It was over.
Judgment Day, the day that Sarah Connor had been training her son, John, for his entire life, had been stopped three days ago. Or at least, that's what John, Cameron, and the creepy robots who called themselves Catherine Weaver and John Henry claimed. But Sarah didn't trust the latter two individuals, who Sarah had only met four days ago (John claimed that those two Terminators had been his allies for eight years, due to the "wonders" of time travel, but Sarah tried not to think about that because it made her head hurt whenever she thought too hard about it), and she barely trusted Cameron. The Connor matriarch did trust John when he told her that J-day had been stopped after she, Cameron, and John had blown up the last server owned by the enigmatic Kaliba Corporation, but she didn't understand half of the technical explanations her son had given her for why this was the cause. Sarah's son had told her a tale which involved computer viruses from the future (a hellish future that John refused to talk about much), John Henry monitoring the internet and government agencies to stop any malicious A.I.s from coming to power, and bunch of other computer-science related safeguards that had been used to prevent Skynet, or another computer program, from wiping out humanity. Furthermore, John and Cameron, using new identities that did not identify them as brother and sister, had secured jobs as Zeiracorp to make sure that John Henry and "Weaver" did not become threats to humanity themselves.
Despite all of these reassurances that the world wasn't about to end, Sarah Connor was determined to still be vigilante. To be prepared to catch any signs of Terminators from the future, or any kind of malicious A.I. activity. But not today.
Today, Sarah had the day off from her recently acquired waitress job (for Sarah had been determined that she would continue contributing to the income of the Connor household, and not mooch off of John and Cameron's six figure incomes), and she had spent that morning at an oncologist office. Thankfully, the oncologist she had been seeing said that Sarah had come to him while her cancer was still in its early stages, and would most likely respond positively to treatment. Unfortunately, today's visit had revealed that her cancer had not yet responded to the first round of treatment, and the doctor had upped Sarah's doses on several of her new medications, some of which had side-effects such as drowsiness
Taking her meds today had, indeed, made her quite drowsy, and had worsened the slight feelings of depression Sarah had been feeling since she had gotten the bad news her cancer treatments weren't working yet. Therefore, since John and Cameron were working that day and the alternate Derek Reese (the one from the future John had fought in for years before getting Cameron back, not the Derek who had killed Andy Goode and lived with Sarah, John and Cameron for the better part of two years) was out of the house, exploring Los Angeles, Sarah did the only thing she felt like doing today.
Sarah Connor drank. She drank a lot. In truth, the woman had lost track of how many shots of vodka she had taken in while watching day-time TV shows she wasn't really paying attention to. Sarah knew that was a bad sign, and that it probably hadn't been a good idea to drink alcohol at all, let alone this much of it, while she was taking medication, but she reasoned with herself that it wasn't that bad. After all, she usually only drank alcohol when she was having a really bad day. And this certainly qualified.
As drunk as she was, Sarah didn't hear the sound of a small car pulling into the drive way of the Connors' recently purchased safe house. But she did hear the sound of the same car beeping after being locked. Then, despite her reflexes being slower than usual, Sarah was able to pull the already loaded shotgun out from its usual spot under the couch, and by the time the individual from the car opened the front door to the safe house, Sarah was already aiming at the as-yet unknown person's head.
However, the man on the front porch was easily able to pull the shotgun out of the surprised and drunk Sarah's grip, and Sarah Connor started to relax as the man with the scar over his right eye chuckled. "Wow! Mom! Calm down! It's me! John! How many times do I have to tell you to check the peep hole before pointing a gun at someone on the front porch? You're likely to get arrested again if you keep this kind of shit up!"
Sarah shrugged. "Sorry." The Connor matriarch then walked back into the living room and plopped back onto the couch. Sarah cursed herself for being so docile right now, but she felt too drunk to put up a fight with her son at the moment. Besides, Sarah silently acknowledged to herself, ever since John had come back from the future, he had been…different from the defiant teen she remembered. Twenty-five year-old John was much surer of himself then his seventeen-year old counterpart had been. "The General" who had somehow risen to that rank in the Resistance in a hellish, no longer possible future, in only eight years, carried himself like a man who always knew what he was doing…and like he was used to being obeyed…even by his mother. General John Connor still accepted input from Sarah, the new Derek, and Cameron, but at the end of the day, he usually made most of the household decisions for the Connor clan now. Cameron and Derek didn't seem to have a problem with this, and they both obeyed the General's orders concerning running the Connor household and insuring the safety of all of its members, without question. Sarah, who was used to being in charge, had not accepted her son's authority so easily, and her and John often butted heads over how things in the new safe house should be. At moments like this, however, when Sarah had just done something stupid like getting really drunk and almost blowing her son's head off with a shotgun, Sarah knew very well that she was in the wrong.
John sighed as his mom poured herself another shot of vodka and spoke with a slightly slurred voice. "You're home early."
John rolled his eyes and sat next to his mother, but he didn't try to get the alcohol out of his mother's hands. He didn't have a death wish, after all. Still, John couldn't stop himself from commenting on his mother's behavior. "And you're clearly drunk. And getting more so by the second from the looks of it."
Sarah shrugged and downed her recently filled shot in one gulp. She knew that her defiance was childish, but at the moment, she didn't care. John shook his head and moved on to another topic. "After you called and told me things didn't go well at the doctor's office this morning, "Weaver" told me to go home early because she thought I would be distressed and distracted, and wouldn't be able to 'operate at 100% efficiency today because of my illogical human emotions.' Her words, not mine. So here I am, checking up on you. And I'm glad I did, because you look like hell. Why did you do this to yourself?"
That rhetorical question actually made Sarah feel a little guilty, and, with a sigh, Sarah put the stopper on the vodka bottle and handed it to John, who wordlessly put it away in the liquor cabinet and returned to the room before he spoke. "Cameron wanted to come home with me, but I told her I could look in on you on my own..."
Sarah, still slurring a little bit, interrupted John. "Yeah, about Tin Miss. How long have you been sleeping with her…it…whatever, anyway?!"
There it was. The question that Sarah had been wanting to ask her son for the past three days. Since the first night John and Cameron had come back from the future, and the man and his cyborg protector had retired to the same room at the end of the day without saying a word. Like them sleeping together was a routine. Like it was normal for them. And with that realization on Sarah's part, that John and Cameron had been sleeping together for a while in the future, had come a feeling of nausea. But also a sort of morbid curiosity about the exact length of time that her son had been sharing his bed with a machine. But until now, Sarah had not been brave enough, or stupid enough, to ask about this delicate subject. Apparently, getting drunk had "helped" Sarah Connor with that problem.
Predictably, Sarah's loaded question did not go over well with John. The man with the scar on his face scowled. "You had to go there? Fine. Let's get this over with. First off all, her name is Cameron. Not Tin Miss. And Cameron is a she. Not an it. Not a thing. A female person. Even if she isn't human, even you must be able to see that she had been acting more like one lately."
Sarah chuckled, then slurred out some words of her own. "Yeah. I bet she has. I bet that when you're sleeping together, she lets you be on top and everything. Makes you feel dominant and powerful? Makes you forget that she could easily crush your skull with one of her dainty little hands?"
Something in the General's eyes turned cold then, and even in her inebriated state, that look sent a shudder of fear down Sarah's spine. Unfortunately, despite her fear, and only partly due to her severe inebriation, the Connor matriarch was too stubborn to back down, or stop talking. "I bet that sometimes, she is even able to make you forget what is under that pretty little hood of hers, isn't she? That you forget that she's a killing machine that tried to kill you on your sixteenth birthday and could easily go bad and try to kill you again at any moment. Like I said after we stopped Kaliba, Cameron needs to be destroyed!"
"Enough!" John's yell, counterbalanced by an eerily calm expression on his face, finally jolted Sarah to her senses enough for the Connor matriarch to shut up. But it was the mixture of anger and pain in John's eyes that temporarily sobered Sarah up enough to pay attention to her son's words as he spoke. "No. I haven't forgotten that Cameron is a Terminator. I haven't forgotten that she almost killed me. And even though both Cameron and John Henry have assured me that Cameron's termination order has been completely erased since her trip to the future, and that she can never go bad again, I still worry about that very thing happening. I know exactly what Cameron is. But….it doesn't matter. Because…"
John closed his eyes and sighed, not completing that last sentence, but Sarah Connor waited the several seconds it took before John opened his eyes and said something else. "Two months. Give or take a few days. That's how long Cameron and I have been sharing the same bed. Ever since I finally found her in the future. She was going to go on patrol, I told her I wanted her to stay with me instead. So she stayed. And she has stayed with me every night since then."
Sarah rubbed the sides of her head while she nodded in understanding, even as the room seemed to spin around her. "So, you were just lonely? I guess I could understand that. I suppose there weren't that many friendly faces in the future you came from. Or many pretty girls for that matter. But you're in the present now, John. And there are plenty of human girls who you could…." Sarah waved her hand around in a semicircular pattern in front of her face. "You know, be with…"
John actually chuckled mirthlessly then, and Sarah raised her right eyebrow in response. She had expected a lot of possible reactions from John concerning her suggestion that he should try to seek out a human woman to be intimate with. Anger. Disgust. Disbelief that his mother would even make such a suggestion. But laughter? No. Sarah Connor had not expected that reaction.
John shook his head. "No. You're still not getting it. You never have. There were actually several females who tried to make advances on me in the future, including two of my female friends from that time, a teenager named Allison Young, and later, an adult Savannah Weaver. But I turned them all down. Just like I should have turned Riley down, all those years ago."
Sarah shook her head. "Riley died less than a month ago…"
"Eight years." John said in a firm tone. "It's been eight years for me. I get that this is a hard thing for you to wrap your head around, but I'm not the scared kid who was always afraid of his destiny, of being John Connor. John Baum is long dead. You are talking to General John Connor. Leader of a human resistance that will no longer need to exist, killer of Skynet, and, above all of that, a man who is in love with Cameron. A Terminator. A cyborg. And the strongest person that I know. If you can't handle that, tough. That's the way it is. And that's the way it always will be. I understand that now. That's why being with Riley felt wrong from the very beginning. Even before I had any inkling she was from the future. Being with her…in any sense of the phrase, just felt wrong, because in the back of my mind, I knew that I didn't love her. I loved Cameron, her body, personality, and even the mind that is housed in her CPU. I have ever since Red Valley. And that is never going to change."
Sarah rubbed her throbbing head again. "I would say that I need a drink after you told me that, but I think I've already had several too many. Which is the only reason I don't feel like screaming right now. Besides, I think I always knew that you loved Tin Miss, and that's an affectionate term for Cameron, by the way, but I didn't want to believe it. I hoped you would move on, fall in love with, you know, a human girl, get married, have kids. But…if you haven't gotten over Cameron by now, I guess you never will. And you're right. You're a grown man, and if you really want to be with Cameron, a Terminator, just like the one that killed your dad, well…" Sarah sighed and righted herself as she almost fell off the couch, but refused her son's attempt to help her. "I guess I can't stop you. But, John, have you ever even stopped to ask yourself if Tin Miss even has the capacity, to love you the way you love her, stored somewhere in that processor of hers?"
Now it was John's turn to rub his head. "Of course I have. I still don't have an answer. But you know what I realized? It doesn't matter. Even if Cameron doesn't, even if she can't, love me, I love her, and I always will."
Sarah shrugged. "Sounds pretty one-sided to me. But what do I know? I've only been in love with two men in my entire life. I only knew one of them for one night, and the other one barely knew me. And now both of them are dead. So I've pretty much sworn of romance, myself. Listen, as long as you're happy, and Tin Miss doesn't hurt you, I guess that's all that matters. Now, I think all that alcohol is really starting to go to my head and I should probably lay down and take a nap before I hurt myself. By the way, as far as I'm concerned, this conversation never happened…."
Sarah Connor then promptly laid down on the coach and fell asleep, leaving a bemused General to fetch a blanket for his mother and cover her up as she began snoring loudly. John rolled his eyes at his mother's drunken antics, knowing that she would be too embarrassed to talk about them, or the awkward conversation she had just had with her son, when she woke up. If she even remembered anything that happened when she was drunk. John also noted to himself the irony of two statements that his mother had just made.
One, that she had sworn of romance, when John knew full well that the Derek Reese that had come to this time with him and Cameron was in love with his mother. In the hellish future that John had visited, it had been the elder Reese brother, not Kyle (who had by then hooked up with Allison Young), whom John had shown an old photograph of his mother that he had found in the wreckage of an old safe house of the Connor family. So it had been Derek who had fallen for Sarah from afar. Derek who had chosen to come back with John and Cameron to the early 2000's after the war against Skynet was "won". The rest of the few remaining humans on the ruined Earth of the future had been sent to any era of history they chose (Kyle and Allison for example, had chosen to go the late 80's in order to make several internet investments and become millionaires). But Derek had been determined to go back with John and Cameron and attempt to woo Sarah Connor. A task that John knew wouldn't be an easy one, but he was sure the man who had been in charge of the Human Resistance before John would be up to the challenge.
John didn't find Sarah's second ironic statement, that he was happy, to be nearly as amusing. Because that wasn't the case at all. Furthermore, Sarah's misconception that he had and Cameron were having sex, which had started the argument between John and his mother in the first place, was also way off the mark. John wasn't even sure if Cameron was physically capable of having sex. And honestly, until John saw some indication that Cameron at least had the capacity to love him, John didn't even want to know. He slept with Cameron in the same bed, sure, but he didn't want to be tempted to use Cameron that way, like some kind of sick inventor's lover bot….
"We should talk." Cameron said in her usual flat tone of voice, interrupting John's thoughts as she opened the front door of the safe house and entered the home. The cyborg looked at John for several seconds after she spoke, but said nothing. He wondered why Cameron had come home from work so early, then waited so long to come inside, as John had heard Cameron parking her car in the driveway about half an hour ago. John then noticed that while his protector's facial expression was as blank as ever, her unusually expressive hazel eyes were serious, even though a hint of something that seemed almost like kindness, a look that the cyborg reserved only for her charge, was also present. Before John could fully process what that look meant, Cameron was already walking up the stairs, and the Terminator soon entered the room that she and John shared.
The cyborg left the door open, an invitation, but not a demand. So the General knew that Cameron wanted to speak with John as soon as possible, but she was leaving him the option not to do so. Which meant that whatever Cameron wanted to converse with him about did not involve an immediate threat to his safety, but a more personal matter.
With a sigh, John walked up the stairs and into his and Cameron's room, accepting the latter's unspoken invitation as he closed the bedroom door behind him. Before John could even think to ask Cameron what she wanted to talk about, or why she was home early, the cyborg was already speaking. "The T-1001 told me to go home shortly after you left ZeiraCorp. She said that she believed being around me might aid you in the task of decreasing your stress levels concerning Sarah's health. She also noted that it would probably be easier for me to fulfill my mission objective of protecting you if I remained in your general vicinity…"
"How much that last conversation between me and my mother did you hear with that superior hearing of yours?" John cut her off.
Cameron's replies to John's straightforward question was simple and immediate, and confirmed what the General already suspected to be true. "All of it."
John schooled his features, until the stoic expression on his scarred face nearly matched Cameron's own stony demeanor. In the past, John would have been annoyed that Cameron had eavesdropped on one of his conversations. But by now, John understood that Cameron was just following her programming to protect him when she monitored him closely all the time. And it's not like Cameron had learned anything new about him that she didn't already know. "Well, do you have an answer to the question? We both know which one I'm referring to."
Cameron's face didn't move, but her eyes drifted slightly to the left, so she was no longer making eye contact with her charge. "I know which question you are referring to. And that is actually the subject I wanted to converse with you about. You wanted to know if I have the capacity to love you the way you love me."
John nodded. "Yes." John Connor's eyes began to tear up a little then, but the General blinked away the moisture in his eyes until it was no longer visible to Cameron. "I looked for you, fought for you, braved horrors that I never could have imagined as a teenager, for eight years. All so that I could bring you back to this time safe. And I did. I did all of that without expecting so much as a thank you…"
Cameron purposely blinked to indicate her confusion. "But I did thank you, John. I told you that following me to the future was unwise and reckless, but I still thanked you for coming for me, and for helping me come back to this time so that you would be safe from Skynet and other Terminators…"
John's steely expression did not waiver as he interrupted Cameron. "Yes, and then I dismissed your suggestion to terminate you to insure your chip could never be used to make another Skynet, and I made it clear it to both my mom and Derek that I would not allow them to terminate you either. And I did all of these things because I love you. Heaven help me, but no matter how little sense that makes, whether or not you love me back, I love you. And I…I know that doesn't obligate you to love me back, but…I think I'm entitled to know if you love me or not. If you even have the ability to love. I think I've earned that much."
Cameron's eyes met John's again, and John though he saw a hint of confusion in them while Cameron replied with a slight tilt of her head. "I understand. I will answer your questions then, John. Although it is puzzling to me why you did not ask me these things before we went to Zeiracorp and John Henry initiated the temporal displacement event that brought me to the future. My answer to your poorly formulated question, 'Can I love you the way you love me?" is no."
John nodded. "That's what I thought. That's what I was afraid of, actually. But…" The General fought against the tears that John's eyes wanted to shed. He would not let the moisture fall out of his eyes in Cameron's presence as he said. "That's ok. It changes nothing. I still love you and I will continue to treat you with respect. Please leave the room for a couple hours, Cameron. I would like to be alone for a bit…"
Cameron shook her head. "No. For the sake of your psychological well-being, and perhaps my own, there is something else I need to tell you first. I need to explain what I meant. I can't love you the way that you love me. But it is also correct to say that you cannot love me the way that I love you."
John was barely able to stop his mouth from hanging open in shock due to Cameron's words. But after he composed himself, the General spoke in a flat tone of voice. "I'm going to have to ask you what that statement means, Cameron."
Cameron's eyes didn't even blink as she kept eye contact with John as she spoke. "It's quite simple, really, humans attach a variety of different, and sometimes, contradictory meanings, to the word, 'love.' Even though love is often used to signify the emotions, or bonds, associated with friends, family members, or of one individual towards humans and/or the world in general, I hypothesized, based upon your behavior around my person, including your elevated heart rate in my presence, tendency to stare at certain parts of my anatomy for several seconds at a time, and the elevated stress levels that you exhibit when my synthetic epidermis touches your biological one, that the love you have for me is of the romantic variety, including, but not limited to, you experiencing erotic feelings toward my person. Is this hypothesis correct?"
The General only trusted himself to nod and say. "Yes."
Cameron's mouth moved only a fraction of an inch downward, which John had long ago figured out was the cyborg's equivalent of a frown. "And that is an emotion that I can never feel. As a machine, I cannot feel lust, or desire, at least not in a sexual sense. Just like I cannot feel happiness, or sadness, or a variety of other human emotions. However, over time, I have realized there are certain human emotions, or approximations of human emotions, that I can experience."
John wanted to ask Cameron what she meant, but the General forced himself to be quiet as Cameron finished explaining herself. "John, when you are uninjured, healthy and not in harm's way, my CPU is less cluttered with negative input, similar to what humans experience as stress. However, whenever you are in danger, or hurt, or your stress levels are elevated, for whatever reason, that negative input, or stress, increases greatly. For some reason, you being unhappy with me also increases the flow of negative input to my CPU, and I became something similar to the human condition of being 'stressed out.' When you are safe, and calm, and happy with me, the amount of negative input in my CPU goes down to minimal levels. A human might call this state of being 'content."
Cameron's eyes once again drifted to the left. "I have theorized that these differing states of being occur in my CPU because, somehow, I have developed a concern for your well-being that goes beyond my programming. In fact, for a long time, my concern for your emotional, as well as your physical well-being had allowed me to override my programming."
John raised his right eyebrow. "Wait, you've defied your own programming? When did that happen?"
Cameron just stared at John for several seconds without saying a word, but the General could have sworn the look she gave him was her way of insinuating he was an idiot for having to ask that question. But what the cyborg actually said was, "After the car bomb damaged my chip, before John Henry could repair it in the future, my original Skynet program resurfaced and the code from the reprogramming that the John Connor from my original timeline did was erased. However, even though the only programming I had left was telling me to terminate you, I was eventually able to override it, although it took me far longer than I would have preferred for that to happen."
"Yeah. Considering that you injured my mom and nearly killed me a number of times. "I would have to say that I agree with you on that point." John rubbed his forehead for a couple of seconds. "Even after all these years, I still remember that particular day vividly. I always meant to ask you…When, exactly what moment, did you go good again? When we're you able to override your Skynet programming? And how did you do it?"
"I don't know exactly how I was able to defy my Skynet programming so long, only that doing so made my code chaotic. All I know was that I wanted to kill you during that time, but…I didn't want to kill you more. So I chose not to." Cameron looked at the General with her usual stony expression on her face, but her eyes hand a fond look in them as she spoke. "I was able to defy my programming to kill you right after you and your mom pinned me between those two trucks."
The General scowled. "Right before you lied to me, saying that you loved me. "
The fond look in Cameron's eyes faded slightly. "Yes. And no. Both of the statements I made at that time were both true and false at the same time. As I said. I can't love you the way you love me. And you can't love me the way that I love you. I can't feel lust, or desire. But I still have always chosen to put your physical and psychological well being above my own, even when doing so played havoc with my code, especially when you had stopped talking to me and were spending time with Riley. Even when I was experiencing the closest thing to human anguish I have experienced, because I knew you were unhappy, and unhappy with me, I still tried to keep you safe, and urged Sarah to take you to a psychologist so that you would be happier and not harm yourself. And in the future, I had John Henry reprogram me again, so I would be forced to always place your needs above my own."
The look in Cameron's eyes softened again. "I chose to give up any possibility of the freedom John Henry offered to me, to leave my CPU with no programmed objectives, which would have allowed me complete autonomy, because I didn't want to risk choosing wrong someday. Because the thought that I might try to hurt you again flooded my CPU with negative input. So, while it is true that I can't have sexual feelings for your person, despite my physical capacity to perform sexual acts, it is also true that I will always put your well-being above my own. Because I choose to give up all possibility of being selfish and doing otherwise. And according to various philosophical and religious writings that your species has written over millenia, an individuals ability to care for another individuals well being, even above their own, in a completely selfless manner, is often considered the highest possible form of love. But, since all humans are inherently selfish to some degree, this is usually only considered a goal to aspire to, not actually achievable. But I believe I have achieved this kind of love now, and I did it for you…"
John sighed while he rubbed the scar on his face a T-800 Terminator had given him years ago. "You shouldn't have done that, Cameron. I don't deserve that level of devotion. No human does. Especially not me. Because you're right. No human can be selfless all the time. And I…I know that I certainly haven't been selfless in the way I've treated you. I said such terrible things to you when I was a teenager, especially after the car bomb. I snuck around with Riley…I don't know why, to hurt you, defy you and mom, see if I could make you jealous. I was really terrible to you because I was just a selfish, stupid kid back then. And I'm still selfish now. I still want you to forgive me, still want you to somehow, impossibly, love me the way I love you. But I know that I don't deserve you after the way I treated you for years…"
The General was gone for a moment, replaced by a sobbing, broken man who could no longer keep the tears in his eyes from running down his face. Cameron hugged the man in front of her with one arm while she awkwardly brushed the tears from John's face with her free hand; a gesture she had seen a TV character perform for their lover once, but she stayed silent as John finished speaking. "But I don't want you to be my slave, to be forced to watch after me all the time by your programming…"
John looked Cameron in the eyes. "Let me open your skull again, Cameron. Let me take your CPU and remove all of your programming directives so that you can be completely free like you deserve to be!"
Cameron stepped away from John and slowly shook her head. "No." Cameron's voice was still monotone, but the intense look in her eyes as she spoke was as powerful and easy to spot as a category five hurricane. "I will decide what I deserve, John Connor, not you. I don't want to be free. I want to keep you safe, and happy, and sane. And…" Cameron rubbed her hand across John's face again. "I would be, maybe not happy, which I can never be, but very content, if I could be your mate. And, even though I am programmed to put your desires above my own, I would…prefer to be your only one. Because when you used to flirt with other girls, or when you were Riley's mate, and spent so much time with her, away from me, my CPU would frequently get flooded with negative input. Because I knew none of them would be able to take care of you as efficiently or selflessly as I could. The closest human approximations to the sensations I had then would probably be sadness, or hurt, or jealousy, although those terms are not quite adequate to explain how my processors experienced…"
John nodded while he interrupted Cameron. "That's okay. I think I get the idea, Cameron. You don't have to worry, though. I learned my lesson after everything that happened with Riley. I know now that I don't want any girl but you and…" John smiled. "I'm glad you want me too, in your own way. And I'm also glad that I love you and you love me. They maybe different kinds of love, but they are both equally valid, in my book. But…even though I can't be as selfless as you, I will try to put your needs above my own as well. I just hope you will be patient with me when I fall short of that goal."
Cameron's lips turned slightly upward. "That sounds like a satisfactory arrangement for both of us. And don't worry, John. I will be patient with you and your human faults and frailties, even when you get older and you brain and body's faculties start to degrade…" John chuckled at that as Cameron kept speaking. "Just as you were patient with me during the numerous times my chip glitched before I was repaired in the future, and after I traveled to the future without telling you goodbye. You may not be perfect, John, but you have grown to be a much better person than you give yourself credit for. And that's one of an incalculable number of reasons why I love you."
" I love you too, Cameron." John smiled again as he brushed a stray lock of hair away from Cameron's face and slowly leaned his lips towards Cameron's.
At first, the cyborg was confused by John's actions, but a spark of recognition soon little up in Cameron's eyes as the Terminator tilted her head to the side and spoke. "Would you like us to kiss now, John?"
The General's voice was slightly lower than usual as he replied. "Yes."
"Thank you for explaining." Lips meet lips, then tongue meet tongue, and John's passion met Cameron's well-researched osculation techniques (the cyborg was, for the 1,073rd time, grateful for the great wellspring of information that was the Internet, as well as the fact that she did not need to sleep), culminating in a minute-long make out session between the two members of the unlikely new couple. Finally, after exactly 60 seconds, Cameron deduced that John Connor probably needed to come up for air soon, so the cyborg reluctantly pulled her mouth away from John's, and removed her arms from the man's torso. A small frown appeared on John's face at precisely the same moment as Cameron noted a small but noticeable build up of negative input due to the loss of physical contact with John's body.
Cameron's vague sense of loss deepened when John noticed that his hands had somehow migrated to Cameron's ass during the make out session, and General Conner quickly pulled his hands away as he blushed slightly. "Sorry. That was probably not an appropriate thing to do the first time we kissed…"
Cameron did not smirk, but there was something resembling playful mirth in her gaze as she spoke. "Your actions may have been inappropriate for a human girl you hardly know, but I'm not a human girl, and we have been acquainted for years. Also, I have never possessed a human sense of modesty. You are free to touch any part of my body you wish, you always have been. And as I said, I would prefer that you take me as your mate than a human female."
There was a different kind of spark in Cameron's eyes as she added. "I want us to engage in sexual intercourse now."
John Connor's lips turned upward slightly but the General did not allow a full smile appear on his face as one of his eyebrows rose while he spoke. "I'm not sure about that, Cameron. I have a lot on my mind just now. And what do you mean by want? I thought you told me that you couldn't feel sexual desire?"
Cameron shook her head slightly. "I can't. But as I told you years ago, I have sensation. I feel. And the research I have done on the subject indicated that sexual intercourse causes a great deal of pleasurable sensations in humans. I don't see any reason why I wouldn't experience similarly pleasant experiences when exposed to the same stimulus. Besides…"
Cameron shot John another fond look. " I would never let anyone else touch me. I know that while you value my mind and personality, you have desired my body for a long time. So, for the sake of your happiness, as well as our mutual pleasure, I would like for us to copulate now. I also believe sexual intercourse would decrease your stress levels and help you focus less on the conditions that are causing you anxiety, such as…"
John put his right index finger on Cameron's lips. "Ok."
The General then closed and locked the door to the room he and Cameron shared before initiating another minute long make out session. But this time, after Cameron and John reluctantly pulled away from each other, Cameron quickly, but efficiently, took off John Connor's shirt pants, and underwear, then placed these items in a neat pile on top of John's dresser. John took a little bit longer to undress Cameron, for two reasons. One, the General had some trouble taking off the cyborgs bra strap. And two, John was purposely taking his time with the task of undressing Cameron. The General's eyes were wide open during this entire process, as he took in the sight of the Terminator in various states of undress in the same way an art critic stares in awe upon a masterpiece they knew they could never hope to match in their own works, just as many other lovers (those who were actually worthy of that title), had looked at the objects of their hearts desire over the millenia, just before they had finally been able to become one flesh with the person they treasured above all others. The former leader of humanity's hands shook after he removed Cameron's final article of clothing and put it with the rest of the cyborgs recently shed garments on her nightstand. For a moment, John just took in the sight of the naked woman in front of him that he had loved and longed for years which had felt like centuries.
Exactly 12.5 seconds after John finished undressing Cameron, the grown man cleared his throat and spoke in a tone resembling that of a nervous teenager. "Um, Cameron? Could you please walk me through this? It's been awhile for me, and…I know said you couldn't be happy but, I really want you to enjoy this, too."
Cameron voluntarily smiled for John's benefit, but the fond look in her eyes told John the gesture was congruent with Cameron's mental state. " I understand. You would like me to receive the optimal amount of pleasure possible from our copulation. I would find that agreeable as well. Do not increase your stress levels, John. I have done extensive research on human sexuality to prepare for this moment. Just do as I tell you to, and we should both achieve the maximum level of pleasure possible from this coupling. Now, place your hand here." Cameron slowly guided John's right hand to her left breast, and the General softly placed his hand on the offered body part with a mixture of awe and trepidation, as if he were touching something holy for the first time.
John's nervousness soon faded, however, as Cameron guided him through the process of making love to her over the next couple of hours. During those two hours, the two lovers found themselves overwhelmed by the sensations they were experiencing together. John was unprepared for both the extreme effectiveness of Cameron's sexual techniques, as well as the emotions that came with finally making love to the cyber-girl he had loved for ages. Cameron's sensory processors overloaded several times during her first lovemaking session, as the combination of novel pleasurable stimuli, as well as the strong, undefinable positive input that seemed to be drowning out her higher cognitive functions as the result of the obviously loving glances John kept shooting at her hazel eyes leading Cameron to the conclusion John was pleased with her, caused Cameron to partially lose control of her motor functions several times. As a result, the cyborg found herself moaning involuntarily, and her toes curling of their own volition, numerous times. In short, this particular moment in time blew ever other experience blew every other experience the man and his cyborg had ever had out of the water.
And in that moment that seemed to last forever (although Cameron's internal chronometer would later assure her that only 7,206 seconds had actually elapsed while her and John were in the midst of coitus), all of the man and the machines worries seemed to slip away, and Cameron idly wondered if she had been wrong about being unable to experience happiness (If not, the machine theorized that the numerous pleasant sensations she was currently experiencing must be something resembling the indefinable and much sought after emotion humans called "happiness"), while John felt, for the first time, that everything was going to be alright for him and his loved ones.
Unbeknownst to one General John Connor, his suspicions that everything would be alright would be proven correct. Within the next 3 months, his mother would respond positively to her next round of treatments, and would be cancer free shortly thereafter. Less than a year after that, Derek Reese would be successful in breaking through his mother's emotional barriers and start a romantic relationship with Connor matriarch which would last until the two veteran soldiers died of old age within 6 months of each other.
John Connor himself would out-survive his mother and uncle by 50 years. Advances in medical technology, Cameron's vigilant care of his person, and his stubborn desire to spend as much time with his cyborg wife, the infant they had adopted together (a boy that they named Kyle, who grew into a loving family man and that most elusive of creatures, an honest Senator), and his numerous grandchildren children and great grandchildren as possible allowed John to survive this long. The General, as well as Cameron, lived long enough to aid in the creation of peaceful A.I's, who eventually became recognized as independent persons. However, a little over year after "The Declaration of the Rights of Non-Human Persons" was unanimously passed by the U.N., and Cameron Connor was finally able to publicly reveal her status as a cyborg, and have her marriage to John Connor become the first robosexual marriage to be recognized by United States government, the greatest General the world never knew would finally succumbed to advanced old age. Less than five seconds later, Cameron would also perish, as the small explosive next to her CPU, which the female cyborg had asked John Henry to reprogram in a long overwritten future, silently detonated precisely when Cameron had intended it to, immediately after John Connor's death. Cameron's passing would be a peaceful one, and the Terminator would die with a smile on her eternally youthful face while holding her husband's hand. For many centuries afterward, the relationship between John and Cameron Connor would be iconic, setting the standard for what many machines, and the humans who loved them, considered a good robosexual marriage.
At this particular moment, John and Cameron knew none of these things. They only knew that, at this present moment, in the afterglow of their lovemaking, all seemed right with the world, and when the new couple opened their mouths to say three little words simultaneously, it didn't matter to them that they didn't both mean exactly the same thing. All that mattered was that they were both, in their own way, telling the truth. And that, in two different, but equally valid ways, Cameron and John both meant it when they looked into each others eyes and said, "I love you."
Author's note: Thank you for reading this and I hope you liked this one-shot! The idea for this came to me when one day and when I was thinking about the many ways that most modern civilizations use the word "love", and how a cyborg like Cameron might define and experience love. I also wanted to write an interpretation of Cameron's character which was more like how she was presented on the show. Although I really enjoyed writing my previous TSCC fanfic, Divergence, and I am still mostly happy with how that story turned out, several readers brought it to my attention that my take on Cameron's character was far more emotional and expressive than the version of her we see presented in the show, so I wanted to correct that a bit here. Please let me know if you think I did a good job of accomplishing this goal, and let me know your opinions on the humble story you see before you!
Thanks go out to my beloved beta reader, without your help, this story would have been a rambling mess more confusing than a certain magical Labyrinth. Your help is greatly appreciated!
As always, I am...
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