just give me advance notice if you want to go back to the apartment. And tell me how to get stains off the ceiling, because the mop won't reach… are you coming back?"
The coffee had gotten stale. "You want me back? That what this is about?"
"I want things to go back to the way they were. I want you to stop hurting."
"I'm not hurting."
"I want you to stop denying you're hurting."
"I'm not denying—" Sam fumed and drank his coffee.
"Have you talked to anyone? It doesn't have to be me. There are these people called psychologists, you can tell them about Tron and they won't let anyone else know—"
"You think I'm crazy now?" Why was he still drinking this coffee? It was awful.
"Don't twist my words, Sam. It isn't nice."
He turned and started looking through the cupboards. There was a box of power bars somewhere. He could eat on the road.
"Are you still asking what I want?" Her voice bounced off his ears, even the doors he was opening and cookware he was shoving around did nothing to obscure it. "I want to be your friend." Her arms were suddenly linked around his stomach, her weight pervading him from behind. It wasn't heavy—it was more like what he'd wanted from standing under the stream of hot water in the shower. "I want to help," she whispered in his ear.
He spotted the power bars. Grabbed the whole box, easily broke free of Quorra's embrace, and walked.
***
Work was work. He could detach, autopilot, and Alan had known Sam long enough to leave him alone on a day like this. Unfortunately, Ed Dillinger Jr. didn't.
"That open-door policy still in effect?" he asked, entering without knocking. Sam hated that.
"It is, actually, so you shouldn't have any trouble getting out."
Ed smiled and sat himself in front of Sam's desk. "I'm just wondering if we can expect a speech at the candlelight vigil."
"What are you talking about, Dillweed?"
"Celebrating Kevin Flynn's legacy. Since you've made Encom go all retro, I thought it was only right that we honor the man who so… inspired you. I volunteered for it. Since you assigned me to the janitorial department, I've had a lot of free time."
"I was hoping you could use it for job-hunting." Sam wondered if this was what hyperventilating felt like. Had Alan known about this? Why hadn't he told him?
"You waltzed in and stole this company from me, just like your dad did to mine, framing him for plagiarism. So if it weren't for Kev's example, our stock prices might still be soaring."
"Get out of my office."
"So that's a no on the speech."
Ed stood, pulling a rolled-up magazine from his jacket pocket. He dropped it to unfold on Sam's desk. It was a tabloid. The cover story was on 'Sam Flynn's new beau'.
"By the way, everyone will understand if you want to take the day off like you did on Valentine's. After all, if I had a girl like that. I'd want to get my money's worth too."
Ed sauntered for the door, almost hearing the armrests crack under Sam's white-knuckle grip. He paused in the doorway, hearing the wheels on Sam's chair squeak and footfalls so heavy they weren't swallowed up by the carpet.
Ed turned to find Sam in his face, eyes blank. "What? Got some street luge to do?"
"No. Bumfighting," Sam said, before driving his forehead directly into the bone of Ed's nose.
***
Alan was close to frantic on the phone. Quorra could tell he didn't like entrusting her with this, but he was desperate.
"The police are looking for Sam?" Quorra asked, reflexively clutching for the cord on the wireless phone. That always seemed to help on TV. "What did he ever do to Sting? Oh, the other police."
Alan was still talking, but Quorra had pressed the phone to her breast. There was a key scrapping at the lock to the door. Quorra hurried over and opened it. Sam stood there, jabbing the air with his key for a moment, before his hand dropped to his side.
He was still in his suit, barely—his pants were tattered, his shoes were scuffed, his jacket was MIA, and his tie had been sliced into a collar. Blood stained the front of his dress shirt, which was partially unbuttoned down to his tanktop. The blood smeared on his chest, drying into crumbs, matching the stains on his mouth and chin, complimenting the bruises smearing his face.
"Sam! Oh…" Quorra couldn't think of anything to say, couldn't think of what people were supposed to exclaim at times like this. She just touched Sam's face to hold him still as she scanned for bone damage, or even a concussion, and said "Oh please no" as she did.
"I'm fine." Sam brushed her off and stepped inside. "Worse than it looks."
Quorra closed the door behind him. "What happened? What's that smell?"
"Two parts vodka, three parts bourbon… maybe the other way around." His voice was slurred. He didn't have a concussion. Sam turned to look at her and when he smiled, there was even blood on his teeth. "You ever noticed how many people need punching when you need to punch someone?"
Quorra took him by the arm and dragged him towards the couch. She still wasn't sure he wasn't about to fall down—he looked like he might—and she didn't want him to land on anything. "Sam, the police are looking for you. They say you hit someone."
"Old news. I've been hitting a few people…" He sagged into the couch where she set him down. "What did you think I did before I met you?"
"You grew up on a farm, playing with wooden swords and getting lessons from a mysterious old man?"
Sam's head drifted back against the cushion. "I'm not a hero, Quorra. I'm not your hero."
Quorra stared at him. She looked betrayed, for a moment, then angry, then nothing. "I don't understand."
"Which part?" Sam asked, head still back, eyes still closed.
"All of it! Why would you hit Ed Dillinger?"
"Well… have you met him?"
"And why would you go out drinking and—and jacket-losing—"
"It's called having a good time."
"You don't look like you've had a very good time."
Sam plastered a grin on his face and gave her two thumbs up.
Quorra didn't laugh. "Why is it that on the Grid, you can deal with people trying to kill you, but here, you can't deal with me?"
Sam laughed boozily. "You're a lot scarier than all of them."
"Then be brave. I've seen you do it."
Sam jerked himself upright in response. Quorra moved to steady him, but he grabbed her first, twisting her under him to bring his lips to hers. He tasted of alcohol molecules and blood cells, not himself.
"Stop," Quorra said when his drunkenness moved his sloppy mouth over her jawline. "No."
Sam dropped away like something that had rotted from her. "I thought that's where we were going with this."
Quorra had pulled his hands off her body, but she held onto them, squeezing apologetically. "If we keep going, I'm afraid I'd let you do anything you wanted."
Sam collapsed back down to the couch. "That'd be terrible."
Quorra sat beside him, pulling his head down onto her lap and petting his hair. If it worked for Marv… "It wouldn't. I'd do anything for you… to you… on you…"
He sat up. "I'm getting some mixed signals here."
Quorra pushed him back down and rubbed his scalp like she was sandpapering wood. "I'm alright with that. But I don't think you would be. You want me to have something special. But right now you're not yourself."
"You know what's funny?"
"The Muppets."
"No. What's funny is that for all the time you've spent studying humanity, you still don't know me. This is who I am. The reason I didn't want to have sex with you is that you're not in love with me. You… imprinted on me. Like a baby bird. If Meatloaf had gone to the Grid, you'd be in love with him. I wasn't courting you. I was letting you down easy."
Quorra stopped petting his hair. "That's not true."
"Sure it is."
"But... but…" she sputtered. She hadn't wanted to engage with him, hadn't wanted to get worked up again, but this quiet hurt worse than him calling names or yelling at her. "I could never be in love with Meatloaf! He's a married man!"
Sam has found his sea legs. He rolled off the couch and made a beeline, sure and swift, for the door.
"Where are you going?" Quorra demanded.
Sam slapped his forehead. "I just remembered: the party's over, but I still need to do the after-party. And the pre-party for the next part. And the next party."
Quorra stampeded up to him. "You can't drive like this!"
"Never taught you about taxis, did I?" He opened the door. "Relax. I know better than to risk abandoning someone who might love me on a foolish—"
Quorra shut the door in front of him. "You'll hurt someone. Maybe yourself."
"I don't think fortune-telling is one of your superpowers."
"You hurt me."
For a moment, he seemed to sober. His eyes filled with regret and he opened his mouth as if to apologize. Then he turned to the door. "I should get going. It's rude to gate-crash late."
Quorra reached out and pinched his neck.
"Oww! What are you, Mrs. Spock? Quit pinching me!"
"I'm not pinching you. I'm pinching your carotid artery. If my anatomy books are right, without its blood supply to your brain, you'll lose consciousness in a few seconds. I'm sorry, but the alternative is kicking you, and I'm trying to prevent you from getting hurt."
Sam pulled away, stumbled a few steps, then fell through the coffee table. Quorra's hand went to her mouth and only came down when she tried to pick him up. Her real-world muscles weren't up to the task.
"You must have been drinking heavy liquor." She put a pillow under Sam's head, then picked up the phone and hit Redial. "Hello, Alan? I need you to come over here. There are some things I need to tell you about Sam… and his father. Oh, and could you bring a gurney, or some kind of rope-and-pulley system?"
Fandom: Tron: Legacy
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: 2,090
Characters/Pairings: Sam Flynn, Quorra, Ed Dillinger
Previous: Happy Valentine's Day
Next: 2/2
Summary: Sam lived for twenty-seven years without Quorra in his life. It's amazing how he can't do it anymore.
There was a month after Sam's father left—was taken—when Sam was sure he was coming back. Whole weeks passed with Sam being tightened with frustration. Not with his father, no, with everyone else. Everyone trying to comfort him when his Dad wasn't dead. That was what he remembered most about his father's disappearance. The doomed certainty that they would be reunited.
It was what he dreamed of without Quorra.
He hadn't wanted to deprive Quorra of the apartment—she was sheltered there—so Sam had moved back into the garage. Crashing on the couch had been like coming up for air. Otherwise, he threw himself into work, glad-handing, ass-kissing, even programming a little. The stocks were building again. It didn't relieve him. He had the persistent feeling that Encom was about to crash and burn.
When he got out of the shower, the lukewarm water having loosened him just enough to walk, he smelled maple syrup and heard the scrape of a bowl as pancake batter was made. Quorra had descended on his kitchenette, and a counter had been emptied of dirty dishes and filled with breakfast things.
She was snitching some of the batter when she saw him. "Oh. You're wearing the bathrobe I got you."
He almost took it off, but that seemed like it would give the wrong impression. "What are you doing here?"
Quorra set the bowl down. "I know what today is. I thought you shouldn't be alone."
Sam stepped past her and her cooking to get to the coffeemaker. It was all the breakfast he needed. "I'm pretty used to being alone on my dad's birthday."
"But you don't have to be anymore!" Before he could meet her gaze, she turned back to the stove. "We can talk about it or not talk about it—I can make pancakes or waffles or French toast. I know genre conventions would dictate me being comically inept at cooking, but I've actually gotten pretty good. Just give me advance notice if you want to go back to the apartment. And tell me how to get stains off the ceiling, because the mop won't reach… are you coming back?"
The coffee had gotten stale. "You want me back? That what this is about?"
"I want things to go back to the way they were. I want you to stop hurting."
"I'm not hurting."
"I want you to stop denying you're hurting."
"I'm not denying—" Sam fumed and drank his coffee.
"Have you talked to anyone? It doesn't have to be me. There are these people called psychologists, you can tell them about Tron and they won't let anyone else know—"
"You think I'm crazy now?" Why was he still drinking this coffee? It was awful.
"Don't twist my words, Sam. It isn't nice."
He turned and started looking through the cupboards. There was a box of power bars somewhere. He could eat on the road.
"Are you still asking what I want?" Her voice bounced off his ears, even the doors he was opening and cookware he was shoving around did nothing to obscure it. "I want to be your friend." Her arms were suddenly linked around his stomach, her weight pervading him from behind. It wasn't heavy—it was more like what he'd wanted from standing under the stream of hot water in the shower. "I want to help," she whispered in his ear.
He spotted the power bars. Grabbed the whole box, easily broke free of Quorra's embrace, and walked.
***
Work was work. He could detach, autopilot, and Alan had known Sam long enough to leave him alone on a day like this. Unfortunately, Ed Dillinger Jr. didn't.
"That open-door policy still in effect?" he asked, entering without knocking. Sam hated that.
"It is, actually, so you shouldn't have any trouble getting out."
Ed smiled and sat himself in front of Sam's desk. "I'm just wondering if we can expect a speech at the candlelight vigil."
"What are you talking about, Dillweed?"
"Celebrating Kevin Flynn's legacy. Since you've made Encom go all retro, I thought it was only right that we honor the man who so… inspired you. I volunteered for it. Since you assigned me to the janitorial department, I've had a lot of free time."
"I was hoping you could use it for job-hunting." Sam wondered if this was what hyperventilating felt like. Had Alan known about this? Why hadn't he told him?
"You waltzed in and stole this company from me, just like your dad did to mine, framing him for plagiarism. So if it weren't for Kev's example, our stock prices might still be soaring."
"Get out of my office."
"So that's a no on the speech."
Ed stood, pulling a rolled-up magazine from his jacket pocket. He dropped it to unfold on Sam's desk. It was a tabloid. The cover story was on 'Sam Flynn's new beau'.
"By the way, everyone will understand if you want to take the day off like you did on Valentine's. After all, if I had a girl like that. I'd want to get my money's worth too."
Ed sauntered for the door, almost hearing the armrests crack under Sam's white-knuckle grip. He paused in the doorway, hearing the wheels on Sam's chair squeak and footfalls so heavy they weren't swallowed up by the carpet.
Ed turned to find Sam in his face, eyes blank. "What? Got some street luge to do?"
"No. Bumfighting," Sam said, before driving his forehead directly into the bone of Ed's nose.
***
Alan was close to frantic on the phone. Quorra could tell he didn't like entrusting her with this, but he was desperate.
"The police are looking for Sam?" Quorra asked, reflexively clutching for the cord on the wireless phone. That always seemed to help on TV. "What did he ever do to Sting? Oh, the other police."
Alan was still talking, but Quorra had pressed the phone to her breast. There was a key scrapping at the lock to the door. Quorra hurried over and opened it. Sam stood there, jabbing the air with his key for a moment, before his hand dropped to his side.
He was still in his suit, barely—his pants were tattered, his shoes were scuffed, his jacket was MIA, and his tie had been sliced into a collar. Blood stained the front of his dress shirt, which was partially unbuttoned down to his tanktop. The blood smeared on his chest, drying into crumbs, matching the stains on his mouth and chin, complimenting the bruises smearing his face.
"Sam! Oh…" Quorra couldn't think of anything to say, couldn't think of what people were supposed to exclaim at times like this. She just touched Sam's face to hold him still as she scanned for bone damage, or even a concussion, and said "Oh please no" as she did.
"I'm fine." Sam brushed her off and stepped inside. "Worse than it looks."
Quorra closed the door behind him. "What happened? What's that smell?"
"Two parts vodka, three parts bourbon… maybe the other way around." His voice was slurred. He didn't have a concussion. Sam turned to look at her and when he smiled, there was even blood on his teeth. "You ever noticed how many people need punching when you need to punch someone?"
Quorra took him by the arm and dragged him towards the couch. She still wasn't sure he wasn't about to fall down—he looked like he might—and she didn't want him to land on anything. "Sam, the police are looking for you. They say you hit someone."
"Old news. I've been hitting a few people…" He sagged into the couch where she set him down. "What did you think I did before I met you?"
"You grew up on a farm, playing with wooden swords and getting lessons from a mysterious old man?"
Sam's head drifted back against the cushion. "I'm not a hero, Quorra. I'm not your hero."
Quorra stared at him. She looked betrayed, for a moment, then angry, then nothing. "I don't understand."
"Which part?" Sam asked, head still back, eyes still closed.
"All of it! Why would you hit Ed Dillinger?"
"Well… have you met him?"
"And why would you go out drinking and—and jacket-losing—"
"It's called having a good time."
"You don't look like you've had a very good time."
Sam plastered a grin on his face and gave her two thumbs up.
Quorra didn't laugh. "Why is it that on the Grid, you can deal with people trying to kill you, but here, you can't deal with me?"
Sam laughed boozily. "You're a lot scarier than all of them."
"Then be brave. I've seen you do it."
Sam jerked himself upright in response. Quorra moved to steady him, but he grabbed her first, twisting her under him to bring his lips to hers. He tasted of alcohol molecules and blood cells, not himself.
"Stop," Quorra said when his drunkenness moved his sloppy mouth over her jawline. "No."
Sam dropped away like something that had rotted from her. "I thought that's where we were going with this."
Quorra had pulled his hands off her body, but she held onto them, squeezing apologetically. "If we keep going, I'm afraid I'd let you do anything you wanted."
Sam collapsed back down to the couch. "That'd be terrible."
Quorra sat beside him, pulling his head down onto her lap and petting his hair. If it worked for Marv… "It wouldn't. I'd do anything for you… to you… on you…"
He sat up. "I'm getting some mixed signals here."
Quorra pushed him back down and rubbed his scalp like she was sandpapering wood. "I'm alright with that. But I don't think you would be. You want me to have something special. But right now you're not yourself."
"You know what's funny?"
"The Muppets."
"No. What's funny is that for all the time you've spent studying humanity, you still don't know me. This is who I am. The reason I didn't want to have sex with you is that you're not in love with me. You… imprinted on me. Like a baby bird. If Meatloaf had gone to the Grid, you'd be in love with him. I wasn't courting you. I was letting you down easy."
Quorra stopped petting his hair. "That's not true."
"Sure it is."
"But... but…" she sputtered. She hadn't wanted to engage with him, hadn't wanted to get worked up again, but this quiet hurt worse than him calling names or yelling at her. "I could never be in love with Meatloaf! He's a married man!"
Sam has found his sea legs. He rolled off the couch and made a beeline, sure and swift, for the door.
"Where are you going?" Quorra demanded.
Sam slapped his forehead. "I just remembered: the party's over, but I still need to do the after-party. And the pre-party for the next part. And the next party."
Quorra stampeded up to him. "You can't drive like this!"
"Never taught you about taxis, did I?" He opened the door. "Relax. I know better than to risk abandoning someone who might love me on a foolish—"
Quorra shut the door in front of him. "You'll hurt someone. Maybe yourself."
"I don't think fortune-telling is one of your superpowers."
"You hurt me."
For a moment, he seemed to sober. His eyes filled with regret and he opened his mouth as if to apologize. Then he turned to the door. "I should get going. It's rude to gate-crash late."
Quorra reached out and pinched his neck.
"Oww! What are you, Mrs. Spock? Quit pinching me!"
"I'm not pinching you. I'm pinching your carotid artery. If my anatomy books are right, without its blood supply to your brain, you'll lose consciousness in a few seconds. I'm sorry, but the alternative is kicking you, and I'm trying to prevent you from getting hurt."
Sam pulled away, stumbled a few steps, then fell through the coffee table. Quorra's hand went to her mouth and only came down when she tried to pick him up. Her real-world muscles weren't up to the task.
"You must have been drinking heavy liquor." She put a pillow under Sam's head, then picked up the phone and hit Redial. "Hello, Alan? I need you to come over here. There are some things I need to tell you about Sam… and his father. Oh, and could you bring a gurney, or some kind of rope-and-pulley system?"
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2011-02-23 11:53 pm (UTC)Alan! And Dillinger called the police on Sam? What a douchebag. He provoked him!
And LOL at the Meatloaf bits. Ahahahahaha.
no subject
Date: 2011-02-25 02:11 pm (UTC)I could actually hear that part in Garrett Hedlund's voice. XD
no subject
Date: 2011-02-24 08:15 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-02-24 09:49 pm (UTC):)
Date: 2011-02-26 03:49 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-02-28 11:30 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-03-01 04:22 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-03-29 09:48 am (UTC)