Terminator Model T-Z900 was ready.
It had taken several frantic weeks of working nonstop to produce this living, breathing, feeling machine. The researchers had no idea why Connor wanted such a complex Terminator, but they happily obliged. T-Z900 was the hardest model they had ever worked on, because Connor wanted something that could feel human emotions. Not only that, he wanted it to be as human as possible. Certain emotions were deliberately downplayed (i.e. fear, confusion) and others didn't exist at all (pain, mostly). But it was a tall order, and finally, after what seemed like ages of work, it was completed.
T-Z900 looked exactly like the original T-100, down to the intense brown eyes and the heavily sculpted, muscular body, and the thick, almost indiscernible accent. But this one was hugely complicated, mostly because of the love factor. The researchers had pored and puzzled and tested the fickle emotion, and finally just inserted it anyway. Why Connor had wanted a killing machine to love, they had no idea. But it wasn't their job to think.
They powered it up with a few important looking buttons, and it stood, stretching. There was a brief flash of red in the hard brown eyes, but this vanished quickly. It turned to the panel of testers, cocking it's head to the side, in search mode.
"T-Z900, go to the door." said one of the testers into the microphone. He was very nervous, mostly because this gigantic, muscle-bound hulk was only separated from him by a thin sheet of Plexiglas.
Obediently, the robot went to the door and threw it open. Several of the designers gasped in pleasure and amazement as they scurried foreword, pawing all over the robot. T-Z900 seemed mildly puzzled by this, but he remained silent. A few people came over, holding bundles of leather clothes in their arms.
Twenty minutes later, the T-Z900 stood outside the door to Connor's office. It was dressed in leather biker gear, complete with zippers, spikes and a red insignia on the back. It gave one hard, staccato knock on the pure white door, and the door swung open noiselessly.
"Ah! The T-Z900, I presume?" said Connor, coming foreword. His black eyes were quick and missed nothing, and he circled slowly around the machine, checking everything.
"Affirmative." said the T-Z900 in a deep, harsh accent. Connor clapped his hands together, delighted.
"Excellent! Now, I think my lab rats have told you of your mission?" he said, sitting down in his chair. The giant gave one slow nod. "Perfect! So, if you will kindly sit over there in that chair…It has been updated, you know, so you can go with clothes on." John Connor said kindly
The T-Z900 sat down, his calloused hands stretching the snow white, futuristic chair. Connor pressed a button carefully, and all the T-Z900 could do was sit there as a hole opened in the floor, and the machine was dropped back in time, in the era of 1992, June 19th.
Lilly Anderson sighed and rubbed her neck miserably. Her curly red hair was damp with sweat, and the sun beat down on her face, making her freckles stand out even more. She was unusually pretty, with a curvaceous figure and a rosebud mouth, coupled with sparkling green eyes.
She dropped to the grass once again, relishing the coolness, and began doing pushups. Her arms screamed for release, but she relentlessly pushed herself past the pain, then fell face-down on the grass. It was really too hot to be even thinking about working out, but she was not going to become some fat teenager. Her lightly muscled arms and strong back proved this.
With a grunt, she pushed herself off the ground and dusted off her hands. A revving motorcycle caught her attention, and she saw a handsome man with leather clothes and wraparound sunglasses roaring down the street. She blew a curl out of her face.
"Jerk," she mumbled. She bent at the waist to retrieve her water bottle from her bag, and it was at this improbable moment that a bullet screamed overhead, grazing her ear.
The T-X was on top of an apartment building, a snipers rifle in his hands. His blue eyes were glazed and blank, but there was a slight spark of malicious pleasure in them. His finger tightened on the trigger, watching the beautiful teenager work out in the park. This was too easy. All he had to do was shoot her once in the head, and it was all over. John Connor would never have a son who would marry this girl's daughter, and their child would never be able to turn the tide of the war. It was so simple.
As he pulled the trigger, at the most improbable moment, the girl bent over, her dark red curls cascading around her face, as she bent to get a drink of water.
Lilly screamed, and curled in a ball, minimizing the target. She crawled away as fast as she could, but she knew she would get tagged. It happened in all those action movies she watched. The only way she couldn't get hit was if some random hero came in out of nowhere and took the bullet for her.
Also at the most improbable moment, that was precisely what happened.
The T-Z900 rode his bike straight through three lanes of traffic, over a sidewalk, and crashed through a park bench that had probably been there for generations. With a sudden, powerful leap he jumped off the bike and threw himself on the pretty girl, smothering her with his massive body. She gave a muffled little squeak, like "Ow! You're heavy!" but he ignored this. Another bullet sank into his left shoulder, but instead of tearing through flesh and bone, it merely gave a hollow pinging noise, like it was striking metal instead of skin.
T-X swore, and jumped off the building. He landed in a puddle of liquid metal, then reformed himself slowly, and ran as fast as he could over to the T-Z900.
Lilly was hauled roughly to her feet by the huge biker guy, who ungraciously threw her over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes, and hopped back on his bike. She screamed and kicked at him, but the blows hurt her more then him. Damn, thought Lilly. This guy is a serious body builder. His shoulders and waist were heavily muscled, and they felt as hard as a book cover.
Reluctantly, she put her arms around his waist. A bullet tore through her shoulder, and she screamed again, this time in fear and pain. The motorcycle sped off, weaving through lanes of traffic, in and out among cars and angrily honking taxis.
They stopped at a warehouse about twenty miles out of New York City. Lilly was quite dizzy and faint. One time she had risked a glance at the wound on her shoulder, and the sight of her blood encrusted shirt made a wave of nausea rise up in her belly.
She watched as the biker guy put the kickstand down, then shut off the engine. "We're safe here," he said, speaking for the first time. His accent was thick and heavy, but she couldn't quite place it. It was almost too thick to be understood.
Lilly gave a little groan and slumped foreword. Without the supporting mass of the T-Z900, she felt as though her bones were water.
Quickly, the machine scooped her up, bridal-style, and ignored her feeble protests. He kicked the metal door, and Lilly fully expected him to crumple to the floor with a howl of pain, but the lock snapped and the biker strode inside the dim storeroom.
He leaned her up against the wall gently, and took off his sunglasses. Lilly was relieved and surprised to see his eyes. They were warm and brown, with a concerned gleam in them.
"Who…who are you?" she asked as he shrugged off his leather coat. Underneath the jacket he wore a tight gray t-shirt that clung to his well-defined muscles.
"I am the T-Z900, Prototype model," he answered, going over to one of the many wooden crates that littered the warehouse. With a savage punch that wound have given any normal man several dozen splinters, he tore the box apart and withdrew some medical supplies.
Lilly leaned against the wall and closed her eyes. "You're a what?" she asked. The machine came over, tearing off a strip of paper towels. Tenderly he blotted the blood that was seeping through her fingers.
"A T-Z900," he repeated, cutting open her shirt with a knife that was at least six inches long. Normally, Lilly would be embarrassed and scared to be dressed in nothing but a jogging bra from the waist upwards in front of a strange man, but the pain in her arm was overriding almost every other thought in her brain.
"John Connor sent me," he explained, taking out a roll of surgical thread and a needle. "I am from the year 2029. In exactly ten months you will have a daughter named Sonja Anderson. She will marry John Connor's son, Michael Connor, and they will have a daughter named Julia Connor. Julia Connor will, in turn, turn the tide of the war."
"What war?" asked Lilly, moistening her lips with her parched tongue. She cried out as the needle penetrated her skin, pulling the thread with it.
"The war between humans and robots." he stated, tying off the stitches. Lilly thought she might faint, but the pain was subsiding to a dull throb.
"But wait, aren't you a T-something whatever?" Lilly said, opening her eyes. For an instant, he was taken aback at the brilliance of her green eyes. Then he mentally shook himself.
"I am a T-Z900, yes. I have been reprogrammed by John Connor to be your protector." he said, taking a wad of paper towels that had been dampened with hydrogen peroxide, and dabbed at the wound.
"Protector from what?" Lilly asked, closing her eyes again. She was feeling very sleepy all of a sudden. It was probably the loss of blood.
"The T-X," he said. "The one who shot you." he added. Lilly sighed.
"You have no idea who this father of my daughter will be, right? I mean, so I can't tell him to scram?" she said, digging her fingers into her bare thigh. The short, tight gray exercise shorts had ridden up slightly, revealing a patch of smooth white skin.
The Terminator shook his head. "No. I do not know." He was watching her breathe slowly, her chest rising and falling.
Then he got up and put the leather jacket over her, tucking it around her firmly. He broke another crate and took out a double barreled shotgun, which he loaded. The remaining ammo was put in his pocket, where it jingled like spare change. He took up a position by the only window, which was cracked and yellowed with age.
They traveled for almost two weeks, never staying very long in one place. Lilly began to get used to this lifestyle, breaking into a new car every morning, eating some food the Terminator had stolen. She began calling him Brutal, because of his savage ways. But, if she was truly honest with herself, she liked him protecting her. She loved the feeling of being safe with someone.
Brutal, on the other hand, was all in a muddle. The love factor had been rather haphazard, and he was confused about his feelings towards Lilly. She was, so far, the prettiest human he had encountered, and apparently other males of her species thought so too. Almost every day he had to drive off another presumptuous human who thought he had a right to Lilly's beguiling body.
But it wasn't just her features that attracted him. It was that adorable laugh of hers, sweet and pretty, and the way she ran both her hands through her red hair, tousling it slightly. It was the way she slept, with one arm thrown over to the side, her eyes closed in slumber. It was the way she talked, the way she taught him about human rules and the way people meant things. She was the first person to teach him about sarcasm. It was the way she danced to the music on the radio, the way she sang along in her remarkably beautiful voice.
Then it happened. They stopped at a motel for the night, somewhere in very Southern Texas, hovering only a few miles above the border. Lilly had announced that she was taking a shower, and she retreated into the dingy bathroom with two towels and a bar of soap.
He had no idea what possessed him to open the door slightly and watch her. She was even prettier in the water, soaping herself up, then he would have thought possible. Her hair was darker, almost brown in color, when it was under the steady stream of water.
Brutal closed the door quietly, and went back over to his customary spot by the door. His heart was hammering loudly, and he had no idea what was making him do all this. It was as if a reckless demon had begun wreaking havoc in his heart, driving out all other thoughts except the ones about Lilly.
Lilly heard the door close, and smiled to herself. She had been half-hoping he would watch her, and now her wish was granted. The fluttery feeling in her stomach increased, and she shut off the shower. Now it was time to see where it went from here.
She skipped out of the bathroom, clad only in a towel, and rummaged in her bag for fresh clothes. Brutal had been taking to raiding stores every other day for supplies and clothes. Lilly had discovered that if she didn't ask where he got them, her conscience felt better.
He swallowed hard. "Hey, Brutal?" said Lilly's sweet voice. He turned, his eyes going soft at the sight of her. She was sitting with her back to him, and the damp towel was on the floor, discarded.
