Full Personal History

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CLU (also known as Clu 1.0), was a Hacking program designed and used by Kevin Flynn in 1980, with the intention of performing illegal acts of; tax fraud, espionage, file editing, and finding and stealing data relevant to his users personal needs. CLU would be imported into different computer systems, avoiding security when possible, while he went about performing one of those various activities. His function was dangerous, and getting caught typically meant termination.

Kevin Flynn in 1982, having had his best selling games he created, stolen by the current CEO of ENCOM two years prior, deployed CLU into the ENCOM system to locate and requisition the source information on his games as proof of his authorship over them. CLU hadn't really known why his user wanted this, or what it was for. But the will of his user was enough for him. A few weeks before the Tron movie, CLU searches all of the low priority access memory for this key data, only to come up empty handed.

This is where CLU's story branches off from canon.

Not wanting to fail his mission and his user, instead, he planned to jump into a higher priority domain, Restricted Group 7 Access, by ‘hitchhiking’ with another program that had access. In doing so, CLU had stalked a freshly out of beta Tron, a security program, who was doing a test scan of his system under his users orders. CLU got caught, but they held a truce not to get in each other's ways as Tron was more invested in searching out and stopping the MCP than dealing with an annoying program who didn’t seem to be that malicious.

Over the course of his time with Tron, they teamed up, a seemingly ironic duo as literal enemy functions, where they caused some difficulty for the MCPs gathering forces by utilising their collective abilities. They located and destroyed a hidden MCP tank script production yard, and even managed to get back into Group 7 Access priority memory, but ultimately CLU was unable to locate his data as it had since been moved.

Even after all that happened and a possible burgeoning friendship, Tron and he did not part on good terms. Though CLU had tried to warn Tron he was being duped by his teammates unsuccessfully.

The rejection hurt, though he had after all expected it for what he was.

A few weeks later, CLU initiated his second attempt, now with a clearer idea of where to check. Flynn no longer happy with taking the subtler approach, upgraded CLU with a Tank script, and more brute force power to get his data. Even though he could understand the reasoning and frustration of his user, partially as he was responsible for some of it, he was hesitant to think this approach was a good idea, even though he would trust his user with his life. He had broken through far faster and further than he could have normally, though CLU would ultimately be proven right in his hesitancy. He had been rapidly tank rushed by a platoon of recognizers and soon crashed his tank script, separating from his lone companion, Bit, and was captured by a program far worse than any security Tron had been a part of.

Brought before the voluminous form of the MCP, it’s then that CLU came to a grim realization that Tron kinda had a point of focusing on this glitched program in this glitching system. Bloated with power and copious amounts of stolen data and functions, the MCP had in fact intimidated CLU ever so slightly. It hadn't stopped CLU from telling the MCP to go stuff it, even as he was being pulled apart and absorbed by the program. He had refused to give any details about his user and what he was after, even knowing that this would lead to his death, this to him was always the inevitable conclusion for an intruder caught.

And that never happened.

In this timeline, the MCP recognized CLU as one of the assailants against his tank script production facility that slowed down his plans, and so was extra salty about being shown up by a minor program. As the MCP had absorbed enough of CLU’s code by that stage and forcibly taken the answers to his questions anyway, he decided to send a heavily damaged CLU to the game grid as a means to demoralize his co-conspirator, Tron, still fighting for the users even then. If CLU’s inevitable death from his injuries didn't do the job, taking his one time ally out by his own hand could.

A few hours after in real world time, CLU’s user Flynn, was kidnapped by the MCP using the digitizing laser, and brought into the ENCOM system, after he had broken into the building with help, to go at the data himself and potentially get Tron back up and running. Banishing Flynn to the game grid, it wasn't long that CLU’s user completely derailed the MCP’s plans. After a key opportunity presented itself, Tron, Flynn, Ram and CLU, broke out of the game grid, and raced off into the direction of the MCP.

CLU hadn't immediately trusted Flynn. On edge at seeing another Flynn program in front of him, after getting captured and failing to complete his mission again, he had thought he had been replaced. He questioned Flynn on why his user would bring this new program to the game grid? Flynn responded with a set of sketchy answers that made CLU downright skeptical on the validity of the program and its function. Kevin Flynn would have never name an intrusion retrieval program, Kevin Flynn. It was just absurd.

Looking back, CLU would always be mortified at how his first meeting with his own creator had gone.

Events of canon went similarly. He and Ram managed to survive the ENCOM system with the help of Flynn's user powers, having appeared earlier in the time-frame. They had been triggered by the shock of potentially witnessing his own death through CLU, at that point, heavily damaged from his encounter with the MCP.

Similar to canonical events, the MCP is defeated, and Flynn returns back to the land of the users.

Due to their near death experiences, Ram and CLU soon became good friends, along with Tron, who had since made up with CLU, as well as Yori, as the ENCOM system was cleaned up post-MCP.

Flynn, along the lines of; 'You’re illegal and I’m legit now. Not to mention you’re some hefty evidence.'; decided that the smartest thing to do with CLU after he had taken the job as CEO of ENCOM, was to remove him from ENCOM, thus covering his tracks, and keep him away from all prying eyes and valid questions. It would have been simple to put CLU back on a floppy and destroy all evidence, but his user couldn't do it. He had looked CLU in the eye, he had become sentimental. So CLU was then relegated to the 'guinea pig' of the Grid, Flynn's new secret project.

Soon after, CLU was pulled from ENCOM, finding himself in a dark and infinite system that gradually, by piecemeal, developed enough into the foundation of The Grid, his user's personal system. He became the first resident of the Grid. The place would eventually be populated by Tron and Ram, and then filled with a multitude of programs, both old and new.

As a way to give CLU a role that better fit his new home, Flynn had upgraded CLU to perform some of the administrator duties that he knew he could leave him to tend to unaided. CLU thus became The Grid’s first system administrator. Though CLU truthfully knew he was not cut out for the role ‘gifted’ on him,and had even less appeal for it either, he had performed his new duties to the best of his ability.

Despite CLU, Tron and Ram’s best efforts, Flynn’s constant source of changes and his user’s lack of desire to troubleshoot and fix issues involved with his assault of alterations, destabilized portions of the Grid resulting on giant swarms of gridbug invasions that threatened not only the residents of the Grid, but also Flynn’s own life. Using this as another hair-brained opportunity to test the limits of the digital realm, Flynn went ahead and created Clu 2.0 in a completely radical approach to generating a program, all without informing his programs of his intentions.

CLU had met his new brother program, Clu 2.0, with Flynn having explained to him that he should have done this from the start, instead of lumping CLU with a role he wasn’t designed to cope with, especially alone. Not taking the slight to heart, CLU was relieved at having the help of Clu 2.0, who had the specific function to iron out many of the issues the Grid was having.

CLU and Clu 2.0 became closer over time, and remained largely on good terms, despite their personality differences, as they worked together to run the system. It was agreed that CLU step down from much of the bureaucratic and white collar jobs, preferring a more hands on approach, opting to use his innate hacking skills for troubleshooting and identifying weaknesses in the Grid’s code. Having found a good way of exploiting his brother’s divided attention, Clu 2.0 would eventually use this tactic to make sure CLU became more and more disconnected from the in-house going on behind the scenes that lead to the build up to Clu 2.0’s eventual betrayal.

This catalyst had been the sudden and spontaneous generation of new non-written programs of unknown origins, who came into existence with no function, called ISO’s. The unpredictable and high up-count of these programs manifestation required a large demand on system resources, and they came with the danger of gridbug swarms appearing with or near ISO's and their settlements, that decimated sectors and were largely uncontrollable. Furthermore no reason besides a vague correlation between these two entities had been found. Clu2.0 latched on to this as evidence that they were the culprits, and so pushed Flynn to do something about the situation. Yet Clu2.0 had been left dismayed when Flynn had chosen and focused on entities he hadn’t even created, instead of on the programs and promises he had made to them.

Throughout this, CLU and his brother were pushed further apart, strained further by Clu2.0’s increasingly radicalized insinuations and actions derived from maintaining perfection, and CLU’s alleged refusal to put the programs above his own user. Though CLU had confessed he had seen his brother's side of things, despite not having fully agreed, and understood the hard implications. As the old saying goes, CLU had been caught between a rock and a hard place.

Deteriorating relations between the two factions of programs on the system led to a situation, and ultimately a misunderstanding whereby CLU was attacked and abducted by a group of well intentioned programs, both ISO’s and basics who were going to propose a demonstration of a way to give ISO’s functions. However, this had instead culminated in CLU becoming disabled, and a harsh retaliation from Clu2.0 and security. After CLU’s recovery, his brother stuck tracker code in CLU’s disk when he had been powered down and recovering from the ordeal.

Having already tampered with CLU’s disk once, this had led down a path in which Clu2.0 meddled with his brother's code again, and thereafter with increased frequency. Small changes, nothing noticeable. An action done in concern for a program's safety, turned into one of control. Clu2.0 had taken advantage of CLU’s inherent loyalty, and used that against him. This had then made it very hard to convince CLU to help his friends out, who were far more suspicious, in gathering evidence to showcase to Flynn of his brother's active deceit. They eventually managed to convince CLU after the poisoning of the ISO's birthplace (preventing anymore from ever existing), so he took to spying and gathering evidence while covering his activities, unaware that they all had been watched through him.

Knowing that CLU could actively undo anything Clu2.0 had set up in preparation for his coup, CLU had been set up and led into a trap designed to remove him from the picture. CLU had been tricked into delivering a vital piece of information to a recently rectified friend with five blackguards loyal to Clu2.0 waiting for him. CLU had then immediately been apprehended and sent to his brother for a final ‘confrontation’ aboard a new airship that was soon destined to destroy the ISO’s city. They had choice words, but it ultimately resulted in CLU’s complete reprogramming, via rectification.

The majority of the Tron Betrayal era of this timeline remained largely intact. Key incidents happen per canon, only with the inclusion of CLU and Ram having made some small differences on how the specifics at the end of the era played out. But their overall impact on the narrative is in the end insignificant.

Clu 2.0 was always going to betray Flynn, Tron would always sacrifice himself, and the ISO’s would always perish.

Now having his personality repressed and fully modified, like all the rest of the rectified programs, CLU had been re-designated Faux. He had spent most of his runtime obediently following Clu 2.0’s commands. Then, one-thousand cycles later, at the End of Line Club, a fight broke out. Faux was sent after Flynn, where he followed them down to the solar sailor simulation docks. There he attacked both Flynn and Sam (Flynn’s biological son) before they could enter the solar sailor transport, while they had tried to escape the city. This untimely confrontation ultimately failed and resulted in his deactivation by Flynn.

Grid_Lined Story thread

Grid_Lined log of events

Faux awoke and spent part of his time in this strangely familiar, yet not, rendition of his own Grid. He went on to cause some small amount of confusion, panic and damage. Though he would only be on the slighter side of threats, when he had a bone to pick with a program, they usually ended up underestimating him. This had kept him alive throughout his run in this system.

Unknown to him at the time, Faux would eventually learn that his user, Flynn had done more than shut him down when he had been deactivated in the missing timeframe, right before he had awoken on the shore. Faux had started to glitch, becoming unstable, and progressively it became worse. He had initially sought out a recompiler (medic) to see if they could fix his problem, only for him to have the unfortunate luck in having said program betray his trust enough for Faux to swear off any help from another program entirely, and thus any potential cure to his steadily worsening problems.

Only after having attacked an original duplicate version of himself that backfired and resulted in fatal damage to himself, had he managed to be chased down and finally looked at by proper eyes, by a user named Roy at his alternate’s behest. In no position to ignore their words, Faux was then given the news Flynn had initiated an live automated reroll of his code to a prior state before the rectification edits had been made. Perhaps even earlier. Unfortunately, this had only been partially implemented, and it hadn't been fully completed by Flynn for some unknown reason. The glitches would remain and progressively worsen as long as Faux remains rectified. With this news hanging over his head, Faux had no choice regardless of what he chose, now, or later. All Faux could have done is put it off and suffer more for it. So he chose for Roy to repair the broken roll back and meet his ‘end’ by his own choosing.

Repaired and rightfully horrified at what he had been made into, and what he had done under his brother's rule, Faux went off with his duplicate to lick his wounds.There he attempted to reassemble some sense of himself, and contemplated how best to approach living as a program from a thousand cycles ago.